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 Candace Veach, MTOM, L.Ac. | ||||||||
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The Chinese Medical TraditionThe theories and practices of Chinese Medicine are based on philosophies and principals that have withstood the rigors of the least forgiving of all challenges - Time. During the Golden Age of Greece when Western Medicine was in its infancy, the physicians of China were reviewing their ancient texts and revising their pharmacopoeia of medical substances for the third time.In order to understand this complex and subtle system, one needs to understand at least a little of the philosophy behind it. This philosophy sees the human body as intricately connected to the universe it exists within and therefore believes it is affected by all movements of "Qi" (or life-force) around it. Whether these movements of Life-force, "Qi" in Chinese, take the form of wind and rain beating against us, food digesting and becoming the building blocks of our bodies, the dramatic birth of a child or the inevitable death of a beloved - these movements of life-force/Qi impact our bodies and health because they are not really separate from us. Working from the fundamental foundation of "as above, so below" the ancients grasped the concept of yin and yang (in Western ideology, matter and energy) and the relationship between the two. They observed the elements wind, fire, water, metal, and earth and how those interact with one another. They understood that the principals that regulate the world outside our body must also regulate the world within the confines of our skin. By watching nature and understanding natural laws, the earliest physicians were able to come to an understanding of human existence modern science has not yet been able to explain. But the Western scientific community is working on it and as these secrets are revealed they are bound to change the way we experience our bodies, our world and the relationship between the two. |
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