Acupuncture with beams of light:
A gentle non-invasive approach to wellness

Julianne Bien
Spectrahue Light & Sound Inc.
Toronto, Canada

Washington, Winter 2004/5 copyright

visit our color therapy website http://www.spectrahue.com

In the pursuit of treatment strategies capable of achieving better long-term outcomes, the pairing of acupuncture and color light therapy is offering significant benefits for practitioners and patients alike. These two treatment modalities that trace their origins to ancient Chinese and Greek healers respectively readily complement each other so much that color therapy is often called color acupuncture. When specific color light frequencies are focussed on the body's acupuncture points, the energy is absorbed by the acupuncture receptors and distributed along the same meridian system that is the basis of modern acupuncture. These infusions of energy restore the body's energy balance, removing blockages that underpin physical and emotional disease and malaise.

Many acupuncturists are offering color light treatments in conjunction with acupuncture to dissipate energy blockages at the root of their patients' problems. Holistic practitioners are using it as part of a complete wellness strategy to help restore or maintain a state of physical, emotional and spiritual well being. For the acupuncturist with his/her knowledge of the meridian system, the techniques involved in applying non-invasive color light treatments are particularly easy to grasp. Offering patients a dual treatment regime allows the practitioner to expand his or her roster of services and venture into preventative wellness strategies. Patients tend to be receptive to combining acupuncture sessions with color light applications because of the prospect of addressing the root cause of their symptoms for a better long-term outcome.

Color light therapy is becoming a mainstream treatment regime in North America, just as acupuncture "crossed over" from traditional Chinese medicine over a generation ago. Each color frequency has a unique energy vibration pattern and different therapeutic uses. Blue is a cool color. A trained therapist would apply cool colors to reduce inflammation, hot ones to stimulate circulation. Red is hot and stimulating and often used for pain relief. Now, US Army doctors are using red light treatments to alleviate chronic pain, with notable anecdotal success.

For many people, hearing that the US military has put its imprimatur on color light therapy for pain relief is enough to embrace it wholeheartedly. However, it's the broader, holistic application of color light energy, addressing the underlying causes of emotional and physical disease that offers the greatest potential for humanity. Color therapy doesn't treat specific muscles or organs. It addresses the integrated body, mind and spirit through its energy field. All life is energy based. Research in the 1970s by Nobel nominee Fritz-Albert Popp determined that our bodies are virtual electromagnetic fields, affected by the energy around us. All natural organisms emit light energy at the cellular level and all organic life absorbs light, processing it internally. Faint, color-coded broadcasts of light energy emitted by cells is the basis of inter-cellular communications in all living organisms. A generation ago, Dr Valerie Hunt of UCLA demonstrated how the body's energetic emissions display chaotic changes before pathological conditions develop in the tissue. This led to the main postulate of color light therapy: Ailments begin as energetic imbalances, which, if detected in time, can be dispersed using external, non-invasive color light energy treatments.

In short, many emotional and physical disturbances are not only treatable but also preventable through energy re-balancing. Following on the work of Popp and Hunt, German naturopath Peter Mandel, considered the father of modern color light therapy, discovered that when specific acupuncture points, reflex zones and other established grid systems in the body are irradiated with focussed light beams of color, pain from some symptoms can be alleviated within minutes. It had already been demonstrated that light energy absorbed through the eyes could reduce the frequency and severity of migraine headaches and reduce pain levels associated with some lung diseases.

Today, the field of modern energy medicine includes different treatments like color irradiation and low intensity lasers. Use of color energy is proving beneficial for patients suffering from jetlag, eating and mood disorders including bulimia. In psychiatry, research has validated light therapy through the eyes as the most effective treatment for seasonal affective disorder. Color therapy is being investigated for its potential to help people with non-seasonal depression, persistent insomnia and difficulties adapting to shift work. And this is just scratching the surface of what we are likely to learn through color energy work as its usage becomes more widespread and the science behind it better understood. For further information on color acupuncture precision penlights and educational material, contact: Julianne Bien Spectrahue Light & Sound Inc. Toronto, Canada (416) 340.0882 www.spectrahue.com