Qiological Podcast

Access to acupuncture point location and function has not always been a matter of a few clicks on your mobile phone. This kind of information has not always been at our fingertips. And there is a great wealth of material has not made its way into your digitial library, let alone into English.

In this conversation we talk about knowing what’s true in Chinese medicine, the problem of cherry picking resources, and the work of translating a Qing dynasty text on acupuncture.

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview.  

Stems and Branches are old Chinese science. Our medicine touches on it, but most of us rely on the more modern perspectives for our clincal work. The Stems and Branches speak to a perspective of the universe and our place in it that is foreign to our minds not because of language and culture, but because we live a world that focus more on humanity than cosmos.

In this conversation we touch on the influence of numbers, the spiral nature of unfoldment and change, a few things about the Hun and Po that will surprise you, how time and space give us different glimpses into reality and how a sense of playfulness wtih medicine and philosophy just might be a most wise approach.

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview.  

The medicine we practice doesn’t just help us to help others. It can help us to live more deeply into our own lives. The challenges, adversity and difficulties we encounter show us what we are made of and build resiliency. The practices we create are a living expression of who we see ourselves to be. Furthermore, the process of creating a successful practice that we want to work in, it’s an on-going process.

Listen into this conversation on the power of mentorship, the transformational influence of having a business, and how being your authentic self is the best way to build a practice you want to work in.

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview. 

With Chinese medicine we know that issues of the skin are more than skin deep. That imbalances in the internal environment can manifest on the exterior. And that if we focus solely on what is seen on the surface, we’ll miss the larger picture that is unfolding below.

In this conversation we explore dermatological conditions with an eye toward internal organ function, the emotions and how diagnosis can be easy but the treatment more difficult.

Listen in to the conversation on healthy skin from the inside out.

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview.  

The characters for acupuncture in Chinese, 針灸zhen jiu, literally translate as needle and moxa.

You surely were introduced to the cigar-like pole moxa and large cones of smoldering mugwort on slices of ginger or aconite in acupuncture school. Perhaps you also were exposed to the Japanese rice grain moxa techniques or burning balls of moxa on the head of needle. Not surprising there are a variety of forms of using Ai Ye to bring a kind of simulative heat into the body.

In this conversation we explore the use of moxa that is combined with touch, rhythm, warmth, and with an eye to the channel dynamics that Yoshio Manaka, one of the great masters of the 20th century, wrote about in Chasing the Dragon’s Tail.

Even if you don’t use much moxa in your clinical, you’ll find this percussive bamboo method goes beyond the simple induction of heat into the body. And indeed can be used in a variety of contexts where you’d usually employ a needle, but in this case, it’s motion, rhythm and moxa.

Listen in to this conversation that will have you looking at moxibustion in a whole new way.

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview.