High Conversation

above: The view from Amy and Bruce's house. On special occasions Amy would set up a card table in the den and the children would eat out there. Amy would always cook special food from traditional recipes for these dinners. Then she would announce, “No children at the table; tonight we will have only high conversation.” The first time we had spent the afternoon making several hundred dumplings and she boiled them, shocking them with cold water added to the boiling pot and then skimming off the ones that rose to the top. There would be no talk about the day’s affairs on this night. We would talk about philosophy and manifestations of the “strange force” in history and Amy’s personal experiences in China. These dinners and the conversations with Amy and Bruce have a special place in my memories now, so many years later.

I came as a beggar with very little to add to any of these conversations. These conversations made me deepen my reading about Chinese thought, history and language. I remember Amy, with Bruce translating and adding comments, talking about the concept of sanjiao sizhi or “unity among the Three Teachings or Paths “ of Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism. She easily slipped from one teaching to another in philosophical conversation, blending the concepts perfectly. Bruce translated much of this for me and explained that the literati had developed this ecumenical approach from the core teachings of the Complete Realization sect of Taoism. The more ancient text concerning this was Zhouyi Cantongqi, or the Concordance of the Three, according to the Book of Changes of the Zhou Dynasty (the Three being Earth, Man, Heaven, on the outer or macrocosmic level and jing, qi, and zhen on the inner level.) The practice that this text advocated brought Taoism and Confucianism together; only later was Buddhism recognized as an equal. to be continued

Introduction: Meeting the Doctor

This subject is so near and dear to my heart that I have found it difficult to write it down. I start to think," What if Bruce hadn’t invited me to meet Amy? What if Amy had refused to treat me? Where would I be now if these things hadn’t taken place?” But I promised to write this down for Claire.

I first met Bruce at the home of David and Catherine White. He was there to get firewood and I was there working on a book on Chi Kung with David. We talked about his experience in Taiwan and he translated a little bit of Chinese for me. He told me, “You have to come over and meet my wife.” He wrote down his phone number at work at the VA hospital for me. It was the fall of 1984. I had been bitten on the leg by a Brown Recluse spider six months before this and had been very sick ever since then. I was 28 years old and had practiced Chinese martial arts for more than half of my life, but I felt old and sick. I couldn’t really trust my own judgment because I felt so out of sorts ever since I had taken the medicine the doctors gave me to combat the spider’s poison. I didn’t know who to ask for help. My face was blue and I frequently felt dizzy and weak. I had no appetite and I spoke in a low murmur. I went to thir house on the appointed day. Amy answered the door and seemed nonplused; Bruce had forgotten to tell her I was coming. Steve and Pei¬Pei took one look at me and with terror on their faces, ran to their room! I left and came back another day.She had very long hair and she was very serious, and she refused to use any English in my presence! We had tea and Bruce translated as Amy asked me questions. After a while Amy agreed to take my pulse. My life was about to change forever. We sat at the kitchen table and she placed my arm on a red pillow and very gently touched my wrist. I felt a very subtle energy come from her fingertips and go into my body and up to my third eye. Bruce translated as Amy gave me what seemed like a psychic reading covering my complete medical history, all the way back to when I fell out of bed and hit my head on the radiator when I was seven years old. I was in shock to say the least. This was accomplished with a series of questions. Amy then summarized my symptoms and asked the final question, “Do you know why your body is in this state?” I then pulled up my pants leg and showed her the spider bite for the first time. She looked suprised and then relieved. She traced the path of the stomach channel down my leg and said the bite was directly on the channel and very near an extremely important acupuncture point [zusangli, St36]. The air in the room changed, the reading was over, and Amy and Bruce gave me basic instruction on diet. Amy told me to make leek soup and eat the leeks as well. She told me to stop eating ice cream and fried food. She also told me to get fresh moxa and do moxabustion on my center. It took me several days to find moxa in Richmond but I did as she said. Then I went back to see her.That's when she realized she would never get rid of me. Amy told me years later that at first she was a little bit afraid of me, and thus the kids were, because she could tell that I had been poisoned. She didn’t know if I was a bad man who had been poisoned in retribution for something wicked I had done. That’s why she was relieved to see the spider bite. She also told me that she thought telling me I had to make special soup and do moxabustion to myself would get rid of me and so she was suprised when I came back. David was born that fall, I remember when Bruce called from the hospital to tell me. Amy didn’t like my long hair and demanded that I get it cut so that all my chi wouldn’t go to my hair. I decided out of respect for her I would do as she asked. I made an appointment with a barber for the next day. That evening I went to Bruce and Amy’s house and told Amy that I was going to the barber shop the next day. Amy made the most horrible face and was aghast at the prospect of me going to the barber shop. Bruce started laughing and I was completely confused, I was trying hard to do what she asked and she was horrified! Bruce had to explain to me that a Chinese wife wouId never letmar husbanthgo to the barber shop, they cut their husband's hair. Seems a little more than hair cuts goes on at barber shops in China and the wife will not let her huusband go. Amy figured barber shops were the same here.We had a lot of good laughs over the years but that was the first one. I changed my diet for six’ months and felt much stronger. I injured my hand and went to Bruce and Amy for acupuncture in the spring of 1985. This time around she was more comfortable with me and spoke some English. Often I had to go to the house at ten at night, because I was not to come until Bruce got home. One night the needles went in and I turned white as a sheet and started to faint. Amy quickly pulled the needles out and pushed the point under my nose. I remember the look of worry on her face as she worked over me. I had not eaten enough and I remember Amy fussing at me. After that I went to the house every afternoon and dealt with Amy one on one. I was supposed to come over after three in the afternoon but I went early and interupted her meditation.

Amy used to feed me a lot. She was always inviting me to stay for dinner. I had never used chopsticks before but I didn’t tell them that I just picked them up and used them. Amy said I was remembering my past, Chinese, life. I learned my Chinese table manners by Steve and Pei-Pei laughing at me when I did something wrong. Sometimes she would take my pulse and very solemnly say “No noodles today.” I'd crack up laughing and she’d start laughing too! Noodles and needles just sounded the same to her. Over the months her English got better and better. She said I had an unusual problem that she had only seen once before. Bruce got into MCV at this time and was placed under the stress of Medical school as well having a wife and three kids at home. I resolved to try to help anyway I could. I used to babysit David, like when Amy had her wisdom teeth taken out or when she went back to Taiwan.Sometimes Amy would call me up and ask me to come over."I can't be the bad guy and the good guy simultaneously. They need to blow off steam. I'll leave and you let them play, just make sure no one gets hurt." David would look around and smile and say "Mommy is gone...let's be bad!" and they would have a big pillow fight. I was awed at the way East and West met in their house and merged into something superior. Amy cooked all of Bruce’s food [no hospital food for him] and kept the stress down at home so that he could focus on school. The children were such a blessing and they were such a happy family that I felt lucky to be able to go spend an hour or two each day with them. I always felt better after going to Bruce and Amy’s whether I got treatment or not. I will always love this family for what they did for me. Anytime I tried to thank Amy she would always say "Don't mention it." Scroll down for part one

The Amy

Why do we call my teacher "The Amy"? There is an old story about  when she was on a flight from London to Vienna some years ago. There were two British bankers sitting in front of her. She could hear them talking, they were on their way to go see this mysterious doctor in Vienna they called The Amy. They were talking about the "one small Chinese housewife" sitting right behind them! Ever since then we have joked about her being "The Amy".
She is truly one of a kind with her tremendous spiritual insight, intuition, and diagnostic abilities making her a legend among her many patients all over the world.

Part two

[Scroll down for Part 1]

                                                                    Amy and Bruce
Part 2
The second part of the story of my experience with traditional Chinese doctor and meditation expert Amy Tseng Ballon

After my first encounter with Amy and Bruce I changed my diet for six months and strengthened my body enough so that I could receive treatment from her. I had been bitten by a Brown Recluse spider on a channel and very near an important acupuncture point. I had received western treatment for this infection but I had side effects that made my case complicated.

When she took my pulse this time it started out just like before but then my pulse felt to me like it did a drum roll when she touched my wrist and Amy cried "Aha!" Now she really became interested in my case. She said I had a rare syndrome that she had only seen once before. Now she felt sure that I had been sent to her so she could ”save me” as she put it. Amy told me I would get worse before I got better and I had to promise not to stop in the middle of the treatment. She started giving me needles everyday and she got a note book and kept detailed records of my treatment. This went on for the next year. I went to her house each afternoon and was immersed in the culture, the food, the language, and the medicine.

Amy made me promise I wouldn't tell anyone else I was getting treatment during the 3/4 of a year that I went to her house almost everyday. She told me it was her destiny to treat me. She said to me "If I treat you I will help a lot of people I will never meet.”
[From that day in 1984 I have tried to live up to this by helping people help themselves with Amy’s basic information on diet and lifestyle.]

She said it was not her destiny to treat other people and not to bring anyone to her house. She would take my pulse and then get the needles out of the tin they were stored in. I had two sets of needles just for me. One went to the hospital each day with Bruce to be sterilized; the other set was used on me. These were the old fashioned Chinese needles which are bigger than the Japanese made disposable needles acupuncturists use now. The more they were used the duller the tips became and the more painful the treatment became. Some days after treatment all I could do was go home and sleep.

After I had gotten needles everyday for three weeks on the same points over and over they had multicolored bruises over them and I felt like a pin cushion. I had to talk myself into going back for each treatment. Finally one day I told Amy I didn’t think I could stand it again today. She looked at me in a funny way and said, “Finally! I have been waiting for this for some time. You some kinda tough guy huh?” We laughed and laughed. I wasn’t tough, just ignorant! After this she would take my pulse every day and give me needles most days, but not always.

One weekend I went to Washington DC with Amy and Bruce and we got back late so I slept on the couch at their house. That night I dreamed about a past life as a Chinese man and heard Chinese spoken in my dreams. When I told Amy about this dream the next morning over shi fan and tea she didn’t seem surprised. She told me as a matter of fact that I was remembering my past life.
That morning Amy said she had a special treatment for me. I remember my response was "Oh no!" because the needles had been so painful. Amy laughed at me and assured me that it was "first class entertainment" and wouldn't hurt. She did acupressure to my back and neck. I was a massage therapist at the time but I had never experienced anything like what she did.

Amy did this wonderful technique where she pushed the energy gently up with her thumbs and it almost felt like liquid. Using the HuaT’o special points she pushed the energy up and out of any stuck points on the spine. Later she marked the points of Du Mai and some Bladder channel points on my back with a felt tipped pen. [This was when I really began to try to learn her point location information and style of acupressure and energy work.]

Eventually Amy asked to see what I had been taught about acupressure points in martial arts. I demonstrated on her 12 year old son Steve some basic points on the arms. I only knew a few points and what l knew about them was how to grab and hit them. She watched and told me that what I had been taught was very good location, or “spotting,” and seizing skills. She also noted that it was first level and none of the points were lethal, they were only used to weaken an opponent's arm and control a violent person. Then she said she would agree to teach me the first level of positive or healing knowledge using non-lethal points. First she frowned and gave me a “small speech” which I have never forgotten. She said, "We are not here to hurt anyone, and you must never use any of this information for the wrong reasons. We are here to make this a better planet for everyone to live on!" She said I had a big heart and this was why she agreed to teach me some of what she knew.

She spoke to me about the chi liang, the spirit of benevolence, and how this was the basis of Chinese medicine and all higher gung fu. This chi glowed in a person’s aura and was strengthened by being of service to mankind. The reason the ancient holy men were said to glow was because everything they did was in service to others. She talked about how the ancient Chinese traditions of the goddess such as Tou mu, the goddess of the North Star in ancient times, evolved into the Buddhist Bodhisattva Kuan Yin pusa and became the patron saint of Chinese medicine. Kuan Yin vowed to be the last to ascend to heaven and this is the pledge of the traditional doctor as well. There is a statue of Kuan Yin in Amy and Bruce’s house today.
To be continued

The Amy part one

by Wilson Pitts

Tseng, Ching-ying was the highest level Traditional Chinese Medicine doctor to immigrate from Taiwan to America in the 1980's. This is my story of meeting, being treated by, and studying with this amazing woman.

When I first met my teacher Tseng, Ching ying, she looked at me and said “You can not go to the mountain.” She continued, “You are of this world, you must serve humanity.” When she put my arm on a red pillow and lightly touched my wrist with her fingertips, I felt a subtle energy travel up my arm to yin tang, my third eye, and she said “I know you, I don’t need to take your pulse anymore.”

She agreed to give me acupuncture, but only when her husband was at home at night. Her husband, Bruce, was going to medical school at the time and would get home late in the evening. She would sing the pattern of treatment in Chinese before each treatment. The sound of her voice had a very special quality and even though I couldn’t understand the words the songs haunted my dreams for years. It seemed to trigger very old memories that I could not quite remember, I had dreams of being Chinese and heard the songs “fengchi, quchi, Zusanli”

Her two youngest children were born while they lived here in Richmond. After dinner the family would gather in a circle and put the toddler in the middle of the floor, “Kepeisa! ” baby show!” The toddler would be the center of attention and everyone would laugh and shower love on the little one while they played or performed. The warmth of the family, the gathering of everyone together at the end of the day, the one chi, was what was deemed important. We had enough good food for everyone, a warm place for the baby show, what else did you need? The stress of everyday life melted away.

One night when my teacher’s youngest child [at that time]David was about 6 months old he started crying and she passed him around the circle to each adult in turn. This was the early 80’s and I was “Mister-Mom” to my daughter Holly who was two when I began acupuncture treatment and then studied with the master. I had learned to send the chi to my hands from years of Pa Kua Chang practice. I found I could pacify my daughter when she was an infant by sending the chi to my hands and holding her. It worked every time so when they passed me the screaming baby I sent the chi to my hands and held him with my right hand on his lower back my left hand on his neck. He stopped crying immediately and opened his eyes a little wider than normal and gave me a “knowing look.”

Amy jumped up from her chair and exclaimed that the baby recognized me from a past life! That meant I was family, and not just gungfu family, I was made a part of the family! I had never been so honored, the warmth and healing energy of that family was a blessing. Many people felt healed after just coming over and sitting on the couch and speaking to the master. Her house had a very special vibe.

On several occasions she told me I was her brother from a past life and because of this connection she agreed to teach me. Her children still refer to me as “Uncle Wilson.” That is one of those times in life when you look back and recognize a fork in the road and you took one path and not another. I chose the this path because it had heart, you could feel it in her house, at dinner, in the treatment room, in the circle clapping, watching the baby show, this path, this Dao, had heart.

She picked the American name Amy Ballon and began to try to learn more English at this time. Amy told me to come to her house every day at 3 o’clock for acupuncture treatment. The first day I arrived a little after two to be sure I wasn’t late. I interrupted her meditation hour, something I never did again, but this time she led me in and then resumed her meditation. I joined her. it was wonderful, to this day there is nothing so special to me as the times I got to meditate with her. I still keep 2-3 in the afternoon for meditation when I am home. At 3 o’clock she opened her eyes and said in a low voice, “Who taught you to do the meditation?”

I told her I read a book about TM and taught myself when I was 13, and really found that it was what I had been doing ever since I was much younger and had no words for. Her eyes turned to slits and she shook her head, “So strange.” she said

Besides extensive acupuncture treatment she gave me lessons in Chinese language, culture, calligraphy, and cooking. After I had gone through the whole course of treatment she had me go back to my daily gungfu practice and she took my pulse after I did each form. She advised me in my internal practice and corrected my energy body in each form. She also demonstrated her gung fu on numerous occasions.



this episode was first published on twitter one sentence at a time!
To be continued