I love this book: Meditation as Medicine: Activate the Power of your Natural Healing Force, by Dr. Dharma Khalsa and Cameron Stauth. Dr Khalsa is medical director of the Alzheimer’s Prevention Foundation in Tucson.

Meditation as Medicine gives a detailed yet easy to comprehend medical and scientific view of how the human body works, and follows that up with useful exercises and meditations to help improve our health. It is a great layperson’s read – I’m serious! – about how the endocrine and nervous system work, about our hormones, and just why using the voice (in prayer or mantra) or the fingers (in music or art or mudra) and the eyes, breath and arms impact our heart and brain and well being and can restore the body’s proper functioning.

I have an acupuncture practice in Old Town Alexandria and I give these postures and meditations to willing clients to help correct issues. The movements are simple – the hardest part being that they are repeated for sometimes hefty lengths of time. One client found herself suffering unusual fatigue, muscular ache and hair loss. With acupuncture and a kriya (meaning a set of simple postures) to help the thyroid, she recovered energy and optimism and a healthy head of hair.

I highly recommend the book as an interesting tool to better understand your body and to learn simple actions that, performed with purpose, can optimize your health.

Does acupuncture hurt?

I will wager that the most wondered question about acupuncture – whether given voice to or not – is probably: Does acupuncture hurt?

And from the vantage point of my acupuncture practice in Old Town Alexandria, I can answer: not really.

I can safely say that most people are surprised by how little discomfort there is. Even the most needle-phobic person – and in my nearly 13 years of practice, I have worked with quite a few – loses his or her apprehension and fear once they experience acupuncture and see how good it makes them feel.

But never say never: sometimes the insertion of the needle at a point can give a zing. But by far the majority of my clients don’t feel the needles, and when they do, the discomfort is minor and almost instantly recedes.

I am often asked if there is something inside the needle. There is not. The needles licensed acupuncturists use are solid – usually stainless steel – and as fine as a hair or two on your head. They are not hypodermic and, in general, bear no similarity to those used in western medical offices.

And lastly, Virginia state law requires we use disposable needles, and so we do. They are never reused. Once used, they are disposed of as bio-hazardous waste.