 You've probably seen movies like Kill Bill, or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, or even Mortal Kombat, where some Chinese martial artists know certain points that can paralyze as well as ones that can heal. Now, this is based off of traditional Chinese medical theory, based off of the channel and meridian system and the acupuncture points of TCM. Now, on a pragmatic daily level, outside of just learning how to paralyze your boss with one finger and quitting your job, what you can actually learn to do with acupressure is stimulate the blood flow to certain organs in your body. And it is a science-backed way to actually improve certain symptoms. So in this video, I thought I would introduce you to three very simple acupressure practices based on three famous acupuncture points. There are things you can do right now, and you can do them every single day at home. Hi guys, I'm Dr. Alex Hine, board licensed acupuncturist and doctor of acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine, author of the health book, Master the Day. So, let's jump in. Now, our first acupressure point is a point called Guan Yuan. Now, we're going to focus on this point for certain kinds of pain. Pain like bloating and lower abdominal pain, pain related to a woman's menses or cycle, and just general most commonly when patients come in, I recommend it for people who get really, really bloated after meals. This point Guan Yuan is called the gait of origin in Chinese. And from a TCM point of view, it is what we call the front mu or alarm point of the small intestine. So for example, patients that come in and they have SIBO, small intestine bacterial overgrowth will often experience lots of lower abdominal distention. Interesting that this is considered an alarm point if there's pressure pain here. Now, this point Guan Yuan, we often say it is used to treat issues with the Yuan Qi. Yuan Qi is almost like your battery charge, your vitality, your life force, if I could dare use that term. It's used to treat kidney function. And again, for us, kidneys do govern the bones. They govern knees. They govern your overall vitality and also points related to the uterus or reproductive functions for women. When we talk about Guan Yuan, this point, what we want to do is basically have two fingers that are essentially like sword fingers. You can have two fingers in each hand or you can create these little beaks with your hand. And what I want you to do is just tap the low abdomen. Now, the location of this point is what we call three sun below the belly button. So basically take your four fingers and you're going to put them right at the base of your belly button. And that will approximately show us where this point Guan Yuan is. So you formed your two fingers or even little beaks. And I'm just going to have you tap, tap, tap, tap and do that for five minutes straight. Now, when you do this, if you notice, when you get really bloated or even some women, if they're having menstrual pain, that tapping will generate an increase in circulation in that area, similar to a woman putting a heating pad on her low abdomen. And that's why it can help with pain or even abdominal distension from bloating. Now, the other alternative is you can basically slap the low abdomen. And you can do that for five minutes as well. And that will help stimulate the functions of this point, Guan Yuan, for bloating, for lower abdominal pain and for women's health issues. Now, our second acupressure point here is called Shan Zhong. Shan Zhong is a point basically between the nipples in the center of the chest, right on the sternum here. It's almost like when you're suffering some kind of shock, sadness or happiness, people tend to clutch their chest, right, to protect that area. Now, what's interesting, the heart is anatomically can be center or more towards the left. But when people clutch their chest, they clutch the center. This point is called chest center, essentially. But this is the front mu point, front alarm point, of the pericardium. Pericardium is called the heart protector. So I love this phrase because, yes, there is an anatomical reference there to what the pericardium actually functions as, but from an emotional point of view, you know, we talk about the shocks that people have. They endure the heartbreak, the loss, the death of someone, the divorce, and just the damage it causes to somebody's internal state. And so for issues with the heart protector, the spirit, the emotions, that kind of thing. What we have to do is often stimulate the pericardium function. So for stimulating this point, we often use, for example, chest pain, anxiety, even people with difficulty breathing, shortness of breath, which of course can be related to lung function or nervous system function like anxiety. For Shanzhong, what we're going to do is just do a very gentle technique where we rub the chest. So for this point, you can treat it in many different ways. In a lot of traditional Qigong forms, you just go like this, right? And you're stimulating this point. Now, if you're having anxiety or panic attacks, that may not be that reassuring. So what you can do is create two hands together with a palm like this. And basically you're going to rub clockwise, one, one thousand, two, one thousand, three, one thousand, four, one thousand, one rotation here, one circle, a second, and do that for two to three minutes on one side and then two to three minutes on the other side. And one specialty function I find that this helps with because we talk about the heart in TCM, which is the seed of, yes, the physical heart like heart disease, but also the seed of emotions and the psychoemotional status. So for people who have anxiety or depression and who can't fall asleep, doing this exercise five minutes before bed can often be the thing that makes the difference without needing medication, that kind of thing. Or you can actually beat on the sternum in that way as well. A third point here is called hagu, which is for, we'll call it headaches and some degrees of stress. So hagu is large intestine form, just translated often as joining valley. And this one is what we call the source point of the large intestine channel. So you wouldn't think that this point in the flesh of your hand near the, what's called anatomical snuff box, this point would stimulate large intestine function. But it has another function as well because a lot of these channels go up into the head and into the face. So this is often considered one of the master points for ENT issues involving the head. I'll never forget when I was doing judo, one time I had a really bad headache and I didn't want to do the practice for the day as a kid. And so my actual judo teacher, he said, come over here. And he just started really massaging this point of hagu, LI4, and it was so painful. But after about five minutes, the headache had seemed to decrease. And whether that was placebo or really he knew a little bit of basic acupressure, I don't remember, I was a kid. But you can actually use this for headaches or general stress management. So hagu in general is a master point for ear, nose, and throat issues, as well as issues involving the intestines. So for this particular point, you can basically squish your hand together, find the highest lump on the hand, the bump there, and then you're going to effectively massage in clockwise circles as one option. So we're just going to go one, two, three, four, five, six, and you can do three minutes on each side and then go to the other hand. Another option is some people for acupressure, they push and hold, two, three, relax. Push and hold, two, three, relax. Push and hold, two, three, and relax. So that's one of the ways you can stimulate the function of LI4, hagu, for particularly, let's say, headaches. Also, it can help with stress, particularly if you do breathing exercises with it at the same time. So those are three famous acupressure points that you can really utilize on a day-to-day basis to help with some of these issues and I want you to try them. Leave a comment down below this video and let me know if they helped you. Primarily in my practice, I don't use acupressure, I use internal medicine formulas, but these are three that I've seen really help people and really do work. Now, before you guys go, there are other healing rituals you can do every day from traditional Chinese medicine and I have a free guide which is called Four Daily Rituals that can potentially help you add years to your life with traditional Chinese medicine. It's the first link right below this video. It's something you can download and go check out. It also has info below the video on booking a visit with me in Los Angeles or virtually via telemedicine. And besides that, I have a very exciting announcement which is that I just launched a brand new learning portal called The Healing Library and it's all about videos and courses on how to heal yourself with traditional Chinese medicine and I figure what better way to keep this channel sponsor and otherwise ad-free and not promoting a bunch of supplements that I know you guys have probably bought from online people that probably don't do anything, let's be real but putting out courses will keep this channel sponsor and ad-free in that way. So there's a link below to learn more about The Healing Library. Right now we have one course, Introduction to Healing with Traditional Chinese Medicine 101 and you guys can check it out and see if it resonates with you. So before you go, there's one more final video here on related acupuncture and qigong practices that I think will help you.