Everyday Acupuncture Podcast

Qi is not pronounceable in English. Its whistled aspiration is not a sound found in our language. And much as we can approximate it with the “chee”, as in the beginning of “cheese”, it will forever be a curious transplant; like an exotic ornamental tree from abroad. Qi. In English we don't have anything close to the idea of an overall enlivening force in nature. A connective force that blows clouds across the sky, surges currents through the ocean, directs the growth, blooming and decline of the myriad forms we recognize as Life. We don't perceive a unified field that directs the beating of your heart and calls the tune on next week's weather forecast. We don't really have a word in our language that connects the dots between your wife's personality, the pungent taste of cinnamon, the character of the oak tree outside your breakfast window and the way thaty snowy grey-white days gentle and calm the spirit. Q-i, c-h-e-e, c-h-i, however you wish to represent it in Latinized characters, it basically translates a