A Self-Evaluation and Mental Bridge

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote "the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function." As I began my journey in China, studying Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and the capacity for integrating a Western-scientific medical paradigm, I felt a keen sense of contradiction. While much of traditional healing practices make intuitive sense to me, my trained logical response is based largely on the Western analytic medical culture in which I was raised. I noticed also a mirror of this contradiction in many of the patients, as well as doctors, who I observed throughout the practical application of my studies; because although the two systems of curing and healing complement each other in many ways and various circumstances, the theoretical basis of both are inherently contradictory. I struggled particularly with the question of whether we can, and how to integrate the tools that have grown out of these opposing theoretical understandings of the body, health, and ultimately, the universe.

The way a society handles illness is a reflection of how they understand their world; in the same way that our identities are the stories we tell about ourselves, the way we heal ourselves is an application of a larger story our community tells. By making use of a certain medical approach, we implicitly accept the story behind the practice, and hope that it will work in our circumstance. Physician and author, Louis Mehl-Madrona writes, "Within any healing art, whatever else we do, we treat by telling a story," he goes on to discuss the "impossibility of separating treatment from the stories told about the treatment, the audience hearing the stories, and the context in which the stories are told." However, as has been pointed out by psychologists, Buddhists, and scholars in the field of consciousness, our identities are comprised of a multitude of stories, some of which are contradictory, that we employ at different times and under various circumstances. Both story-telling and "the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time" are inherent in being members of human culture.

In my attempt to understand TCM and my struggle to reconcile Eastern and Western healing and curative practices, I was forced to look critically at these two broad stories. In my reading and class lectures, as well as clinical observation and private discussions with TCM doctors and my Tai-chi master, I continually relied on my meditative practices to reflect on my skepticism and alternatively, my blind-faith. There were moments of which I gradually became more aware and appreciative, where I noticed a shift in my mind; a swapping of stories, when one became less applicable, less useful, and another rose to prominence. These are the moments, so frequently unrecognized, where so much potential lies. Rather than urging two stories into compromise, as seems to be the prevailing method of "integration" both in Western and Chinese institutions, perhaps we can encourage a fluidity between the stories, a mutual respect both for the strengths of the other, and the shortcomings.

By relentlessly engaging with the borders and points of contention between Western medicine and Chinese healing, I was able to settle into a space not of overlap, but of allowance. My language study gave me various insights into the culture that tells the TCM story and challenged me to confront my own mental blocks in connecting to the community in Kunming. I was more able in this quarter than in the Fall to connect to other people working in the areas of radical healing, and narrative and transformative medicine with the help of the LinkedIn online professional network, and a few friends. With the knowledge and experience I've gained here, I will continue, in India, my work of integration through embodiment and will begin an exchange between community and land, and the telling of a larger story of holistic health of mind-body, community and environment that can emerge through that interaction

Chicken in a Box

There is an exercise done in many art classes with a live model who will change poses about every 45 seconds, and the students complete what are called "impression drawings" or "gesture drawings" from these very quick moments. The idea is to capture the "essence" of the model, the energy of the posture. By moving in such quick succession of 45-second intervals, the analytic mind doesn't really have time to kick in and judge, criticize, or even question; you only have enough time for acceptance. 

This can be a useful exercise in traveling, too. And while I've done my fair share and maybe more of analyzing and comparing, questioning and perhaps more judging than I would have liked, I've also truly enjoyed and reveled in the wonderful strangeness and fleeting moments of simple being. So for this post, I'm drawing a few impressions from my time in China.

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On the flight from Guangzhou to Kunming, I am reading China's newspaper written in English, when the flight attendant rolls by and asks me, "Chicken or pork?" and I am glad that I let go of my exclusively vegetarian ways a few months back because I am getting the feeling that that would not fly here.

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zai jensuo (at the Clinic)

I am sitting behind Dr. Huang Pu's desk in an office that is about 4ft x 6ft; there is a patient sitting in a chair adjacent to me, with her wrists exposed on a pillow on his desk. The girl's boyfriend and mother are standing behind her, and behind them are about 10 other people waiting to be seen by the doctor. They are sitting, leaning against the wall, on their phones, and walking in and out of the office. They are peering over the current patient's shoulder, and looking somewhat curiously at Andreas, Liu Jin (our teacher/translator) and I. Patients wander in and out of the offices, interrupting with questions, and dropping their history books as a form of waiting their turn. As it becomes clear that these people are not part of the patient's family, but other patients waiting to be treated, we are perplexed for a moment or two, and then chuckle to ourselves at the thought of the closed doors of doctors' offices in the West. There isn't even a door to close in any of the herbal doctors' offices at the clinic in Kunming.

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In another doctor's office, a mother brings in her 5 month old daughter looking for an herbal prescription after returning from the hospital where the baby received intravenous antibiotics (I cringe at how often this happens). When the baby gets anxious enough to begin crying, mom flips open her Smartphone and plays a cartoon on the screen which captures the baby's attention so completely and quickly that I swear the tear stopped mid-roll down her cheek. It's a strange juxtaposition of this old traditional medicine and this new-fangled technology. And then the next patient walks in.

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I get caught in a little language trip at the clinic when I realize that the doctor is speaking in Chinese, Liu Jin translates into English and Andreas is taking notes in German.

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We take a quick tour around the pharmacy at the clinic. But this is not at all reminiscent of Walgreens. Yes, there is a counter where patients bring their prescriptions, and there are pharmacists who go behind the counter and bring out the medicine requested, but the similarities end there. The prescriptions are a hand written recipe, specifically for the individual patient- a list of herbs and their amounts in grams to be measured and combined by the pharmacist, wrapped up in brown paper and given to the patient with instructions on how to boil the remedy, for how long, and how much and how often to drink it. There are three walls of drawers behind the pharmacy counter inside of which contain everything from chrysanthemum to donkey skin, turtle shell, scorpion, sandalwood and almond. I tasted the donkey skin. It tasted like donkey skin.

-> I am reminded of a passage in Ballentine's Radical Healing, in which he gives a homeopathic remedy to a woman with breathing problems and control issues. When she is pleased at how well it works, she asks him if she can give the remedy to her son, who also has asthma. He responds by saying, "The remedy isn't for asthma... it's for YOU."

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When the doctor asks the patient how their appetite is, they measure in bowls of rice. Andreas, who is from Italy, turns to me and says, "In Italy, they would be measuring in pizzas." I think... how do we measure appetite in the U.S.? In Big-Macs, or calories, in grams of fat or carbs or protein? Is that even a measure of appetite, or is it a measure of self control, or self worth?

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A woman walks into Dr. Yang's office, sits down, and even though it's not her turn, she says she doesn't want to wait. He asks her what her symptoms are. She pulls up her sleeve, places her wrist on the pillow on his desk, and says, "Feel my pulse, and you tell me what's wrong."

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Sitting in the waiting area of the clinic, there is a man across the hallway with a 2ft x 2ft x 1ft box at his feet. There are small squares cut out of the sides. And a rooster's beak pokes out.

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