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Energy Channels
With the Flow
Imagine a series of
invisible pipes, canals, or even hallways that begin
within your skin and connect to every tissue and
organ inside your body. According to traditional
Oriental Medicine, these channels or
meridians—transport your life’s energy, or qi, along
with blood and bodily fluids that nourish and
moisten your entire system. It’s a two-way street
from the outside to the inside, transporting
diseases or the healing stimulation of acu-points.
With so much traffic along these pathways, you can
see why it’s vital to your health to keep them
running smoothly and efficiently. In fact, illness
results from the "traffic jams" in your channels.
This disruption in flow may occur just where you
feel it, or may be the result of a problem
"upstream" in another part of your body. Your acu-pro,
a term used throughout this text to identify a
practitioner using either acupressure or
acupuncture, will help you determine the origin of
the blockage and assist you in unblocking it.
The word meridian is often used in place of channels
in many oriental medical books. Its French origin
refers to pathways that encircle our earth, which
compare to the channels that encircle our bodies.
The Chinese meaning of "acupuncture point" is the
combination of the words "hole" and "position."
These points serve as external doors or openings to
the channels that access the internal muscles and
organs of your body. No one knows exactly how these
points’ healing properties were discovered, but the
earliest written document dates back to The Yellow
Emperor’s Inner Classic (second century B.C.). By
then, points had been assigned to a channel
according to similar curative benefits and given
names describing what they were used for. Also, a
numbering system was developed to match their order
of placement on the channel. For instance, ST-36
(the Three Mile Point) is on the stomach channel and
is the 36th point of the channel. This point is used
for a wide variety of stomach complaints as well as
general energy hence the traditional name indicating
this point will give your legs three more miles
worth of energy.
You can locate acu-points on main channels that
traverse your body up, down, and sideways. Most of
the 361 main channel points had been identified by
the third century A.D. |
