April Self-Healing Tips

Chinese Nutritional

The ancient Chinese taoist sages were rumored to have eaten a small handful of Gou Qi Zi every day to ensure longevity and good health. Now in April 2006 these gems of good health have made a come back into our modern culture of well-being and prevention. Goji berries play an especially delicious role in an empowering and nourishing diet at this time of year, for Spring is the time to love, cleanse, and nourish your liver. One of the most important roles of a healthy liver is to fight off and protect against stress and nervous tension. Eating a small amount of Goji berries regularly is an excellent way to help you do just that. Tibetan Goji berries in particular are grown with care and without pesticides, so go ahead and step into your local health food store, walk on over to Dragon Herbs, or jump online to himalania.com and reach through the millennia for your handful right now.

Goji berries contain all 8 essential amino acids, and they have 18 amino acids total. They also contain up to 21 trace minerals and boast vitamins B1, B2, B6, and vitamin E as well as 500 times the amount of the anti-oxidant vitamin C than oranges have per ounce. This makes Goji berries one of the most profound sources of vitamin C on earth. It has also been shown that Goji berries contain many important polysaccharides that help boost immune system response. From a Chinese medical perspective, these berries can help strengthen eyesight and brighten the eyes; they help alleviate sore legs and back, clarify blurry vision, and treat dizziness.
Suggestions for use: Goji berries can be added to smoothies and cereal (hot or cold); you can add them to recipes for cookies and muffins, use them in trail mix, or boil them for tea. Try sneaking them into stir-fry and other savory dishes or use them as a substitute for raisins. Of course, you can always just eat a small handful anytime for a snack or treat.

Acupressure & Wellness

An amazing way to invite Spring's energy into the body and support your liver is to take brisk walks early in the morning. This activates the muscles and sinews, and awakes and refreshes the Qi. It is said that viewing the bright green color of fresh young plants nourishes the soul. In Chinese medical theory, the Liver is the organ that houses the soul and opens to the eyes. When our souls are being fed, we need less in the material world to feel well-being and fulfillment. That means we need to take in less food, and we are less overcome in general by excessive desires. In this culture that continually drives us to do and be more, Spring's gentle antidote might be as simple as rising early and walking somewhere green with the first light of day.

With the extra walking, there's always a chance that in addition to feeling gratitude and fulfillment in your soul, you might feel some fatigue and soreness in your feet. Liver 3, Tai Chong, is an excellent point to massage in order to soothe tired feet, nourish the Liver yin and blood, restore fluidity to the Liver qi, clear the head, and regulate menstruation (for women). LR 3's Chinese medical benefits include the ones listed above, as well as treating lumbar pain, weakness of the knees, pain in the leg, and inability to walk, alleviating vomiting and nausea, constipation, diarrhea, amenorrhea, improving urinary difficulty, treating sighing, abdominal pain, insomnia, headache, and helping to control hypertension.

Tai Chong, or Great Surge as it is called in English, is located on the top of the foot. To locate it, place a finger where the webbing begins between your big toe and the next one over. Run your finger up the space between those two metatarsal bones (the long bones that make up the longest part of the foot) toward the ankle until you feel a pronounced depression just before the place where the two bones meet. This is Liver 3, and it is probably sensitive to light pressure.

Suggestion: Go ahead and start massaging Liver 3; try the left foot first and then the right. Give it at least 5 minutes on each foot, and remember to breathe! - especially if it is tight and sore.

Julie Festa, L.Ac., MTOM, is a licensed acupuncturist and Chinese herbalist who has a private practice at Shakti's Elements