Back to the Basics
If you have been following TCM Hub then you have heard Michael and Chris consistently reminding you to always go back to the basics. Especially when it comes to making sense of a seemingly difficult patient case. When a patient comes to you with a long list of Western diagnoses, symptoms, and medications it is easy to become overwhelmed and intimidated at first. “Back to the basics” is a reminder for you to stop, remember and trust in your training, reframe what you see into Chinese disease patterns, and throw out all the unnecessary stuff that doesn’t inform your CM diagnosis. From there you will be able to diagnose your patient with clarity and confidence.
“Back to the basics” doesn’t only apply to your clinical practice. You can use it anytime you start to feel overwhelmed, exhausted, over-scheduled, or like things in your life are off-track. It can also be used as a regular audit for yourself to be sure you’re still on the right path toward your goals. The main questions to ask yourself that help bring you back to the basics are:
What life results are you aiming for?
Is what you are doing right now bringing you closer to that result? Why or why not?
At the beginning of this year I held a goal setting workshop called Engineer Your Year. Part of that workshop was to choose a word of the year. This word acts as a theme for everything you do this year. My word of the year is “Abundance”. This means that with every decision for action that I make I check in to be sure that I’m coming from a place of abundance rather than scarcity. It’s a back-to-the-basics check-in for myself to help bring clarity when things feel muddled and confusing.
When you’re not living consciously and purposefully it can be easy to find yourself in a place where you feel life is getting away from you. A place where life is happening TO you and not FOR you. Pausing and asking yourself these two basic questions can immediately help you drop the unnecessary stuff clogging up your mind and keeping you stuck, and bring you more clarity and confidence to do what you need to do to move forward.