Lordy, time is flying

Life is going by in a blur. I am running at full speed all the time, and wow. I am not sure where the days go.

School is getting very interesting. The teachers are loosening up with us as they get to know us. The class is loosening up with each other - in fact we got told off today for being noisy. I was secretly glad we got told off, as I don't like loud chatter, but hey. I am at least glad that MOST of the class are really nice and friendly. And then the studying is also getting interesting, with lots of hints this week about energy medicine. And by energy I mean "Qi" - what is qi you ask? Well, I don't have a good translation - life force, or energy is the best. As one of the profs says, if your liver is in your body working away it is full of qi. If you cut it out and put it on the table, it is a piece of meat. It is dead because it has no qi. OK, OK, you might get all "it's dead meat because there's no blood circulation" with me but the theory goes that qi and blood zoom around together.

OK, so on to energy. We are doing qigong and taiji exercises to get our energy flowing. Professor after professor tells us that we should be doing qigong every day if we want to be good acupuncturists. One of the profs on Tuesday was talking about the energy of her patients, and how she can tell a lot when someone walks in the room. Some of it makes sense, as we've all had the "cut the tension with a knife" moments, or been able to tell that someone is angry just because of the vibes they are giving off. But these people go way further. And that makes me feel sometimes like I'm sitting in an x-ray machine!

Then another prof. did a healing on a student (not from our class) on Wednesday and invited one of my class in to watch. It was me! I am not sure why he asked me, but he didn't use needles, he used his fingers. And not acupressure either. I got the impression that he was sending qi down his fingers into the student. Did he ask me to show me the energy work, or did he just pick on me because I was the smart arse answering questions that day? Was I supposed to see this energy work and start paying more attention to this stuff? I tried to send out a healing vibe while I was in the room, but I doubt if I was much of a help.

And then today, we had this patient come in to class, and she had been in last week as well. I just feel so badly like I want her to be healed, because she is in constant pain. She had tears in her eyes today telling us about stuff. And as I listened and empathized I felt like I had all this energy going through me and my hands were getting hot, like we're told should happen in qigong. Ooh, I thought, maybe I am full of qi, maybe I've opened a couple of energy meridians or something! So I tried to send the healing energy her way. When we were watching her getting her acu treatment, one of the students from a higher class was there, making up some class time with us, and I noticed she was sitting weirdly and pointing her palm at the patient - aha! Sending qi! So I tried to do similarly. But this student got a treatment too, and she was all "I react SO strongly to the treatment" and saying how she feels the qi flowing. And someone asked a question about energy flow so she said to the teacher "ahh, she's one of us." One of us? One of us? One of us what? Aren't we ALL supposed to learn about this stuff, or is she saying that only certain people are gifted with heightened awareness of energy? It put me slightly on edge. Although intrigued.

It's like one thing after another is suddenly saying "pay attention to this qi stuff."

But sadly as we were walking out the arrogant jackass dude was all "that patient today was a hypochondriac. She could describe pain so minutely, in so much detail. Who does that? She's imagining it.Or maybe she has a mental problem." And I felt so annoyed with him. The poor woman has been in constant pain for 2 years and has been to doctor after doctor. She has probably had to describe the pain six ways from Sunday. Multiple times a day. No wonder she is precise when she says things, and not just "my legs kinda hurt."

And I certainly felt the angry energy well up as he was speaking! Grrrr. Again, I'm just going to try to be polite and say that I hope his thinking evolves. But really, what's the effing point of doing this if you think fat people are all fat because they don't exercise, and people in chronic pain are making it up? Really? Where's the effing empathy?