Category: ACS Blog

Just a short note today.  This morning I received an email from an acupuncturist asking for tips for sustaining commitment.  The writer commented that I seem to have no trouble with it.  It took me aback because the premise of the question is that there is an elusive effort or skill in such commitment.  Certainly

Sorry to be out of touch. Right now it’s 5:45AM and Andrew is beside me driving in the dark while I write this very overdue missive as we return to the city from a day in the country. I’ll see eleven patients over twelve hours and Andrew will Zoomteach to Poland a dietary class in

“How does it feel to be Empty Nesters?” a friend asked this week, with a wink. There’s an expectation that the answer be something like, “I just can’t believe it—my little girl—it goes so fast—it seems like just yesterday she was saying her first word—where did the time go…”   But it felt like the

Sometimes when you feel into a person’s wrist, as you’re listening to the moderate level of the pulses, something extraordinary happens—the pulses suddenly adopt a pendular action, swinging laterally toward and away from the tendons in very regular fashion with every beat.  This happened a couple of weeks ago in a patient with a very

Picture: Miriam’s room is at the very far left of the building. It’s been a whirlwind few weeks. Sorry to be out of touch. The classes in Australia and Hawaii went beautifully, thanks to their amazing hosts, Mei Li and Jordan. It’s been so lovely to meet many new people eager to engage the medicine.

Today was another day of village-style healing.  I had taken my daughter out for a driving lesson, and we were coming up the driveway when I saw a person at the front door. There was no car in sight, so he had presumably walked, yet he wasn’t a neighbor. Miriam drove the car into the

Very often the subject I’m teaching in the Mentorship Program becomes a subject outside the Mentorship at the same time.  When I arrived in the apartment late this afternoon, my daughter didn’t respond when I greeted her through her closed bedroom door. I spoke again. “I have a really bad a headache,” said a weak, pained

If you’ve been reading the blog for a while, you might remember one dated December 11, 2019, when a car came up the driveway and a young boy got out and asked me to help his father who was suffering a great deal of pain and needed help to get out of the car and

Greetings from Paris! Twenty-seven years ago, when I was living in my native Melbourne, I met Andrew on the phone. I’d been introduced to him by email through a friend as I was looking for some esoteric advice for a essay I was writing as part of a Masters degree at Melbourne in 1997. A

In response to a post we put up on Instagram a couple of weeks ago about unexpected reactions after treatment, a strong and very kindly worded reaction came back. Responses of this nature are always welcome, by the way, especially if they elicit a hopefully helpful blog! Here’s the post:  And here’s the response:  “Humble

Last night I arrived home after a really lovely two days visiting friends at the beach in South Carolina. It was a treat to travel just for the sheer enjoyment of friendship. When I landed in New York I turned on my phone to type “landed 💕,” which is our custom, only to see a

Sometimes it’s necessary to step up and take strong action as one’s own practitioner. What a gift the complement channels are when one finds oneself in times of trouble.  These past few days I’ve taken some long walks in the very early morning and finding extra meditation time since I’ve been quite sad about a

Sometimes people ask the question, “What does it mean if the patient releases a little blood during a sinew treatment?” Often, if there is wind (pain) in the musculature and you’re performing a sinew treatment, blood will move since it must move to move wind. This is how cupping works to relieve pain; the red

An interesting question came in this week:  “I‘ve been working with a client who for years has had a stubborn vaginal yeast infection. Her legs always feel icy cold to her, but not to the touch, and they’re so cold that while driving she has to pull over to nap. Her tongue is red all

Reprinted from The Golden Flower Newsletter, 2014.  My favorite chapter of the Ling Shu is certainly chapter 22. In those remarkable passages we read of a highly sophisticated system of channels that treat any condition related to Blood or Fluids. Of particular interest to me is the Blood because it is the Blood that contains