Why does Classical Chinese Medicine seem so complicated? A continuing conversation…
Here is the second part of the article by my colleague Michael Givens. You can read the first part here. I hope we will see more of him here on Deepest Health. Please be sure to leave your thoughts in the comments, as he is a regular reader of the blog and will most certainly be interested in hearing what you have to say.
———
In the broad view it is simply the nature of Yin and Yang, yet it is also because Chinese medicine has had such a long fermentation process; the classical texts as we’ve understood them, present the view that I’ve described above, one of functional dynamics, but as Chinese society grew and changed, and as the West’s materialism influenced them, the lens of the Chinese doctors went through a few very important changes. This is why it is so complicated. It is not “one medicine.” Like most things in China’s history, there has been a perpetual push to maintain an umbrella called “Chinese” for all things “Chinese” but this actually barely holds together. It is the same with the Chinese language: though there is a claim that the Chinese have had the same language for thousands of years, it is not completely true. What is true is that there is a continuous thread linking the oracle bones to modern Chinese, but that does not at all mean that it is the same language. The language meaning and usage within the context of culture and understanding could not possibly be the same.
With Chinese medicine, we could really isolate the different eras and dynasties and call these “Chinese medicine periods,” and there are some very real differences among them. Yet, the reason for our program is that there is a common root. There are the Shennong Ben Cao Jing, the Neijing, the Shang Han Lun, the Zang Zhong Jing, the Nan Jing, the Jia Yi Jing and the Maijing, for starters. Within these classical texts, while there are some significant differences and disagreements (even within the Neijing there are important discrepancies) it does seem that there is a common perception and worldview amongst them, a common understanding of the functional dynamism of human physiology and its correspondence to the movement of nature. However, after these texts and times, Chinese medicine becomes confusing and complicated.
This does not mean that anything written or practiced after Wangshu He in the second century CE is wrong by any means; it means that all of the formulas and treatments after this have to be carefully examined to gain any sort of understanding of the perceptions of those who created them. All Chinese scholars of all periods had a very deep and profound understanding of the classics, so in some ways we could say that what TCM (the Chinese medicine practiced and taught everywhere that has the approval of contemporary Chinese medical scholars of today) has to offer is the best of two thousand years of practice and scholarship. But, I believe we are in a better position today than that. We are in the position to broadly see how human consciousness has traversed from immaterialism to materialism, from conceptualization of process and movement, to a conceptualization of matter and physical (Western) physiology, and today, we can see how we are now reaching about as far as a materialist view can go. This allows us to move forward to a new, yet much less material understanding. Western science is also running up to this point and it appears that a subtle, yet great paradigm shift is underway. I believe classical Chinese medicine can be at the forefront of this shift.
Thus, I am advocating for the importance of not acquiring too many useful tools of TCM, but rather to push Chinese medicine further by doing what the scholars of all times have had to do. It should be each one of our responsibilities to read, study, examine, practice and experiment with what the classical texts have to offer, before we try to see what others have done with them. We should do this so that we can at the very least, understand why for instance, one scholar in Chinese history decided to modify Li Zhong Wan (a formula from the Shang Han Lun, Han Dynasty, 1st century, designed to “rectify” the spleen and “center” using the herbs: dried ginger, ginseng, atractylodes, and honey-fried licorice) and turn it into Bai Zhu Tang or the later more well known name, Si Jun Zi Tang (Four Gentlemen’s Decoction: Song Dynasty, 11th century, designed to strengthen the Spleen, using the herbs: ginseng, atractylodes, poria and honey-fried licorice), which is so widely used today.
Was it because he was more evolved in his understanding? Did he have a better grasp of the human body and human diseases, or did he simply have a different understanding of it; was he, perhaps more materialistic and narrow in his understanding? The only way for us to know, despite the fact that our teachers will advocate for one or the other, is to have a specific frame of reference. Otherwise, we just have to choose one or the other and see what happens. But, I believe that we will at some point, have to define for ourselves our own understanding of what medicine does and how the body works.
Of course, this is what we have been learning while at school, but it has not been consistent. The holistic view of classical Chinese medicine is not the holistic view of TCM, though TCM claims it is. The holistic view of one teacher, for that matter is not always the holistic view of another. Yet, based on what we have learned from the classical texts, classical holism is a dynamic interplay between function and matter, internal and external, time and space. It is based on the concept that matter follows energy, and energy follows consciousness; this is what we have been taught, yet is easy to neglect. It is also essential to recall that, like (classical) Naturopathic medicine, classical Chinese medicine works primarily through helping the body (functionally, not materially) to regain balance rather than doing something to the body (supplementing materially) to re-establish balance.
The holistic view of TCM is simply that internal and external are mutually related, and that the laws of yin and yang and the five elements apply to both humans and to nature, that’s it. There certainly is the concept of functionality in TCM, but it is clear that material concepts are much more predominant, and this is seen in the way disease is treated. For us to be able to effectively evaluate the various treatments and protocols from the thousand years of fermentation, we must be able to know when they are doing something to the body and when they are communicating a functional shift within the dynamic of the whole person. We can only know this by knowing the classical understanding of physiology. We really can only know classical physiology by understanding deeply the classical theoretical principles of nature and the cosmos.
I believe that we can only foster a growth and evolution of the future of Chinese medicine through deeply assimilating our perceptions and understandings to the perceptions and understandings of the ancient scholars. We must understand our medicine from a physiological, dynamic, functional perspective that takes in to consideration space (physical and relational), time (seasonal breath and astrological changes) and direction (momentum, flow, and interrelation) to begin to understand what was intended in the Chinese medical classics. With this kind of an understanding, we can then easily evaluate classical and traditional Chinese formulas and treatments; more importantly, we will be able to develop new, yet classical methods of treating diseases, for we will be protecting the functions and warmth of life, flowing with the processes of nature, and never working against either.
Michael Givens - National College of Natural Medicine - 3rd year in Classical Chinese Medicine program
If you like what you read here, you may want to keep updated by using my RSS feed. Want to know more about RSS/feeds? - read more here. Thanks for visiting!
Tags: Classical Texts (general), classical-chinese-medicine, Learning, materialism, Michael Givens, scholar, study, traditional-chinese-medicineRelated posts
Another scholar reviews his first month of Sagely Living
This is an article that Michael Givens, author of the recent article “Why does Chinese Medicine seem so complicated?” sent to me last night. He was one of the first on board for the Year of Sagely Living, but doesn’t have an online home - so he’s posting his insights here.
——-
Since this is the last day of January and near the new moon (and new seasonal node), I thought it would be fitting to write up a review of the month for me in this “Year of Sagely Living.” I have been participating, but have not shared my experience in the discussion, so perhaps I’ll try to continue to after this with more monthly reviews. I am very appreciative of all of your efforts, Eric, and inspiration. This project could not have come at a better time.
At the beginning of the month I made the following personal commitment:
1. School work
I committed myself to study for each class on one day a week for two hours, as well as a 30 minute formulas review each day. I also choose one other subject each day to research further and deeper than was taught to me. I have 8 classes, so I needed to combine two classes to one day (one hour for each). This may seem like not a lot of studying for classes, but I have to keep in balance a family (I have two children) and my wife is also a Naturopathic Physician who is beginning to open her own practice. So, I have to keep my study time focused and efficient.
2. Classical Texts Personal Study
I am enrolled in two classical texts courses at NCNM (one on the Shanghan Lun and the other on the 19 lines of Pathology in the Neijing), but they are focused on exploring the texts in Chinese, so much of the work is in improving my continuous study of classical Chinese as well as deeply engaging specific aspects of the essential classical texts. In my personal study, I am committed to not only familiarize myself with the classical cannon of Chinese medicine, but to know as much of it by heart as I can. So, I practice memorizing lines or specific information from the texts. In this project, I committed my self to continue to study the Ling Shu (of the Neijing), the Shanghan Lun, the NanJing, the Jia YiJing and the Shennong Bencao Jing. I have been studying these texts for a while now, so I chose specific chapters to focus on, or specific texts to complete (if I hadn’t read it through completely yet). I committed myself to focusing on this study at least two hours a day, two days a week. This is as much as I am able to fit into my schedule.
3. Writing
I also committed myself to writing for a half an hour a day, every day. I wanted to choose a topic and explore it in depth. I also committed myself to writing one article per week to be submitted somewhere or saved for a later submission.
So, how successful was I with this project?
Terribly unsuccessful, I’m sad to say. Yet, it has been a great lesson for me, and by continuing to simply view it as a lesson and an experiment, I did not beat myself up about it, but rather, kept reminding myself of my goal. In the first week (prior to school beginning) I was very successful in my study and classical text reading, yet could not get myself to sit down to write. By the time school began, I was able to maintain only my classical text study. This may seem strange, for it means that I neglected my school studies and chose my personal studies, but it shows me that when I do not have my life in balance, I uphold only what I truly want and put off what I need to do, but can do later.
I feel that I put a lot of intention into my plan that was really quite intense and in doing so I believe that I sabotaged myself. It was as if since I couldn’t wait to get started, I jumped in too quickly, planning on doing too much, and the energy I put into my plan carried too much weight; I simply couldn’t find a rhythm with it. By the third week though, I felt much more detached from the outcome and the plan itself, and simply tried every day to participate as much as I could in my commitment, and soon I found myself much more on track than the weeks before. This last week, I have even written an article which Eric graciously posted. Thus, I’ve greatly benefited from this project already, but I have also learned to return to following more of a middle path in life, to keep the extremes and the intensity to a more harmonious central rhythmic flow.
I enjoyed focusing on the Scholar aspect of this time, though I see that it is the time of the Gall Bladder moving toward the Liver. Though I think this has been a perfect time of year (especially for students) to focus on strengthening the Scholar, another perspective of the twelve archetypes of the seasons is that it is the Ram who is the true scholar, the Small Intestine (the sixth month), the King Wen archetype, who, locked away, worked out the scholarly mapping of the energy of the Bagua. The Gall Bladder, who is the Rat (this first month), is much more of the King Wu archetype, who, seeing the eclipse at noon (much like transition from the old year to the new year) initiated the great battle and marched his troops to attack the Shang by “crossing the great water.”
Thus, perhaps I was more taken away with my Gall Bladder intensity of initiating this project, and unable to maintain the scholar’s rhythm and cultivation. I am hoping that as the Wood energy rises in this node of “Li Chun” or “Spring Standing Up” time of the Liver, I will be able to sustain my plan and continue to flow with it. In harmonizing with the Qi of the seasons, I believe I will be able to do so. I’ll let you know how it went.
Michael Givens
Tags: balance, Classical Texts (general), commitment, Cultivation, focus, January, Michael Givens, personal commitment, scholar, students, studyingRelated posts
Why does Classical Chinese Medicine seem so complicated?
This is the first part of a two part guest article by my friend and peer, Michael Givens. Michael is also a third year student of Classical Chinese Medicine at the National College of Natural Medicine in Portland, OR. He shares my fervor for the medicine and has been an inspiration to me as I seek to plumb the depths of this profession we have both chosen. I hope you will enjoy what he has to say. Please do leave your thoughts in the comments - he is a regular reader of the blog.
—
When I first started to study Chinese medicine (long before I became a student at NCNM), I fell instantly in love with it because it made so much sense to me. When I read the Huangdi Neijing Suwen for the first time, it was as if all the questions I had about life, my place in relation to nature and the stars, the interplay between light and shade, warmth and cold, and how life seems to exist somewhere between them all were illuminated by Huangdi, Qibo and the other sages. The cycle of the five dynamic movements in nature and how they manifest inside and out of all things, defined for me what I felt was already true; I had found a detailed system that defined the wholeness I had been searching to understand.
As I pursued my studies as a Chinese medicine student, I began to see how my initial understanding was limited and superficial, and soon, rather than being the clearest and most elegant text I had ever read, the Neijing became the most complicated. I found myself spending hour upon hour trying to draw out the inter-lapping cycles of the six confirmations, influencing each other on the right and the left through time, in the heavens and on earth, connecting to the heavenly stems and earthly branches and the five movements…I quickly became lost in the details of such an amazingly intricate systematic understanding of the nature and movement of Qi.
When I first learned about the five organs and their relations to the five “elements”, it seemed so clear; yet, as I deepened my understanding of physiology (Chinese physiology that is), simple concepts like “Fire generates Earth, Earth generates Metal, Metal generates Water” became extremely complicated. How is it, after all, that Fire descends through the malleability of Metal, physiologically, or that Metal really descends only when Fire descends? What does it mean that Water, while it resonates with the flavor of Salty, is actually reduced by Salty and strengthened by Bitter? What is at the heart of the difference between the six atmospheric conditions and the five dynamic processes and how do they interact physiologically? Questions such as these began to plague me.
Of course, this is what happens as one deepens his or her understanding of something; and, as one narrows his or her focus from the “big picture” to the minutia, the complexities of the universe become overwhelming. Yet, the beauty of Chinese medicine lies in the central view that the Chinese sages held. Rather than lose themselves in the grand picture, focusing only on the Dao or on the stars alone, and rather than (as Western science has done) lose themselves in the smaller and smaller details of the parts, the sages of Chinese medicine maintained an open view of both through using the language of symbolism and correspondences and remaining focused on processes and dynamics, functions and movements. So, though I was swimming out in the ocean of stars, and at the same time swirling amidst the tiny fragments of manifestation, by taking on this central position of the Chinese, I found a way to begin to have clarity and understanding and to flow with the movement of nature.
This is not to say that I would advocate ignoring the details and taking for granted the whole, not at all in fact; as I said earlier, the Neijing incorporates extremely detailed understandings of the very large and the very small, though there is a much stronger emphasis on the very large. What I have found is that one’s lens is what matters, regardless of what one is looking at. The lens of the Chinese medical sages allowed them to see dynamic processes and functional qualities rather than matter or manifestation. Though much of what a Chinese doctor does is to examine the symptoms and manifestations (especially in that the pulse is so very important), the treatment comes about through understanding function and movement, quality and time.
But, this is where a new confusion arises and is really what I meant by the title of this article. Chinese medicine is complicated just because it’s complicated, to be sure. But, how we are learning about Chinese medicine is also complicated. At times we are looking from a point of view of function, and at times we are looking from a point of view of materials. At times we learn of formulas and treatments that are based on an understanding of processes, and at times we learn formulas and treatments that are based on a desire to supplement matter.
—
How is a student of this medicine to behave? How are we to wade through this sea of complexity that so many years of history have created for us? That will be the topic of the second part of Michael’s article - to be released soon. Thanks for reading.
Eric
Tags: classical-chinese-medicine, five phases, focus, Learning, Michael Givens, neijing, overwhelm, Science, symbolismRelated posts
-
-
What am I up to?
-
Subscribe to Deepest Health
