📍 What is an Acupuncture Point?

What is an acupuncture point?

Like, when we go to locate a point, what exactly are we feeling for?

And should we be needling our patients like a dextrous butcher?

What is a Point?

When we do acupuncture, we talk about locating and needling "points" on the body. But what does that mean?

Well, it turns out that "point" is not actually a great translation of the Chinese character.

In English, a "point" usually refers to a location, like a set of coordinates on a map. But the Chinese character 穴 xué means more like a hole, cave, or dug out space where things are stored.

In fact, Paul Unschuld would sometimes translate this as "hole." So instead of saying, "needle the Lung 9 point," he would say, "prick the taiyuan hole."

Empty Spaces

And this lines up with what is stated in the Nei Jing. When talking about the acupuncture points, Chapter 1 of the Ling Shu says:

They are not the same as skin, flesh, sinews and bones.

Meaning, they are not any of these physical tissues. Rather, they are the empty spaces between these tissues.

The Dextrous Butcher

Chapter 3 of the Zhuang Zi8 is sometimes called, "The Dextrous Butcher." Some people think that this story about Cook Ting carving an ox can also be applied to acupuncture treatments:

Ting the cook was cutting meat free from the bones of an ox for Lord Wen-hui. His hands danced as his shoulders turned with the step of his foot and bending of his knee. With a shush and a hush, the blade sang following his lead, never missing a note. Ting and his blade moved as though dancing to “The Mulberry Grove,” or as if conducting the “Ching-shou” with a full orchestra.

Lord Wen-hui exclaimed, “What a joy! It’s good, is it not, that such a simple craft can be so elevated?"

Ting laid aside his knife. “All I care about is the Way. If find it in my craft, that’s all. When I first butchered an ox, I saw nothing but ox meat. It took three years for me to see the whole ox. Now I go out to meet it with my whole spirit and don’t think only about what meets the eye. Sensing and knowing stop. The spirit goes where it will, following the natural contours, revealing large cavities, leading the blade through openings, moving onward according to actual form — yet not touching the central arteries or tendons and ligaments, much less touching bone.

“A good cook need sharpen his blade but once a year. He cuts cleanly. An awkward cook sharpens his knife every month. He chops. I’ve used this knife for nineteen years, carving thousands of oxen. Still the blade is as sharp as the first time it was lifted from the whetstone. At the joints there are spaces, and the blade has no thickness. Entering with no thickness where there is space, the blade may move freely where it will: there’s plenty of room to move. Thus, after nineteen years, my knife remains as sharp as it was that first day.

“Even so, there are always difficult places, and when I see rough going ahead, my heart offers proper respect as I pause to look deeply into it. Then I work slowly, moving my blade with increasing subtlety until — kerplop! — meat falls apart like a crumbling clod of earth. I then raise my knife and assess my work until I’m fully satisfied. Then I give my knife a good cleaning and put it carefully away.”

Lord Wen-hui said, “That’s good, indeed! Ting the cook has shown me how to find the Way to nurture life.”

Seeing with the Spirit

Cook Ting says he first saw nothing but meat. As he got more experience, he began to see the ox as a whole. With even more experience, he began to look with his spirit.

Locating acupuncture points may have the same progression.

The Empty Spaces

Cook Ting never has to sharpen his knife. The reason is because he searches for the empty spaces. The blade has no thickness, so when you insert it into an empty space, there is room to spare!

Similarly, an acupuncture needle has virtually no thickness. When you search for "points" that are empty spaces, there is plenty of room.

Knowing When to Stop

A common theme in Daoism is knowing when to stop. The Dao De Jing says things like, "If you sharpen a knife too much, it will lose its edge. Draw a bow to its utmost, and you'll wish you'd stopped in time."

Cook Ting makes a point that when he is finished, he assesses his work then stops and puts his knife away.

With acupuncture, it is also important to know when you are finished. More needles and more stimulation are not necessarily better.