Why Acupuncture Doesn’t Work
If you aren’t a Medium member yet, read here
Is acupuncture like an old school telephone operator’s switchboard? Plug a needle into this point to call New York, connect the call from your foot to your nose, add a nickel to keep sleeping.
There are hundreds of systems of insertion-focused acupuncture. I’d wager that most of these systems have their unique understanding of why their system works while others don’t.
Many times, two patients with the same symptoms and bio-medical diagnosis are treated with completely different acupuncture points, and they both get better!
Sometimes, you can give people acupuncture twice a week for months, and they still don’t feel cured. Now they’re sleeping better, have a bigger appetite, and aren’t frustrated all day, but their back still aches every time it rains.
Acupuncture doesn’t work because we try to make it stand on its own.
Acupuncture isn’t like the ‘silver-bullet’ pills we’ve grown accustomed to. You can’t stay up all night drinking alcohol, live on candy and soda, and then expect acupuncture to make you feel like none of that ever happened. That’s not reality.
Acupuncture doesn’t work because we see it as savior medicine, like modern medicine. Acupuncture will make your back feel better for a few hours or a few days, but the fact that you don’t change anything else in your life means you’ll be back next week for another round of needles.
Acupuncture doesn’t work because we enjoy living out of balance. We like to compare our aches and pains with our friends.
The person with the worst insomnia wins! The most stressed out among us must be the hardest worker.
If we want acupuncture to really work, we need to get into the whole system that acupuncture comes from. We should eat better, go to sleep earlier, wake up with the sun, spend more time outside, eat less sugar, take our herbs etc.
Acupuncture doesn’t work because we’ve been convinced that our symptoms are the problem. Our symptoms are only branches on a tree, and the roots are where acupuncture works.
Yes, acupuncture is great for pain relief, but using acupuncture only to treat pain is like playing whack-a-mole. Why not unplug the game, then there are no moles to whack!
Acupuncture works by unraveling the knots from years of mismanagement. The problem is, the acupuncturist can spend an hour pulling at strings to get the knot unwound, but the knot closes as soon as you ignore their advice and stay up all night!
To make acupuncture work, you need to put all the pieces of your life together.
Acupuncture works when we dismantle our cognitive dissonance of separating our life into neat boxes. Our life is a complete picture, we cannot separate one piece from another.
Our sleeptime is as important as our daytime. The food we eat, the water we drink, and the content we consume, all affect our body and mental health.
This is not a game of pluses and minuses, it is a continuous adventure. You can’t eat enough kale to counteract your pack a day smoking habit.
Rather than pit your bad habits against the one hour a week you commit to self-care, make your whole week about self-care.
What are some bad habits you try to balance with healthy habits?
Thanks for reading,
More from the author: