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Shen Kuo沈括1031～1095《沈存中良方》” Master Shen’s Effective Prescriptions for Preserving the Center” later on medical prescriptions from Su Shi (蘇軾) (1037-1101) were inserted and the work was renamed《苏沈良方》”Effective prescriptions of Su and Shen”. In it is said:

“Treating a disease has five difficulties: differentiating the disease, choosing a correct treatment plan, knowing the individual herbs, knowing how to put the herbal formula together and knowing how to distinguish between the herbs in the formula.” This shows that to be able to put a herbal formula together the practitioner needs to a have an adequate knowledge in a variety of areas. Further more, in the introduction to the same book Shen Kuo writes “When the sages prepared herbs, they had rules for cooking and rules for drinking the herbal teas. Some herbs need to be cooked for a long time, while other herbs cannot be cooked for long. Some herbs require strong flame, while others require low heat for their cooking. These are the main rules of cooking. For drinking, some herbs need to be consumed warm while others cold, some need to be sipped slow while others fast. Some herbs need to be consumed with emotions such as anger or happiness and these emotions help the action of the herbs, while other herbs are contra indicated to emotions. For these contra-indicated herbs the emotions are enemies. These are the rules for drinking the herbs. In addition, some spring water is good and some is bad, so if the patient receives herbs and they don’t always work, don’t blame the herbs for that. This is because there is difficulty in determining the right way to prepare and drink the herbs.”

Yaron Seidman

Hunyuan Research Institute for Chinese Classics

Dear Yaron (and "Webdoktor" - is that Spence?),

I loved your last post. What a rich quote, full of so many challenges to the modern practitioner. I attended a seminar a few months back by Charles Martin, from the NMSU Sustainable Agriculture Research Center, where he has been growing Asian herbs experimentally for a couple of years now, I believe. Z'ev Rosenberg came to share his clinical take, which was a WONDERFUL addition. The room was full of mostly practitioners, with really only three people who I would consider "real" farmers, not the backyard hobbyist variety but people who spend a large part of their day with the hands in the dirt. When the discussion turned to money, a practitioner made the point that the herbs must be cheap, that they must be able to provide treatment for less than $20, I believe, to their low-income clientele. Now I am all for sharing what I grow for free with people less fortunate than I am. I am pathetic about giving my food away for free. I am not into any agricultural endeavor I engage in for the money, let's make that clear. But... there is no way we can be growing local sustainably grown and harvested high-quality herbs here and compete with Chinese prices, where they are produced for slave wages under often terrible conditions, with who knows what environmental consequences. I personally got quite offended by that comment because people drop thousands of dollars without thinking when it comes to their health in the biomedical field. To put such a ridiculous price limitation on our practice in Chinese Medicine is shooting ourselves in the foot, I believe, and is partly related to the fact that many practitioners themselves don't believe in the value of what they are doing as a true equivalent and complement, an EQUAL to Western medicine.

I strive for sustainability in all I do. If I want to get involved in producing Chinese medicinals grown with the purest water, ingredients, qi, right soil/climate/harvesting/processing/storage conditions and yes, in the framework of "nurturing life" as it intersects with the local foods/sustainability movement, it is simply not possible to produce herbs that compete with cheap Chinese imports. In our capitalist society, putting such a price limitation on what we produce/practice implies how little we value it, and ultimately I will run out of steam and shut my business down. So I walked away from that seminar quite discouraged because it seemed like many practitioners, people who are all into local sustainable organic foods and don't blink twice about shopping at up-scale organic markets and dropping $5 or whatever the going rate is for a fancy latte or several hundred dollars for a car repair, don't value their own work enough to charge what a plumber charges.

The same conversation applies to the production of books, especially translations, as far as I am concerned. I refuse to crank out cheap, quick translation jobs and drive my publisher crazy because of that attitude. And I absolutely want what I produce to be out there, available to the public (which is why I love what Spence and Lorne are doing here!!!) but we have to put a real price on books that contain years and years of research, a price that reflects the value of that knowledge (if such a thing is even possible). My Qianjinfang translation took me 3 solid years full time, locked away in a library with no other source of income or distraction, to produce. I will not sell it for a ridiculously low price, because frankly, it's not going to be a best-seller anyway and people won't be any more likely to read it if sold that cheaply. That's where libraries come in.  Somebody posted on some acupuncture listserve that translations should be produced for free. Well, I don't know where that person was coming from but you would never say that about biomedical textbooks, for which students routinely drop hundreds of dollars a semester. To complicate matters further, the production of mainstream medical knowledge is supported by huge university research budgets and big pharma endowments etc. none of which exists for CM. Somehow our culture understands the value of information on anatomy or Western herbs but what about CM? Who finances the production of knowledge in this field that furthers questions like Yaron brought up in this thread?

Anyway, I love your post, Yaron, because it is such an important conversation that needs to be held, because herbs are food (and qi), not just neatly wrapped pills. I am so happy that once again our views seem to complement each other. A wonderful thing to read first thing Friday morning.  And in my own experience with my farm products (whether raw goat milk and cheese, eggs, nettles, apples, honey, or our potential new line of lip balm and soaps), you put a price on the product that is fair and sustainable to you, and then you educate people on why you charge what you do, and the good people get it and come back, and you just forget about the others. So I would encourage all you new (and old) practitioners to do the same and not sell yourself to cheap.

I have a dear friend here who is one of the best CM practitioners I have ever met. He is a recluse and charges almost twice the going rate for acupuncture and only has really high-quality herbs, but who cares? I am always just blown away at the notion that people would actually "shop around" for the cheapest doctor. You do that for an oil change but not for a heart surgeon, do you? So who would do that for an acupuncturist? That is the attitude we should be addressing among patients and practitioners, and your thread here, while from a different angle, to me provides an important aspect in this conversation. The herbs are what heals us, so if we care about the Kale we put in our bodies, why should CM supplements be different? Thank you so much for starting this conversation!

Sabine

Sabine, you put the truth is such a wonderful, and in my opinion, correct way. Our medicine is only about one thing and one thing only, how to help patients the most and not how to help them the cheapest.

In another subject, I must commend you for being such a great confucianist explaining everything in such a great detail, leaving no hidden places for mystery.

Yaron Seidman

Hunyuan Research Institute for Chinese Classics

I'm really looking forward to this raw herbal cooking webinar. It is a huge topic that I would love to have some light shed upon.

I know the topic is too huge to have solidified during only 1 hour so I"m hoping that Yaron Seidman will be able to help point me in the right direction to better help me prescribe to my patients.

Looking forward to joining you this week Yaron ! Thanks

Yaron will be presenting a 3 hour CEU approved webinar on March 21: 

Hunyuan: Treating Infertility with Classical Chinese Medicine

Details here http://www.prodseminars.net/store/hunyuan-treating-infertili...

and Sabine Wilms will also be presenting a 3 hour CEU approved webinar on May 2:

The Foundations of Classical Chinese Gynecology

Details here http://www.prodseminars.net/store/foundations-classical-chin...

And Yaron is offering a $75 discount on his certificate program.  When you register ask for the Pro D Seminars disount to receive $75 off.  This is not a Pro D program but we think it looks great and want to recommend it to all those who treat infertility using CM.

Knowledge*Confidence*Success www.prodseminars.com Online acupuncture CEU/PDA's

Thanks everyone for spending with me the hour last night. Please post here any questions you have, feedback or criticism. Its all welcomed.

regards

Yaron Seidman

Hunyuan Research Institute for Chinese Classics