Chinese Medicine
A Point for Menstrual Cramp Prevention and Relief: Landscape of Your Body #18
Menstrual cramp relief + prevention with acupressure self-massage! This point can bring quick relief of menstrual cramps, and even prevention of cramps when treated just before someone’s period starts. 🏞️ Your Spleen channel is a river on the landscape of your body, beginning from a spring on your big toe and coursing along the inner…
Read MoreEpisode 37: How Restoring the Water Web Relieves Drought, Fire and Flood (with Alpha Lo)
Alpha Lo caught my attention when I heard him say, “All we have to do is…” and then lay out a sweeping plan for how California can effectively restore rain, prevent both wildfires and floods, and regenerate the water cycle. He explained how we could reverse the negative effects on the water cycle caused by…
Read MoreEpisode 36: Personal and Collective Healing in Chinese Medicine and Deep Ecology (with Leilani Wong Navar and guest interviewer Lydia Violet Harutoonian)
Our bodies are just like the rest of the living world: coursing with healing, life-affirming intelligence and capacity; and suffering the effects of being out of balance. The body is one setting for what Joanna Macy called “the three stories of our time”: Business as Usual, the Great Unraveling, and the Great Turning. We’ve explored…
Read MoreA Point for Easy, Complete Bowel Movements: Landscape of Your Body #17
A self-acupressure point for when bowel movements aren’t as easy, as complete, or happening as often as they should (aka… constipation) 👉🏼 Self-massage here, on both legs, for 1-2 minutes every day, can be a powerful complement to whatever food choices, supplements, acupuncture, or other gut-healing practices you’re using. This point is called Shang Ju…
Read MoreA Point for Eye Relief: Landscape of Your Body #16
For people dealing with eye symptoms from allergies, here’s a place to find relief, at the next stop on the Landscape of Your Body: Bladder 2 (aka “Zan Zhu,” aka “Bamboo Gathering”). Self-massage with acupressure here is super helpful for people dealing with eye symptoms like itchy, watery eyes due to allergies, other eye health…
Read MoreDreamwork in the Acupuncture Clinic: Engaging with Your Dreams for Healing Insights and Guidance
Enjoy this recording of a public talk hosted by Revive Qi and Fertility Center, about why and how I engage with patients’ dreams and what it’s like to experience dreamwork in the acupuncture clinic, plus view a mini-dreamwork session with one participant’s dream. For more info on my work with dreams: https://leilaninavar.com/dreamwork/ To schedule a…
Read MoreA Point for Soothing the Heart: Landscape of Your Body #15
https://leilaninavar.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Heart-7-25.mp4 On the landscape of your body, where the river of your Heart Channel passes through your wrist, you can find Shen Men (aka Spirit Gate, aka Heart 7). This is a soothing point to hold, or press and release, for people dealing with anxiety, trouble falling asleep, or heart palpitations. Make loving contact, take…
Read MoreGetting Better Can Feel Really Good
The things that are bringing us into better balance FEEL GOOD ✨ Trust your compass. Here’s what I say in the video: “Getting better can feel really good. The things that bring us into balance make us feel good. I’m sure that one reason I love to sing is that the Metal element in my…
Read MoreHealing Sunday / Healing Season
I had a dreamy Sunday morning a few days ago: I wrote down my dreams, practiced qigong and back rehab exercises, played guitar and sang myself some songs, breathed in gratitude with the green leaves around me – all before I emerged from my room. Then I had a yummy breakfast, followed by a little…
Read MoreWhat the Five Elements Really Are
The Five Elements are not like the atoms on the periodic table of the elements. They’re not the building blocks of matter. In Classical Chinese Medicine, in Daoist philosophy, the word xíng, which we usually translate as “elements,” could better be translated as “phases”. These five phases are processes. (Verbs, not nouns – hey! just…
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