Using Your Big Toe To Check Your Health
Submitted by David Trammel on Thu, 03/31/2022 - 08:03
Something to consider is as access to the paid sick care system gets harder and harder, you will need to do much more preventative health care for yourself.
"Chinese Master: "Your Big Toe Tells a lot About Your Health""
I am a big fan of massage and posture as a way to keep yourself fit and prevent illness.
What is your opinion?
Ken
Fri, 04/01/2022 - 19:34
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Mix and Match doesn't work for me
I am extremely skeptical of 'yoga-lite' videos. I wouldn't recommend cherrypicking Chinese toe massage or Indian sitting with your heel under your root chakra out of the highly evolved, intricate systems that they are embedded within. A little knowledge is dangerous when you have no appreciation for the complexities and subtleties of the culture and lifeways of the people that created them. This is an aspect of why 'emptying the mind', when taken out of it's proper context, is such a problematic thing. I think it is great to explore other cultures and their wisdom ways, but spirituality is not a salad bar. You don't get to pick the parts you like and ignore the rest in ANY genuine spiritual practice. Unless you are part of Goop Lab, of course...
David Trammel
Sat, 04/02/2022 - 07:02
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Getting People To Think About Alternatives
I understand your concerns about Youtube gurus and people practicing a discipline without understanding the nuances of the practice. I am thinking more along the lines of posting this as a way for people to think about alternatives to traditional sickcare. Our medical system isn't going to be there for the majority of us proles. I happen to think massages are a great way to preventatively maintain your health. When I was in Hollywood there was one stressful period of several months, when we had a masseuse coming in once a week to the building. Getting half an hour of body maintenance was a great way to help me focus and helped me deal with the stress. If massaging your big toe can get people to consider a wider option for health care, then I'm all for it. At worst I figure their feet will feel a little better.
Ken
Wed, 04/06/2022 - 21:34
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All massage is good
You are undoubtedly right about needing to take care of our own health as much as possible. My wife is a Jin Shin (a bit like acupuncture without the needles) practitioner and has taught me enough to work on her, so we take care of each other with that modality. I consider basic energy work like Jin Shin as complementary to knowing advanced first aid. I suspect the future will hold a lot more room for non-medical school graduate health practitioners, simply because there won't be any option to run see a board certified doctor unless you are part of the elite enclaves (which themselves will be short lived). Barefoot 'doctors', nurse-practitioners, midwives, paramedics and physician's assistants will be about as high up the medical foodchain as most of us will get unless we need serious surgery requiring an operating room and even then I suspect it will be for the privileged few. 50 years from now there won't be any hip replacements happening for most people who need them. It will be self care, massage and medicating with herbs. Not that that is necessarily such a bad situation anyway. Medical mistakes are considered to be the 3rd leading cause of death in America according to Johns Hopkins Medicine! So maybe being a little more careful and a little more cautious as we age and spending a little more time and attention on our HEALTH, will actually result in better outcomes for many of us.