The Yin and Yang of Climate Crisis: Healing Personal, Cultural, and Ecological Imbalance with Chinese Medicine

213 Pages·2015·1.55 MB·English

by  Brendan Kelly

“Brendan Kelly uses his expertise in Chinese medicine to draw a connection
between the environmental excesses that have led us to the age of climate
change and the individual excesses that lead to depletion, imbalance, and
disease. His fascinating book offers fresh, clear insight into the root causes of
both, as well as a map toward greater personal and environmental health and
balance.”
—Kristin Kimball, author of The Dirty Life; farmer and co-founder of
Essex Farm
“The human body is a mirror of our home planet. The Yin and Yang of Climate
Crisis not only teaches that the body and earth are connected, it explains the
need for healing both.”
—Scott Frazier, member of the Crow/Santee tribe; founder and director
of Project Indigenous
“Brendan Kelly invites us to set aside our typical ways of thinking—
reductionistic, fragmented, and dualistic—and to embrace a more holistic and
systemic mode of thought. Using the conceptual framework of Chinese
medicine, Kelly incisively diagnoses the source of what most ails us, both
personally and collectively, and offers guidelines for meaningful change. What
could be more important?”
—John Christopher, PhD, Fellow of the American Psychological
Association and the Mind & Life Institutes
“With a radically expansive understanding of holistic principles, Brendan Kelly
shows us that the remedy for our individual bodies and our planet-body is the
same. He invites us to look at the deeper causes of our situation and, in so doing,
to experience deeper purpose and connection with life. This book is a must-read
for anyone who cares about the earth.”
—Sarah Von Hoy, PhD, LAc, professor at Goddard College
“The Yin and Yang of Climate Crisis is a brilliantly written, far-sighted
exploration of climate change using Chinese medicine as an ancient way to see
personal mind-body inflammation as deeply interrelated with the earth’s rising
heat. This book empowers people to embrace cooler lifestyles and less
inflammatory diets to help rebalance their own lives and in a small, yet
organically powerful, way.”
—Susan Green, PhD, department chair of Behavioral Sciences and
director of Wellness & Alternative Medicine, Johnson State College
The Yin and Yang of Climate
Crisis
Healing Personal, Cultural, and Ecological
Imbalance with Chinese Medicine
BRENDAN KELLY, LAC
North Atlantic Books
Berkeley, California
Copyright © 2015 by Brendan Kelly. All rights reserved. No portion of this book, except for brief review,
may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the written permission of the publisher. For
information contact North Atlantic Books.
Published by
North Atlantic Books Berkeley, California Cover image © shutterstock.com/Alexandr79
Cover design by Mary Ann Casler
The Yin and Yang of Climate Crisis: Healing Personal, Cultural, and Ecological Imbalance with Chinese
Medicine is sponsored and published by the Society for the Study of Native Arts and Sciences (dba North
Atlantic Books), an educational nonprofit based in Berkeley, California, that collaborates with partners to
develop cross-cultural perspectives, nurture holistic views of art, science, the humanities, and healing, and
seed personal and global transformation by publishing work on the relationship of body, spirit, and nature.
North Atlantic Books’ publications are available through most bookstores. For further information, visit our
website at www.northatlanticbooks.com or call 800-733-3000.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Kelly, Brendan (Brendan D.), author.
The yin and yang of climate crisis : healing personal, cultural, and ecological imbalance with Chinese
medicine / Brendan Kelly.
pages cm
Summary: “Examines the current climate crisis through the lens of Chinese medicine.”—Provided by
publisher.
ISBN 978-1-58394-951-1 (paperback) — ISBN 978-1-58394-952-8 (e-book) 1. Climatic changes—Health
aspects. 2. Medical climatology. 3. Human beings—Effect of climate on. 4. Medicine, Chinese. I. Title.
RA793.K45 2015
616.9'88—dc23 2015001171
Dedicated to my beautiful wife, Liz, who helped make this book
happen in innumerable ways, both large and small
Also dedicated to my parents, Joan and Richard, for a lifetime of
love, support, and encouragement
Acknowledgments
To my wife, Liz—thank you for several years of keeping me fed, which
provided me days at a time to write and research. And thank you for a decade of
listening to me talk about the ideas that would become this book.
To the patients at our clinic—thank you for the opportunity to see the depth of
healing possible with Chinese medicine.
To my current teachers of Chinese medicine, especially Wolfe Lowenthal and
Jeffrey Yuen—thank you for all that you’ve given me and all of your students.
To the teachers of my teachers of Chinese medicine, including Huang Di, Sun
Si Miao, Zhang Zhong-jing, and Cheng Man-ch’ing—thank you for the wisdom
you’ve imparted to generations of students and practitioners.
And to Tim McKee, Richard Grossinger, and everyone at North Atlantic
Books—thank you for seeing the potential in a Chinese medicine understanding
of climate change.
Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1: The Sickness of Climate Change
Chapter 2: The Science of Climate Change: A Chinese Medicine Perspective
Chapter 3: The Meaning of Climate Change: The Personal Level
Chapter 4: Feeding the Fire of Climate Change
Chapter 5: The Water Phase: Oil and Jing
Chapter 6: The Consequences of Continuous Growth: Wood and Wind
Chapter 7: Quality Controls Quantity: Metal Controls Wood
Chapter 8: The Dissatisfaction of Too Much Fire
Chapter 9: Cancer and Climate Change: A Tale of Two Diagnoses
Chapter 10: Internal Climate Change: Tongue Diagnosis
Chapter 11: The Opportunities of Climate Change
Notes
Bibliography
Index
About the Author