There is very little risk of needling yourself.  However, using the Clean Needle Technique that we teach our students is very important.  You do not want to introduce infection in your body by having dirty hands when you needle.  You also want to follow all the guidelines we teach all of our students:

• Never reuse a needle
• Always dispose of a needle properly in a biohazard box.
• Only needle the selected points we teach you

Every student will receive a Needle Kit for attending and completing our seminar. We will supply you with the proper size needles for the points that we teach you.  You do not need any other needles except the ones we give you in your gift Needle Kit.  When you are ready to purchase another supply of needles, you can contact us to ship you another supply.

During your 2 day seminar, we will teach you how to locate the selected points we want you to practice once you return home.  We will also mark out the points on your body with a sharpie, so you can continue to practice finding the points on your own using the mark on your skin as a guide.  We will also supply you with a tutorial video of each point to help you remember once you are back home and needling on your own. 

After your 2 days of needling, you will be very familiar with the feel of your qi moving.  The sensation you will be feeling is an electrical current, or a pressure, or a tingling.  People tend to use the word pain if they feel anything at all.  But once you ask them "Does it hurt?" they say no.  There is a fear that comes from feeling something in your body that you have never experienced before.  Once you understand that feeling your qi rush is a very good thing, and it is how your body will regenerate itself, then you will welcome the sensation that comes with needling.

It is unacceptable to feel like a needle is pricking you on your skin. That is very painful. We will teach you how to tap the needle in assertively, so that you do not prick yourself by tapping too lightly.  We have a tendency to want to tap lightly to not hurt ourselves.  But the reality is, it is only when you tap too lightly that you will feel pain.  

Every student will learn Clean Needle Technique. We stress how important it is to follow this protocol every single time you needle yourself.  You will also be given a tutorial video demonstrating the Clean Needle Technique procedure.

The best advantage of learning to self-needle is that you can treat yourself on a regular basis.  Consistency is key to success.  The frequency and intensity of your symptoms will determine how frequently you will needle. The more extreme your illness, the more frequently you will needle yourself. For example, if you have been diagnosed with cancer, you would benefit from putting in needles in the morning for an hour and again at night for an hour.  If you sprained your ankle while running, it would be best to put needles in off and on about 4 times in a day and even through the middle of the night if you can.  If you get migraines several times a week, it is best to put the needles in once a day for 3 days then you can space out to every other day then once a week.  If you are comfortable with leaving them longer, then that is even better. The longer you leave the needles in, the more work they can do.  In general, we recommend you leave the needles in for about 30 - 45 minutes. 

Every medical condition is the result of an organ that is in need of a repair. Even if you have a sports injury or are the victim of a car accident, there is an organ that is responsible for the muscles, the bones, building blood, etc.  The way to heal anything in the body is to go directly to the organs and help them to regenerate.  Therefore, all medical conditions can be improved by needling yourself.  We do not recommend you needle yourself while pregnant.

Absolutely. We highly recommend you stay on the program your doctor prescribed and add acupuncture as an adjunct to your Western medical treatment plan.  Once your body has improved enough, you can slowly go off your medication with your doctor's consent.

With acupuncture, it is common for a symptom to get more pronounced before it gets better.  This is for a very short period of time.  Then you will see the symptom either stabilize at the same level or it will continue to decrease in its intensity.  It eventually always goes down but in the beginning it could be more pronounced because it is coming up and out of the system.  

If you ever see a symptom that is escalating over an extended period of time that is not normal and you should consult a medical professional. 

If you have a very high fever and it is not coming down, if you have blood coming out of the body in any opening (except the menstrual cycle for women), if you have not been able to sleep for more than 2 days, if you try to eat and everything comes back up for more than 1 day, if you are having thoughts of suicide, or if you feel disoriented to the point of not being able to do normal daily functions, then you should seek medical care right away. 

It is normal after a needling session that you may feel "sick", or you may feel a symptom a lot that you used to get as a kid.  This is a common treatment reaction.  The body is working and you are feeling things shift and change.  It is important to remember that acupuncture is very powerful and it will create a shift in the body as soon as you put the needles in.  When the body starts repairing, you will really feel it.  It is not a cortisone shot. It does not numb the area. It awakens things and the body becomes more alive in activity and sensation.  You may not always like this feeling in the body, but it is only temporary and then the body will finish its work.  This will be felt more strongly in the beginning.  Once the body has completed a lot of its work to rebuild and regenerate, it will be less dramatic.  

Susan Jones has created a series of videos that teach students all about the human body, the Five Elements, and needling.  This is the best resource for further learning in self-acupuncture.

We recommend you continue your practice of needling yourself with the You Healing You program.  We will offer further training for those who are ready for the follow up seminars.  We cannot vouch for any other program in terms of safety or efficacy.

Each student will be given the book by Diane Connelly called The Law of the Five Elements as well as the complete video courses by Susan Jones upon registration for the You Healing You Seminar. After completion of the 3 day program, each student will receive a bi monthly newsletter to facilitate further understanding of Chinese Medicine and how it works.  All of these resources are the best way to further your learning after the seminar.

The best thing about acupuncture is that you will make progress after every needling session. It is impossible to put a needle in the body and not have many things shift and change towards homeostasis (the perfect balance).

We teach our students to track their symptoms with a numbering system.  Number 10 is the most extreme and the number 0 means there is no symptom at all and everything is functioning perfectly. 

It is common for people to be happy when their symptom goes down to a 3 or 2.  It is imperative that you continue to needle until you reach a number 0. This is when your body has resolved the issue completely.  If you stop treating the symptom at a number 3, it will continue to go back up again over time.

When you put a needle in the body, you arrest the Pattern of Disharmony and stop it from going in that direction.  You then get that pattern to reverse and go back in the other direction towards homeostasis.

If you are using acupuncture to remove a headache, food poisoning, nausea etc., then you should see very quickly after you insert the needle in the acupuncture point that is prescribed for that symptom that the pain will begin to lower systematically.  The more you turn the needles clockwise, the faster you can resolve the pain from the headache, food poisoning, nausea, etc.

If you are not experiencing relief fairly quickly (after 15 minutes), you should insert another point from the list of points that you were taught.

If you do not feel any improvement, you should take the needle out, re palpate the point again, insert the needle again, move the needle up and down and turn clockwise.

If you do not feel a marked change in your body then choose one of the other points from your prescribed points.  You can combine several points at once.

The #1 thing most people experience after a session is a feeling of being very relaxed.  People find that they sleep longer and fall asleep more easily. This is your body forcing you to go down and be dormant so it can get its work done. 

You may feel a symptom "speaking" more loudly for a short time after the session, but then the symptom will begin to be more quiet. Your body will tell you how much it needs.  Observe then needle.  Observe then needle.  The most important thing is to learn to listen to the body. It will always tell you what it needs.  And it will always give you a sign when your lifestyle is wreaking havoc on the body. Sometimes, the best medicine is to be mindful of what you put in your body.  For example, if you have terrible rashes on your body and they dissipate more and more after your consistent needling sessions, and then you have 2 cocktails and a chocolate dessert and your rash flairs up again, that is your body telling you that the sugar and alcohol create too much excess internal heat and that manifests in a rash on the skin.  This is your body's way of communicating with you.  It is your job to observe what makes the body thrive, and what makes the body break down.  We need to create a lifestyle based on these messages from th

The best way to gauge whether you should continue, adjust, or stop self-acupuncture is to listen to what your body is telling you,  You should observe all body systems in order to know what is best. Your body systems are:

Sleep  Appetite   Digestion  Bowels   Urination  Body Temperature  Mood/Emotions   Menstrual Cycle   Pain

When any of these functions are out of balance, it is best to regularly needle yourself.  In the You Healing You Seminar, you will learn which points to needle for each of these imbalances.

It is very common for the human being to become very balanced physically and emotionally with regular self-needling.  It may seem like everything is running like clock work and you have no complaints.  And then life happens! An accident, or an injury, or something in our environment invades the system and makes us sick. You can guarantee that life will bring these challenges over the course of our life. This is why learning to needle your own self is the best course of action for every human's long term health.

Acupuncture is very simple and straightforward. Most of the time, you don't need to make it more complicated by combining points. Each point is very powerful.  But a combination that is called The Four Gates of Buddha that is known to be very powerful together is Large Intestine 4 and Liver 3.  Both of these points are taught to all students at You Healing You.

Some points are inserted very shallow and some are located in the more fatty, meaty parts of the body so they go in a little deeper. We do not choose any points for students to learn that are complicated or risky to needle.  There are plenty of excellent points that are located in areas that are very easy to locate and very safe to needle .

The best thing you can do for yourself to make the most progress quickly is to sleep. Your body will be asking you to sleep more.  If you give in and make sleep your priority for this limited time, your body will make great progress so much faster. 

Of course, drinking lots of water is always a good thing. Eat whole foods. Remove yourself from your source of stress as much as possible.

If you are feeling positive effects, then your body is telling you that this is exactly what it needs. So continue with the same routine.

It's an excellent idea to keep a journal of your acupuncture sessions, the points you did, and what you are observing at the start of every new session.

You will be amazed at what symptoms you used to live with every day that are now long gone and you can barely remember having them.

The numbering system is very important.  Every person needs to feel like they are making progress, otherwise they would not have the motivation to continue.  When you keep a journal and mark down the number you are feeling in your body, it is very easy to go back over the past weeks and see what your numbers were before compared to what they are now. This is your proof that your body is truly benefitting from the self-needling.

If you make note of the points you used, it will be very easy to go back and see what points you used to help with that ailment you had on that day that quickly dissipated right after needles.

• Always call your doctor if anything in your body is escalating at a rapid rate and the needles are not having a positive effect
• Always call your doctor if you have experienced an injury to the head or the body that may have caused internal bleeding
• Always call your doctor if you are having a very high fever and the needles and ibuprofen are not making it come down.
• Always call your doctor if you feel dizzy or disoriented and find that you are not functioning normally