Each new client to the Tao Center gets their own needles, to insure the maximum sanitation. Also, the needles themselves are painless. Frequently, clients don't even know the needles have been inserted!
Click on these thumbs to see larger pictures of Michel Matsuda at work.

 

Michel Matsuda, founder and chief practitioner at the Tao Acupuncture Center in Charlotte, NC.
 
Japanese Acupuncture (1 2 )

The style of Acupuncture practiced at the Tao Center is a return or sorts to a classical style of healing. Japan experienced a modernization period in the late nineteenth century, during which time traditional medical practices were supressed in favor of more Western styles of practice. During the 1910's and 1920's, however, a revival of traditional herbal medicine soon led to a reexamination of classical texts of acupuncture. Two students of this revival, Sodo Okabe and Keiri Inoue, were largely responsible for forming Japanese Meridian Therapy into the practice it is today.

Japanese Meridian Therapy differs from other styles of Acupuncture in that needles are lightly and superficially inserted, as opposed to deeply. The intent of inserting needles into special points in the body is to resolve fundamental energetic imbalances in the body. The energy of life, known as Chi, is represented by a dual nature, Yin and Yang. Imbalances in Chi eventually lead to illness. From the Meridian Therapy perspective, most imbalances (and thus, most illnesses) are caused because of a deficiency in the Yin organs and meridians. Applying needles to certain energetic points on the body can restore the balance to Yin and Yang.

 

 

 

Michel Matsuda has been practicing acupuncture and the healing arts for over twenty-five years. His real interest in the power to heal, though, started almost forty years ago when he used a combination of a macrobiotic diet and acupuncture to cure his own debilitating lower back pain. As a young adult, he was very passionate about promoting the macrobiotic way, and this passion led him to study Oriental Medicine on a grander scale.

In 1977, he graduated from the Meiji School of Oriental Medicine in Osaka, Japan. Here, he learned the "Electric Chi" treatment, which served as the basis for his first office, opened in Kyoto, Japan. Soon, he studied other methods of traditional Japanese acupuncture, including "Ishizaka Ryu," or the Way of Ishizaka. This is the technique he uses, with great effectiveness, to this day, combining his own skills as a healer with his great sense of perception and understanding.

After maintaining an office in Boston for ten years, he moved his practice to Charlotte, NC. He has had opportunity to work with many different patients from around the globe, including NFL stars, Major League Baseball players, and Madonna. He believes that learning about Macrobiotics and Japanese Meridian Therapy never ends, because there is an unlimited wealth of knowledge to the discipline.