When do small things matter?

On a recent morning, I was washing my face with some music on and the door closed, thinking about the day ahead, when my husband called out for me from another part of the house.

“Arta! Arta! Look, quick!”

With the mix of all the sounds around me, I couldn’t tell if this was an excited or in-need-of-help call, so I rushed out of the room to see what the matter could be.

In the front of our home, I found my husband turning away from a window, walking quickly towards me.

He had spotted a cute bunny in our yard, hopping toward the side of the house I was on. He wanted to make sure I looked outside quickly, so as not to miss the bunny and its cuteness.

As we both stood there, peering out at this sweet, small bunny chomping on plants still wet with morning dew alongside our home, I thought about how nice it was to have my attention pulled into the present in this way.

Sometimes, placing our attention on small, seemingly inconsequential things can have a beneficial effect on our present physical and mental state. These moments can encourage gratitude, stillness, and an appreciation for the mundane.

At other times, attention to small details can be distracting and aggravating. We can get caught up in the minutiae and lose sight of the forest for the trees.

There is a distinction between these two cases, with room for individual differences. The threshold at which small things matter is arguably different for each person.

When it comes to our health, it is important to develop a good understanding of our own temperament so that we can guide our attention wisely.

Do you tend to become easily caught up in catastrophic thinking about small health worries? Are you more likely to overlook or procrastinate health disharmonies until they are big problems?

Once we understand how sticky or hypervigilant our attention is, we can more effectively sort through which of our health observations may be causes for concern and we can become more nuanced in our responses.

Chinese medicine is quite nuanced in its conceptualization and response to illness.

For example, the Six Stages of Disease, as documented in the Shang Han Lun (written before 220 CE), describe the trajectory of an external pathogen as it progress in the body. Briefly stated, this kind of illness describes a pathogen that is externally contracted (comes from something outside of the body), usually from wind or cold.

The first stage of disease is called the taiyang stage (pronounced like “tie-yang”), which describes the very first symptoms: mild headaches with stiff neck and shoulders, an aversion to cold, and some general body aches and pain. Fever and chills might be present in this stage, but they don’t have to be. At this point, the pathogen is on the most external level of the body.

• There is a specific herbal formula - gui zhi tang (cinnamon twig formula) - indicated for this stage. It prominently features gui zhi (cinnamon twig), which has the ability to “push the pathogen off of the exterior” before it goes even more deeply into the body.

In our modern lives, we might not pay much attention to these first symptoms - mild headaches, stiffness, body aches - yet Chinese medicine understands the cooccurrence of these symptoms as a pattern that can be tended to. The more efficiently we respond to these symptoms, the more effectively we can prevent the intensification of the disease.

Once those initial chills intensify a bit and start to alternate with a fever - we get hot, then cold, then hot again, then cold again, etc. - Chinese medicine understands this as a separate stage of disease. Now we are in the shaoyang stage. The external pathogen has gotten to the level of the gallbladder channel.

• A different herbal formula - xiao chai hu tang (minor bupleurum decoction) - is indicated for this stage. The main herb in this formula is chai hu (bupleurum), which has an affinity for the gallbladder and is good at releasing the exterior.

As we can see in this brief description of two of the Six Stages, Chinese medicine provides us with a system of sorting through seemingly small shifts in our pathology. This system gives a sophisticated and nuanced framework with which we can respond once we’ve identified meaningful signs and symptoms.

Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how much you like rules), there is not a rulebook that states exactly how we should pay attention to our health.

From my point of view, I think three good steps to start with are:

1) Become very honest with yourself about your emotional disposition.

• As mentioned earlier - do you tend to worry/fixate/dismiss/ignore?

2) Take a short inventory of your current health on a day-to-day basis.

• Piece together an observational practice that works for you. This might include a 3-minute body scan morning and evening, a health journal, a spreadsheet, a calendar dedicated to health notes, or a conversation with a practitioner. Note what you notice in your physical body, emotional state, and mood. This does not need to be a long, complicated activity - it’s better if it isn’t. 

3) Trust yourself.

• If something feels serious, don’t dismiss it. Get a professional opinion. No need to wait until something is severe before seeking help.

You are welcome to send me a note if you’re having trouble getting started. You are also invited to schedule an appointment if that feels right for you in this season. A big part of my clinical work is teaching clients how to tune inward and feel into the needs of their bodies while learning a bit of Chinese medicine along the way.

As always, I love to hear from you!

By the way, did you know that you can access all the newsletters in the online archive? You can search by keyword without having to scan through your email inbox. 🙂

Warmly,

Artemisia

Clinical Herbalist | Chinese Medicine

innervillagehealth.com 

@innervillagehealth