A student stands over a patient, needle poised. They have a “perfect” prescription: a textbook combination of points harvested from a lecture slide on chronic lower back pain. But as the needle meets the skin, the student hesitates - the symptom of a quiet habit that has taken hold of our profession. We routinely say we “prescribe” points. It sounds efficient. It echoes the authority of biomedical culture and fits neatly into the insurance field. But vocabulary is never neutral; repeated long enough, it dictates behavior.
Protecting Jing in Modern Women (Pt. 1)
In classical Chinese medicine, jing – or essence – is the deepest foundation of human life. It governs our capacity for growth, reproduction, and graceful aging, anchoring the strength of the kidneys, the vitality of the reproductive system, and the arc of our longevity. It is, in every sense, our constitutional inheritance.