Can acupuncture help me?
Many people seek support with migraines, back pain, depressions, anxiety, menstrual difficulties, relationship issues to name a few, and when people ask me if these medicines can help them, I always say that my function is to help an individual reconnect with nature and let nature do its healing work. In this way we reconnect to our true original state which is unfabricated, wholesome, and naturally good. Very frequently surface level problems and disorders become resolved through this deeper level of integration and peace found inside. We find that our attitude towards life, our struggling and illnesses becomes more open and optimistic.
Can this medicine help me?
This is an extremely common question and the answer is nearly always Yes! Ancient Chinese healers understood that underlying imbalances in the energy and the body, mind, and Spirit of an individual give rise to symptoms of distress, disease, and disharmony. By harmonizing and aligning these energies surface-level symptoms are frequently eliminated and reduced.
Acupuncture and Plant Spirit Medicine be able to help me?
The answer again is Yes, and this has been my experience in years of treating people as an acupuncturist. While these healing modalities and our connection with nature can bring a tremendous quality of healing to many conditions, it’s still very important to have an individual assessment which is why all treatments begin with a two hour examination to truly get to the root of whatever is going on for you. This examination includes a life history, pulse-taking, and physical exam.
Why do I practice Classical Five Element Acupuncture (CFEA)?
When I was young, I was able to feel subtle vibrations of energy throughout my body but I never had the context for understanding what I later discovered to be called Qi (Ki, Prana). When I was fifteen I met my first teacher, a great Master of Chinese Medicine and the Tao who was a successful businessman, accountant, basketball player and an incredible healer who used profound energy work to heal people of any variety of conditions including cancers, diabetes, polio, and the like.
When I first met him, I discovered the remarkable quality of a person who had mastered energy, who had a language for it and understood the law of nature and that everything is made up of five elements, that the body is something like a family with all of its organ systems and elements acting harmoniously, one remains in harmony and peace with oneself and in the world. We formed an early bond and he has been like a grandfatherly teacher since then. He guided me and encouraged me to study counseling, acupuncture and music.
Many years later after meeting Qing Chuan for the first time, I began studying Classical Five Element Acupuncture at the Institute of Taoist Education and Acupuncture where I began to learn how to embody and practice the principles that Qing Chuan had told me about as a kid.
As a trained counselor, I always valued the empathy and exchange a conversation can bring and I was delighted to find that through stimulating the energy points within the body that have a high amount of bio-magnetic concentration, profound healing can take place within the body, mind, and Spirit of a person. When I continued my studies and undertook training from Suzanne Burnell in Plant Spirit Medicine I understood that one can have an even more essential connection and grasp of the Five Elements through using this unique modality, and from that moment on my connection and love for nature and its healing capacities have grown exponentially. It brings me such joy to see the relief, lightness, warmth, and reintegration in peoples’ eyes when they receive these modalities of healing.
But how does this system of medicine work?
The physiological structures of our body, mind, and Spirit are also supported by the free flowing of Qi or electromagnetic energy, not so dissimilar from the free flow of electricity which supports most of our modern activities. If this flow is interrupted, causes friction, or is imbalanced in any way, it results in imbalanced disorders that manifest physiologically and psychologically. By inserting fine sterilized needles into particular energy centers which are like receptors for controlling and harmonizing these energies balance can be restored within an individual system. This combined with diet and lifestyle behavior changes can align an individual back with their own inherent balance and well being.
