Self-healing system
Often on my radio show I talk about how nature designed us. We are a self-healing system. So why do people have symptoms that last year after year?
I can relate it to a recent experience I had that I thought I’d share. Saturday morning, I went to the local market to get breakfast, a couple of eggs and store made sausage. They put the whole thing in one of those foil containers because I don’t eat bread. As I was bending up the tabs I sliced my thumb, in a very inconvenient location. I quickly applied direct pressure and headed off to the radio station. Well the bleeding stopped in short order, maybe a few minutes, but there was a problem. Every time I used my hand to grab something (of course with my opposable thumbs), I would pull open the cut and it would bleed, again. This went on for days and days. I had to check to make sure I wasn’t bleeding all over the place. Till finally, the cut started healing from the inside out and is finally going away. Usually the skin will heal in a matter of a day or two. Now it has almost been a week.
What’s the point of this story? The point is the body will always try to heal itself. However, if something gets in the way (in this case me opening the cut again) then the healing process will slow down or maybe not happen at all. We see this every day with our patients. Whether it is poor diet or lack of exercise, unabated stress and lack of stress management, environmental toxins or even negative attitudes, your body needs time to heal without interruption. It wants to function optimally. But these factors put a burden on your organs, tissues and nerves. So, if you give your body the right conditions, it will happen much faster and you will feel that much better. That’s what we strive to do in our clinic every day. East Asian medicine provides this philosophy within its medical system and is why acupuncture is such an important tool for us. In the hands of experts, it will not only return the body back to its optimal state of health, but can restore the healing process for you. In addition, you have to give your body the opportunity to do its best for you by nurturing yourself and removing any obstructions to the healing process.
Dr. Kenneth Hoffman, DACM, L.Ac., Medical Director
SOPHIA Natural Health Center
