Acupuncture and is  ancient’s forms of therapy that are unique to traditional Chinese medicine and work di­rectly with the human energy system. Traditional European, Avurvedic, Native American, and other medical systems all practice some form of horology, diet and nutrition, fasting, massage, breath­ing, and exercise as therapies for human health, but only China de­veloped acupuncture and moxibustion, which are usually referred to together as a single branch of therapy with the traditional term jen­jiou, literally “needle and moxa.” Both methods are applied to vital energy points located along the meridian system, and both operate by influencing the currents of electromagnetic energies that flow through the channels. These altered energy currents then carry the therapeutic effects to the targeted internal organs and tissues, balancing and regulating their functions.

Acupuncture was first discovered as a result of arrow wounds suffered by soldiers on the battlefields of ancient China. Sometimes a soldier with an arrowhead embedded in his leg or arm would report the sudden disappearance of long-stand­ing symptoms in other parts of his body, such as headaches or diges­tive disorders. Before long, Chinese doctors had mapped out a series of points on the surface of the body that, when pressed or punctured with crude stone implements, would have specific therapeutic ef­fects on various other areas of the body, including internal organs, the bloodstream, the nervous system, and the muscle tissues of the limbs.

At first, sharp, flat stones called bian were used to press or super­ficially prick certain points on the surface of the body to treat various internal diseases known to respond to pressure at those points. Later, the stones were sharpened to make crude stone needles for deeper penetration. Slivers of bone and bamboo were also used for this purpose.

With the invention of metallurgy, various types of needles were fashioned from copper, iron, bronze, silver, and gold, enabling physi­cians to design various specifically shaped needles for different thera­peutic purposes. By the second century BCE, nine kinds of needles had been developed for medical use in acupuncture, and they were recorded in the Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine.

The meridians and finer branch channels used in acupuncture form a grid like network that constitutes a template outlining the entire human body. These channels, and the energy currents that run through them, compose a very real, albeit invisible, body of subtle energies that govern the functions of the physical body and all its parts. Mystics and psychics who have developed subtle vision by opening the so-called Celestial Eye that lies hidden between the brows are able to perceive the glow and influence the flow of these energies. Today there are psychic healers throughout the world who diagnose and treat disease by reading the patterns and adjusting the flow of energies in the channels of the human system. The Celestial he is in fact a Eye is in fact a mass of magnetic cells-similar to those used as in-flight radar systems by bats and homing pigeons located just be­hind the skull, between the forehead and pituitary, in all human beings and these cells respond to the electromagnetic waves emitted by the energy systems of living organisms. The secret to awakening this power is learning how to perceive and interpret these subtle electromagnetic energy signals.

Over eight hundred vital points have been identified along the meridians of the human energy system, but in general practice, less than fifty of them are used for most common ailments. Because of the electromagnetic nature of human energy currents, metal needles inserted at vital points along the meridian network can be used to stimulate, sedate, accelerate, block, and otherwise modulate the in­tensity and flow of these energies, depending on which points are used and how the needles arc inserted and manipulated. Since all injuries to the human body occur first on the invisible aura of energy that surrounds it, timely acupuncture therapy can prevent injuries from becoming deeply rooted somatically in the physical body. And even when an injury or disease has already become rooted, acupunc­ture may be used to gradually correct the associated energy imbal­ances responsible for the physical condition. Because the energy channels form a template that closely parallels the paths of both the nervous and blood circulatory systems, acupuncture therapy is particularly swift and effective for disorders of those systems.

In traditional Chinese practice there are many other therapeutic uses of acupuncture in human health care, although few Western physicians have bothered to explore them, mainly because of con­ceptual gaps regarding the nature of the human system. Acupunc­ture is routinely used in Chinese clinics to stimulate sluggish organs, sedate overactive ones, move slow bowels, reduce high blood pres­sure, cure insomnia and other nervous disorders, promote fertility, regulate menstrual cycles, and much more. All these applications are based on the idea that every organ, gland, and tissue in the body is governed by a network of major meridians and minor branch chan­nels that regulate their functions by conducting the currents of vital energy on which they depend. Stimulating various points along the meridian network in particular ways with needles and electric currents may therefore therapeutically influence the vital functions.

One of the most interesting recent developments for acupuncture is its use as anesthesia in major surgical operations. During the 1950s, doctors in China began using long, deep penetrating needles to achieve a sufficient state of anesthesia to perform abdominal, brain, and heart surgery. Indeed, it was this particular use of acu­puncture that first brought traditional Chinese medicine to the gen­eral attention of Americans, when New York Times journalist James Reston underwent an emergency appendectomy under acupuncture anesthesia in Peking, while covering President Nixon’s visit to China. The advantages here are obvious: not only does acupuncture anes­thesia permit the patient to remain conscious, it also eliminates the long, difficult hangover and recovery period experienced by patients who undergo conventional chemical anesthesia, the effects of which are usually far n-lore traumatic to the human system than the surgical procedure itself.

People who have never experienced acupuncture therapy often hesitate to try it because they associate needles with the pain of getting Western-style injections or blood tests, or else because they worry about getting infected with viruses such as hepatitis B or HIV. The latter fear has become groundless owing to the current practice throughout the world of using only disposable needles in clinical acupuncture treatments. As for pain, not only is acupuncture itself quite painless, it actually provides immediate relief from chronic aches and pains throughout the entire body, while also giving the patient an integrated sense of tranquility and well-being, plus a soothing dose of endorphin secretion in the brain.

After being swiftly inserted, the needle is twirled in either direc­tion or both directions, depending on the effect to be achieved, until a tight, tingling sensation, or a heavy numbness, is felt in the tissue just below the surface where the needle is inserted. This feeling indi­cates that energy is present and moving there. It is called deh chee, “to obtain energy,” a sign that the therapy is taking effect. Acupunc­ture is also a very good way to get a firsthand experience for how energy feels and Rows through the body via the meridian system, and this experience is useful for those who also wish to practice chee­gung and internal energy meditation.

As more and more Westerners choose to be trained in traditional Chinese rather than conventional Western medical sciences, both the classical and modern adoptions of acupuncture therapy, as well as moxibustion, are becoming generally available as viable alternative therapies to patients throughout the Western world. Acupuncture is currently the only traditional Chinese therapy that many medical insurance companies are now willing to cover in their health insur­ance policies in the U.S., and this development is rapidly bringing this branch of Chinese medicine firmly into the mainstream of mod­em American medical practice.

If a stitch in time saves nine in human health, then the acupuncture needle is an instrument that can help reweave the threads of energy in the complex tapestry of the human energy system when­ever the wear and tear of life dishevels its normal woof and wrap.