Sometimes you will see me walking around in my favorite T-Shirt, which Rachel gave me a few years ago. It says "The Self is the Guru." This is my mantra and my call to acupuncturists everywhere to recognize the power within each and every one of them.
Every so often someone calls me "Sensei," which is a term of respect and means something along the lines of "one who has been there before" or "one who is walking a little further up the path from me and can give me some guidance of what is coming toward me in life." A Japanese colleague of mine shared another definition of this term in saying that "Sensei really just means 'Mister' these days." So while I am flattered that someone means to respect me when they call me Sensei, I am not a fan of this term for two reasons.
Firstly, the American acupuncture profession (I can't speak for other countries) is mostly made up of women. Among the many female senior practitioners who have shaped my life and made me the practitioner I am today, only two have ever to my knowledge been called "Sensei" regularly by their students. Perhaps the word really does mean "Mister." If we are going to have a term of respect for our senior practitioners and cherished teachers, let's get one that we apply evenly to men and women.
Secondly, "Sensei" is not an English word. There are certain words from Chinese and Japanese that are difficult to translate satisfactorally into English, like "Qi" or "Shen." So while I often will use the word "energy" when talking with clients, "Qi" and "Shen" convey concepts I cannot easily express in Engligh. But I am pretty sure that we have a number of excellent words in our language to appropriately venerate our teachers.
In using our own words, we own the acupuncture we practice as part of our heritage here. There is a balance: we should respect the East Asian sources of our art and be greatful for the teaching that came from China and Japan, and we should also equally respect ourselves as the ones who are carrying this lineage forward and shaping our practice of acupuncture into something that is uniquely American.
The Self is the Guru. The universe will give you help and teaching when you need it, but to truly fly with your life and your art, you have to recognize the wonderful teacher inside you and own your own power. The Self is the Guru - say it with me.
