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To me, being a chiropractor means an acceptance of a few specific responsibilities:

1. Educating the public on the philosophy of chiropracTIC

2. Empowering people with the knowledge of human potential, the life-experience enhancing benefits of being free from subluxation

3. Empowering them with a way to share this knowledge with others

4. Providing them with a specific adjustment to aid the body in removing subluxations

5. Striving daily for increased mastery of these four responsibilities

I believe public education should be the greatest priority of chiropractic because an understanding of the philosophy will allow people to filter their daily experiences through vitalism.

If someone understands the philosophy, they will be more empowered to make life-enhancing choices in every facet of their lives. A firm grasp of vitalism precludes you from vaccinations, believing health comes from a bottle, making ecologically destructive consumer choices, and disrespect of life in general.

The philosophy gives one the power, as well as the responsibility, of regaining control over their health.

Owning the ADIO principle allows you to have a virtually unlimited source of knowledge and power, yourself. If you understand the principles of innate intelligence, you don't even need nutritional advice aside from "eat whole foods that were made by innate intelligence and not refined, processed drug-foods."

As you understand the philosophy and remove the contradictions, then decisions come from within easier, and answers seem to reveal themselves more readily.

The philosophy also is the thing that, along with subluxation, defines us as a separate and distinct entity. Furthermore it is the thing that the public is actively looking for as evidenced by success of authors like Deepak Chopra, Bernie Siegel, and Andrew Weil.

I am often amused that people in our own profession want to distance themselves from the philosophy in favor of science (as if the two are mutually exclusive) just as science (quantum mechanics, chaos theory, and psychoneuroimmunology) is finally validating (read "catching up with") the philosophy.

Rejecting the philosophy of innate intelligence, vitalism, etc. in favor of a mechanistic, antiquated, Newtonian-Cartesian view of what we do would be the kiss of death for our professional identity.

This would literally be two steps backward which would guarantee our extinction as a separate and distinct entity, and we would follow in the path of osteopathy.

When people understand the philosophy, they need to understand that as physical manifestations of this vitalistic force we are subject to interference by the physical manifestation of subluxation.

It is my personal belief however, that we empower the public by sharing the life enhancing benefit of the removal of subluxation, rather than scaring them with the silent killer tirade.

We, in the profession, know that subluxations kill people, and that should motivate us to share our message, but we should not scare people into our care.

Arno Burnier, D.C., says that, "I can do nothing about what is wrong with you, I can only address what is right within you. You can not fight darkness, you can only turn on light. You can not fight disease, you can only turn on life."

Joe Strauss, D.C. elucidates this further. "Disease is a non-entity, it is the absence of health," he explains. "Cold is a non-entity, it is the absence of heat."

Health and life are synonymous, and as chiropractors, these are the entities that we work with when we remove subluxations. Reggie Gold, D.C., tells us that every aspect of human performance is affected by the chemicals we make, affected by our glands, affected by our nerve system which is affected by subluxations, regardless of whether or not a particular symptom subsides.

After we educate people about the philosophy and the importance of being free of subluxation, we need to enable them to share this message with others. If this critical step is taken seriously, chiropractors won't need to worry about getting new patients -- and students won't have to lose sleep about the ridiculously high debt load they have acquired.

If systems are in place that help lay people become warriors for chiropractic, people you've never met will flood into your practice, seeking true wellness care. We need to disseminate quality literature, captivating tapes, and well-made videos that share the chiropractic message.

When people see the value in chiropractic, they'll be willing to do whatever it takes to get chiropractic care for themselves and their loved ones. There will be people actively seeking out chiropractic and you'll need to be able to deliver our unique service, "the specific adjustment."

As medical doctors and physical therapists encroach on our territory, the emphasis on specific has to be increased. Anyone can go in and "manipulate" a spine and affect mechanoreceptors and improve ROM. As chiropractors, we apply a universal force (adjustment) that the body's innate intelligence adapts to make a correction via the intrinsic muscles of the spine.

The more specific our universal force is, the less amplitude and thrust we need to use, greatly increasing the gentleness of our care and likelihood of the body making a correction.

As accrediting agencies and licensing boards increase emphasis on diagnostics and therapeutics that have nothing to do with correcting subluxations, emphasis is taken away from the art of chiropractic.

In his book, "Awaken The Giant Within," Anthony Robbins espouses a philosophy that I try to incorporate in my life: CANI, Constant And Never-ending Improvement.

We should try to get better at the previous four steps every day. There is an old Chinese saying that you can't step in the same river twice. Time moves the water along and new water takes it's place, it is a dynamic thing. The evolution of an art is a dynamic thing also. If we do not constantly improve then we are stagnating, and in today's rapid world we cannot afford to stagnate or someone else will take our place.

So, to me being a chiropractor means a grateful acceptance of these five responsibilities. Grateful that we were chosen into this profession, and get to live in a time of unparalleled opportunity for chiropractic.