Meridians… What a fascinating, mysterious concept. It has been in my knowing for more than three years now, and I have studied, contemplated, experienced them from several perspectives: the traditional, the metaphysical, the scientific, the spiritual, the intersectional (with Yoga for instance) … There is a way to explain meridians from an approach of understanding that each can comprehend. Meaning, if simply visualizing and experiencing meridians in your body isn’t convincing enough, there are now scientific explanations, if not to the exact pathway, to the theory behind how it “works”. But if you know me and my fascination for ancient traditions, you know that sciences which have been refined over millennia, have withstood the test of time, and have figured out things that only recently where scientifically proven and approved through the western lens don’t need that stamp of approval from modern science in my eyes (although it’s still cool). Let’s break down the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) explanation of meridians, touch on the theoretical concepts behind it, talk about Meridian Yoga Therapy and some personal anecdotes related to meridians. You’re in for a comprehensive, detailed read.
As westerners, we have a difficult relationship with anything that is outside of the tangible realm. Here’s the paradox I’ve found: we commonly use terms like “good energy”, “vibration”, or “emotions”, because we all physically feel them. You can get so much information and feel a wide range of things by simply being in a certain surrounding. Spending time with an animal, standing in a big crowd, hearing a baby cry, giving a hug will inevitably induce a certain type of emotion, right? Yet admitting that our emotions have repercussions on our physical health, or that every cell of our bodies are interconnected and communicating, or even that we can heal by simply changing our thoughts, is so hard to wrap our heads around. We have bones, musculature and other tissues, organs, vascular, neural and lymphatic systems, and then our brains coordinating it all. That’s about it, right? Well, it’s far from being that simple…
If you’re here reading this, I’m assuming you’re at least open to the idea of there being more than just flesh in your body. In order to practice Meridian Yoga, it’s helpful to have an intellectual understanding of meridians, to then visualize them and train yourself to feel them. That experiential understanding is ultimately the most important one, like with any practice. I can guarantee you that when you’ll reach that point, it will transform your asana practice and the way you perceive your precious body.
So, let’s get to the point… what ARE meridians anyway?
To understand the function of the meridians we need to address the concept of Qi. Similar to what yogis refer to as prana, qi is the life force, the fundamental substance constituting the universe, and all phenomena are produced by the changes and movement of qi. Meaning, everything that happens in your body is a product of the presence and movement of qi. When qi ceases to move and circulate, ailments and disease creep in. Qi stagnation is thought to be the cause of pain: qi accumulates in an area of the body, creating a local excess, which manifests as pain. In TCM terms, cancer and blood stasis are extreme forms of qi and blood stagnation.
Qi also has a yin and a yang aspect to it. The yang is what makes the qi move and circulate, while the yin is the “material” that makes up qi and sustains the bodily functions.
Now this concept isn’t one that can be reduced to a few lines and you can be sure that I’ll return to this subject specifically later on.
If there’s one thing you need to remember from this post, it’s this: meridians are energy pathways that run through the body in which qi circulates. It’s difficult to explain with words what an energy pathway is, because for the most part meridians are intangible. It cannot be physically observed, but they are closely related to the vascular system, as qi and blood are intimately connected (part of the qi circulates in the blood). Meridians also have to do with the lymphatic and nervous system. You can think of them as a metro/underground system which maps the entire body, both internally and on the surface. Each meridian pertains to an organ, which gives the name to the meridian, for instance the lung meridian.
There are many ways to describe and assign properties to meridians, which I will try to make more digestible by naming them in bullet point:
· There are 12 main meridians which are the most used ones in Meridian Yoga Therapy and clinical practice.
· Meridians are paired together with the other organ’s meridian related to the same element. For example, Spleen and Stomach are both organs of the Earth element, and work together as a pair.
· Meridians start or end in the body’s extremities, such as the fingers, toes and face. They are all connected to another meridian on both ends, which creates a closed circuit through which qi circulates in the body (which is what we visualize and meditate on in the Pranayama and MYT body scan class).
· Meridians are part of an organ’s “system”: in TCM, when we refer to an organ, we think of it as more than just the physical organ. The system includes the meridian and the organ’s multiple functions and characteristics (more on that later).
· A meridian has an internal branch, which directly goes to and from the organs, and has a superficial branch, which is the one we commonly refer to as the meridian. It’s on that superficial branch that can be traced along the skin that we locate the acupoints. Stimulating the points through acupuncture, acupressure and massage helps regulate the flow of qi in the meridians.
From a purely (western) scientific point of view, the explanation to the why and the how is done with connective tissues. I'm not an expert in this topic, but I'll give you what I know and that most people will be content with. If you're nerdy and want to learn more about connective tissues and their function, I suggest you start here.
There are several types of connective tissues in the body, and they are quite literally everywhere. They were thought to be simply holding things together and "filling up space", but it turns out fascia, a form of connective tissue that lies right under the skin, is our biggest sensory organ. Yes, you read it right. Fascia truly lives up to the current hype around it, as it houses your sensory nerves. With about 250 million sensory receptors in the fascia, it can be considered as an information highway, making the cells in your toes communicate with the cells of your stomach. You can see this as a tangible explanation to the "everything is interconnected" concept.
The more you learn about meridians in detail, their pathway, which emotions they govern, how they relate to each other, the more fascinating and less overwhelming this becomes. I promise it’s fun and insightful when you can make sense of it all! When I learnt about meridians in my acupuncture training in Shanghai, we really took our time to break down each meridian, learn to locate the points, study them through the lens of the 5 elements theory… And this is exactly what we do in Meridian Yoga Therapy!
What does Meridian Yoga therapy refer to exactly?
MYT is a practice that combines the sciences of Yoga and TCM. It has two components to it: the physical asana (posture) practice and the clinical practice using other TCM healing modalities. Both are deeply therapeutic and are two different ways of achieving a state of balance in body and mind. In a way, Chinese Tai chi and Qi gong are similar to the Yoga asana practice, at least in their function, but that’s not what we practice. An MYT class looks a lot like a regular asana class, but uses meridians to bring our awareness from our extremities, the most conscious parts of the body (think of how sensitive and incredibly precise in their movement your hands are), to our organs, the deepest least conscious parts. We visualize and stimulate the meridians by stretching them and pressing on points in between and in postures to further promote the flow of qi, help us go deeper in postures, but most importantly to bring our awareness to those points. When you direct your touch to a part of your body, it helps to cultivate concentration (because when you find a tender spot and press into it, it’s hard to ignore it!). Fun fact: by directing your mental awareness to a specific part of your body, you can increase the blood flow there! You can experiment with this yourself. By focusing on the palms of your hands, you can start feeling heat building up there.
An important point of this practice is that we move our bodies to release hidden dormant emotions and change our though patterns. It’s something most people can recognize intuitively: after a physical activity, we tend to feel better and see our mood improve. In MYT, we move our bodies to increase and regulate energy flows and the breath to target certain meridians where the stuck emotions are held, to help us reprogram our thoughts. For instance, we stretch the Gallbladder meridian on the whole sides of the body to release anger, frustration, impatience, resentment, general stress and to help with decision making. It’s interesting to notice what emotions arise when we do the different practices, because they really do come up to the surface if they were lingering there!
For me, MYT has helped me experience meridians in a new way. I had felt them many times during acupuncture practices, as puncturing a point can create a radiating electrical sensation along those meridians. The MYT practice has brought me new accessible tools to feel them by doing simply stretches. They may look like nothing but they create a lot of heat in the body!
This practice is a combination of two of my favorite sciences that I had studied separately. Learning and now teaching this practice feels like coming full circle. It brings me a great sense of fulfillment. I think back at my 18 year-old self who learnt acupuncture almost as an accident (saving this story for another day, it’s a good one), practiced it for some time but didn’t know how to integrate it into her life. Fast forward 3 years later, during my 200h Yoga teacher training I learnt about this opportunity to study MYT with Rose Erin Vaughan, and naturally I dove head first into this training. In hindsight, I can say that none of it was an accident. I let go of the need to figure out why I needed to study this, I simply did because the opportunity was quite literally served to me. I went down the path of least resistance, and here I am today sharing this fascinating knowledge with you.
If you’d like to study Meridian Yoga Therapy with me, you can join my weekly classes of MYT Official Sequence (which is a 60 min set sequence) and my Meridian Exploration class, which focuses on a different pair of meridian every week. To learn more, you can find my class descriptions here. To sign up, click here.
I hope this was useful information to you and you enjoyed the read. There is so much information to unpack that I’m excited to break down for you really soon!
With love,
Lucile
Yes! So valuable and informative. Love the balanced take on the topic and cultural sensitivity. Much love Luce ❤️