Acknowledgments

I’d like to extend my gratitude to all of the remarkable teachers and physicians I’ve been privileged to learn from over the years, whose wisdom and insights shaped my own healing and teaching abilities and whose contributions to my growth helped make this book possible.

Thanks to the faculty of the San Francisco College of Acupuncture in 1991:

• Robert Johns, a maverick who allowed me to attend his Advanced Classical Needling Techniques classes before I even knew how to properly locate a point.

• Richard Liao—in addition to providing comprehensive herbal instruction, his treatments cured me of three types of asthma simultaneously, strongly motivating me to learn Chinese herbology.

• John Yeh, MD, who first opened my eyes to the ways in which Western medical constructs and paradigms could be analyzed within the context of Chinese medicine.

Thanks to the faculty and staff of the American College of Traditional Chinese Medicine in 1991–1994 for their diligence and patience and for their passion and enthusiasm for sharing their knowledge of Chinese medicine. Those whose guidance remains most notable include Xingguo Fu, Denise Hsu, Daniel Jiao, Lifang Liang, Lee Wugofski, MD (Western medicine), and Baibing Zhu.

Thanks to all of the outstanding Qigong masters dedicated to imparting the deepest and most subtle aspects of Chinese healing and spirituality. Their teachings continue to influence and further my cultivation. Special thanks to three of the most personally significant, for generously permitting me to relay some of their inspired teachings in this book:

• Master B. K. Frantzis, Daoist lineage holder and my primary Qigong teacher since 1987.

• Deguang He, acupuncturist, herbalist, and medical Qigong physician.

• Grandmaster Hong Liu, Qigong master, healer, herbalist, and medical researcher.

A special thanks to Michael Shear for contributing the photographs that were used to create many of the illustrations found in this book.