The Mid-Autumn Festival has arrived, and the pungent fragrance of blooming osmanthus flowers fills the air as people are bustling about, enjoying the spectacular weather. While most foreigners are beginning to appreciate the taste, aroma and health benefits of Chinese cha (tea), tea art is relatively unknown abroad.
There are numerous traditional forms of folk art here in China, dating back to the beginning of civilization. Many of these crafts have been incorporated into the local culture's daily life and are seen all over, especially in the numerous teahouses, art galleries and even national holiday celebrations and museums.
Even though the medicinal value of "aesthetics" and "surroundings" are scoffed at by many, modern science has developed some interest in their healing value.
For example, feng shui and color therapy have gained tremendous popularity. I would assume that many of you readers are firm believers and supporters, as are we, of such art for its cultural value, and its less tangible benefits as well. So, we thought we would share some of our valued Chinese tea art collectibles with you. We hope you enjoy these as much as we do.
Fertility acupuncture sometimes gets presented as a narrow protocol: a handful of reproductive points applied uniformly across patients. What this case reinforced for me: The most powerful work happens when we read the whole picture. The hormone data, the constitutional tendency, the sleep, the digestion, and the menstrual pattern, so we can treat the environment the ovaries live inside.
Mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS) affects more than 15% of the U.S. population but evades most practitioners’ radar. Just five years ago, it wasn’t even on my radar, despite already having 20 years of experience as a clinician at that time. The more I dug (similar to leaky gut and post-COVID syndrome), the more I found my patients were suffering from this disorder.
The motivation behind our practice of medicine is important, impacting not just our experience but also the experiences of those we treat. It is perhaps for this reason that the aspiration to help not just some, but all beings heal, has historically been an important part of the medical tradition. To explain this, we need to consider how medicine is interwoven with other social domains.