Why Spring is the Perfect Time for Acupuncture

As we explored last month, spring isn’t just for refreshing your home... it’s also an ideal time to rejuvenate your mind, body, and spirit. What better way to accomplish this cleansing and renewal than through the healing practice of acupuncture?
 
The Significance of Changing Seasons
Although we’re more than happy to welcome the blooming flowers, chirping birds, and sunny days of spring, many of us don’t feel so hot at this time of year. According to traditional Chinese medicine, humans are microcosms of the natural world, so it makes perfect sense that the transition of seasons affects how we feel. It’s a time of significant change for all living creatures, humans included! With the changes in temperature, humidity, sunlight, and air quality, our systems need to readjust biochemically and energetically.
 
Getting extra support from acupuncture is beneficial regardless of your age, gender, or lifestyle. At Hudson Healing Arts, we have two highly-skilled acupuncture practitioners: Carla San Diego and Joe Del Giodice. Carla explains the importance of acupuncture during this time further, saying, “Physiologically, we survive through homeostasis, so our systems thrive on routine and keeping things balanced, whether it’s our nervous systems or our yin and yang. Acupuncture calms and balances your system to encourage a smoother, shorter seasonal transition.”
 
Benefits include reduced allergies, arthritis, sleep-cycle disruptions, digestive disturbances, fatigue, and anything else that is a reflection of the body trying to readjust to environmental changes--and that’s just the short list!
 
Acupuncture & the Liver
Acupuncture links each season to an organ system in the body, and spring is the season of the liver. As one of the most valuable organs in the human body, the liver has many essential roles in keeping us alive, including storing and detoxifying the blood as well as regulating qi (energy flow) through the body.
 
During this seasonal transition, the liver’s “responsibilities” can get out of whack. Signs of liver disharmony include tension headaches, digestive disturbances, stiff muscles, aching, eye fatigue or dry eyes. Spring, a time of growth and expansion, is optimal for nourishing, healing, and supporting the liver.
 
Each organ in acupuncture also has an associated emotion; the liver’s happens to be anger, so liver imbalance can manifest as frustration and outbursts of irritability. Emotional ‘stuckness’ can mimic the physical stagnation that takes place. (In Chinese medicine, a person with a super-healthy liver is supremely calm!)
 
In addition to acupuncture, other healthy ways to nurture liver detoxification include…

• Eat green and surround yourself with green!
• Eliminate alcohol, coffee, and chemical additives
• Regular stretching
• Add yoga or tai chi to your routine
• Get outdoors--even a 10 minute walk keeps qi flowing!
• Liver-cleansing herbs such as dandelion root, milk thistle, and chamomile flowers
• Expressing your emotions

 
Now is the perfect time for a tune-up to help your body adjust internally to the changes swirling around you, so that you can ‘spring’ forward in optimal health and joyous spirits.
 
We look forward to seeing you at Hudson Healing Arts!