Pure Joy Acupuncture

Marin and several other Bay Area counties drop back a tier today. Please continue to wear your mask and avoid indoor social gatherings to slow the spread and help local businesses remain open.

Yesterday a caravan of cars drove through Marin City emblazoned with racist symbols and massages. Marin City is a historical black neighborhood. This was an act of hate, aggression, and intimidation, designed to suppress the black vote. If you live locally and would like to be notified when Marin City needs you to stand in peaceful support, sign up here: https://eztxt.s3.amazonaws.com//5f9f9090c5df38.98072736.ht

Looking for a safer alternative to traditional Trick-or-Treating this Halloween? Check out this drive thru Trick-or-Treating Halloween Party at the Marin County Fair Grounds!

Have you been struggling with fatigue during Shelter-in-Place (or even longer)? You are not alone! Many people I’ve spoken with are straining to find the energy and motivation to do basic tasks. Chinese medicine looks at energy as a function of your breathing, digestion, and sleep. Breathing allows you to take in the clear or heavenly qi (qing) of the air. When you eat and digest, your body is extracting the nutrients from food qi (gu qi). As you sleep, your body stores any e...xtra qi you produced that day for later. If you’re running at an energy deficit, however, you may be pulling on your reserves to make it through the day and have nothing leftover to store at night. When this happens, you may feel tired, listless, anxious, have a low or moody appetite, or having trouble sleeping. Does that sound like anybody you know in 2020? Read on for some suggestions on how to improve your energy.

If you live in an area that was smothered in wildfire smoke this summer, you know how important air quality is to your health & mood! Also, important to your energy level & health is HOW you breathe. Breath work is a critical component of Chinese medicine. Tai Qi, Qi Gong & meditation all place emphasis on the breath as a way of cultivating your Qi & improving your energy levels. Think about how when you are upset, someone may tell you to, take a deep breath. Slowing down ...your respiration rate and breathing into your belly helps your nervous system shift out of fight or flight mode, slowing the pumping adrenaline and helping your relax. This shift allows your body to focus more attention on extracting nutrition from your food & allows you get better quality sleep. This Saturday, 10/24 at 9:30 AM on Zoom Lily Baker-Lubin & I will lead you acupressure & dynamic neuromuscular stabilization techniques to shift your breathing patterns & help your body & mind relax. For more information and to sign-up use the link below. See more

As more and more communities recognize the second Monday in October as Indigenous Peoples' Day, the question of how best to celebrate indigenous people arises. A great first step is learning about which tribes resided in your specific part of the country before vicious settler colonialism uprooted them, or likely worse.

If you’re living in an area with wildfire smoke, consider adding a little mint tea to your day. Mint helps clear heat from the lungs in traditional Chinese medicine (kind of like clearing out toxins) and helps move liver Qi (which causes that irritability & depression you maybe experiencing with prolonged smoke exposure). In Chinese medicine the stem is considered to be the medicinal part of the plant, not the leaf. If you have access to fresh mint consider using the leaves ...still on the stem to make your tea I made sun tea from @marinrootsfarm chocolate mint available at the AIM Farmers Markets. If you haven’t made sun tea before, place some mint sprigs or tea bags in a clear jar with a lid and set it outside on a hot day. Let the jar sit in the sun until the tea is brewed to your preferred strength. You can also simmer fresh mint on the stove with the lid on if it’s a cool day where you live. Curious what else you can do to support your lung healthy right now? Read my blog on how to care for your lungs in the age of the virus and wildfire smoke: https://www.purejoyacupuncture.com//coping-with-wildfire-/ See more

"It's not about putting a 'brave face' on things, or straining for a falsely positive spin. It's about finding some feeling of safety... so that you're not always in fight or flight mode."

If you live in the Bay Area, chances are you woke up to orange skies this morning. Confused how the air quality can be moderate on such a day? Here is an explanation. (I'm still wearing my KN95 mask outside though.)

So grateful to be a part of this community! Thank you to Salon B. Style Lab for putting together this video featuring the people behind local San Rafael businesses <3 Please support your local small businesses during this time- we need you!

The wildfire smoke is back in Marin this morning. For suggestions on how to cope with wildfire smoke in the age of the virus, check out my latest blog:

Are you wondering what you can do to help Californians who have had to leave their homes due to wildfire ravaging the state? Community Bridges / Puentes De La Comunidad is a non-profit in Santa Cruz contributing to the relief effort. They are instrumental in delivering essential services and providing equitable access to healthcare and other resources to underserved residents in Santa Cruz County. You can purchase items for fire victims directly through their amazon wishlist:... https://www.amazon.com///ls/2TPG31HBR03FH/ref=hz_ls_biz_ex Or donate directly to them: https://communitybridges.org/donate/ If the shipping address does not auto-populate on Amazon, wishlist items can be sent to: 519 Main Street, Watsonville, CA, 95076

If you've been tracking the air quality around the Bay this weekend, you may have noticed a difference between purpleair.com and airnow.gov. This article does a nice job explaining the difference between the two sites.

It's funny cause it's true... When the world's problems seem so incomprehensibly big (and getting bigger every day in 2020), it may seem a bit silly to offer tiny needles and humble plant medicine in response, yet acupuncturists witness all the time how this age-old medicine helps people soothe anxiety, breathe deeper, strengthen immunity, relieve pain, regain equilibrium, deal with PTSD, and better handle the general overwhelm of life. The journey to a healthier, safer world starts with the small steps we take to naturally heal at the individual and community level. Text: @acupunctureannie Meme: @resilientroots.acupuncture

So many of the people I have spoken with this week seem to be running to the end of their resilience. The pandemic, resulting unemployment, non-COVID health issues, lack of childcare, personal issues coming to head under the pressure of SIP, lack of personal and physical contact, the civil rights awakening, the start of wildfire season in North California preceded by a weeklong heatwave and rolling blackouts have most people’s nervous systems on high alert. Some are expressi...ng their heightened arousal as irritability or anger. Others are crying daily. Some people are numb and lethargic. All of these are normal trauma responses. And our country is very much in trauma right now. If you are struggling right now, here are a few questions you might consider asking yourself: Have I eaten today? Have I drunk enough water? Am I too hot/too cold? What is the quality of my breath? Do I need a hug and/or other human connection? Will exercise and/or time in nature help me unwind? Do I need to lie down and rest? Am I avoiding uncomfortable feelings that might have something to teach me and/or pass if I am willing to sit with them? Do I need help from someone else to help me reset my nervous system? Acupuncture is a wonderful way to help your nervous system shift out of trauma and into a greater sense of ease amid the external chaos. If you feel like you need a little help calming down and getting back to yourself, you can book an acupuncture online: https://www.purejoyacupuncture.com/book-now/ If you are not ready to come into the office yet, I am offering socially distanced treatment options as well. Please contact me directly at (415) 994-0252 or [email protected] to learn more. See more