Chinese Medicine, Reciprocity, and Permaculture
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full article : 3 minutes (700 words)
Three peas in a pod.
Have you ever had an experience with nature that stopped you in your tracks, took your breath away, or made you smile without even realizing?
It can be a profoundly moving experience! The immersion in the moment is the gift and you are the lucky recipient. There is a simple yet profound exchange in these moments between you and nature, one of the most beautiful gifts life has to offer.
There are ways to have this experience daily. You don't need to climb a mountain or have a full greenhouse to appreciate what nature gives to the world every single day. All it takes is awareness, recognition, appreciation, and in a perfect world, reciprocation.
Mutual partnership and exchange with nature is precisely the idea behind permaculture. The idea is to grow plants and food by working with the patterns and rhythms found within nature. You do this by creating spaces where nature can thrive. Systems are stronger when they work together rather than against each other. Harmonious relationships cultivate resilience, vibrant health, and overall sustainability for plants, people and the planet.
Build soil, create balance, find places that could be more easeful. Emphasis on the practice of giving will optimize the quality of what you get out of it. Imagine what a beautiful world it could be if everyone operated from this baseline.
Have you ever heard of the concept of the Three Sisters? Or companion planted basil and marigolds next to your tomatoes? Have you seen what good compost can do? Do you find yourself spending your paycheck on worm excrement? Then you know all about these reciprocal concepts!
The current state of climate crisis and overall ecological concerns reflects lack of relationship between humans and the systems we relentlessly draw from.
Imagine for a moment if each time you 'took', you also 'gave back'.
This exchange can flow naturally with balance and ease, so long as the systems each continue to give back to one another. This reciprocity requires an intimate relationship with people, plants and the planet we live in. To recognize those moments takes great awareness. Choosing to give thanks or show appreciation, contribute to your community, extend care to someone in need, or simply take a quiet pause for meditation or reflection can have a profound impact on the quality of relationships around us.
Breathing in without limit is not an option.
Participating in an ongoing exchange is the most sustainable way forward.
Reciprocity in health and medicine is much the same. The more easefully you are aligned with the opportunity for health, the more likely it will be that health can prevail. In other words, you create the conditions for health rather than strongarm health into existence.
Sharon Weisenbalm, director of White Pine Institute so beautifully details the Chinese character for reciprocity :
互 Starting with the Chinese character Hù, one can see that there is a line coming down from above and turning right. Then there is a line coming from below and turning left. This character is a picture of heaven and earth interacting harmoniously with each other. Its meaning is reciprocal, mutual, each other. Imagine a pine tree reaching up from inside the earth toward the sun. The sun is shining down to energize and promote the tree’s growth. This is the image of 互, Hù.
Chinese medicine is all about facilitating space for systems to foster resilience and restore health. Creating the environment the body needs to cultivate well-being nurtures healthy, sustainable, reciprocal relationships. Using food and plants as medicine alongside various physical therapy modalities helps address the root cause as well as any branch symptoms, ultimately restoring balance and enhancing well-being not just for today, but for the future.
Build your soil, find more balance, create ease and free flow.
Preventing disease and maintaining good health is the gold standard that is achieved through cultivating harmonious relationships; mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically.
Every person that decides to manage their health in sustainable ways plays a part in co-creating a healthy future. Yanaroot's mission to uphold planet-based healthcare strategies is an effort to nurture reciprocal, sustainable relationships with people, plants and the planet.
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