What YAO is

YAO turns the everyday layer of Chinese wellness culture — food energetics, the solar-term calendar, gentle movement, acupressure self-massage, the constitution vocabulary — into a daily companion. It's the digital version of what a caring Chinese grandmother might tell you: drink something warm, eat with the season, go to bed, press here, breathe.

What YAO is not

YAO is not medicine. It does not diagnose, treat, or replace doctors — of any tradition. It never tells you to take herbs internally beyond common kitchen foods, never interprets symptoms as diseases, and its AI companion is instructed to point anything serious toward a clinician. If something hurts, bleeds, burns or frightens you: see a doctor. YAO is for the wide territory before that — tired, wired, heavy, dry, stuck.

Where the content comes from

The constitution framework follows the nine-type model (Wang Qi, standardized in the Chinese Constitution in Medicine Questionnaire). Acupoint locations follow the WHO Standard Acupuncture Point Locations in the Western Pacific Region (2008). Food natures and seasonal guidance follow the mainstream of Chinese food-therapy (药膳/食疗) tradition as presented in modern TCM dietetics texts. Framing throughout is deliberately "in the TCM tradition" — these are cultural frameworks with centuries of lived use, presented as lifestyle wisdom rather than biomedical claims.

Practitioner review: content is written for a professional review pass by a licensed acupuncturist/TCM practitioner. Cautions (pregnancy notes on LI4, SP6, GB21; coix seed) are included conservatively.

Your privacy

Everything you enter — constitution, check-ins, cycle dates, tongue log — lives in your browser's local storage only. YAO has no accounts, no tracking pixels, and no server database. Ask YAO sends only your typed question and coarse context (constitution name, today's tendency, solar term) to the AI model to generate your card. Clear your browser data and YAO forgets you completely.

The principle

The Yellow Emperor's Classic praises treating what is not yet disease — 治未病. YAO's whole ambition lives there: small, boring, daily acts of self-care, made a little easier and a little more beautiful. May it help you take care.