“All diseases are rooted in the spirit.”
--Chapter 8, The Yellow Emperor’s Inner Classic, Spiritual Pivot, 5th century BCE
This quote forms the foundation of Chinese medicine and how I think about disease and health. Our soul/ling has a curriculum in this life, and the living energy of the spirit/shen is charged with conveying that destiny/ming. In this way, illness can be seen as an opportunity to return to full wellness. The consciousness that contributes to disease is not the same consciousness that supports healing, says my teacher Jeffrey Yuen. Transformation requires a new sensibility, a new awareness, a new state of mind.
Our emotions, thoughts, beliefs and attitudes are essential components of this new state of mind. I support the evolution of your psyche by treating you as a whole person who is dynamically influenced over time by: a lifetime of experiences, your relationship to your self, individual anatomy and physiology, family lineage, society, history, place, environment and your sense of place in the world. This approach is relevant to our emotional state and to the fields of genetics, epigenetics, intergenerational trauma and inherited diseases.
I’ve continued taking herbal supplements after giving birth for a myriad of things, one of which is constipation that comes along after any childbirth. Nobody talks about constipation, but it happens with every woman I know! I came home from the hospital prepared with something to drink so as to prevent it. My first birth I had constipation, my second birth with the herbs I had none.
