Natural Therapies for Anxiety

Natural Therapies for Anxiety
Acupuncture & Herbs
Massage Therapy
Energy Healing
Meditation – QiGong – Tai Chi

See video at end -
Anxiety: Frankincense and Energy Work

Approximately 38 million Americans suffer with chronic anxiety or depression with one out of eight adults currently taking antidepressant medications for these symptoms. While these medications can offer support and benefit on certain occasions, there are many people that do not respond well to this form of treatment. What happens when you need to try something else?

Natural therapies can offer tremendously helpful support in healing the root causes of this epidemic. This approach is much more comprehensive and much less invasive to the brain than using SSRI medications. Oriental medicine looks at the whole mind-body-spirit, and treats on all 3 levels.

Acupuncture

Practiced for over 2,500 years, acupuncture is a branch of Chinese medicine that treats the energetic level of the human body/mind. Did you know acupuncture is usually a profoundly relaxing experience that establishes a deep quality of restoration and balance to the central nervous system? Many people report a pleasant feeling of an altered mind state, floaty, dreamy, or sleepy after treatment. This feeling tends to stick around for a few hours after the treatment and becomes a more continuous experience with repetitive treatment.

Acupuncture works by balancing the flow of Qi, or internal life force, in the body. Energetically, anxiety is considered a byproduct of weakened Qi in the heart or kidneys. Other symptoms such as low back pain, heart palpitations, insomnia, irritability, or nightmares commonly accompany the anxiety and are naturally included as part of the treatment.

Chinese & Western Herbs

There are a number of Chinese herbal formulas that can work wonders for anxiety disorders. Here is a brief list of formulas an acupuncturist may use to treat anxiety followed by several common Western herbs that can be easily found at your local health food store:

• Peaceful (or Calm) Spirit
• Salvia and Amber
• Heavenly Emperor's classic formula
• Free and Easy Wanderer – one of our favorites!
• Suan Zao Ren Tang
• chamomile
• valerian
• lemon balm
• passion flower

Massage Therapy

Many people have found Massage Therapy to have a wonderful effect in relaxing the body-mind and re-integrating a sense of peace and calm into the nervous system. Regular massage, which we suggest either once a week or every other week for about one season, trains our body to attain and maintain a strongly serene state. It can become much easier to avoid or release the feelings that anxiety brings on.

Energy Healing

Many people find light touch/no touch energy healing helps them to reach a mind state that is so relaxed it becomes a mentally transformative experience.  In this altered state, it can feel like floating, energetic sensations throughout the body or in focused areas, and simultaneously being in a deep sleep while being aware of not being asleep.  Medical QiGong Energy Healing uses the same energy pathways as acupuncture, and externally re-balances energy (Qi) flow to assist in healing symptoms.  The therapist helps the energy of your heart and kidneys communicate harmoniously again so that deep healing can occur.

Meditation – QiGong – Tai Chi

Many people find meditation, qigong, and tai chi to be their most powerful allies in healing anxiety. With regular practice of various breathing techniques and tai chi postures, people often feel that they have much more control over their anxiety and that it need not run their life anymore. These practices can be direct gateways to the rest and restore mode of the nervous system. On a deeper level, they can help us forge a spiritual connection with our lives that instills an unshakable sense of trust and safety in the workings of the universe. 

From a holistic perspective, our symptoms are never random. There is always a reason why they creep up. In the case of anxiety, it is helpful to disengage from our personal feelings about it and look at the bigger picture. What is the anxiety telling us about ourselves and where we are at in life? Is it a warning sign that something is amiss and needs to be acknowledged or changed? In any regard, the practices mentioned here can offer a profound level of support in getting to the root of the problem and inducing a gentle course in a new direction of calmness and insight.

Natural Therapies for Insomnia

Natural Therapies for Insomnia
Acupuncture & Herbs
Massage Therapy
Energy Healing
Meditation / QiGong
Essential Oils & Ear Reflexology

Sleep disorders plague millions of Americans and can be attributed to a variety of causes. Perhaps the main cause of insomnia and restless sleep is the whirlwind pace that most modern people live with day in and day out. Our society emphasizes ‘doing’ much more than ‘being’.

From the perspective of acupuncture, the yin aspect of life is quite depleted for the average modern American.  [

In case you have never heard of yin and yang, these are the polar forces that are reflected in everything in the natural world. Yin is related to stillness, tranquility, and contemplation. Yang is related to movement, accomplishment, and function. We need yin and yang to be in balance within ourselves in order to experience true health and wellbeing.

When we are yin deficient, we easily become restless, irritable, and excessively busy. Our ability to rest and restore is compromised, as we never seem to get a break from the constant activity in our minds and our lives.

This is one of the main dilemmas that we face in terms of experiencing deep states of continuous sleep. We have forgotten how to turn our minds off due to the frantic speed of everything around us and we have become yin deficient.

The common word is stress, but there is a lot more to this picture than is implied. Another way to look at this is that the sympathetic nervous system is on overdrive. We are stuck in fight or flight mode, as we are trying to keep up with our hectic schedules and myriad responsibilities. We have excessive amounts of cortisol and adrenaline in our systems, which keep us feeling amped up and unable to rest.

With the pattern of yin deficiency and a hyperactive sympathetic nervous system, we often feel too warm, excessively thirsty, dried out, and anxious. This pattern is extremely common in menopausal women. Due to the fact that we are in fight or flight, we sometimes can’t tell if we are tired. We often feel wired or manic. Yet other times a deep-seated exhaustion is felt that penetrates into our bones.

There are many other factors that contribute to insomnia, but this is the primary issue that many people are facing. Other potential inputs are nutritional imbalances, suppressed emotions, relationship troubles, hormonal imbalances, and energetic imbalances.

Let’s take a look at a few of the top natural treatment options for insomnia:

1) Acupuncture: All of the major organs of the body are related to specific kinds of insomnia. For instance, there is a liver/gall bladder insomnia in which one is kept awake strategizing, planning and scheduling their lives at night. This person often can’t turn their minds off unless they read or watch TV before bed. Likewise, there are kidney, heart, lung and spleen forms of insomnia that all have specific manifestations. Acupuncture is an excellent treatment option for insomnia, regardless of its etiology.

For chronic insomnia, we generally recommend receiving acupuncture once a week for 4-6 weeks, then we can assess for progress. Acupuncture helps to restore balance to the central nervous system and harmonize Qi, the functional energy that underlies our general state of health. Qi can either become stagnant, meaning that too much energy is locked up in a certain area or organ, or it can become deficient, meaning that there is not enough energy in an area or organ. Either pattern can cause insomnia and both are treatable with acupuncture.

2) Herbs: There are many Chinese and Western herbs that can be very helpful for insomnia. Chinese herbs are typically used in combination to create formulas that treat specific patterns of disharmony. Western herbs are frequently used on their own. The great thing about herbs is that they don’t cause the drowsiness and disorientation that many of the Western sedative drugs do. Here is a great list, and our Acupuncturist can help you make an appropriate selection.

·         Valerian: Has mild sedative properties that help to relax the nervous system and calm the mind.

·         Chamomile: Has a mild tranquilizing and calming effect that soothes all major systems of the body.

·         Kava: A highly prized medicinal that is used to alleviate anxiety and induce deeper sleeping patterns. Kava is contraindicated for those with Liver disease.

·         Gui pi tang: A Chinese formula that nourishes the heart and spleen, for insomnia with low energy, nightmares, anxiety, depression, and possibly night sweats.

·         Tian wan bu xin dan: A Chinese formula that balances the relationship between the heart and kidneys, for symptoms such as insomnia, low back pain, anxiety, feeling of heat, thirst, and night sweats.

·         Suan zao ren tang: A Chinese formula that nourishes the heart and liver, for insomnia irritability.

·         An mian pian: A Chinese formula translated as peaceful sleep, for insomnia due to heart blood deficiency.

3) Massage Therapy:  This is the ultimate way of teaching our body how to go into a deeply relaxed state.  Through massage, our muscles relax, circulation flows smoothly, and our mind quiets.  For insomnia, we recommend getting a massage once per week for 5-8 weeks to start making full relaxation a welcome change. We like to reassess at this point to see if continued  weekly massage is still needed, or changing the frequency to a massage every 2-4 weeks would be of better benefit.  The goal is to re-train the body to attain and maintain a state of pure relaxation and great sleep on its own.

4) Energy Healing:  Many people find light touch/no touch energy healing helps them to reach a mind state that is so relaxed it becomes a mentally transformed experience.  In this altered state, it can feel like floating, energetic sensations throughout the body or in focused areas, and simultaneously being in a deep sleep while being aware of not being asleep.  Medical QiGong Energy Healing uses the same energy pathways as acupuncture, and externally re-balances energy (Qi) flow to assist in healing symptoms.

5) Meditation and QiGong: Meditation – either still or gently moving like QiGong, is a deeply restorative practice and can replicate many of the benefits of sleep. In fact, meditation is often considered to be even more beneficial because it can lead to a state of non-thought, which is said by many spiritual traditions to be the deepest state of relaxation and healing possible for human beings. In sleep, our minds are still processing and dreaming. Spend 15 minutes before bed meditating and it will quite likely allow you to fall asleep faster and to sleep more peacefully. Not sure how to do this? We can teach you, and there are many excellent guided meditations.

6) See our YouTube video on Essential Oil and Ear Reflexology for Insomnia. Click the image to access the video.