The Great Western Disadvantage:Memorization of Linear Acupuncture Points vs. Understanding Points fr

"The points are not merely normal, each has a profound meaning." Sun Si Miao Acupuncture Points. The word "point" is a linear concept; a coordinate, the intersection of two lines. The Western system for recognition of the names of Acupuncture Points is distinctly different than what the Chinese student learns. To the Western mind, memorization of a numbered sequence, channel by channel, and the linear points that are identified by alphanumeric codes is all that is required. However efficient this may seem to the Western mind, Western students of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Acupuncture to be specific, have been deprived of a significant advantage that the Chinese Acupuncture students have had for millennia: insights into Chinese culture, medicine and learning about each individual Acupuncture point in and of itself. Traditionally, the knowledge of Chinese Medicine was handed down from father to son, teacher to apprentice. The son was required to memorize the classics, and point names with mnemonic symbols helped in remembering the important information of Acupuncture Points. The Master may also have hidden his secrets in point names, with the meanings known only to his students, thus protecting his secrets from other practitioners and further, protecting his income. The selection of Acupuncture point names is a direct reflection of the Taoist view of man as a microscopic manifestation of the entire universe, the Confucian commandments of social propriety and China's agrarian culture's observation of and dependence on nature. "With heaven above and earth below," man was viewed as the ever flowing interchange of yin and yang subject to the five phases and utterly inseparable from the Tao itself. With time and study, the Acupuncture point names become much more than labels- they become guides to the understanding of the points and the system of medicine that named them.