In this week’s episode we discuss how the Neijing describes seasonal patterns and changes in relation to our bodies’ natural patterns. What does it mean to breathe with the seasons? When we learn to live with the seasons we learn to go with the flow of life. Join us as we learn “The Sacred Dance of the Seasons”.
Youtube
Spotify
Your hosts, Dr. Edward Neal and Mel Hopper Koppelman, explore the importance that stories play in our understanding of the world and how telling better stories may improve the outcomes of our patients. Acupuncture points are more than poetic descriptions, and in this episode, we begin to unearth how the Neijing describes a complete physiological understanding of the human body, with the points being anatomical descriptions and not just numbers on a line.
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By Dr. Edward Neal, MD
First published in Chinese Medicine and Culture
Volume 7, Issue 1 (March 2024)
Huang Di Nei Jing ( 黄帝内经 The Yellow Emperor’s Inner Classic) has been the source text of Chinese medicine knowledge and innovation for over two thousand years. Despite this key relevance, many of its ideas and practices have proven difficult to understand and implement fully into clinical practice. Cultural and language differences can be compounded with these challenges but may also present new opportunities for advancement and insight when studied by researchers outside of the originating culture. This article introduces the method of Classical-Text Archaeology and delves into the author’s two-decade journey of researching this text, with a discussion on cultural differences and issues of medical scholarship.
VIDEO
In the initial descriptions of Chinese medicine set down in the Huangdi Neijing, acupuncture was described as a traditional form of ecological surgery. Its primary aim was to restore the natural watersheds of the body by regulating the flow of the blood circulating through these regions. These writings compare the vascular rivers of the body to rivers in nature, understanding them to be formed by the same basic forces and patterns of nature. Similar to rivers in nature, the flow qualities of the vascular rivers display different seasonal variations or 'tides'. We assess these seasonal tides in the pulse qualities of the major blood vessels of the body. This allows us to synchronize the bodies of our patients with the seasonal patterns of nature.
By Dr. Edward Neal, MD
First published in Journal of Chinese Medicine
Issue 125 (February 2021)
By the 1980s, a majority of early Chinese texts had been placed on computer databases. This undertaking allowed new, potentially paradigm-shifting, approaches to classical text research. While the full potential of this research has yet to be realised, information discovered to date significantly alters our picture of the early practices and theories of Chinese medicine and presents a wide-ranging collection of new research and clinical opportunities to be explored. This information has the potential to change the way Chinese medicine is understood, taught and practised in significant ways. As such, it affirms the profession by providing new challenges and opportunities and at the same time presents unique challenges by requiring the reevaluation of core concepts. Part one of this article reviews work done over the past 20 years on the Huángdì nèijīng and presents some of the findings discovered using these research approaches. Part two will review the clinical methods that have been developed from this research.
By Dr. Edward Neal, MD
First published in Journal of Chinese Medicine
Issue 126 (June 2021)
The Huángdì nèijīng is the primary source text for the entire profession of Chinese medicine. Despite this central importance, fully implementing a comprehensive clinical method based on its principles and theories has remained elusive. Because of this, the full potential of these principles and theories has remained underutilised in clinical practice, particularly in the West. Over the past twenty years, new approaches to classical text-based research have been developed using the techniques of classical text-based archaeology (see part 1 of this series of articles in issue 125 of the Journal of Chinese Medicine). This research methodology has led to the development of Nèijīng nature-based medicine, a comprehensive clinical practice based on the writings, principles and theories of the Huángdì nèijīng. In this article, I introduce basic principles of Nèijīng nature-based medicine. In a subsequent article in this series, I will introduce technical aspects of this practice.
By Dr. Edward Neal, MD
First published in Journal of Chinese Medicine
Issue 125 (February 2021)
By the 1980s, a majority of early Chinese texts had been placed on computer databases. This undertaking allowed new, potentially paradigm-shifting, approaches to classical text research. While the full potential of this research has yet to be realised, information discovered to date significantly alters our picture of the early practices and theories of Chinese medicine and presents a wide-ranging collection of new research and clinical opportunities to be explored. This information has the potential to change the way Chinese medicine is understood, taught and practised in significant ways. As such, it affirms the profession by providing new challenges and opportunities and at the same time presents unique challenges by requiring the reevaluation of core concepts. Part one of this article reviews work done over the past 20 years on the Huángdì nèijīng and presents some of the findings discovered using these research approaches. Part two will review the clinical methods that have been developed from this research.
VIDEO
This is a lecture presented by Dr. Edward Neal about Covid-19, given on April 20, 2020 and hosted by Healthy Seminars.
PODCAST
WITH DR. EDWARD NEAL
INTERVIEWED BY MICHAEL MAX (QIOLOGICAL)
We trace our medicine back to the Neijing, but most of our actual practices come from a more modern perspective.
Going back to those roots is not easy. Even for native speakers of Chinese, reading the 文言文 wen yan wen, the classic Chinese is difficult. For those of us in the modern West, these ancient texts are challenging. They require not just language, but a minset that views the world from through a completely different set of lenses and prisms than Cartesian and materialistic science offers to us.
Immersion in this ancient material changes us if we allow it. Gives us hints at seeing how matter and energy interact in ways toward which modern medical science is blind.
In this conversation we listen into how the Neijing gives another way of approaching acupuncture, the 脈 mai, channels, and helps us to understand our bodies as fluid based ecosystems.
VIDEO
Watch Dr, Neal present a brief excerpt from a lecture on External Diseases given to 2017-2018 Neijing Studies: Level I students on October 1, 2017.
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道可道非常道名可名非常名無名天地之始有名萬物之母故常無欲以觀其妙常有欲以觀其徼
The Dao that can be percieved by our mind is not the true Dao. The name that can be perceived by our ears is not the true name. The world without names creates the patterns of heaven and earth; the world with names is the mother of the Ten Thousand Things. Thus, to perceive the mysteries, let your desires fall away. To experience the world of limitations, hold them tight.
Dao De Jing
Chapter 1
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4201 NE Couch Street
Portland, Oregon 97213
道可道非常道名可名非常名無名天地之始有名萬物之母故常無欲以觀其妙常有欲以觀其徼
The Dao that can be known by our mind is not the true Dao. The name that can be heard by our ears is not the true name. The world without names creates the dimensions of heaven and earth, while the world with names is the mother of the Ten Thousand Things. Thus, to perceive the mysteries of the world, let your desires fall away. To experience the world of limitations, hold them tight.
Dao De Jing
Chapter 1
Join The Apricot Grove mailing list to stay informed about courses, events, workshops, and other happenings!
The Apricot Grove Project
Dr. Edward Neal
Neijing Nature-Based Medicine (NNBM)
Huangdi Neijing
Classical Text Archaeology (CTA)
NNBM: Wisdom of the Cosmos
NNBM: Foundations Level I Mentorship Training
Course Main Page
Curriculum
Schedule
Tuition, Payment, and Scholarships
In-Person Clinical Practicums
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NNBM: Advanced Level II Clinical Internship Training
Apricot Grove Educational Services, LLC
4201 NE Couch Street
Portland, Oregon 97213
道可道非常道名可名非常名無名天地之始有名萬物之母故常無欲以觀其妙常有欲以觀其徼
The Dao that can be known by our mind is not the true Dao. The name that can be heard by our ears is not the true name. The world without names creates the dimensions of heaven and earth, while the world with names is the mother of the Ten Thousand Things. Thus, to perceive the mysteries of the world, let your desires fall away. To experience the world of limitations, hold them tight.
Dao De Jing
Chapter 1
Join The Apricot Grove mailing list to stay informed about courses, events, workshops, and other happenings!
The Apricot Grove Project
Dr. Edward Neal
Neijing Nature-Based Medicine (NNBM)
Huangdi Neijing
Classical Text Archaeology (CTA)
NNBM: Wisdom of the Cosmos
NNBM: Foundations Level I Mentorship Training
Course Main Page
Curriculum
Schedule
Tuition, Payment, and Scholarships
In-Person Clinical Practicums
Testimonials
Policies and Instructors
FAQs
NNBM: Advanced Level II Clinical Internship Training