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 wǔ zhe xīnkǒu zhí hǎn téng.
He clutched his chest and kept yelling in pain.
Tā zhège rénxīn kǒu rúyī, cóngbù 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