Qiological Podcast

Good medicine has less to do with having the “right system” and more to do with the human being holding the needles. With the way we listen. The way we wait. The way we’re willing to not know… yet. In this conversation with Stephen Brown we trace his unlikely path from welding in a west coast shipyard—literally working with fire and metal—to becoming one of the key bridges between Japanese acupunc...

There are seasons in a woman’s life that don’t arrive quietly. They come with a tremor, a shimmer, a sense that something deep in the architecture of who you are is being rewritten. It’s not collapse, but instead a reordering that can’t be ignored. In this conversation with Heidi Lovie, we wander into the transformation of menopause. She invites us to consider this transition not as a breakdown, b...

Medicine finds its way into our lives not through textbooks, but by getting sand in our shoes, salt in our hair, and noticing how our hands long to be in the dirt—or on people. Liz Vitale didn’t simply move to the Oregon Coast. She rooted herself there among fishermen, surfers, firefighters, foresters, Latina moms, and retirees. Over time she became part of the village, not just as a practitioner,...

We tend to think of eyesight as a technical problem—retinas, optics, refractive errors, clearer lenses. But eyes don’t just see—they interpret. They blur when the world feels too intrusive, or sharpen when clarity feels like safety. The eyes are woven through with story, memory, emotion, and the ways we've learned to look—or to look away. In this conversation with Dr. Marc Grossman, optometrist, a...

Some people find acupuncture after a twisted ankle, a twist of fate, or some stubborn health condition that finally surrenders to a few needles. But every now and then you meet someone who caught the spark early—before the world had a chance to talk them out of their own curiosity. In this conversation with Will Martin, we trace the path of a high-school kid who dove headfirst into Chinese medicin...

Punk rock and Chinese medicine might seem worlds apart, but both pushed back on dominant systems. Punk challenged the mainstream music industry; Chinese medicine, the dominance of biomedicine. Each created space for alternative voices, for people questioning authority and rewriting the rules. In this conversation with Tyler Phan, we explore how rebellion, identity, and power intersect in the makin...

Sometimes clarity doesn’t come from adding more—it comes from taking away. Simplifying helps to see more clearly what’s already there. In medicine, that often means noticing the simple patterns hiding beneath complex presentations. In this conversation with Fang Cai, we explore the meeting place between Saam acupuncture and dermatology. Fang brings years of clinical experience and study with Mazen...

The tools we use to shape our world, they in turn shape us. Whether it’s the brush in a painter’s hand or the software code that organizes the clinic day. The interface becomes part of our perception. Technology, like medicine, is an expression of relationship. In this conversation with Kenan Akbas, we trace the unlikely path from acupuncture to algorithms. This is a story that begins in the club...

Sometimes the most interesting things happen when we stop trying to confirm what we think we know. In clinic, certainty can close doors—but curiosity opens them. There’s a kind of listening that goes beyond the intellect, a way of paying attention that allows discovery to unfold on its own time. In this conversation with Dan Bensky, we explore the art of noticing. What it means to let medicine be...

The 1970s were a turbulent time—streets alive with protest, classrooms charged with new ideas, and an entire generation questioning the stories they’d inherited. It was a decade of upheaval, but also one where curious opportunities arose. For some, those opportunities led not to politics or protest, but to the quiet pulse of a medicine few in America had ever heard of. In this conversation with Ge...

Ever wonder if being human is less about mechanics and more about patterns? Not the kind of patterns you memorize in a textbook, but the ones that repeat like spirals in a sunflower, or the way a thought can shape the body before we even realize it. In this conversation with Rory Hiltbrand, we wander through the field of being human—where Daoist numerics, fractals, and the golden ratio intersect w...

Sometimes old books get treated like sacred relics.  But what if the Nei Jing isn’t a mystery text at all? What if it’s closer to a well-worn how-to manual — a guide for the hands, a companion for the clinic? In this conversation with Ethan Murchie, we explore the Nei Jing not as a theory to be memorized but as a craft to be lived. Ethan comes to this work through martial arts and manual medi...

The face tells a story, etched in its lines, the color of our skin, and the expressions we carry. These are not mere physical features; they are a language—an ancient map that, if we learn to read, can reveal traces of our life’s journey,  ancestral gifts, and the yet to be resolved challenges holding us back. This wisdom often goes unnoticed in a world focused on external appearances, but it...

Here in the West, acupuncture often feels like something foreign, something patients approach with curiosity but no context. “I don’t know anything about Chinese medicine,” they’ll say. And most of the time, that’s true. We didn’t grow up with an uncle who prescribed herbs or a parent using needles to ease the illnesses and injuries of childhood. For Wei Dong Lu, medicine wasn’t foreign at all. He...

Ever notice how our bodies have their own climate? The heat of fire and cold of water aren’t just metaphors, they are elemental forces that don’t just live in the weather—they’re playing out in our patients’ bodies every day. In this conversation with Roseline Lambert, we explore her work blending Saam acupuncture with Japanese palpation methods, and how she’s been experimenting with heating and c...

Some things can’t be seen—only felt. The texture of presence, the quiet shifts in atmosphere, the way the body speaks before words arrive. In the clinic, it’s not always the protocols or point prescriptions that lead the way, but something quieter. Something more fluid. In this conversation with Felix de Haas, we meander through the tactile world of East Asian medicine—through pulse, palpation, an...

Books are more than just words on a page. They carry texture, weight, and the kind of quiet intimacy that screens can never quite match. A book slows down time, unfolds the quiet potency of a moment, and invites us into its rhythm. In this conversation with Erinne Adachi—acupuncturist, editor, and devoted bibliophile—we explore her lifelong love of books and how it has shaped her path, from making...

Part Two The body speaks with a visceral language —a hint of thirst, the ache of hunger, the sudden urge for something salty. These signals can be quiet, and easily dismissed when thinking about the “common knowledge” of modern medicine. However, they carry an ancient wisdom that, if we learn to listen, can guide us back toward balance. In this conversation with Peter Torssell, we wander through t...

Part One The body speaks with a visceral language —a hint of thirst, the ache of hunger, the sudden urge for something salty. These signals can be quiet, and easily dismissed when thinking about the “common knowledge” of modern medicine. However, they carry an ancient wisdom that, if we learn to listen, can guide us back toward balance. In this conversation with Peter Torssell, we wander through t...

History isn’t always something you study from a distance. Sometimes, you find yourself in the middle of it—shaped by the events, people, and unexpected turns that unfold around you. Those moments influence destiny, and over time, they become the foundation for how you see and practice your work. In this conversation with Craig Mitchell, we trace those threads through his unexpected entry into Chin...

Words shape the world. But they also limit it. Especially when we mistake translation for clarity—when really, it’s an act of interpretation, adaptation, and sometimes… a kind of poetic guesswork. In this conversation with Sarah Rivkin—a clinician, scholar, and longtime student of language—we talk about what it means to translate not just texts, but meaning itself. Sarah brings a thoughtful lens t...

Sometimes a few needles and a willingness to help—that’s enough to start a quiet revolution. In this conversation with Richard Mandell, we trace the roots of the Global Acupuncture Project, a training-based initiative that brings simple, effective acupuncture protocols to underserved communities around the world. What started as a gut feeling and an internet search has become a decades-long effort...

What if the first step in healing wasn’t a pill, a treatment, or a diagnosis—but dinner? In this deliciously nourishing conversation we sit down with Andrew Sterman, a practitioner of tai qi and nutritional arts, lifelong musician, and author of Diet is Medicine for Home Cooks and Other Healers . We discuss how our health is shaped not only by what we eat—but how we live, digest, feel, and listen....

Some treasures aren’t just hidden—they’re buried, wrapped in mystery and legend, and waiting for the right moment to surface and return to the world of human affairs. What’s astonishing isn’t just that these Dunhuang scrolls survived—but that they journeyed from caves to libraries, and fell into hands that knew enough to recognize them for what they are: threads of ancient medicine waiting to be r...

Long before “cold damage” became a checkbox on exams or a buzzword among classical enthusiasts, Dr. Liu Du-Zhou was quietly doing the work—teaching, treating, and writing from a mind steeped in both lineage and clinical experience. He wasn’t just preserving tradition; he was refining it. His approach to the Shang Han Lun was rigorous yet poetic, grounded in clinical realities and shaped by decades...