A selection from Meditations on the Tarot

One of the most common references that I make to the magisterial Meditations on the Tarot, (the magnum opus published anonymously and posthumously by (we now realize) Valentin Tomberg) is found in the chapter devoted to the Temperance card. The reference is to “the problem of fluids” and because of this it offers a clear analogy to the Taiyang conformation. One of the most profound lessons, and indeed the first spiritual exercise discussed in the very first chapter dedicated to the Magician is about analogical thinking as the foundation of hermeticism. Of course, it also ventures into the realm of what Thinley Norbu calls “playmind” and what is known as “wu wei” in Daoist terminology. It is that quality of thinking that delights me, and allows me to perceive the Chinese medicine in everything, including the Tarot, and Angels. What channel do you suppose angel wings would attach to, after all? And, at least in my current understanding, one can map the activity angels in such natural phenomena as the very water cycle in nature, here in this sublunar realm.

I can say unequivocally that Meditations on the Tarot has become my favorite book of all time.

The problem of fluids is that of the dynamic functioning of the whole human

being, i.e. corporeal, psychic and spiritual. In reality, it amounts to that of life —

understood as a comprehensive spiritual, psychic and corporeal process. For just

as there exists a system of physical circulation, so also there exists a system of vital

and astral circulation, which in its turn is simply a reflection of the system of circulation

comprising spirit, soul and body—the threefold body—as a living unity.

The principle underlying this total system of circulation is the divine likeness.

And as it is this which has undergone the disfiguring effect of original sin, it is

the mission of the guardian Angel to see to it that the total system of circulation

functions in as healthy a way as possible. The guardian Angel therefore watches

over the functioning of the system of spiritual-psychic-corporeal circulation, i.e.

the health and the life of the whole human being. This is why the Card of the

fourteenth Arcanum represents him to us as engaged in the accomplishing of his

office of regulating the system of circulation, or the human being's fluidic system.

The system in question comprises several active centres —the "lotuses", the nerve

centres, the glands, to name only the principal ones — but the harmonious functioning

of all these centres depends on a single thing, a single action which takes

place at the key position: this is the current which constitutes the relationship

between the image and the likeness in man. The monad (the image) should not

exist for nothing nor should it inundate the system of circulation (the likeness) (385).

Book List

What follows is a book list that I offer to students in my mentorship to choose a title for review. Each one of these books, as surprising as it may at first appear, reflects and influences my understanding of Chinese medicine. Many more could be added to the list, of course.  

Chinese Magical Medicine

Fourth Uncle in the Mountain

A Story Waiting to Pierce You

In the Dark Places of Wisdom

Star.Ships

A Story as Sharp as a Knife

Secret Teachers of the Western World

Make Prayers to the Raven

Transforming Emotions with Chinese Medicine

The Body Bears the Burden

Waking the Tiger

How Forests Think

The Secret Teachings of Plants

Fools Crow

The Other Within

Original Tao

The Mushroom at the End of the World

Shamanism Colonialism and the Wild Man

Nervous System (Taussig)

A Thousand Plateaus 

Seven Quartets of Becoming

Early Chinese Medical Literature

For the Time Being

The Unbroken Field

Bodymind Energetics

Sacred Land, Sacred Sex, Rapture of the Deep

The Heart of Listening vol 1

Stillness

Mandate of Heaven

Meditations on the Tarot

Ever Present Origin

Secret of the Vedas

Mountains Beyond Mountains

Moby Dick

Dragon Rises Red Bird Flies

Dragon Rises Red Bird Flies, by Dr. Leon Hammer is the single most significant book that I have read, and is the greatest influence on my thinking about Chinese medicine.  I first encountered this book in the very first semester of acupuncture school.  I was wandering the stacks and pulled the book off the shelf, and leafing through its pages I experienced a powerful intuition of its importance.  As I devoured the book I discovered my life's work. I have read the book at least 8-10 times in its entirety through the years, and discover new insights with every reading.

Months later, upon the urging of my teacher Dr. Robert Johns, I began studying Shen-Hammer pulse diagnosis, (the system taught by the author of Dragon Rises Red Bird flies) with my first teacher of this system, Brian LaForgia.  Within about a year of beginning my pulse studies, I had the opportunity to begin studying directly under Dr. Hammer's tutelage.

Then, after another couple years that included assiduous pulse study, clinical training, work in a Chinese hospital, a cross-country move, and starting out in private practice, I was asked by Dr. Hammer to begin teaching a course based on his book at Dragon Rises College of Oriental Medicine.  I have taught courses based on the text there, as well as at the National University of Natural medicine, and in seminar formats, as well.  Soon, I will begin offering a course in an online format, utilizing the best university-level platform for coursework. 

Dragon Rises Red Bird Flies describes a model of Chinese medicine as it is applied to the psychological and spiritual evolution of the individual.  In discovering how the fundamental concepts of Chinese medicine represent a congenial therapeutic partnership with humanistic psychology, the book articulates the potential of Chinese medicine to assist in the becoming of individuals.  But even more importantly, Dr. Hammer's book describes how Chinese medicine is a vital and robust model of a truly psychosomatic medicine, and how, as he discovered in his own prodigious, ground-breaking work, Chinese medicine actual solves many of the conundrums that Western psychology could not satisfactorily address.  In essence, in parallel with burgeoning developments in somatic psychology, Dr. Hammer explores the full potential of Chinese medicine as a truly holistic medicine encompassing the entire scope of human experience.  

This review is not the place to describe the literally hundreds of guiding principles described in this book, deeply resonant with Classical medical and philosophical concepts, that inform my approach to practicing Chinese medicine.  I will certainly explore each and every one of those wellsprings on the blog as time goes on.  Additionally, I will also, through writing and courses, demonstrate precisely how the book informs my use of the formulas of Zhang Zhong Jing (and how the Six Conformations profoundly fulfill the imperatives outlined in Dragon Rises, Red Bird Flies).  I will also demonstrate how the work outlined in this text positions Chinese medicine at the table with any of the psychological models or schools of thought, and also is deeply intertwined with the historical development of somatic psychology in the West.  

The first 100 pages of the book introduce the theoretical underpinnings of the model, and are general enough in tone to be of interest to non-CM readers.  Many of my patients have read and benefitted from reading the book.  The fundamentally salutogenic approach is elaborated in terms of basic Chinese medicine theory.  In the heart of the text, each chapter is devoted to an elaboration of the 5-Phase model as it pertains to the natural function, cognitive style, anxiety, depression, love, sex and psychosis.  In describing these patterns, the etiology and development of the patterns is clearly elaborated.  There are many brief case studies in each chapter that further situate the ideas in more embodied scenarios.  All of the material is then summarized and compared in a chapter devoted to anxiety and depression, and a brief summary of Dr. Shen's Systems Model (incidentally, Dr. Shen's Systems Model is one of the key components that intersects with the Six Conformations).  

Finally, a word on style: this book is dense, and full of incredible insights.  It warrants close and sensitive reading.  Yet, in spite of its density, there are incredible, gleaming gems of not only crystal clear insights into life, but artful turns of phrase that will illuminate one's understanding, and ultimately shed light on clinical realities.  Every time that I read the book, another powerful phrase emerges, like a mantra, to guide my thought and clinical practice.