Uncle Screwtape

Registration with a professional body is not enough. They need to come under statutory regulation by the government. Then they will be allowed to keep prescribing medicines. It is the same all over Europe. It's the same directive for all of us. Plus, you can still mix your own medicines. Richard

If you're not regulated by your government then they are banned. If you are regulated then you can go on prescribing them. Practioners in the UK have been going for regulation as a way around the EU directive for more than ten years. The recent round of emails about this issue never made it clear that regulation was the answer. Instead they called for the directive itself to be scrapped, but that was never going to happen. I think it would be more helpful if people knew that there is another option; one that is more likely to succeed. But it takes a long time and a sympathetic government. The previous UK government (Labour) promised regulation then went back on it. The Conservatives got in and pressed ahead with it. What I would urge people to do is to put pressure on their governments to regulate practitioners. In the UK, practitioners were all for regulation. I know people with experience of herbal medicines and who are not qualified will resent not being able to buy them over the counter any more but at least you know now that soon, if you go to a practitioner, they are qualified and experienced and prescribing medicines that are what they say they are and will not harm you. So it could be worse. Richard

Just adding to the most recent reply, really, that in the UK, at least, registered herbalists who have been educated to degree level will be able to continue to prescribe medicines that would otherwise be banned. I don't think this is such a bad thing as it will ensure basic standards for the consumer, who, as things stand, often have to take pot luck. The same option is available, I assume, to practitioners all over Europe. About 18 months ago I asked every UK-based member of Tao Bums to write to their MPs and to fill in the consultation form. Six million did, all in all, and it worked. So to those here who made the effort, thank you. At least on behalf of the herbalist girlfriend I was with at the time who still has a career it seems.

Thank you, TM! It comes as such a relief to see someone else say this. I remember the first time I asked you the question: what made movement enter stillness? I have been circling this question ever since. But I am no closer to understanding. Nor am I any closer to giving up wondering. Richard

If you want to know about tea ask an Englishman! We drink more per person than any other nation on earth. Click here to see how many cups we have drunk today. Allow me to introduce you to Gerald: He is on the right with Geraldine on the left. One spoonful of black tea per person and 'one for the teapot'. Let it brew for about five minutes and pour into a china cup through a strainer. Add milk and sugar to suit your personal taste. I have a knitted tea cosy to keep the pot warm, but I have no picture of it to show you. I sometimes wear the tea cosy on my head when I think no one is looking. Richard

I am so glad you said that. So many interpret Taoism as being indifferent, but nothing could be further from the truth. There is clear bias in Taoism toward a certain way of living. Richard

Do sages serve Tao? I never got that impression. Perhaps they do, but it just seemed to me they utilised it. I no more serve Tao, anyway, than I serve the wind when I use it to steer a sail boat. I respect it and it instils a sense of awe and wonder in me, however. I don't see Tao as anything other than the way the universe and nature works. I can use that way to my advantage, but I am not that way. In demystifying Tao I may have overdone it, I admit. Richard

We don't know why Lao Tzu left, where he went and what he went on to do. not for sure anyway. Richard

I am sure the great sages did concern themselves with such matters. Even Lao Tzu had ideas of how a society could be run to make it better. Fuxi, Shennong, Yu the Great, King Wen all appeared to concern themselves deeply with the path events took. Although everything is perfect as it is, change is inevitable and the direction of that change has yet to be decided. The difference is that a sage has an innate sense of the right thing to do and does not have to contrive it. But as you say, for those of us who are not sages, contriving to do the right thing is better than contriving to do the wrong thing. And Lao Tzu, at least, didn't think all is Tao. He spoke of Tao being lost and of actions contradicting Tao. To him it was something to wield, to use and to utilise. It was a way that you used or didn't. Tao is what causes galaxies to spin, stars to be born; it holds planets in their orbits and makes the earth turn, the winds blow, the rains fall and the grasses grow. I cannot do that; therefore I am not Tao. I may harness Tao, though. But that doesn't make me it. That's how I see it anyway. Richard

If you drop an egg on the floor then the mess that results is perfect. It is perfect in that that is what happens when you drop eggs. But does that mean you have to leave the mess there and not clear it up? Of course not! If you want a clean floor then you are perfectly entitled, as a Taoist, to get out the mop. Bad is not the same as good. Not even for Lao Tzu, or he would not have made the distinction. They both have their place. But you still have choices to make. Taoism has something to say about how you make those choices and then carry them out. Plenty, actually. The I Ching is based on the idea that we can choose between possibilities. There is nothing wrong with that at all. The I Ching talks about choices leading to fortune or misfortune. The rest is up to you. I want to be happy, but I accept I will often be sad; I want to succeed, but I accept I will sometimes fail; I want to gain, but I accept I will occasionally lose. Richard

And if you do get her to settle down, will she lose her appeal? Plus, should you really be trying to keep any woman 'in check'? Have enough respect to let a woman be what she really is and not what you want to shape them into. If you don't like her as she is, you have a decision to make. Richard

Whenever I have worked out it was for no specific purpose in mind except to improve my general fitness.

TM, I really appreciated what you said about learning how to ask a question. It took me a while to learn I had to learn how to ask, too. It was like fiddling with a combination lock and then suddenly it popped open. I prefer the yarrow method because of the time it takes and the opportunity the I Ching has to talk to me before a hexagram is revealed. She sometimes tells me that I am asking the wrong question; I'll even be told what question I should ask! Once I asked about what role a particular person plays in my life and I was told: 'That's not for you to know; but you know who you should ask about?' Then she told me. So much of the divination takes place even before the final hexagram has been divined. It took me years to get to that stage. That's even before I get to the hexagrams themselves. (For me, the Ta Chuan is more valuable a text than the TTC.) Richard PS Pietro, it was a divination TM did for me that brought me so close to the I Ching and I am thankful to this day. You'd do well to take her up on her generous offer.

We have had a couple of spring-like days in England, but then it snows again. However, I grow my own food, and from this month I have had broad beans, tomatoes and parsnips growing in seed trays. There is nothing quite like seeing seeds germinate and green shoots poking through the soil to make you at least get excited at the prospect of spring, even if it's grey and wet outside. I can recommend it to anyone! Richard

Stephen Karcher's Total I Ching is beautifully poetic and allows further insights into the historical context of the texts. A very good addition to anyone's collection. The Ernaos is sumptuous. Meaning applicable to you in the moment seems to float up out of the text. It is hard work and I still need my Wilhelm open beside me for the while, but it is the daddy of them all in my opinion. And beautifully presented too. Now I come to think of it, Karcher's has fields of meaning too. Richard