update from the firehouse, 6 months in

Philadelphia is pregnant with CA twins. Two more community acupuncture clinics are forming in greater Philly as a direct result of the workshop led here by Skip and Lisa.

Ellen and I are doing what we can to support the three practitioners involved in these projects. We know both places are going to be successful; and Philly will be that much further along towards making acupuncture accessible to the majority of its people.

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Many of you may not know that there's a new acupuncture school in suburban Philly. The Won Institute. Ellen and I were just asked to teach a unit on community acupuncture for their practice management course this year.

This happened, as far as I can tell, because of overwhelming interest from students, including in particular one rabble rousing organizer who attended the CA workshop held here in November.

We're excited to oblige. Apparently, the main instructor of the course is the president of Pennsylvania's Association for Professional Acupuncture.

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My relationship to practicing CA style acupuncture continues to evolve.

Although in my biggest thinking and most rational mind, I know that the simple and frequent treatments experienced in a community setting are the best possible acupuncture medicine, I have had periods of distressed feelings (mostly fear) telling me that there's no way i can be a good acupuncturist without using more moxa, without being able to treat the back, or without being able to spend more time with my patients.

So, its with great gladness and satisfaction that I report how much better the ten minute thing is going. Each treatment is much more likely to excite rather than drain my qi, and the treatment results are improving.

Several factors are leading to these changes. An important one is the way I've pushed myself beyond my comfort zone in terms of getting down to the business of pulse taking and needling with every patient. This means not getting drawn into unrelated talk when there's no time, and expecting return patients to be in a chair and ready to be needled when it's time for their appointment. It means exercising maybe gentle but definitely firm leadership with new patients that says what we'll be doing and what we cannot do.

The more subtle interpersonal stuff behind this has to do with my trying on KNOWING that what I'm doing is enough and that I don't need to show my care by listening to patients longer than I can. It has to do with really recognizing how sweet and supportive and healing the whole experience is going to be for each patient, and how my role in that is being a competent acupuncturist, doing a treatment that helps a patient feel better and making sure they understand how important regular visits are.

In this context, I am hugely grateful for our team of volunteers (Jacks, Waliyyah, Lou, Vida, Leigh, Rafik, Aurora) who very directly deal in providing sweetness and listening, while being brilliant interpreters and guides to a radically different and therefore potentially confusing experience.

I realize these things have been said. I'm just noticing what a huge difference it makes to the effectiveness of the treatments now that I'm really internalizing this essence of CA.

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Of course, as acupuncturists we are actually listening, listening, listening, all the time, as well as looking and smelling and asking. I noticed an instance recently how my own classism clouded my closeness and understanding of a patient, and so too my diagnosis and treatment.

This will be a bit oblique, but I'll try to tell you what I mean. During her third treatment, a woman told me something about her day that made me realize I had made an inaccurate assumption about the nature of her work. "Oh", I heard a part of myself say. "Wow, she does THAT for work! That's a really serious job. I thought that she just....."

Yikes.

And, I didn't catch myself until I had subtly but immediately shifted my take on the etiology of her symptoms in my mind. I think the best I can do to describe this is to say, I was looking differently at her spleen and the patterns of worry affecting it.

Fortunately, I'm not a machine measuring things, and I get to step back, maybe laugh at myself, and shift my thinking to reflect the reality that every single patient is Good and worthy and part of the same world where yin and yang and the five elements are at play.

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I made a trip to New Hampshire recently and got to see Andrew and Manchester Acupuncture Studio. I took photos, the file of which I managed to loose, else I'd be posting pics of the beautiful clinic all over the place.

I got to see Andy at work, interacting with the good people of Manchester, and just experience yet another unique example of CA, where the clinic really reflects and respects both the particular and the universal of another place on earth.

A bald eagle was flying north up the Merrimack as I entered the building. A nun and some other really funny, sweet, grumpy, and loud guy were walking out, both looking lightened and shiny.

I fell in love with the whole movement yet again.