"Tanaduk" presents new project - translation of Doctor Nida's book “Sowa Rigpa Points” into Russian.
The book is unique, because it is the first text where detailed descriptions of points, organs, channels, bones, and vessels in Tibetan are precisely connected to modern anatomical terms and pictures.
To make a reliable translation of good quality and to create a book layout in Russian we need to collect 45000- 50000 Rub. The result of this work will be the text fully prepared for edition. These efforts will soon give us a chance to purchase the most precise modern Atlas of Tibetan Medicine in Russian, that can be an on-table anatomical encyclopedia for doctors, students and other practitioners of TTM.

The team of the project:
Elena Shirshova – translation from English
Anastasia Teplyakova – scientific and technical edition, will write an additional chapter
Dmitry Crebs - layout design
If necessary, we will involve more specialists in the field of medicine, languages and design.

The Tibetan word for Points is Sang Mig, (Tib: གསང་དམིགས་ gsang dmigsSang means secret, and Mig is target, so the points are ‘secret targets.’ I’m very excited about publishing this book because it is so important for our students, for researchers, for doctors, for everyone, to have a very clear book like this about Sowa Rigpa (Traditional Tibetan Medicine) points. According to Sowa Rigpa there are two kinds of points, one category is called ‘standard points’ and the other one is called ‘freestyle points.’
Standard points are called the ‘points searched for by the doctor,’ and for these we have to study the location, know their unctions, how to find them, how to make measurements, all these things. This book is talking about all of these standard points, and for standard points, the most important is the location. If you miss the location and you are not so precise, then maybe your therapy will not be effective. This book was created according to the Four Tantras (Gyud Zhi) and Soma Radza. These are the two most important historical texts. There are also other historical texts that mention many more points for moxibustion, for stick therapy, but as a base and foundation what we mentioned in this book is enough. In the future I wish that we can make a second version of the Points book to study more details, more points, as well as different texts.
In Tibetan Medicine the points can be used for moxibustion/moxa (me gsang , or me dmigs), we also have points for stick therapy, and both the moxa and stick therapy points can be used for acupressure, massage. Then there are the venesection points and Tibetan acupuncture (thur dbyad) points. In this book we tried to give a clear map about the different type of points in the human body and the different standard points. When you study it is important to memorize the names of the points. You must know the names, the locations, and the functions, and once you know the locations and the functions, how you treat with moxibustion, with massage, or with acupuncture, then choosing which therapy is much easier. And sometimes moxa points, you do moxibustion and it doesn’t work, but if you put needles it works better. This book is a base, like a foundation — a very nice clear structure, but then it’s important to use these points and to experiment and put them into practice.
The second kind of points are called the free style points. Our entire human body can be a point. For example, every nail is a point, every fingertip is a point, these are called free style points. To find these freestyle points the most important thing is to have experience. In the beginning we use the standard points, we learn them and understand them, and then we gain experiences. Slowly slowly as we get used to working with the points, we can find more freestyle points. As Tibetan Medicine says, everything is interconnected. Our body is interconnected from up to down, right to left, inner part to outer part — it’s like a big network, every part, every angle depends perfectly on one another and is connected to one another. That’s why the points are so important. Sometimes the problem is on the right side, but the points are on the left side, sometimes the problem is in the upper part, and the points are in the lower part, or the problems are internal, but the points are outside. That’s why according to the Gyud Zhi these freestyle points are known as the ‘points shown by the disease.’ For example if someone has a heart condition and has pain in the center of palm, we can understand that the heart is connected with the center of palms. Or if someone says, ‘I have pain in the center of the palms’, and if you know that is connected with the heart, then you know that the heart is showing its’ weak point, or its’ weak condition is manifesting through the point. Lung points can manifest on the head or on the foot or on the arms and so on.
Historically some Tibetan old doctors had their own points. They discovered different points then they wrote explanations. But I think that is good also to stay more freestyle. We cannot identify and write about every single point on the human body. Chinese acupuncture talks about approximately 360 principle points but this is only a small fraction of the points. If you are experienced in acupuncture you can use so many thousands of other points. That’s why I really like this division — the standard points, the really basic points that we need to learn because these are used for treatment and also for diagnosis, and then the freestyle points that you use once you are are very experienced with these standard points. In Tibet sometimes the very experienced old doctors, they don’t follow the book anymore because they are so experienced that they can find their own points. So that’s the final goal, we learn the structured ones and basic ones and then once you understand them very well, you gain experience and you get the vast points, the points from creativity, from your own experience.
This book is very unique, not only in the English language, but also in the Tibetan language where there are not many books that are specialized on points. We have some books about moxa which talk about the points connected to moxa. Then there are some books on stick therapy that mention only the points that are connected with the stick therapy, etc. But we don’t have a book that talks about all the different kind of points. That is why this book is very unique. I hope that one day we can make everything available for publication in the Tibetan language also. It is my old wish from my time in Tibet to have a kind of book which really talks about points because you cannot find such things.
This book is also very unique because of the anatomical precision with which we show the points. In Tibet traditionally we had Point Studies, but these studies are based on the old thangka paintings. The thangka painters are not trained in the medical science so they know more or less the area, they show the general locations, but they are not anatomically very precise. That’s why this book is especially important. Dr Tam Nguyen is a medical doctor, she designed this text according to modern anatomy so that’s why the locations in this book are very precise. She respects the traditional knowledge and studied Sowa Rigpa so well and understands, respects, and sees the value in the traditional medicine. But at the same time she is very well trained in Western Medicine, in anatomy and physiology, so she has the perfect capacity to put these two systems together and to make it clear for people. And she did all of the drawings herself using the computer, so she is also an artist. She has this medical knowledge, she is so precise, but she is also artistic. Also the way that she structured the book, divided amongst only head points, arm points, etc, it is very practical and very useful. Without her effort and dedication we could not have this book. It was a very good collaboration between the two of us and I am really really happy with this result.
I really wish that this book will go beyond our students, to everyone, to all Sowa Rigpa practitioners from Tibet, from Mongolia, from Siberia. everywhere. I also wish that this book will be read by other practitioners, yoga practitioners, Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners, Ayurvedic doctors. I think it is very good that we study from one another and make comparisons. I also hope that in the future we can translate some original texts from Tibetan to English. This book is very modernized and once people know this book, in order to go more deeply into the study of points, we also need these original texts, so I look forward to doing this work and creating more publications.

December 6th, 2016
Los Angeles, CA
www.sorig.net