What If? | The Foundation

Shen & Shenanigans | Episode 1: What If We Treated the Person?
Conversation between Dr. James and Devynne
Recorded January 2025

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INTRODUCTION

Devynne: Happy Wednesday. If you’re watching this, you’re getting ready to watch a clip from Dr. James and my first recording that we did probably about a week or so ago. If you’ve clicked on it, you’re obviously interested in what we have to talk about and what we’re going to be sharing. We’d love to hear how you are connected to us, if you are already connected to us.

This is a new project that’s been on our radar for a few years. We are both doctors of acupuncture and Chinese medicine. Dr. James is my dad. We’ve been in practice together for about ten years now. We joke about the really long conversations that we have about the medicine, about life, and just things in general.

A few years ago we made a joke about how we should turn on some recording equipment and capture some of these conversations. This is the year we’ve decided to pull the trigger on that, and we’re excited about it. It’s definitely going to be a learning curve, and we’re going to continue to learn and grow along with you.

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THE PROJECT

Devynne: Some of what we’re going to start sharing are clips and segments of conversations we have. We’re setting aside some time every week to have conversations we’re already probably going to have, and we’re going to do what we said we should do and just turn on the equipment.

As we get started, we don’t really have a structured plan for what we’re going to talk about. We just know we’re going to create some consistency and rhythm by doing it, and then we’ll get to see where it goes. Our long-term plan is creating some very specific content on different topics. If there’s something you’re curious about or want to know about, feel free to drop it below. We’d love to hear from you.

If you’re already connected to us, we’d love to hear how you know us. Maybe you’re a friend from back in South Carolina. Maybe you know us through the CrossFit world or the Chinese medicine world. We’d love to hear from you.

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THE INTENTION

James: One of the things on our horizon is teaching and some coursework and educational informational things that we want to get out there. This project will allow us to play with the tools that we need.

We’ve always had these really good conversations around the office when we sit down and talk about stuff. Many years ago, we always made the joke that we should turn on the recording equipment and capture some of it. It’s different to sit down and try to capture it on cue versus just random conversations throughout the office. But I do think there’s certainly some theory and philosophy that we live our lives with that is valuable and relates to the medicine and the work that we do and how we see the world.

There’s value in sharing that with our community and people that may or may not be interested in it. But it’s also going to lead to coursework. There are certain things that are unique about the way we practice the medicine that I think are valuable. We don’t really always let people peek behind the curtain, but I also recognize that the way we practice may be interesting to folks. Why not share it? We’re going to have the conversations anyway, so let’s just record them and see who picks them up, see who’s interested, and see where they go.

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THE APPROACH

James: In the beginning, we’ve just decided we’re going to set aside a certain chunk of time on a certain day of the week to sit down and see where conversation leads rather than necessarily steer it in a specific direction.

There’s an element of this for us that will also just be mystery and surprise. We have a plan and intention and direction we’re trying to go with things, but the conversations we get to have are so good because they’re usually authentic and off the cuff. We’re also trying to figure out how to create the environment for us to settle into that.

It’ll be interesting to see how it gets pieced together and which pieces we share at which times. The teaching component isn’t necessarily a lecture. We’ve done some wellness talks recently in our clinic where we come in with a specific topic. There’s also the piece of wanting to share a little bit more behind the scenes of what we’re doing, what’s going on, and the curiosities and questions we get to pose.

We’re also going to do some recording with Sarah. She’s going to be part of these conversations and talks as well. We want to create space for the Chinese medicine hat as doctors of acupuncture and Chinese medicine to talk about herbs and the medicine and treatment points. But we also want to pull her in with different projects she’s part of within the space.

Then on the gym side of what we do, how do we tie all these pieces together? They feel so natural for us in our day-to-day lives and it all makes sense, but we also want to share in that.

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WHO WE ARE

Devynne: We’ve been practicing for almost ten years. Our education is rooted in the old five element approach to the medicine, which we’ve also pursued through a more classical approach to treatment with postgraduate education.

We have our clinic inside. Well, we shouldn’t say it’s inside a gym because it’s not really adjunct to the gym. We run a Chinese medicine clinic during the day, but we also have a CrossFit gym that launched this year for lots of reasons that probably don’t make sense to a lot of people who do know us. It’s been an adventure to launch that and communicate the message.

We’ve had an herbal apothecary since we started, where we use raw herbs. There’s lots of ground to cover on the herbal side of it. It’s also become a tea shop. So we’ve got a lot of ground to cover in these conversations, and we expect Sarah to join us fairly frequently, bringing topics from her perspective as someone who’s been a nurse for twenty years and is currently studying to be a nurse practitioner. That adds value to the whole of what we’re doing.

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WHY WE’RE DOING THIS

James: There’s not really many people within our field. The teachers we’ve studied with are not retiring, but they’re in a later stage of their practice. It doesn’t feel like there’s anybody coming behind them, stepping up or stepping forward to continue the conversation.

We’re not saying this is how the medicine should be taught or practiced. There’s just not as much conversation as it felt like when we were first starting. A lot of my conversations come from you, right? You were just a couple years behind me in school, and our timelines are so similar. We’ve overlapped in who we’ve chosen to study with as we got into practice. But it feels like there’s a vacancy there, and it feels weird to be like, oh, let’s fill that vacancy.

We’ve always been really good at questions and curiosities. Even in the treatment room, we don’t take things too seriously or come at patients like this is what you need to do and this will solve all your problems. It’s an exploration.

There are certainly still some of those bigger conversations happening in some places, but some of that gap feels like it’s also just talking so far over the general public’s head. Maybe what we’re trying to do is lean into that within our field but also help bridge that gap with the public in a way that doesn’t require years of study to be part of the conversation.

This isn’t really for anything else. It’s more for us than anything, which feels like a weird thing to say.

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THE FOUNDATION: “WHAT IF”

Devynne: One of the things I always appreciated about how we practice and how we have conversations is that most of them start with what if. I find it’s been a neat way to engage the medicine and a neat way to engage patients.

We practice medicine that not everybody is attached to. There’s a level of the question that comes up all the time: do you have to believe in this for it to work? No. It works. I don’t have double blind studies to prove it to you. I have results in my patients that prove it to you.

When a patient comes in and they have something going on that their doctors just can’t solve or they’re being put into boxes but still having the same symptoms, their problems aren’t being solved. That’s when we get to the conversation. Well, I wonder what if we approach this and do what we do. Can we get you some relief? It’s been amazing to bridge that for a lot of people, especially when oftentimes the last place you’re going to go is to someone who’s going to poke you with needles. They’ve tried everything else.

They come in and get a different perspective on what they’re going through. We approach it and look at it differently. Next thing you know, they’re starting to get some relief and things are moving in a direction they’ve been told would never be right again.

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REAL OUTCOMES

Devynne: We’ve worked with veterans who were told they’d never be out of pain, and they were out of pain. We’ve worked with patients who were told this is just the way it is and they’d have to live the rest of their lives with it. Somehow they find their way in, and they’re finding relief and healing from things they were expecting to never get relief from.

Learning the medicine is interesting that way too. The conversations we have usually start with what if, and then you just see more of an exploration of what’s possible versus this is absolutely the fix.

The description in traditional Chinese medicine these days is if A and B, I have A, then do this. But what if we approached the person like they’re a person and not just another migraine that needs a prescription of points versus a prescription of meds? What if we approach it that way and treated the person? It’s a powerful way to practice and show up in the world.

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THE LARGER VISION

James: Ultimately, we’re doing this because we want to take care of people. We haven’t built what we’ve built here for any other reason than because we just want to find alternative ways to take care of people. Maybe something outside the box thinking or something they never considered before.

We’ve got people in our CrossFit gym right now that you’d never find in a typical CrossFit gym. They found their way in because they got results here and they trust us. They’re moving in ways they haven’t moved in before. Building community is part of that. All of it is about living a nourished life.

There are so many different aspects of what we do. It’s cool to see how we meet people because not everybody becomes a patient and then launches into everything else. It’s usually the other way around. We meet them through something else we’re doing, and then oh yeah, we’re acupuncturing. They didn’t come to us as patients first.

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EXPAND AND CONTRACT

Devynne: I know you and I have had a lot of private conversations about how we spent the last year building a gym, which is wonderful and awesome. It’s only in the last month and a half that I remember and feel like an acupuncturist again because all the focus has been on the gym.

We took a class recently that overlaid the two worlds, but it’s what it’s all coming back to. It’s cool that we’ve always had this joke of expand and contract. We’ve just been expanding, and we’re contracting back to Chinese medicine and acupuncture. We’re not putting the other thing down, but we’re coming back to the heart of who we are and what we do and why all the other sprouting projects started in the first place. The others were just branches off of this.

It’s interesting timing to be bringing it all back home to that as well.

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[Conversation continues. Full episode available in audio.]