We give a great amount of respect to the Classics in Chinese medicine, but understanding these foundational texts of our medicine can be challenge, even if you do understand the old form of Chinese. Just as many of struggle to get through the brilliance of Shakespeare, the classics of Chinese medicine require a particular kind of attention. And it doesn't hurt if you actually can understand the "gu wen" classical Chinese language. It's even more helpful if you engaged the other classic literatur...
Aug 04, 2020•50 min•Ep. 159
Medicine is a curious business. The “agreement” is that the patient has a problem and we as practitioners are going to fix it. It’s not an unreasonable expectation in our fee for service world. And after all, we are the experts that are supposed to know how to resolve a medical condition. But what often gets left out of the conversation is the question of “what is healing?” Along with “who” is responsible for that and “what” is to be done? Healing is a curious business. And while patient and pra...
Jul 28, 2020•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 158
Nothing new about city and rural life being very different. But what about when it comes to having an acupuncture practice? What’s it like to practice to practice away from the bustle of big city? Are country folk really that different from city slickers? And what about non-mainstream medicine like acupuncture, how’s it accepted in the hinterlands? In this conversation with Barbara Bittinger we discuss the benefits of living and working in rural America and how community is not just an idea but ...
Jul 21, 2020•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 157
Can you remember in those first couple of years of puberty when your senses began to quicken and a new world began to open up and you started to question your place in the unfolding this world? Adolescence is a glorious and often troublesome ripening and as with so many aspects of our lives these days... it’s medicalized as pathology instead of being seen as a series of dress rehearsals for the challenges the world will ask of us in the future. Acupuncture can be tremendously helpful teens navig...
Jul 14, 2020•1 hr 22 min•Ep. 156
It’s easy to think of researchers as stotic characters in laboratory coats who rely on their frontal cortex and religiously follow the flowchart of “science.” But science is not a flowchart, and researcher is really another name for someone who grew into adulthood with their curiosity intact. Listen in to this conversation on luck, intention, intuition, investigation and biofields.
Jul 08, 2020•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 418
It is surprising where life can take us. We follow a hunch or a nudge and somehow gain some momentum that in time generates wind for our sails. Not many westerners in the 1970’s started along the road of Chinese medicine. In this long ranging conversation with Jake Fratkin we discuss his perspectives over time and his current thoughts on medicine. Listen in for a conversation about herbs, TCM, Japanese acupuncture and the curious road of practice that unfolds when you follow your interests. Head...
Jul 07, 2020•1 hr 21 min•Ep. 155
Chinese medicine is not one medicine; it’s a kaleidoscopic plurality. There is no one true acupuncture; we have a rich ecosystem of perspectives and methods. The trouble with learning something new is that we have let loose of our current understanding usually acquired through effort and hard work. It’s hard to release what we’ve struggled to learn. Our limited understanding of the terrain becomes our turf. It takes a certain amount of confidence in ourselves, and recognition we know we don’t kn...
Jun 30, 2020•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 154
We often think of emotion as one thing. That we are sad, or angry, or frustrated, or joyous. But often it’s more complicated than that. Many times there will be an entanglement of emotion. Love and anger, grief and guilt, or excitment and anxiety. It’s when emotions get entangled people can really get stuck as it is hard to sort work through one emotion when it’s intimately connected with another toward which you’re not attending . In this conversation with Lillian Bridges we explore our emotion...
Jun 23, 2020•1 hr 27 min•Ep. 153
The Chinese say 活到老學到老 hou dao lao, xue dao lao, which can be translated as “continue learning for as long as you live.” It’s good advice, and when it comes to the practice of medicine, it’s essential. Our work gives us an endless opportunity to learn and deepen our understanding. In this conversation with Kathy Taromina, Craig Mitchell and Dan Bensky we discuss what they have been learning about using Chinese herbal medicine in responding to the symptoms of Covid-19, as they carry out a study t...
Jun 16, 2020•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 152
The Chinese and people of East Asia deal with epidemic disease on a regular basis. And every time a new bug comes to town, they learn a little more. While we in the west have access to some of the classic materials on treating epidemics, we don’t have the same level experience. It’s not really our fault, epidemics don’t roll through here in the west as often, and even during the cold and flu season most people don’t seek us out first. So our skills are not as polished as we’ve not had the experi...
Jun 13, 2020•1 hr 20 min•Ep. 151
There are many ways to do acupuncture. Each method gives you a glimpse into the workings of the body, each one gives you a different map of the terrain. And each method allows us to understand and problem solve with a different set of both mental and physical tools. Susan Johnson studied with Miriam Lee, who was instrumental not just in bringing Tung Style acupuncture into our western world, but helping to get acupuncture going here in the first place. In this conversation we discuss not just th...
Jun 09, 2020•1 hr 29 min•Ep. 150
Spending time in the clinic seasons us. It exposes us to success, failure and unending questions about healing, wellbeing and connection that over time can help us to sit with our patients in the midst of deep difficulty. In this conversation with Rebecca Avern we discuss the fortitude that must be developed to sit with the difficult to answer questions that arise in clinic. And how clinical work, while it deepens and enriches the lives of our patients and ourselves, does extract kind of price. ...
Jun 07, 2020•1 hr 10 min
The prolific science fiction write Issac Asimov wrote “The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not “Eureka!” (I found it!) but “That’s funny …” The wonderful thing about research is that it invites delicious questions and opens avenues of inquiry that lead us beyond the borders of our maps of the world. In this conversation with Richard Hammerschlag we hear about how his curiosity with how acupuncture was helpful lead him to a shift in career that ha...
Jun 02, 2020•1 hr 26 min•Ep. 149
The airways are full of bad news, fear and conjecture it’s a hit parade of one scary thing after another. This alone would be hard our spirits if you ingest even a portion of the 24 hour media feed. Add on isolation and an unrelenting sense of an inescapable threat— it’s tough on one’s mental and emotional wellbeing. There is a pervasive sense of grief at the loss of a world that just a few short months ago operated in vastly different ways. The physical and social distancing bring their own dif...
May 30, 2020•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 148
These days pretty much anyone can have their own media outlet. The gatekeepers who used to control access to the airwaves and printing presses are pretty much gone. If you have something to share, especially something that focuses on or services a niche market, then this is the best time to be alive. And here in the midst of Covid-19 this just might be the perfect momnet to work on that book you’ve been noodling on as a “some day” project. Digital technology has been disrupting the various commu...
May 26, 2020•1 hr 11 min•Ep. 147
We have many different ways to view the body with Chinese medicine and each of these lenses gives us a different perspective on both physiology and functionality. It’s not unlike those old acetate transparencies you'd find in old encyclopedias that would allow you to overlay different systems of the body one on top of another. Each one has its own domain, and each interlocks with the other systems. Michael Corradino for many years now has been focused on the connection between acupuncture and ne...
May 19, 2020•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 146
The scientific method is useful. It helps us to better understand the world by screening out our biases, beliefs and wishful thinking. The process of crafting a good hypothesis begins not with a great question, but first the more yin process of observation. Seeing what is present, and from there we can begin to distill out questions worth asking. Much of traditional research is not that helpful in understanding Chinese medicine, as our medicine does not lend itself to the binary world of double ...
May 17, 2020•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 145
You’ve noticed in the treatment room, that moment when something “lands” for the patient, and there's a palpable internal shift. You’ve noticed this in yourself, that a question can be inviting as a whisper, or make you bristle like a growling dog. In this conversation with Margot Rossi and Nick Pole we explore Embodied Language, a way of connecting that is friendly to both the body and spirit. What we say, and how we say it can have a profound impact on the experience of both patient and practi...
May 12, 2020•1 hr 26 min•Ep. 144
Getting a practice started is hard. Part of the process is recognizing the strengths and skills we already have, and the other part is being open to allowing our experience to teach us. In this Part Two conversation with Lamya Kamel we look at how our practices ask us to grow in challenging, yet essential ways. And that while we may not have confidence in the beginning, over time it can arise when we approach our work with integrity and passion.
May 11, 2020•1 hr 8 min
Listening is not a skill that I expected to develop. I thought I’d get good with palpation or pulse reading. After all, the masters are said to get what they need with the pause and a few questions. That’s what I was aiming for, however it did not work out that way for me. I’ve found over the years that there is a way of listening to a patient that has allowed me to both uncover what I need to know to treat them, but more importantly, help me to better understand innate resources they have that ...
May 07, 2020•27 min•Ep. 143
Most of us are head’s down in our clinical work and focused on taking care of patients and running a business. It’s easy to forget that 40 years ago people were being arrested for doing acupuncture. As a profession in the West, we are new. Even without Covid-19 we often dealing with issues of growth, development, scope of practice, messaging and regulation that all professions go through. And since we are in a time of challenge and change these issues become all the notable. Listen in to the con...
May 05, 2020•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 142
We are being invited, both by our conditions and circumstances and by people in our profession to “get online and do tele-medicine.” However much of what we do as acupuncturists does not translate well, as our most critical tool cannot be used in a digital form. The questions that I’ve been noodling through for the past month plus are what is the essence of my work when I don’t have access to my kit of tools? And how would I describe what I do, when I can use my needles? In this rebroadcast of a...
May 01, 2020•1 hr 40 min•Ep. 141
Maybe you were one of those people who learned in English class that you weren’t very good at the standardized form of writing they were trying to teach. Perhaps you thought you weren’t a good writer. And you might want to reconsider that, because copywriting is a lot like talking. And it is about being expressive. In this conversation with Iselin Svalastog we explore the importance of putting your authentic voice on your website. And how there is a way to write that is persuasive , informative,...
Apr 28, 2020•1 hr 17 min•Ep. 140
You’ve probably seen patients who are on thyroid medication and the numbers are “fine” according the their conventional doctor, but they just don’t feel right. We know from our experience as practitioners that often our patients are deeply frustrated because they’ve been through thousands of dollars of testing and yet they are told “there is nothing wrong with you.” But the truth of situation more often is “we have not been able to find the source of the problem your having.” In this conversatio...
Apr 21, 2020•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 139
With Covid-19 knocking the bottom out of our practices, there is a call from experts in the field to “get online.” Which isn’t bad advice as it does provide a channel to our patients in a time when we can't put our hands on them. But, and this is important, many of us don’t know what we would do online. Somehow the idea of teaching acupressure leaves me completely cold. And as to helping people with their nutrition, well, most people I see don’t have much of an interest in that anyway. Add on to...
Apr 18, 2020•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 138
Listening is not a skill that I expected to develop. I thought I’d get good with palpation or pulse reading. After all, the masters are said to get what they need with the pause and a few questions. That’s what I was aiming for, however it did not work out that way for me. I’ve found over the years that there is a way of listening to a patient that has allowed me to both uncover what I need to know to treat them, but more importantly, help me to better understand innate resources they have that ...
Apr 14, 2020•59 min•Ep. 137
The opinions we have about “doing business” can dramatically affect the kind of practice we have, the opportunities we recognize or are blind to, and how we feel about ourselves as we begin to generate some momentum and success in our work. Success brings its own issues. And it does not guarantee your insecurities will go away. The more successful you are, the more responsibility comes your way— and there is more to lose if it all comes apart. Sometimes it might seem “safer” to stay small, but o...
Apr 07, 2020•1 hr 24 min•Ep. 136
For those of us in North America the world changed about three weeks ago as the Covid-19 began to make itself known. And as Chinese medicine practitioners begin to close their in-person practice and open up video visits with patients for herbal consultations there is an increasing interest in how we in the modern world, facing this particular pandemic, can use our medicine to help. Heiner Fruehauf has been translating some of the writing and communications of his friend and colleague Dr Liu Li H...
Mar 31, 2020•1 hr 24 min•Ep. 135
Some of the difficulties faced by many of us in this time of pandemic are the disorientation, anxiety and fear that arise from uncertainty. But if you look more closely, you’ll see that there never is in this life the guarantee of certainty. It can feel that way because of habituation, but when you strip away the daily habits and sense of continuity, then the profound and often unbearable uncertainty that all self-aware mortal beings share, is always there. These past few months in Asia and past...
Mar 27, 2020•58 min•Ep. 134
Moxibustion is one of the more interesting methods in toolbox. Stunning in its simplicity and often brings deep relief for those who are a good fit for this method. It’s curious how the burning of this particular herb can bring about healing. Alice Douglas has loved moxa since before she became an acupuncturist. In this conversation we discuss her survey of research into moxibustion. There is a lot you probably heard about moxa in acupuncture school and might have wondered, “is that really true?...
Mar 24, 2020•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 133
