Tibetan Medicine
Tibetan medicine is an ancient, timely healing tradition from Tibet. The Tibetan name is Sowa Rigpa, the science of healing. Over the millennia, Tibetan medicine has evolved into a profound philosophy, psychology, science, and art.
Tibetan medicine teaches that the purpose of life is to be happy. This holistic tradition consists of analyzing your unique inborn nature or constitution and making supportive lifestyle choices. Healthy choices promote healing the source of problems and developing health through balance.
Tibetan medicine explains the complex relationship between mind, body, and environment, and why the mind is the source of suffering. To be happy, you need to create a healthy mind. By using Tibetan medicine for your self-care and integrative care, you can create a healthy mind, even on your deathbed.
Tibetan medicine has roots in the ancient, indigenous culture of Tibet. In the 8th century, the first ever international conference about Tibetan medicine was held at Samye Monastery in Tibet. Physicians from India, China, Persia, and other areas attended. Most historians believe that after the conference, Elder Yuthok Yonten Gonpo, an eminent Tibetan doctor, synthesized the best theories and medical practices into the Gyueshi, the fundamental text of Tibetan medicine. The first Tibetan medical college was established in Lhasa, Tibet, in 1696. In the early 1900s, the two major medical schools in Lhasa were the Chagpori Medical College and the Men-Tsee-Khang (Tibetan Medical and Astrological Institute).
In 1961, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama re-established the Men-Tsee-Khang in Dharamsala, India. This medical college educates post-high-school students during a six-year intensive program to become a doctor of Tibetan medicine. After graduating, the new doctors work under the supervision of senior doctors. You can learn more about the history and practices of Tibetan medicine in the section
What Is the Philosophy of Tibetan Medicine?
Tibetan medicine teaches that the purpose of life is to be happy. By using Tibetan medicine for self-care, you will become aware of how your thoughts and behaviors influence your health and happiness. Tibetan medicine can be part of any program of integrative healthcare.
According to Tibetan medicine:
Health is balance and dis-ease is imbalance.
Tibetan medicine is different from conventional Western medicine because it emphasizes finding and treating imbalance as the first step toward healing and health. Dis-ease or imbalance can be present well before physical symptoms appear or before symptoms are so severe that you seek attention from a conventional health professional.
Treating illness requires correcting the underlying imbalance.
So the goals of treating dis-ease are not about covering up a symptom or reacting to a single abnormality. Instead, each symptom and sign of dysfunction sheds light on the overall pattern of imbalance. Healing negative thinking and making healthy lifestyle choices can restore balance in your body and mind.
Wellbeing is a lifelong process of living in harmony with your unique nature or constitution.
Tibetan medicine teaches that all living beings are made up of energy. You were born with a unique nature or constitution consisting of three primary energies: loong, tripa, and baekan. Loong is movement energy. Tripa is hot energy. Baekan is cold energy. Tibetan medicine is the art and science of keeping your primary energies in balance with your constitution in order to promote your health and happiness.
Your unique constitution has both strengths and weaknesses. By learning about your constitution, you can enhance your strengths and turn your weaknesses into assets, or at least keep them from sabotaging you.
What are the underlying principles of Tibetan medicine?
Tibetan medicine teaches four basic principles:
Karma refers to the universal law of cause and effect. Your individual behavior affects you, other people, and the environment. Sometimes your choices have an immediate and obvious effect, and sometimes the effects are not so obvious at first, or will affect you much later in a roundabout way. For example, choosing to eat a sugary cereal for breakfast may have both the immediate effect of pleasure (from satisfying a sweet tooth) and a delayed consequence of sluggishness and decreased metabolism in the afternoon. Tibetan medicine teaches the importance of being aware of both the immediate and long-term consequences of your choices so that you learn to choose what promotes health and happiness.
Suffering, which can be physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional, is a universal condition of human life. In fact, most of human life is spent trying to avoid suffering or to relieve suffering in one form or another. Physical pain is not the same as suffering, although both can be present together. Tibetan medicine teaches that suffering results from interpreting life in a negative way.
Healing, according to Tibetan medicine, results from creating a healthy mind and making lifestyle choices that bring your primary energies back into balance with your inborn constitution.
Happiness is not simply temporary pleasures and accomplishments. True happiness is lasting peace, meaning, integrity, and wellbeing that result from positive thinking and balanced living
What Do I Need to Know about My Unique Constitution?
According to Tibetan medicine, you were born with a constitution that is made up of a unique combination of three primary energies: loong, tripa, and baekan. To be happy and healthy, you need to make choices that keep your three energies consistent with your innate constitution. Your three primary energies are composed of five universal aspects of energy, called the five elements (joong-wa-nya in Tibetan).
Five Universal Elements
Tibetan medicine teaches that everything is made up of energy. This energy has five universal characteristics, called elements. The five elements explain qualities and physiologic functions that work synergistically to maintain physical and mental health. To describe the five elements, Tibetan medicine uses everyday terms that highlight their universal qualities:
Earth refers to the aspect of energy that provides stability and structure. For example, you can sit up because of the earth element.
Water refers to the aspect of energy that provides moisture, lubrication, and smoothness. For example, your blood is made of the water element.
Fire refers to the aspect of energy that drives growth, development, metabolism, and absorption of food. For example, you can digest your food because of the fire element.
Air refers to the aspect of energy that governs movement in your body, including blood circulation and growth of skin. For example, your heart pumps blood and you can move your body because of the air element.
Space refers to the aspect of energy that allows the other elements to interact and coexist. For example, space in your mouth provides room for your teeth and tongue to help you chew and speak properly.
The five elements of earth, water, fire, air, and space combine to form the three primary energies: movement, heat, and cold. In the Tibetan language, these three primary energies are called loong, tripa, and baekan. The Tibetan word nyepa refers to these energies that are essential for life. You, like everyone else, were born with a unique combination of the three primary energies, called your constitutional nature or constitution.
Primary Energy
Tibetan Term
Composed of This Element:
Movement
loong
air
Heat
tripa
fire
Cold
baekan
earth, water
Each of your three primary energies has many divisions and subdivisions. To be healthy and happy, you must keep your loong, tripa, and baekan consistent with their percentages in your inborn constitution.
Seven general constitutions or energy patterns
Tibetan medicine teaches that the three primary energies interact to form seven general constitutions. Each constitution is named by the dominant energy or energies:
Loong: Loong dominates tripa and baekan.
Tripa: Tripa dominates loong and baekan.
Baekan: Baekan dominates loong and tripa.
Loong/tripa or tripa/loong: Loong and tripa dominate baekan.
Loong/baekan or baekan/loong: Loong and baekan dominate tripa.
Tripa/baekan or baekan/tripa: Tripa and baekan dominate loong.
Loong/tripa/baekan: All three energies are in equal amounts, a very rare constitution.
Your inborn constitution does not change throughout your lifetime. However, your three primary energies rise and fall according to your thoughts, lifestyle choices, the time of day, your stage in life, the weather, and other factors. Your energies can become unbalanced: either too high, too low, or disturbed.
According to Tibetan medicine, baekan is highest in the first stage of life, when children are growing and developing tissues. Tripa is highest during the second and third stages of life, when adults need sufficient heat energy to work, go to school, develop a career, raise a family, form and nurture relationships, and do all the other busy activities involved with adulthood. Later, in the fourth stage of life, loong is highest when older adults’ nervous systems becomes more sensitive as the physical body gradually deteriorates.
Find out your unique constitution
The gold standard for determining your particular constitution is to have a consultation with a qualified and experienced practitioner of Tibetan medicine. Such practitioners have graduated from a six-year medical program and worked as new doctors under the supervision of senior doctors. An example is the Medical College at the Men-Tsee-Khang , the Tibetan Medical Institute of His Holiness the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala, India. Because Tibetan medicine is new in North America, you may not have access to a qualified and experienced practitioner of Tibetan medicine.
However, you can complete two free, online, anonymous, research-based tools developed at the University of Minnesota. Use the Constitutional Self-Assessment Tool (CSAT) and the Lifestyle Guidelines Tool (LGT) to learn about your constitution and how to live in harmony with it.
What causes imbalance in your three primary energies?
Many factors can cause your three primary energies to go out of balance. Examples are what you eat and drink, seasonal changes, your lifestyle behaviors, and your mental patterns. Tibetan medicine teaches that what you think impacts your health and energy balance. Both positive and negative thinking affect your body. For example, happiness and compassion calm your body. In contrast, anger increases your heart rate and blood pressure, causes shallow and irregular breathing, and depresses your immune system. Negative thinking doesn’t just refer to a pessimistic outlook. Rather, negative thinking encompasses three major categories of afflictive thought patterns that cause suffering as described below.
Three Categories of Negative Thinking
Tibetan medicine teaches that three categories of negative thinking, called mental poisons, produce suffering instead of happiness. The three categories of mental poisons are:
• Greed –including attachments to desires, people, objects, and behaviors.
• Anger –including hostility, irritation, aversion, and aggression.
• Delusion –including confusion, delusion, ignorance, and narrow-mindedness.
Each category of mental poisons affects one of the three primary energies described below.
Mental Poison:
Causes Imbalance in This Primary Energy:
Imbalance Can Lead to These Health Problems:
greed, attachments, desire
loong
anxiety, movement disorders, insomnia, mental illness, addictions
anger, hostility, aggression
tripa
inflammations, infections, metabolic and hormonal problems
delusion, confusion, close-mindedness
baekan
respiratory disorders, obesity, diabetes
Your inborn constitution makes you particularly vulnerable to a certain type of mental attitude as you go about your daily life. If, for example, loong is the dominant energy in your constitution, you are prone to engaging in the mental poison of greed, attachments, and desire. Consequently, you are vulnerable to developing anxiety, movement disorders, insomnia, mental illness, and addictions.
In other words, greed both causes and results from an imbalance in loong energy. Anger causes and results from an imbalance in tripa energy. Delusion causes and results from an imbalance in baekan energy.
When one primary energy goes out of balance, the other two energies are likely to go out of balance, too. Chronic energy imbalance can produce complex health problems involving loong, tripa, and baekan. Bringing all three energies back into balance can be difficult. For example, increasing heat (tripa) energy can decrease cold (baekan) energy. Bringing all three energies back into balance requires intricate interventions.
How can I bring my three primary energies back into balance with my inborn constitution?
Creating a healthy mind and making healthy lifestyle choices will help to bring your primary energies back into balance with your innate constitution. For example, your inborn constitution may consist of about 45% tripa, 35% baekan, and 20% loong, meaning that you have a tripa/baekan constitution. If you lead a stressful life, your loong is likely to increase and even become your dominant energy. Consequently, you will suffer because your energies are not in balance with your inborn constitution. Then you need to calm your thinking, practice relaxation techniques, and make other lifestyle choices that decrease your loong and bring you back into balance.
Try to live in a manner that keeps your three energies consistent with their percentages in your inborn constitution. Some of the simplest lifestyle choices consist of eating food that balances your energies. When, for example, you are cold and your baekan energy is too high, you can eat spicy food to increase your heat (tripa) energy and decrease your cold (baekan) energy.
This process of continuously reestablishing balance means to heal from the source and not just chase symptoms! Tibetan medicine teaches that your mental habits and beliefs have a profound effect on both your emotions and your physical body at a very basic level.
How Can I Use Tibetan Medicine to Improve My Health and Wellbeing?
You can use Tibetan medicine as part of integrative care. Tibetan medicine will help you to bring your energies back into balance and live a healthy, happy life. Conventional health care can be beneficial for acute illnesses and when surgery, pharmaceutical medications, and technology are needed.
As His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama wrote,
Tibetan medicine is far more advanced in the understanding of the nature of mind than Western medicine. In matters of understanding the physical functioning of the human body, Tibetan medicine …is less advanced than Western medicine. Without mixing the two approaches, and without saying one is better than the other, both schools should work together in order to find ways of understanding and thus boost the effectiveness of the two healing techniques. (Men-Tsee-Khang, 2017, back cover)
Practices to heal the three mental poisons
Tibetan medicine teaches practices to heal negative thinking that can poison your mind and life. These practices include mindfulness, lovingkindness, compassion, and ethical behavior. By healing the mental poisons, you can create and maintain a healthy mind and body. Even when you are on your deathbed, Tibetan medicine can help you to create a healthy mind and die peacefully. Regularly practicing the meditations and behavior below can help you to heal the mental poisons, bring your energies into balance, and live a happy, meaningful life.
Mental Poison:
Energy Imbalance:
Meditation on:
Behavior:
greed, attachments, desire
loong
impermanence
(continuous change)
generosity, lovingkindness, and acceptance
anger, hostility, aggression
tripa
compassion
(yearning for all to be free of suffering)
actions that relieve suffering in others
delusion, confusion, closed-mindedness
baekan
wisdom
mindful awareness in the present – Wake up!
More practices to balance the three primary energies
By making informed lifestyle choices, you can bring your three primary energies into balance with your innate constitution. For example, you can increase loong by becoming replenished. You can increase tripa by eating spicy food and engaging in activities that heat you up. You can increase baekan by eating cooling foods, such as potatoes and other root vegetables, and engaging in activities that cool you down.
If any of your energies is too high, you can engage in the opposite behavior. The table below describes how to calm loong that is too high, cool tripa that is too high, and warm baekan that is too high.
Energy out of Balance
General Treatment
Loong (movement energy):
Calm loong by doing what is warm, grounded, and calming. For example, listen quietly to calming music.
Tripa (hot energy):
Cool Tripa by doing what is dry and cool. For example, stay out of the sun on a hot day.
Baekan (cold energy):
Warm baekan by doing what is dry and warm. For example, put on more clothes if you are cold.
Tibetan medicine pays particular attention to diet and lifestyle behaviors in order to balance the three primary energies. The term lifestyle behaviors includes types of exercise, choices in environment and climate, leisure activities, sleep patterns, and even spices or tastes in food. The recommendations often are more detailed than the usual considerations about calories, sweets, and fats.
The Practice of Happiness
Tibetan medicine teaches that the purpose of life is to be happy! The way to be happy is to make choices that lead to happiness, rather than suffering. A healthy mind and healthy living create a life in which you can flourish.
The table below lists characteristics of happiness. Rather than engage in mental poisons, increase positivity by practicing these characteristics. Training your mind to behave in this way can heal the mental poisons, your mind, and your body.
LOVE
COMPASSION
KINDNESS
CONTENTMENT
INTEGRITY
RESPONSIBILITY
ALTRUISM
FORGIVENESS
JOY
PEACE
PATIENCE
HUMILITY
TOLERANCE
MEANING
EQUANIMITY
Lasting happiness is within your reach. A beautiful lotus flower must root in mud in order to rise up and bloom. Like a lotus, you can transform the “mud” in your life into nourishment so that you rise up to your best self. As the Dalai Lama teaches, difficult people and situations are your best teachers if you develop compassion and loving kindness for yourself and others. When you heal your mind, you heal your life.
Accepting death and dying peacefully
Tibetan medicine teaches that death is not separate from life, but part of life. You die like you live. Unless you heal the mental poisons during your life, they will trouble you while you are dying. Therefore, you are best off developing a healthy mind now. Then you can face death with acceptance, peace, and even joy.
What Happens During a Tibetan Medicine Consultation?
A qualified, experienced practitioner of Tibetan medicine will use three methods to assess your individual constitutional energy pattern and degree of imbalance.
• Questioning – Such as asking about your lifestyle, thinking, environment, food, and behavior.
• Observation – Looking at your skin, tongue, and urine sample.
• Touch – Feeling the radial artery pulse on both your wrists, inspecting any abnormal growths or painful areas/points of tenderness on your body, and checking your skin temperature.
To get the most out of your consultation, tell the practitioner about your health concerns and ask the following four questions:
• What is my inborn constitutional nature?
• What, if any, energies are out of balance?
• How can I bring my energies back into balance?
• How can I live in harmony with my constitution?
What about Tibetan medicines?
Practitioners of Tibetan medicine may prescribe Tibetan medicines, in addition to dietary and lifestyle recommendations. Tibetan medicines are composites of various plants and occasionally minerals. Some Tibetan medicines have over 100 components. In each Tibetan medicine, some ingredients treat the underlying imbalance and others treat any side effects that may occur.
Before taking a Tibetan medicine, tell the practitioner if you are on any other medications. Ask where the Tibetan medicine came from, what the purpose is, if there are any side effects, and when you should take it. Make sure that the medicine came from a qualified pharmacy. Also, let your regular healthcare provider know that you consulted with a Tibetan medicine practitioner and are taking a Tibetan medicine.How Can I Practice Tibetan Meditation?
Tibetan medicine emphasizes the connection between mind, behavior, and body. You may be amazed at how unruly your mind is when you try to sit quietly and observe your thoughts. Tibetan meditation is designed to tame your monkey mind and help it become a tool that you can use to create health and happiness. Meditation is like training your mental muscle. Your mind improves with practice.
Become familiar with your mind
Meditation is an essential part of Tibetan medicine. The purpose is to investigate the nature of reality, tame the “monkey mind,” and transform the mind into a tool to create health and happiness.
You have many options for taming your mind. For example, you can meditate while sitting, walking, lying down, dancing, or even listening to music. You may feel less distracted if you sit while meditating. Just start with a brief two-minute meditation every hour or so to calm and focus your mind.
Tibetan meditations you can use
These three Tibetan meditations will help you to let go of negativity and develop lovingkindness and compassion toward yourself, others, and the world around you. Lovingkindness and compassion enhance the immune system, open the heart, and promote balance. Doing these meditations regularly will promote your health and happiness.
Meditation on Compassion
• Make yourself comfortable sitting, standing, walking, or lying down.
• Straighten your back, relax your body, and breathe deeply; shift your focus from external distractions to your mind.
• Engage in circular breathing throughout the meditation: Breathe slowly and deeply through your nose, from your abdomen, with your in-breath the same length as out-breath, and no break in-between.
• Chant this Tibetan mantra repeatedly, evenly, and quietly with the intention of developing compassion:
Om Mani Padme Hum
Here is how you pronounce this mantra: (h)ome, man ee, pad mee, hoom.
This mantra means the “jewel (compassion) in the center of the lotus (your heart).” Chanting this mantra can help you to let go of negativity and fill your heart with compassion and lovingkindness. Regular, systematic chanting of this mantra promotes physical, mental, and spiritual health. Some people believe that chanting this mantra for a person who is dying helps the person to let go and die peacefully.
Tibetan Prostrations
Tibetan prostrations help to harmonize mind and body. They are a Tibetan version of “Sun Salutations,” a series of popular yoga poses.
• Stand tall like a mountain, with your hands in prayer pose in front of your chest at the level of your heart. In yoga, this posture is called Mountain Pose.
• Relax your body, lower your eyelids, and breathe deeply; shift your focus from external distractions to your mind.
• Engage in circular breathing throughout this meditation: Breathe slowly and deeply through your nose, from your abdomen, with your in-breath the same length as out-breath, and no break in-between.
• Keeping your hands together in prayer pose, place your hands at the crown of your head, then at your forehead, then at your throat, and then at the level of your heart.
• Kneel on the floor, with your hands flat on floor, and touch your forehead to the floor. Or, for a full-length prostration, kneel on the floor and then lie flat on the floor, forehead touching floor, arms outstretched, and hands flat on floor.
• Stand up, return to Mountain Pose, and bring your attention back to circular breathing.
• Do at least three prostrations.
• Stand up and return to Mountain Pose; bring your attention back to circular breathing.
• Open your eyes; continue circular breathing, mindfulness, and centeredness throughout the day.
Tonglen Meditation
“Breathe in suffering and breathe out compassion”
• Make yourself comfortable sitting, standing, walking, or lying down.
• Straighten your back, relax your body, and breathe deeply; shift your focus from external distractions to your mind.
• Engage in circular breathing throughout this meditation: Breathe slowly and deeply through your nostrils, from your abdomen, with the in-breath the same length as the out-breath, and without a pause in between the in-breath and out-breath.
• Do Tonglen for yourself: As you breathe in, let your greed, anger, jealousy, fear, attachment, confusion, and other negative thinking come to the surface. On your out-breath, breathe out this negative thinking, and fill the empty space with compassion.
• Do Tonglen for someone you love: Breathe in the suffering of someone you love, and breathe out compassion to the person. Realize that your loved one wants to be happy, but is suffering instead. Open your heart to your loved one.
• Do Tonglen for someone about whom you feel neutral: Breathe in the suffering of someone about whom you feel neutral (for example, a clerk in a store), and breathe out compassion to this person. Realize that the individual wants to be happy but is suffering instead. Open your heart to the person.
• Do Tonglen for someone you dislike: Breathe in the suffering of someone you think has hurt you, and breathe out compassion to the person. Realize that the individual, like you and everyone else, wants to be happy. Because of negative thinking, the person makes harmful choices that lead to suffering. If you increase that suffering, the person may behave even worse. You are best off developing compassion so you can think clearly about how to deal with the individual in a manner that brings back good consequences, not bad ones (karma). Open your heart to the person.
• Do Tonglen for the world: Breathe in the suffering of the world, and breathe out compassion to the world. Realize that everyone in the world wants to be happy, but too often makes unhealthy choices that lead to suffering instead. By developing universal compassion, you will take steps to help relieve this suffering. Open your heart to the world.
• Purification: At the end of your meditation, visualize the suffering you breathed in as black smoke. You must let go of this black smoke, or it could increase your own suffering. Breathe out this black smoke completely. Then fill your heart and your whole being with compassion toward yourself, everyone else, and the world.
This meditation uses the breath to transform negativity into compassion for yourself and others. By doing Tonglen Meditation on a regular basis, you will let go of negativity, open your heart, and develop clear thinking that leads to healthy lifestyle choices.
External Tibetan Therapies
Tsa-rLung Therapy
The Tibetan Tsa-rLung practice, Tsa-rLung-‘khrul’khor-gyi-bcos-thabs, is a yogic tantric tradition of ancient Tibetan and Indian Buddhist masters. More than 2500 years ago, Buddha’s healing hands cured many people in this world and the tradition is still practiced by the Tibetan spiritual lamas and masters. They cure the people by giving love, compassion, spiritual energy, tantric and mantric power. They transfer positive energy through their hands by touch and restore the body/mind unbalances. This practice entirely belongs to the Buddhist teaching and practice.
Concept: The proper flow of the energy through the body channels (Tsa) brings the cause of a good health and prolongs life. It helps to avoid the toxin accumulation in the channels which blocks the channels and heart functions of the body/mind. The Tsa-rLung therapy practitioners learn the art of holistic healing and the deep nature of the human body/mind systems by knowing the structure of the traditional psycho-physical nature and its functions. One who understands the method may become able to regulate these complex systems. Certain subjects are beyond the human knowledge and can only be experienced by meditation and practice.
The Tsa-rLung practice starts with the knowledge on Tsa, ‘channels‘, and how to use the wind power through yogic practice. The concentration, meditation and visualization as well as love and compassion motivation are this tradition's way of practice.
Channels
Tsa means channels, tubes or passages where the mind and sense consciousnesses, blood, nutrients, and wind energy flow. The wind flows in the channels and transports the blood and consciousness during day and night until the end of life. As the function of the mind depends on the subtle wind, Buddhism calls it ‘vehicle of the mind‘, while Tsa is called ‘root of life‘ because life depends on the energy and blood circulation through the channels.
The channels exist in three energetic groups. Tsa-Uma, ‘wind channel‘, Tsa-Roma, ‘fire channel‘ and Tsa-Kyangma, ‘water channel‘. They are all similar but keep different aspects of energy. Wind, fire and water are the three essential energies that sustain life. The energies dwell and function in the tiny particles of the body as well as in the boundless cosmic body and elements. For example Mount Meru, the central axis of the world is the relative symbol of the human body middle channel.
Channels are the psychic paths
The 72.000 described channels are divided into three main groups. They all originate from the three mental poisons. Each channel functions influences the daily life and its positive and negative emotion states through physical and mental effects.
Cause of blockage of the psychic passage
Blockages of the psychic paths are not only caused by psychological problems. Other strong factors like unwholesome food and behavior and other external factors can cause them. Wrong diet and behavior are actually important physical cause of the positive or negative energies, and micro-vitae or bacteria srin-bu increasing and deceasing strength in the channels. In short, all psychic, energetic and physical disorders manifested from the mind, wind and micro-bacterial aggravation are agents to produce channels blockages that finally manifest through physical symptoms.
The Tsa-rlung Therapy
The function of the Tsa-rlung therapy is to restore the subtle wind and energy flow systems and bring the blocked channels back to normal function. First of all one should diagnose the individual constitution, temperament and energetic disorders by traditional methods.
Tsa-rlung Diagnosis
The patient should lay down in bed or sit comfortably on a cushion, and diagnosis is made with three important methods.
• Diagnosis by intuitive mind.
• Diagnosis with eyes.
• Flash light observation.
Some useful techniques from the classical Tibetan Medicine may also be used for the diagnosis.
Tsa-rlung therapy has three important sections according to the energy condition:
• Tsa-rlung preliminary therapy
• Basic therapy
• External and internal energetic therapies Could be in person or Distance Healing
Hor-mey therapy (ཧོར་མེ།)
Hor-mey therapy is a simple and effective therapy used in traditional Tibetan Medicine. In this treatment herbal wraps are soaked in heated oil, then applied to special points on the body. Hor-mey works to balance our wind-element energy, known as “Loong” (རླུང།). It is a warm, relaxing and nourishing treatment.
Benefits:
Hor-mey is effective for reducing mental and physical stress. It helps boost the immune system, combats insomnia and increases the quality of sleep. Hor-mey is indicated for common mind and body imbalances including: stress, anxiety, panic attacks, obsessive thoughts, “monkey” mind, floating sensations, depression, PTSD, ADD, ADHD, and insomnia. Hor-mey therapy is also very effective for women’s health issues (menstrual problems, pregnancy, and menopause). It can increase the wellness of seniors and benefit people recovering from serious illnesses such as cancer.
Moxibustion
Moxibustion is a form of therapy that entails the burning of mugwort leaves. This is a small, spongy herb that is believed to enhance healing with acupuncture. As such, the leaves are burnt close to the skin’s surface using a stick to apply heat.
The practice is derived from Chinese medicine. Its purpose is to strengthen the blood, stimulate the flow of Qi or energy, and maintain good health.
According to Chinese medicine, an increase in the circulation of Qi can help your body deal with a broad range of issues, including digestive problems and chronic pain.
What Does the Process Entail?
Your moxibustion therapist can apply the technique directly or indirectly. When used directly, the moxa cone rests on the site of treatment on your body. The practitioner ignites one end of the cone and leaves it to burn slowly. Once your skin starts to turn red and you begin to feel the heat, the therapist removes the cone.
Indirect moxibustion is more common and also a safe option. In this approach, the burning moxa doesn’t come into direct contact with your skin. Instead, the practitioner holds it about an inch away from your body. Once the skin becomes warm and red, they will remove the moxa from near your skin.
Another indirect use of moxa entails using an insulating layer of salt or garlic. The therapist places one of these items between the cone and your skin. Alternatively, they can also fill moxa boxes with the ingredient, ignite it, and put it on the body.
Uses of Moxibustion
Alternative health practitioners say that the heat generated through moxibustion can help to increase the flow of energy throughout the body. This happens through some pathways known as meridians. Chinese traditional medicine considers the stimulation of energy essential to help your body achieve health and wellness.
Moxibustion is founded on the belief that blockages in the flow of energy lead to mental and physical health problems. Because of this, it’s used to treat:
• Tendonitis
• Ulcers
• Fatigue
• Cancer
• Digestive problems
Benefits of Moxibustion
Several studies have been conducted in trying to establish how moxibustion therapy benefits your health. They also strive to find out the safety and effectiveness of the procedure in treating various health conditions.
One study has found moxibustion to be excellent therapy for chronic kidney disease. Researchers found it to have a great effect on reducing serum creatinine, which is responsible for poor kidney function in high doses.
Hot flashes. A study involving 51 women in their postmenopausal stages tried to establish the effect of moxibustion on hot flashes. The researchers found that undergoing 14 sessions of the therapy helped reduce the severity and frequency of hot flashes.
Ulcerative colitis. The existing scientific evidence on the use of moxibustion to treat inflammation of the bowel is not conclusive. The studies determined that the technique doesn’t provide any benefits for people with ulcerative colitis. However, these studies were of low quality.
However, studies are ongoing to establish the safety and efficacy of moxa heat in the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease.