 If you're somebody who's been going through prolonged health problems, or maybe like me, you have some constitutional or genetic problems that you came into this world with, and they've just been your constant companion throughout your whole life, maybe on and off, sometimes better, sometimes worse, you may have had this question, that's a scary question, but an honest and a fair one, which is that is a permanent healing of this condition even possible. This is a big question and a very important one. Now I want to tackle it in this video today because I think it can lead to some very, very important insights and I want to share more about how I personally basically also treat myself. Hey, I'm Dr. Alex Hein, author of the health book Master of the Day, licensed acupuncturist and doctor of Oriental or Chinese medicine. Now I've included a free link down below this video, which is for four daily rituals that can add years to your life with traditional Chinese medicine. So that's a little PDF and a little report I put together for you and you're also going to get a weekly email on this exact topic. Now the big question, in the case of chronic illness, is a permanent resolution of symptoms possible? I've seen people with kind of lifelong migraines or lifelong digestive problems or lifelong eczema just to give a few examples where over the months of treatment, you know, maybe they go from having migraines or their IBS symptoms or their itchy skin. Maybe it's their daily or weekly. And then I've seen over the course of treatment, maybe you can go to now I only have it monthly, I only have it every six months, I only have it a few times a year. So in that context, is it cured? No, because they still have some symptoms. But functionally, it is sort of resolved in the sense that we've kind of shut off all the alarm bells and all the sirens going off that are saying that there's a problem. And now the body is in a state where it doesn't have to manifest those symptoms all the time. But again, is this cured? Is this resolved? Technically, no. Now this very important analogy is something that I've used in my own healing process in that remaining symptom free is like steering a ship in the ocean. So all of us come into life and our genetics, our Constitution is a ship in the ocean, right? It has a natural direction that it tends to drift. And that drift is based on the ocean currents, the waves, the wind, weather patterns that come up. And so the ship, maybe it wants to go straight, but it keeps drifting off course at maybe like 15 degrees, right? 15 degrees, it's always going off this way. It just don't know why just maybe that's the way the currents are in that part of the world, your genetics. Maybe that's just some environmental factors like this diet that I'm born into in this family and this culture is not good for me or the stress, the trauma I've suffered. It just keeps doing this. It's your job as the person who wants to remain well to be a good sailor or a good navigator in these seas. So it's your job to make sure that ship does not go more than 1% off the center, right? If we know we're going to sail from New England up to the old England, that we have to take a certain course and that based on what we know about the currents and the weather and the size of our ship and the winds, based on that, we have to make sure it can't go more than a few degrees off the course. But it's always trying to push you off the course because that is your genetic Constitution. It is a tendency towards the migraines, towards the GI problems, towards loose stools, towards a little bit of insomnia or anxiety, whatever it is, but you have to observe how far off course are we going. So when you notice that 1% going off course, that tilt start to happen, the wobble, maybe that means you drop some work projects for a few months. Maybe it means it's time for a vacation, or it's time to go on a little bit of a cleaner diet for just a couple weeks or it's time to just pull back on some of your affairs and just really enjoy life and get more rest. So in this way, the point is that you catch it with training when it goes off 1%. So that it doesn't go towards 30%, 40%, and then you're having migraines every week or you're having an IBS or some other illness flare, right, or an autoimmune flare. Maybe you know, oh, 5%, time for me to take a vacation. Or 7%, I got to go check in my doctor. Or 15%, I need to go come see me in my clinic or go back to my acupuncturist or naturopath or whatever. It's your job to know that tendency and to watch it very, very closely because that is the natural drift that will happen. So is healing chronic illness really even possible, right? To me, it's not the question of is resolution possible? Going from someone who can have migraines every day to a few times a year, it's pretty damn good, I'd say, right? That that is no longer a condition that's debilitating and that's something that dictates your entire life. But I think the main thing is understanding this is always going to be a pattern, right? This is the body's always going to have a tendency. You can never go back to whatever the lifestyle was that predisposed you to a severe expression of those symptoms. You're always going to have to be more conscious of that. And that's just a luck of the draw in the same way that I'm always going to have a tendency towards GI problems. And if I don't give myself formulas, I usually treat myself about once per quarter, once a season. I'll take formulas for a month or a little over a month. That's the way I make sure the drift is not more than five or 10%. So in the same way, whether you are seeing me or you're seeing somebody else, you're seeing your physician, you're doing lifestyle practices. Just notice a tendency and that can prevent you from having more severe problems. All right? So this ship, this, you know, your body, your constitution and genetics are the ship in the seas that have tendencies to go certain ways. You have to navigate them back to the center has been a very important analogy and metaphor in my own life for my own healing that I now use my patients as well. So I hope it helps you in the same way. Again, there's a free link below this video for a free download, which is four daily rituals that can help you out years to your life with traditional Chinese medicine. And again, if you'd like to become a patient of mine, either locally or via telemedicine in this time, you can check out the link as well below, which will tell you how to get in contact with me and my clinic. All right, before you go, I have two related videos right here.