Alternative medicines attract attention
The diagnosis: poor health.
The cure: slightly more complicated.
From New York to San Francisco and Maine to Florida, health is the word on everybody’s lips. And though traditional avenues to good health have continued in their popularity, many people around the country and in Cache Valley are turning to “alternative” forms of medicine such as yoga, acupuncture and feng shui for a greater wellness in both spirit and body.
According to www.chronogram.com, yoga is a scientific system designed to bring the practitioners health, happiness and a greater sense of self.
Utilizing stretching postures, breathing and meditation techniques, yoga claims to calm the emotional state and the mind, create a higher consciousness, and tone the body.
But whatever it is, yoga has national attention.
Today, Utah State University and most health centers offer some form of yoga class, and with literally millions of Web sites and stores, yoga has become America’s alternative pastime.
Krystin Deschamps, USU matriculation adviser and a yoga practitioner, believes that a desire for relief is one reason for yoga’s popular appeal.
“I think these classes are becoming more popular because the world is increasingly busy and stressful and loud,” Deschamps said. “These exercises offer a quiet respite away from the busy world where one can contemplate life.”
More information about yoga can be found at www.yogajournal.com.
Though acupuncture is often considered a “new-age alternative medicine,” Jeffrey Singer, an acupuncture specialist, points out that it is a medical treatment which is more than 5,000 years old.
According to www.acupuncture.com, acupuncture is based on the Taoist philosophies of Yin and Yang, and is a technique where fine needles are inserted at specific points along the meridians just under the skin to stimulate, disperse and balance the flow of energy (also known as Qi in China), which in turn helps to relieve pain and treat a variety of chronic, acute and degenerative conditions.
Practitioners of this and other Chinese medicines such as herbal medicine, nutrition and Qigong (a form of exercise used to enhance energy), have claimed that acupuncture can do everything from helping to relieve nausea to aiding in curing cancer.
Some of its claims have already been verified.
The National Institute of Health has sponsored research that has helped confirm that acupuncture is indeed effective for the relief of nausea, gastric distress and pain.
Today, acupuncturists follow strict medical standards.
“Most needles are disposable,” Singer said. “They are used once and discarded in accordance with medical biohazard regulations and guidelines.”
There are three acupuncture practitioners in Cache Valley.
Feng shui (a term meaning literally “wind-water”) is part of an ancient Chinese form of geomancy or divination by geographic features. Essentially speaking, feng shui is a philosophy of how our relationship with nature and our environment affect our health and well-being.
Despite its somewhat religious feel, feng shui has become a kind of “interior decorating” in our culture, which according to skeptics.com has led many, such as multi-millionaire Donald Trump, to hire professional feng shui consultants to tell them how to organize their home.
Though there are currently no feng shui consultants in Cache Valley, books on the subject can be bought at any national bookstore chain or ordered online.
-mattgo@cc.usu.edu