Qiological Podcast

Confused by all the diet advice out there? Me too! Seems like there's always a new fad telling us what to eat– or not. I'm a fan of the 80/20 principle and I’ve been wondering if that might apply to diet, especially if you’re using diet as a way to improve health. I chew this over with acupuncturist and nutritionist Brenda Le and see if we can untangle  some of the noise and drama around food...

We have plans, but our destiny usually is not found in the maps we make of the world. It shows up in unexpected, random and often unguarded moments. There’s a lot we “do.” It does not come from knowing, but we can spin up a story in retrospect. In this conversation with John Nieters we notice how our work in time tends to simplify. That our plans and often enough lead to an unexpected potently cha...

Ghost points. Read those words and let the sound echo into your head, your heart and body. Ghost points. Just the words carry an energy. An energy of spirit, of embodiment, or not. The words suggest something of the spirit that can go astray. Like a decision to never let a particular bad experience ever happen again, or on the other side, the addictive desire to recreate again and again something...

If you don’t know where you want to go, it’s fine not to know where you’re going. Not all journeys have a destination– at least, not in the beginning. In the beginning you’re opening to options, surveying the landscape, getting a feel for who you are in the territory. It's the Open part of “Open, Close, Pivot.” Rick Gold, one of the founders of the Pacific College of Oriental Medicine did not star...

Li Shi Zhen and Sun Si Miao, they shared an interest in alchemy. Often enough in our clinical work, patients will describe what happened with them as being magical, but as practitioners we know its not magic, its medicine. But it’s a medicine that works outside the parameters of Western thought, and the consensus of settled science. In this conversation with Peter Firebrace we explore being a Zhen...

Chinese medicine looks to the perspectives of the past to understand the unfolding present. And for sure, there are threads of connection and perspective that come down to us through the curious tides of history. At the same time, there is this unique moment. What we hold, what we discover, these are yin yang aspects of how to make sense of a medicine patinated with history and lore. In this conve...

I still remember the moment when I realized that the character for Listen in traditional written Chinese was composed of the characters for Ears, Eyes, and Heart. Twenty two little strokes that unambiguously describe what is required to genuinely listen. Deborah Woolf has spent the past year teaching a course on basic Chinese  for East Asian medicine practitioners. And while the content of he...

If you’ve studied Traditional East Asian Medicine in English, you no doubt have benefited from the work of today’s guest. Dan Bensky has translated, written, published and taught for more years than most students entering an acupuncture school now have been alive. He set off for Taiwan in the early 70’s to follow his interest in learning Chinese. Taiwan was still under martial law and the mainland...

The book we used for studying acupuncture points at the Seattle Institute of Oriental Medicine was Foundations of Chinese Acupuncture. That along with Grasping the Wind were my entry into the study of channels and points. Both of those books had the handiwork of today’s guest, Andy Ellis. Beyond those early translations, Andy has his fingerprints on a wide swath of books on herbal medicine and acu...

Often enough at the beginning of a sea change, you don’t know what’s coming next. You’re already part of a current, a flow, and while you can steer within current, you’re caught up in a flow that is beyond your capacity to fully understand. In this conversation with Malvin Finkelstein we take a trip in the Wayback Machine to 197xx and his first encounter with acupressure, acupuncture and the poten...

What you grow up with, that’s what becomes normal. You could be smack dab in the middle of something extraordinary, but it’s simply everyday life for you. In this conversation with Yvonne Lau we reflect on her experience of growing up as the daughter of immigrants from Southern China who ran an herb store in San Francisco’s Chinatown. It was a time when a few dedicated young people from the mainst...

What do you do if you’re interested in learning and practicing acupuncture, but there are no schools, standards or licensure? You built it yourself; with help of other spirited colleagues. In this conversation with John Myerson we go back to the days when acupuncture was just coming into the mainstream of American life. It wasn’t there yet— but it was close enough to intuit. John was there in the...

The transport points are rich in story, function, connection and seem to have a capacity for engaging qi in profound ways as it flows from the tips of the fingers and toes, up to the elbows and knees. Lou points are particularly interesting as they both connect yin and yang channels. In this conversation with Sean Tuten we investigate the capacity of the luo channels to act as a first defense agai...

The heart of our work, often enough, leans on the connections and capacity of the heart. In this conversation with Ross Rosen we explore the importance of the patient-practitioner relationship, the concept of negotiating a diagnosis and some Daoist practices in medicine. Listen into this discussion on practical clinical strategies and how traditional medicine intertwines and overlaps with our ever...

East Asian medicine is a nature based medicine. And nature… nature is weird, and mysterious. And as much as we like to come up with “Laws of Nature” they are more like approximations. Useful for sure. But you’re asking for trouble if you confuse the map with the territory. And with nature, the territory is always changing. How do you keep your senses open and unencumbered with habit and belief? Ho...

The story of the blind men exploring the elephant is alluded to often enough that it’s easily  dismissed as cliche. And yet, the profound truth of how our senses and meaning making influence of our mind are worth pausing to consider. In this conversation with Jason Robertson and Stephen Brown we consider the 理 Li, the patterning or connective coherence that runs through creation. As acupunct...

Mind and body are inextricably entangled together. The effect of emotions on the physiology leave a palpable trace. It’s something that we as practitioners can acquire the capacity  to discern and use as part of assessment and treatment. In this conversation with Maya Suzuki we touch on how touch is a potent aspect of treatment. How it gives us direct access to a patient’s inner terrain, and...

Is it the end of the world, or the beginning of a new one? That is the question of the day when cultures go through seatide changes. Ever since the turn into of this yin water rabbit year in February, we’ve been hearing about power, potential and perhaps peril of ChatGPT and the other Artificial Intelligences that have burst into the digital landscape. What is in store for us as acupuncturists? Th...

The acupuncture channels are a curiosity that practitioners have puzzled, and argued, over for centuries. Even as these structures and processes so fundamental to life have been used for treatment and well being since Chinese medicine first began to emerge far beyond recorded history. In a sense, the channels are maps that help us to orient and navigate life, health and meaning. In this conversati...

It can be hard, impossible perhaps, at the beginning to know that you’re at the start of a tidal shift. It’s only in looking back and connecting the pivotal moments that you can see a challenging moment didn’t happen to you, it happened for you. It’s only later that you can see how attempting to solve a troublesome problem would take you down a path your imagination couldn’t dream up in that momen...

There’s a saying that what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger. Maybe. I suspect that it has something to do with the capacity of your 意 Yi to make meaning, and the vitality of the 志 Zhi to take that meaning and marry it to the sense of what you’re here to do in this post-heaven formed world of the created.  In this conversation with Chris Shelton we hear how his troublesome childhood laid...

You probably have an image in your mind, and a feeling that goes with having had a bad marketing experience. But do you know what good marketing feels like?  It feels like someone cares and is trying to be helpful. Effective and ethical marketing is about connective communication and helping your patients to solve problems.  In this conversation with Danielle Weil we focus on the importa...

East Asian medicine uses a completely different map of physiology and function from that of modern biomedicine to understand health and illness. It’s a set of tools and perspectives that gives us a unique look at the entanglements of function and form. And when using acupuncture to help our patients it’s all about the qi, right? Maybe not.  In this conversation with Leah Fehres we consider th...

What’s more powerful, a whisper or a shout? What has more impact, a punch to the gut or an intended and targeted slight? Strength and power, these are two different things. In this conversation with Bob Quinn we explore the gentle practice of using the Teishin, and the landscape that emerges as we attend both to the quiet sensitive aspect of the nervous system as it manifests in the skin, and our...

Business and medicine are interwoven together. Both deeply connect people together through relationships that have an impact.. Yet it’s easy to see the business of medicine as something separate from the practice of medicine. Consider challenging the limiting paradigms and stories you might have on running a business in medicine. A successful business is founded on the principles of providing hone...