An Interview with Billy Woods of NeonPinkTiger Healthworks

QUR: Please introduce yourself.

BW: First of all, thanks for this opportunity to reach out to the acupuncture community on this level. To start, neonpinktiger healthworks is a company that provides educational opportunities and community building for acupuncturists and acupuncture students.

We will offer CEUs for live and online classes globally, but I want to stress that although CEUs will make this project a sustainable business venture, our bottom line is to provide high-caliber information to the community-at-large.

My friend, Robert Baptist, an acupuncture student/brilliant software engineer, is partnering with me. We’ve got a very hands-on approach and intend to do everything at the highest quality possible regarding teachers and classes in order to bridge the community together through multi-media content and other services and tools that can be of true benefit to practitioners.

As for myself, I’m a soon-to-be acupuncturist with a deep passion for this medicine. The inspiration to become a practitioner started with my discovery of meditation and qigong. My curiosity about health and the human body skyrocketed, and about a year and a half later, I started school at the Academy of Oriental Medicine in Austin.

QUR: How did you come up with the idea to start NPT?

BW: The passion to start this company came from my feeling that there was something very important lacking in my education, so I started to seek teachers elsewhere. I live in Texas, where many of the practitioners that intrigued me were all quite distant.

Using my financial aide money, I took a trip to the East coast, went to a Dr. Tan seminar in NYC, then went to Boston to visit two other prominent practitioners. It was really great. Yet so was the hole in my pocket!

So, in lieu of spending money on airplanes, I did a “reverse-switch” maneuver and started importing the knowledge into Texas. Later, with various suggestions from friends and peers, I decided to raise the concept to another level by organizing classes for the national audience using the internet.

QUR: What’s the story behind the name?

BW: I thought of it randomly a few years ago when I was registering for a new email account, and I didn’t want to attempt a username more than once. Neonpinktiger was the first thing that came to mind. It worked.

Later, when I had to come up with a dba account on the quick, well…you can guess the rest. I struggled briefly with the eccentricity of it, but I feel solid with the name now. Although it’s an unconventional name that may incur judgment, I’m positive that the company’s reputation and services will define who we are.

QUR: Has it been difficult to balance your NPT activities while also studying to become a practitioner yourself?

BW: You hit the nail on the head with that one! Yes. It’s been very difficult. There was a moment 8 or 9 months ago where I realized that this project would interfere not only with my progress with my skills as a practitioner, but also with my plans in starting a clinic. But there were far too many synchronicities and opportunities that took me in this direction, and I decided to go with it.

It’s a lot of work, but I’m very excited about it. I have to confess, I’ve been ducking out of class to work on this stuff. Room F in the student clinic is the perfect makeshift office.

By the way, as of this writing, I’ve got 3 MORE DAYS OF SCHOOL LEFT! I’ve got reservations for 20 at this great Thai restaurant in downtown Austin. After 12 hours of clinic, I finish at 9pm, and the celebration begins!

QUR: What advantages does hosting video present vs. getting information from a book or taking a class in person?

BW: I’m going to backtrack a little here.

Apprenticeship, I believe, is the most powerful way to learn this medicine. That’s how it has been done since the very beginning. Only in the last 100 years or so has the medicine been standardized and institutionalized. Because of that I think there is something very special being lost in the process.

The way things are going now, the apprenticeship system is dying. Students are spending their lives in a classroom, building their skills on testing well, rather than building up their clinical skills. We graduate with 100k loans, and in a profession that is so young, there is virtually no professional support.

Additionally, there is neither money nor time to study in-depth with a full time, highly experienced practitioner. In my opinion, this is leading to a” watering down” process where, although our foundational skills are getting the job done, the general effectiveness of AOM is reduced. Unless you're willing to be an outlaw, the only choice now is to search for compromises. And that is what we're trying to do with our company: give people more accessibility to the great practitioners in the field.

QUR: And back to the original question...

BW: There are different types of AOM knowledge, and a lot of this knowledge can be transmitted very effectively in books, video, or audio because it is purely intellectual or simply technique-based that can be learned by watching.

There are so many great teachers out there that are inaccessible, yet their knowledge itself can really make drastic changes in the profession if these methods were more easily available.

Other types of AOM knowledge absolutely requires the presence of a teacher. This includes palpatory skills, energetic/spiritual development and skill, and that ineffable download of information through the teacher’s sheer presence. There is nothing that can replace this, which is why we’re not limiting ourselves to online classes. Additionally, right now we’re working on programs that would allow people to apprentice after taking certain classes either live or online.

QUR: Have you found the content that you present for the benefit of others to be useful in your own AOM studies?

BW: That’s the biggest benefit of all. Both Robert and I get to learn from everyone we work with! In that sense, it’s very exciting.

QUR: Where can our members find your work?

www.neonpinktiger.com or contact me at billy@neonpinktiger.com

BW: Please contact me to comment about this interview or to give any feedback/ideas/questions you might have regarding the website. I would truly appreciate it.

QUR: Do people sometimes resist embracing internet-based communications?

BW: I’m sure. And that’s totally fine. I once went to Europe and decided to go without any form of technology in order to experience life a bit more naturally, so to speak. It was great. I admit though…I was starving for it after awhile.

But currently, the internet is becoming more and more useful in truly functional ways. Its innate power is increasingly being used for progressive ways to help people and the world around us.

QUR: What things do you have approaching on the horizon?

BW: Right now we’re focusing on getting the neonpinktiger web site more solid in every aspect. Most important, this includes acquiring faculty and building up our online class library.

We’re currently working to bring in an extremely talented qigong master into the United States. His name is Dr. Zhou Hong, who currently lives near Shanghai. We’re expecting his arrival in November of ’08, pending visa approval. I’m very excited about this.

Lastly, I would like to comment on the fundraising aspect of our company. In order to be as proactive as possible with the advancement of our profession, we’re hoping to help raise funds with organizations at both the state and national level that carry the same intent.

As effective as AOM is now, I still strongly believe that the healing potential of our medicine is still in its infancy, and if we allow it to grow, the more exciting and rewarding acupuncture will become. On that note, the more we communicate and share information and ideas, the faster we will move forward individually as well as together as a profession.

Ok. The highly optimistic acupuncture neophyte is signing off. Thank you so much for your attention. Three more student clinic shifts left at the time of this writing – then off to the LAc world.