Time of a Meal / Shi Qing
Updated 2026-08-01
INTRODUCTION
English translation pending.
CORE DEFINITION
Shi qing is an old Chinese time unit meaning the span of a single meal, roughly twenty to thirty minutes. It appears in classical medical texts to specify how long needles are retained or how long to wait for a decoction to act. The qualifier is that it measures by physiological rhythm rather than by clock, so the unit is approximate by design. Its value lies in matching interventions to a natural biological cycle instead of an arbitrary number of seconds.
SCAFFOLDING EFFECT
Reduce cognitive load
- Rhythm unit: schedule short waits and observation windows by biological cycles rather than exact seconds - Dosage guide: use one meal as the natural unit for needling retention and medicine onset - Precision caution: keep the physiological feel instead of converting mechanically into fixed minutes
Anchor fast decisions
Many physiological processes, including the circulation of stomach qi, drug absorption, and the onset of needling effects, unfold on a scale of roughly twenty to thirty minutes. Because that interval matches a single meal, using it as the unit aligns action with the body's own tempo. A mechanically fixed number of minutes may be numerically precise yet biologically mistimed, and the fit between intervention and rhythm is what makes the timing effective.
MINIMUM ACTION
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