Reply To: Acupuncture Bootcamp
My goal is to relieve the confusion! 😀
1. I don’t like the wording of the answer and have repaired it under you keen observation:
“Correct! The answer is SP 3 (Taibai), HT 7 (Shenmen). This is classic Spleen Qi Deficiency. SP 3 (Taibai) is the source point, and therefore best point to tonify on that channel. HT 7 (Shenmen) is the source point on Fire, and thereby best point to tonify on that channel. Here you have tonified the Earth element, as well as the Fire Element (which is the Mother of Earth, therefore also great to tonify the Spleen)!”
I agree that it should have a clear explanation that we’re tonifying the Mother
2. The sample questions our team compiled for all acu/TCM exams comes from multiple reliable sources (read: for some, we got permission to just use them as they are, and for others we modified them to avoid copyright while retaining their essence). You are 100% correct that there is no precedence for asking Five-Element questions for the exam. Meanwhile, in the real world, we will just pick a path and stay on it. I absolutely love that you want to get to the bottom of this. It means a lot because you’re passionate about passing the exam, and then doing well in practice. However, there’s no real resource to pass on.
I will say this, however:
– if you know your Five-Element sequences and their various names (Generating, Controlling, Overacting, Insulting; Mother, Son/Child, Father/Grandparent)
– if you know the two configurations of the Five-Elements (the one where all the elements are in a circle, and the one where Earth is at the centre)
– if you know the Five-Shu points, their actions, and their relation to the elements depending on whether the channel is Yin or Yang
you’re gonna do just fine with Five-Element.