the mission

"what i hear, i forget.

what i see, i remember.

what i do, i understand." - xunzi, confucian scholar

As one of a few acupuncturists whose background includes competing, coaching and providing East Asian medical therapy at the division 1 and professional sport levels, I was often asked how to learn more about traditional Chinese medicine. Specifically, many of my patients and athletes were curious about the ancient view on sports medicine and movement. And for years, I really avoided that question, because there are very few resources available in English. And even when they are, they’re often written in coded language that isn’t accessible to a western reader even if it’s translated. 

My experience learning traditional East Asian medicine was one of complete immersion. Year one of my four full-time years of acupuncture school, I was taking theory and practical courses during the day and coaching college track at night. Year 2 I was apprenticing under Japanese Sensei T. Koei Kuwahara, who had us waking at 5 for meditation, qigong, martial arts and traditional sword training until the clinic opened for patients at 8 or 9, before heading to school for more class, before treating patients in the school clinic. Year 3, I was busy treating patients at 3 major hospitals in Boston along with our school’s clinic under supervision. After hours, I was treating as many friends and family who would let me practice on them, and on weekends and days off I would travel to New Hampshire to help Daoist Monk Zhou Xuan Yun from China’s Wudang mountain range realize his vision of building a Daoist Center in the USA, taking the opportunity to train internal martial arts and Daoist Internal Alchemy with him before and after the day’s construction. After school, I trained for weeks at a time in groups led by Lindsey Wei as a senior student of Wudang White Horse and on White Horse Peak of the Wudang Mountains with her and her teacher, Li Shifu of Five Immortals temple. The traditional way of learning these medicinal, movement and meditative arts is immersive and through EXPERIENCE - putting every theory you’ve been given to the test until it’s imprinted on the deepest aspects of your being and permeates every nook and cranny of your life.

You can’t get that from a book. But it’s unrealistic for most people to live what I lived - so, how do we recreate that learning? Through EXPERIENCE. Through hands on, embodied learning. Instead of just handing you books of theory, our courses guide you through ways to use these tools of healing and performance - and then, allow you to go further and integrate them into your life. With teachers available when the right questions arise. With community that helps us all to learn more. That’s what Meridians Move is all about.