Margaret Zhou, L.Ac., FAE
As a practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and an environmental and human rights advocate, I work toward personal and collective health for people and the planet.
I believe that each of us carries an important piece of the remedy for our times. I envision a world in which all people have the sovereign freedom to feel, honor, and delight in their life force flowing through them – as an expression of our connection to the divine, and a reminder of our role as friends and guardians of all that is sacred here between Heaven and Earth.
I am a licensed acupuncturist, and certified Fertility Awareness Method Educator. I live and work on the land of the Cochenyo-speaking Ohlone people in Oakland, California.
I had the privilege of having a multicultural upbringing, living for periods of time in California and northern China. During my undergraduate education at UC Berkeley, my studies focused on Chinese literature. It was here that I was introduced to Daoist and Buddhist practices, and the theoretical basis of Chinese Medicine. I also studied global development, and worked at an environmental and human rights NGO called International Rivers for seven years. Through that work I gained a deep respect for the people who are putting their bodies and livelihoods on the line to protect their ancestral lands and cultures.
Throughout my time working in environmental protection, I was also struggling with my own health journey. The journey for me had begun much earlier when I started menstruating, as I experienced extremely debilitating menstrual cycles. A few years into puberty, I started taking hormonal birth control. This suppressed the symptoms but did not allow me to address the root causes. When I stopped hormonal contraceptives ten years later at age 25, all my painful symptoms returned. I decided to do all I could to heal my cycle naturally. I learned the Fertility Awareness Method and have since been tracking my cycles and using the method for contraception successfully for eight years.
I also studied western folk herbalism and plant spirit medicine with Francisca Santibanez for several years, as well as other teachers here in California and in South America. I started exploring my ancestral medicine of acupuncture and herbal medicine, which has since turned into my main passion and area of study. Acknowledging the interconnections between my physical symptoms and the experiences of my lineage and my upbringing, I also find healing through group recovery programs and somatic processing.
Through this work and my current course of study, I am in awe of how the various threads of my experience are weaving themselves together. The medicine of my ancestors teaches how our bodies are microcosms that manifest and reflect the health of the environment and the world around us. Many indigenous cultures have passed on the wisdom that the health of the Earth and the health of our bodies are one and the same. We cannot have a healthy body without a healthy planet, and vice versa. Much of the imbalance that is experienced today is a result of being forced to disassociate from our bodies, and from the collective Earth body. Becoming “body literate” is one means of undoing this trauma. It is a process of listening to the innate wisdom of our bodies, our ancestors, and the cycles of nature found on Earth and in the cosmos. By learning to work with the way that those larger cycles play out in our own bodily cycles and rhythms, we can remember what it means to live in relationship with the life that is flowing within us and around us. This rememberance is, I believe, an important key to inviting in personal and collective transformation.
These days when I am not studying this beautiful medicine, I am spending time in nature, practicing martial arts, dancing, backpacking, studying the Yi Jing, and exploring ways to live more harmoniously with the planet. I am excited to continue on the path of learning, and doing all that I can to bring these offerings forward.
Acknowledgements
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Dedicated to the ancestors and wise ones who cultivated relationships of harmony on this land.
With deep gratitude for my teachers, mentors, role models, and friends:
The faculty at the Academy of Chinese Culture & Health Sciences
Michael Givens, L.Ac.
Karin Parramore, MSOM
Toni Mandara, Somatic Process Healing
Francisca Santibanez, Plant Spirit Talk
Sarah Bly, The Well: School of Body Literacy
Professora Em Segmen, Merrit College
Dr. Louise Hart, Psychologist