心口

xīnkǒu
noun #34,317

Meanings

  1. 1 pit of the stomach
  2. 2 solar plexus
  3. 3 (figurative) one's words and one's true thoughts

Examples

Tā wǔzhe xīnkǒu zhí hǎn téng.
He clutched his chest and kept yelling in pain.
Tā zhège rén xīnkǒu-rúyī, cóng bù shuōhuǎng.
She is a person whose words and heart are one — she never lies.

Tips

culture
Two senses: anatomical (the spot just below the sternum — what English calls solar plexus) and figurative ('mouth' as the outer voice of the 'heart'). The set phrase 心口如一 ('mouth and heart are one') praises sincerity; 心口不一 means saying one thing but thinking another.
memory
(heart) + (mouth) — the two endpoints of speech. Match them up for sincerity, separate them for hypocrisy.

Stroke Order

xīn
kǒu