Introduction to Chinese Medicine

Introduction to Chinese Medicine

We are part of Nature, Nature is part of us. Nature, the universe, and all beings are in relationship with one another: Earth always below us, the vast sky above, the Sun, the Moon, the planets and stars even further away. We are understood as being in relationship to the elements of Nature around us. And these elements of Nature are understood to be within us.

Observing ourselves in this way, we can get closer to the notion that a human being is a microcosmic representation of the larger Universe. We have seasons of birth, growth, adulthood, decline, and death just as a tree is subject to Spring, Summer, Late Summer, Fall, and Winter. We are made of the same material that makes everything in the world around us. To know ourselves, we look to Nature as the mirror of what we humans might actually be.

What we can see, touch, feel, hear, and taste are known as physical manifestations…Manifestations from what basis?

When we see a tree , we see only a part of it. The roots are hidden beneath the surface of the ground. The seed from which the tree originally sprouted is completely gone. In a similar way, a physical manifestation grows out of energy that is not perceived by our five senses. This original, vast, mysterious Source from which everything came is a Mystery.

“The nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth,” declares the Tao Te Ching.

Every manifestation, every thing, person, plant, and bug originates from this vast and nameless Mystery. The energy of this Mystery is eternal. Each of us has a spark of this energy within us. This spark of life will return to its Mysterious Source when the physical manifestation within which it resides comes to an end.

In Western science we find a similar revelation that humans are composed of 

“star dust.” The molecules that make up the stars are the same as the molecules that form our bodies. As Carl Sagan wrote, “The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.” Some of the material in our bodies is from the beginning of the Universe.

Meridian Massage,

Cindy Black