Dr. Hammer’s teachings and axioms have been and remain the cornerstone of my understanding of Chinese medicine. And in my years of studying with other teachers, I’ve never encountered another teaching that doesn’t align with these core tenets.

As healthcare practitioners, we’ve felt the need to censor ourselves and our beliefs in the name of fostering a safe environment for all people that come through our doors. In alignment with the intention of “maintaining good boundaries” between our “professional” selves and “personal” lives, we’ve been a bit in-the-closet around how we identify and what we feel our Work (i.e. that bigger work than can only be written with a capital “w”) is in the world. We’ve uncovered that staying hidden in silence would be tantamount to complicity with the systemic oppression that exists within our society as well as our own conditioned minds. And we simply aren’t interested in using power—against others or ourselves—in this way. So it’s high time we came out of the closet!

While we’re certainly excited to share our beautiful new clinic space with everyone, we also understand that we’ll be opening our doors at a time when we all need to continue to take extra precautions in order to keep each other healthy and safe.

We chose to be called “Dragon Rises Center for Wholeness” for three main reasons: the name honors our Chinese medicine roots, it reminds us how fierce each person’s healing potential truly is, and it keeps us grounded in the belief that every individual--whether in need of a little support or a complete lifestyle overhaul--is inherently whole.