mistakes – Huwe Acupuncture

Click here to listen to me read this post to you.

This morning I experienced the kind of computer blip that I thought never happened to anyone anymore.

Last week I wrote – and labored over – and twiddled around with – and tweaked – and thought A LOT about – and edited – and changed the name of – and rearranged – an essay about communication and buzzwords.

After several days of this process, I had the essay in (what I consider to be) publishable format. I scheduled it to be published yesterday. And it was. Sort of.

The title of the post was published. And so were the categories and tags. But the TEXT – the part that I labored over, twiddled around with, tweaked, thought about, edited, and rearranged – had disappeared.

Now, I would like to claim that I am responding to this very philosophically.

But I am not.

My response is more like this:

The first reaction

I am awash in the bitter freshness of having lost something that I worked hard on, enjoyed, and was excited to share.

And if I am honest, I see that I am also in denial.

I am hoping the writing is not – in fact – lost. That I after I publish this post I will – gasp! – recover the other one.

I am hoping I can experience the relief of a close shave – you know, “learn a lesson” about scorpions without having to experience the fullness of the sting. Just a little sting-y nibble, please.

Sigh.

Toughening up

So I wrote a blog post and I lost it. Is that going to change the course of the world? Am I such a middle-schooler that I believe my thoughts about buzzwords and messaging MATTER in an all-caps and italicized sort of way?

I’m going to give that a no and a yes.

No because disappointments like this may not determine the direction of the universe – or maybe they do, I can’t claim to say. (I’ve heard that Hitler was a frustrated and thwarted artist. Conceptually, I think that adds up.)

But certainly in this case, a disappeared blog post is not a matter of life and death. No small children are going to go unfed due to its not being published. No weapons were unintentionally detonated in the loss of this essay. And I’m grateful for that. But it’s a false conclusion that because no catastrophe has ensued, my thoughts about buzzwords and messaging don’t matter.

Creation matters

And that’s why yes. When we create something in our jobs or lives – whatever that something is – if it is meaningful to us, it is meaningful. No external authority (be it criticism or praise) can diminish or validate that significance because such things are under the jurisdiction of our internal sovereignty.

But what often happens for people in something like The Case of the Lost Essay, is a self-imposed “toughening up” process that does no good. It goes something like, “Big deal. It doesn’t matter. Get over it. Quit whining. Think of all the suffering in the world, and how much worse that is than this.”

Guess what. That’s not helpful. That is not “perspective.” It’s invalidation, and it ultimately leads to repression and a lack of compassion.

Measuring your own small sadness against all the suffering in the world doesn’t make you less sad. Or any kinder. It just makes you mean.

I repeat, this does no good.

It’s like stepping in dog poop with your right shoe and deciding to wipe it on your left shoe, just to even things out.

I see this process unfold in the treatment room and I see this process unfold in writing clients. And today I see the spark of this process in myself.

The bottom line, though, is we can’t get over something we never let ourselves feel.

From what I’ve observed, most of us are afraid of getting stuck (“wallerin” we call it here in Dixie) in self-pity so we never enter into sadness and disappointment. This is a mistake, I think.

This avoidance adds force and fear to the depth of sadness and disappointment. And if we can’t get our sea legs with “little losses” (like the Case of the Lost Essay,) how unrealistic of us to expect ourselves to weather the big ones.

So, yes. My proverbial right shoe stinks right now. And I am not going to smear it across the left one, too. Sometimes that’s the best we can do, and I think it’s good enough.

Shine on, y’all.

…

Mary Beth Huwe is a writer, an editor, an acupuncturist, and a mama. She helps people identify, articulate, and translate their most essential messages into kickin’ content that is both creative and practical.

These essays are forays into the art and essence of communication. They have not been subjected to the full scrutiny of said editor’s eye, and may contain typos. (But you’ll probably never find apostrophe abuse, because that’s just cruel.)

by Mary Beth Huwe

For a recording of me reading this post to you, click here.

(This post is not going to address the acupuncture-is-BS mistaken thought, because that answer is so long it makes my fingers ache for moxa to think about typing it out. Another day, perhaps!)

1. The Pain Mistake

Much of acupuncture’s press in American media centers around its use in pain. Indeed, the first serious attention acupuncture got in the US was sparked from NY Times’ reporter James Reston’s experience with post-operative moxibustion and acupuncture in China. He had an emergency appendectomy while in China, and he wrote about that experience in a front-page Times article “Now, About My Operation in Peking.” (It’s super fun; go read it instead if you’re planning something boring after this.)

But acupuncture is far more versatile than a simple pain reliever.

Acupuncture is a complete system of medicine.

We often explain it this way: acupuncture treats people, not diseases. That means that no matter who you are or what you’re suffering from, acupuncture is an option for you – not just an alternative or a last-ditch attempt, but an actual, serious, thoughtful medicine.

2. The Nerve Mistake

Acupuncture is not about nerve stimulation. Acupuncture theory is based on a channel system that is neither separate from, nor dependent upon, nerves. These channels connect the whole body and are conduits of qi; points are areas where the qi is accessible.

Qi is not a thing or a substance like blood or sweat. It is a relationship. Qi is the spark of static electricity that shoots from your negatively charged hand as it comes into contact with your positively charged car door. It is a way to look at the all the interactions of the parts of a system and the overall effects or function of that system.

Channels aren’t anatomical parts; their existence depends upon the life they circulate. A corpse, for example, has no channels and no acupuncture points because it has no qi. So the channels are in part what enervate us, but they are not synonymous to nerves.

When we access the acupuncture points of an area, then, we are not attempting to influence the nerves.

The nerves are just one part of the wholeness of qi.

3. The Vague-Health-Benefit Mistake

Acupuncture has precise health benefits. Many people believe that acupuncture is somehow good – with hazy, indeterminate “balancing” benefits.

Maybe this is due in part to the fact that acupuncture’s media attention is generally sound-byte-ish in nature: Acupuncture might be good – get you some!

As a result, lots of people think of acupuncture as a vague panacea with little actual direction. Yet, acupuncture is capable of much more than that; customized treatments can achieve a direct, focused result.

…

These writings are an exploration of what it means to be human – to be sick, to be well, and to heal – viewed through the lens of acupuncture and, occasionally, herbal medicine. These writings aren’t medical advice. And they aren’t meant to be the final word on… well, anything. Rather, I hope they are a beginning of a conversation you have with someone in your life. Thanks for reading! ~MBH

Tag Archives: mistakes

The Case of the Lost Essay (What NOT To Do When Disappointment Strikes!)