Gosh, it is so true. That is truly one of the aspects of TCM that takes the longest to learn. Always looking at the pattern over what it usually is.
That being said, in the 2nd half of the course you will see that I talk about ‘tendencies’ for a lot of the TCM illnesses and diseases. Cancer certainly ‘tends’ to have a mass, you just always have to be open to what the symptoms say and drop any pre-conceived notions if the pattern is different!