Slow Medicine
We’re tired. Living in a culture that puts immense value on productivity, profit, and individual accomplishment, and sees a successful human life as one that yields all of these in ever-increasing returns…. well, it’s exhausting.
One answer to this madness that we all feel on one level or another, is the collection of cultural movements that define themselves as “slow.” Slow food. Sit awhile and open your sensory orifices to take in every delectable experience that a beautifully prepared meal has to offer. Slow fashion. Support local, handmade, artisan garments that don’t depend on underpaid, overworked, ill-treated labor forces.
And slow medicine. These are indigenous medicines, originating alongside wisdom traditions, that understand the pace of nature and don’t urge or rush the healing process. These are medicines that listen and follow, to the seasons, to the plants, to the human bodies. These are medicines that help nature accomplish itself, by working holistically, humbly, and thoroughly. A fast medicine is one that aims to erase symptoms as quickly as possible, no matter what the cost; a slow medicine is one that engages with symptoms, unpacking the messages they bring so that therapeutic input can be appropriate to the person, time, and place. It’s true, results may arrive more gradually, but the resolution of illness is much more likely to be complete and total.
You may have figured out by now, these things aren’t actually slow. They’re regular speed and everything else is sped up. In my treatment room I slow down, but it actually feels like I'm normalizing and finding a more authentic rhythm. I love moving at the pace of the breath, the pulse, the qi in the channels. I love meeting these forces in liminal space, hoping that I might understand what they’re expressing and that they might show me how to be of most benefit to the person on my treatment table.
But I struggle to slow down elsewhere in my life, having been conditioned by the fast-paced culture of my upbringing. For instance, one of the guiding principles in my life is kindness. I strive to find kindness in every situation, with every person I encounter. I realized recently that finding that kindness is dependent on slowing down. The other day I was walking quickly down the street with my mind on my destination, and I missed the elderly person struggling to open a door beside me. They could’ve used help and I didn’t realize until I was to the next corner. So, I keep reminding myself to practice slowness. As I see the benefits of slow medicine, in my practice and in my own health, I strive to let that wisdom of moving at nature's pace recalibrate all aspects of my life.