Although its main treatment methods are aimed at the physical body (massage, acupuncture, dietetics, pharmacopoeia) and that the reasons for consultation are most often physical discomfort and somatization (musculoskeletal pain, withdrawal, fatigue, depression, respiratory disorders , digestive, urogenital, etc.), Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) does not envisage a separation between the physical, emotional and spiritual planes. Neither can it conceive of the functioning of the individual outside his social, geographical and even cosmological context… We are far from a vision which compares the body to a sophisticated machine made of distinct, interchangeable and repairable parts. TCM has always favored a global approach, it bases its diagnosis and treatment plan on a conception of life where all components are considered in a network of relationships and interdependencies.

For example, Heaven and Earth, considered as the two major forces of the macrocosm, provide the human microcosm with both its original spirit and its material framework (the body) which, indivisible, allow it to exist. The organism, throughout its life, receives from the Sky-Earth couple the Air and Foods necessary for its survival. Other aspects of the environment are also decisive for humans, and are considered to be integral parts of their physiology; one can think of the climate, the day-night light cycle or the seasonal variations in temperature and humidity that influence the life cycles of microorganisms, plants and animals. All of this has a major impact on the food chains and ecosystems on which we depend, as well as on the development of pathogenic factors such as viruses and bacteria, which TCM assimilates in its language to perverse energies.

The chemical and dynamic components of Food, which TCM represents by the concept of Flavors, support the activity of Organs and tissues. The assimilation of Air and Food constantly renews the Energies which maintain our primary vitality and our bodily form, allowing us to use, preserve and develop the gifts and capacities that our parents transmitted to us at conception and which represent the heritage of our lineage.

TCM explains that health and balance come from the relationships between three important aspects of our being:

• Substances that circulate in our body – constantly renewed.
• The quality of the physical and psychological characteristics received from our parents.
• The subtle levels that inhabit us: emotions and psychic functions.

All these constituents are interdependent:

• The state of Substances and Organs influences our perceptions and our emotional state (if we have a stomach ache, we can become more intolerant…).
• The dynamism of the emotions has repercussions on the activity of the mind, consciousness and psyche, as well as on the possibility of developing our spiritual dimension (if we live in perpetual insecurity, self-realization is our last concern. ).
• The activity of mind, consciousness and spirituality in turn influence our perceptions and emotions, just as they determine our way of life (the way we breathe, eat and use the resources of Heaven and Earth) .
• This way of life in turn influences the renewal and maintenance of Organ Substances …

Thus, the circle is closed in a spiral which maintains our health and develops our know-how, or on the contrary which leads us towards illness and physical and psychological suffering; and this whole – organic and inextricable – depends on our daily choices, constantly repeated.

TCM intervenes in small doses, on a case-by-case basis, step by step … by respiratory exercises and the gestures repeated a thousand times and corrected by Qigong, by daily meditation, regular diet, the firm and repetitive movements of the Tui Na massage , acupuncture treatments which awaken the memory of a lost state of balance or which gradually draw the map of a new order, and decoctions or herbal teas, drunk and rejected with the same grimaces, but the same patient determination. All these efforts gradually serve to correct the general condition, to stimulate immune functions and to drive out pathogenic factors, like a slow fight that is sometimes won in a dazzling (and easy) way, but more often centimeter by centimeter with courage and perseverance!

The curative approach to TCM is certainly not the easy way – it does not offer to take two pills and wait! Its holistic vision, however, allows the patient to be an active element at the heart of the healing process. She offers the opportunity to take responsibility for her own health, considering the multiple dimensions of her being as much to assess her problem as to choose among the countless possible avenues of healing.