Winter solstice is soon approaching, officially beginning our Winter season.  In Chinese Medicine, winter is associated with the Water element, the Kidneys and Urinary Bladder, the colors blue and black, the emotions of both fear and fortitude, the salty flavor, and a natural sense of introspection.

At White Pine Acupuncture, we have a few things to share with you.  First and foremost, we bid you well at this festive time of year.  We hope that your life is filled with abundant health, love, and prosperity.  Oh, both Tara(our fabulous massage therapist) and I have gift certificates that could make great stocking stuffers! It seems that we often wish that our friends and loved ones could experience the wonder of a treatment but just don’t know how to give them that gentle nudge of encouragement; a gift certificate is a lovely way to do just that.  Tara will be at White Pine more often through the holidays and is happy to facilitate the gift certificate purchases.

Tara is now offering hot stone massage! She finds it is a great way to truly warm the core.  Great timing as we head into these colder months!

Secondly, Heather Spangler, L.Ac., will be here at White Pine December 14-19. We are so appreciative of her seasonal presence.  She is both a delightful woman and a very talented and caring acupuncturist.  She will be coming down from Maine and is looking forward to spending time here.  If you have not yet scheduled a session with her but would like to, please visit our online scheduler.  The link is whitepineacupuncture.fullslate.com

And for the DIY component, I am happy to share a kitchen medicine recipe for nourishing the Kidneys.  It is gomasio.  Gomasio is a Japanese condiment, essentially a substitute for table salt. What you need to make make it:

sesame seeds

fine sea salt

dried seaweed (nori,dulse, arame, kelp, kombu)

Combine sesame seeds and salt in a 8:1 ratio. Shred tiny bits of seaweed into the mixture

 

And for the literary component, I want to share a haiku reflective of hardship and loss.  In this cold, dark time we can readily connect with heavy emotions and death.  Often the challenge is to both be with it and move through it.  This haiku I wrote years ago, yet it feels so accurately appropriate at this moment as I just learned of a mother going through the tragedy of losing her sixteen old son last night. We send our hearts of compassion out to his family, and especially to his mother.

the incense, candles, and oils

waft up through the heavy

skies of rain

 

bringing a mother’s love of

a child lost to this world