Chinese New Year is coming up on February 17. In Asian cultures, New Year's traditions are filled with centuries-old customs, foods, and rituals that carry wishes for health and wellness, abundance and fertility, prosperity and peace. Although Japanese New Years (my heritage) and Chinese (my profession) New Years are celebrated at different times, many of the traditions of this passage of time are similar.
Clearing Stagnation
In the days before the New Year, homes are cleaned from top to bottom. Every corner is swept, windows are washed, and clutter is cleared out. The folklore says you're sweeping away bad luck to make room for good fortune. But there's medicine in this practice too.
In Chinese medicine, stagnation is the root of disease. When qi (energy) doesn't flow freely, things accumulate: physically, mentally, emotionally. Think about how you feel in a cluttered, dusty space versus a clean, open one. Your body and psyche know the difference.
Late winter is the perfect time for this clearing. We're still in the yin, inward phase of winter, but spring, with its expansive, upward Wood energy, is approaching. The Liver, which governs the smooth flow of qi, needs space to move as spring arrives. Clearing physical clutter helps clear energetic stagnation, preparing your environment (and your body) for the growth and movement spring demands.
FOOD AND FAMILY TIME
In both cultures new year’s is a time for family. They gather together to cook, eat, and relax- soaking up the medicinals of the food that nourish the body, and the heart medicine that comes from connection, collaboration, and shared purpose.
The traditional feasts are ancient, dating back to a time when there was no choice but to eat with the seasons. Foods were prepared with great intention - to bring good fortune for the new year.
In Japan, New Year's foods feature root vegetables and stews, soups, beans, candied dried anchovies, fish and shrimp, citrus, salt-cured fish roe, eggs, noodles, and mochi rice cakes.
Similarly but slightly different, Chinese New Years is also about fish, noodles, citrus, mochi, and warmth, giving juicy dumplings.
Both cultures feast on foods to nourish yin but have just enough yang to stoke the fire, support the Kidneys, and nourish the Spleen.
Dumplings and Root Vegetables
The Japanese Root vegetable + chicken stew and the Chinese dumplings are warming, nourishing, moistening, and grounding. They offer carbohydrates that nourish the Spleen and meat to boost yang. In winter, when our bodies still need warmth and substance, these dishes deliver exactly what we need.
Fish
Fish is one of the best sources of yin, the cooling, moistening, substantive quality our bodies need. After a long winter of heating foods and indoor living, we need yin to balance. Fish nourishes blood, supports Kidney essence (our foundational energy), and provides easily digestible protein. It's gentle enough for weakened digestion but substantial enough to build reserves.
Longevity Noodles
Long, uncut noodles symbolize long life. You're supposed to slurp them whole without breaking them.
Wheat and buckwheat noodles nourish the Heart and calm the Shen. They're gentle, easily digestible, and provide sustained energy without overwhelming the system.
Tangerines and mandarines
Citrus fruits are a sweet, juicy, bright treat at New Years. Homes are decorated with them, they're given as gifts, and they're eaten throughout the celebration.
This is brilliant seasonal medicine. Winter and early spring are prime times for congestion, phlegm, and stagnation. Citrus regulates qi; it gets things moving. The orange peel (chen pi) is actually a medicinal herb used specifically to move qi, transform phlegm, and aid digestion.
The bright color and sharp scent also rouse yang energy, helping us wake up from winter's dormancy as we move toward spring.
Mochi -Sticky Rice Cake
Sweet, dense, chewy rice cake is a traditional treat. Sticky rice (glutinous rice) is one of the most tonifying foods for the Spleen and Stomach. It's warming, it strengthens digestion, and it provides deep, sustained energy. In Chinese medicine, the Spleen is the source of postnatal qi—the energy we generate from food after we're born. Strengthening the Spleen enhances your overall vitality.
Eating mochi isn't just about wishing for prosperity. It's about building the energetic foundation you need to actually create it.
Red Red Everywhere: The Color of Fire and Heart
Other than the food, one of my favorite things about Chinese New Years is the red decorations, red money envelopes, red clothing—the color saturates every aspect of the Chinese New Year.
Red corresponds to the Fire element and the Heart in the five-element theory. It's the color of joy, vitality, warmth, and life itself. Surrounding yourself with red during this transition from winter to spring helps kindle the yang energy that's beginning to emerge. It's energetically warming, activating, and uplifting. Color affects us physiologically. Chinese New Year harnesses this intentionally.
The Flow of Energy
Elders give envelopes containing money to younger family members (red ones in Chinese culture!). The tradition is about blessing and abundance, but it's also about flow.
In Chinese medicine, health requires free-flowing qi. Stagnation leads to disease. The exchange of elders giving to the young, energy flowing from one generation to the next, mirrors the natural flow of qi through the body and through families.
It's not just about the money. It's about connection, generosity, and the movement of resources and care through a community. When energy flows freely, everyone benefits. When it's hoarded or blocked, everyone suffers.
No Sweeping on New Year's Day: Preserving What's New
Another favorite Chinese ritual of mine is that on New Year's Day itself, you're not supposed to sweep or take out trash. The explanation is that you'll sweep away your good luck.
But think about it: you've just cleaned everything, gathered your family, eaten nourishing foods, roused your yang. You've set intentions, shifted energy, and welcomed new possibilities. The last thing you want to do is immediately disperse all that carefully cultivated energy.
Not sweeping on the first day is about letting things settle. It's about preservation and integration. You've planted seeds, now let them take root before you start moving things around again.
The 15 Days: A Complete Cycle
Chinese New Year isn't just one day; it's 15 days, from the new moon to the full moon. This matches a complete lunar cycle, a complete energetic arc.
I am told that each day has its own customs and focus. But the overall pattern moves from inward gathering (family, ancestors, home) to outward expansion (community, friends, the wider world). It mirrors how spring energy emerges, starting deep and private, then gradually opening and extending outward.
It's giving your body and spirit time to complete the transition. A reminder that you can't flip from winter mode to spring mode overnight and that you will need a gradual thaw, a supported shift, come spring.
What We Can Learn
You don't have to be Chinese to benefit from the wisdom embedded in Chinese New Year traditions. They apply to everyone living through the winter-to-spring transition.
Here's what you can take from this:
Clear your space. Literally clean your home. Let go of what you're done with. Create room for what's coming.
Gather with people you love. Prioritize connection. Feed your Heart with belonging and joy.
Eat seasonally and intentionally. Choose foods that nourish and support rather than deplete. Pay attention to warming aromatics, yin-building proteins, and qi-moving citrus.
Honor transitions. The shift from one season to another isn't instant. Give yourself time and space to adjust.
Cultivate yang gradually. Don't leap from winter hibernation to spring productivity overnight. Wake up slowly. Build momentum gently.
Let things settle. After you make changes or set intentions, give them time to integrate before you rush to the next thing.
These aren't superstitions. They're practical applications of thousands of years of observation about how humans thrive within natural cycles.
The Deeper Pattern
What strikes me most about Chinese New Year traditions is how they work with nature rather than against it. They support what's already happening, cosmically, seasonally, energetically.
Modern life constantly pushes us out of sync with natural rhythms. We eat summer foods in winter, stay awake when we should sleep, and ignore seasonal shifts. Chinese New Year is a structured opportunity to realign and remember that we're not separate from nature; we're part of it.
And when we align with nature's patterns, we feel better. We have more energy. We're healthier. We're more balanced.
That's the real medicine in the Chinese New Year. Not luck or superstition, but alignment with the way things actually work.
Want to explore more about seasonal health and living in harmony with natural cycles? Read our blog or discover herbal formulas on our website to support your body through every season.
