Fresh Voices: From HR Generalist to Fitness Trainer to Acupuncturist

Talking with Une-Hi Song

Most of the articles in Living Peace are written by sisters, associates, or staff. Fresh Voices is a column written by, or focusing on, someone outside the CSJP community to help raise awareness on specific issues.

Une-Hi Song

When I was younger, my mom always made us take our vitamins and eat our veggies. I was the only one of the four of us she never had to chase down to make sure we did. She also made us drink this dark herbal concoction she made in the crockpot that she learned from her father who was an herbalist in Korea. She told us stories about how he would go up the mountains every day and scavenge fresh raw herbs to sell to local pharmacies. I gladly drank the tea because I liked how it tasted. She would sprinkle a few toasted pine nuts on top, and because one of the herbs in the tea was licorice, it had a mild sweetness to it and made it palatable. So, I always used to say it was in my blood to become the first acupuncturist in the family. It just took me a little time to discover that.

LP: When did you move to the United States? What was it like for you growing up here?

I am a proud Korean-American immigrant who came to America from South Korea on March 28, 1978, with my parents and older sister when I was about to turn three years old. We came to this country with the American dream: to have land, a place to call home, and have freedoms we didn’t have in Korea. We were fortunate to have a relative invite us here and help us get situated. My parents came here with just the clothes on their backs and maybe a couple hundred dollars in their pocket and did everything they could to learn the language and put a roof over our heads and food on the table.

I grew up in Rochester, New York, in a small suburb called Victor. We were the only Asian family amongst a mostly Caucasian community. Growing up was very difficult as we faced so many prejudices, racism and discrimination. I never allowed that to get the better of me because I grew up with so much love and support from my family and a tightknit community that my parents found through our Korean Presbyterian church. Having that strength from our faith in God and the strong work ethic instilled in us from my parents has largely contributed to my tenacity to get through all of life’s ups and downs.

LP: Your path to becoming an acupuncturist wasn’t straightforward. Tell us a little about that.

My parents exposed us to traditional Korean values at home—respect for elders and learning about food and culture so we wouldn’t lose or forget where we came from, and I developed a strong curiosity about the human psyche and wanting to study human psychology, which I did. Upon graduating college with a B.A. in Psychology and Elementary Education, I was not satisfied and didn’t want to become a teacher. I had this unquenchable thirst for something more and didn’t know yet what it was, but I knew teaching was not it for me.

My passion for health, nutrition, fitness, dance, and performance was still stronger than anything else. However, with my college degree, if I wasn’t going to teach, I thought the best career path I could take was in human resources. I landed a great job working for a large investment bank as a Benefits Administrator and HR Generalist for three years, providing me with great benefits and a steady paycheck. But I couldn’t see myself spending the rest of my life in that career. I quit my secure job to pursue a career in personal fitness training in Connecticut.

You can imagine the uproar when I told my family and friends that I quit my job to move to another state and start a whole new career! After just one year of working as a trainer, I quickly realized that something was still missing and that wasn’t the final career path either. I wanted to strengthen my knowledge in nutrition and was just about to go back to school for that when a fellow trainer at the gym, who was studying acupuncture and was in his last year at school, suggested I check out his school.

He was an intern and gave me my first acupuncture treatment. I sat in on all his classes, and that was it! That day changed my life forever, and I fell in love with acupuncture and oriental medicine. It brought the whole picture together for me, because acupuncture encompasses the whole person: mind, body and spirit. It made sense to me to treat the whole being from all aspects of health. I decided to go back to school for acupuncture for the next four years and ended up going to Pacific College of Oriental Medicine in Manhattan.

LP: How long have you been in practice?

I graduated in 2005 and started my own private practice in 2006 in Fort Lee, New Jersey, and have been in private practice ever since. Currently, I am proud to say that I am entering my nineteenth year of practicing acupuncture and still loving it!

LP: What are some of the benefits of acupuncture?

Acupuncture has been around for over 3,000 years and has been recognized by the National Institutes of Health and World Health Organization for its efficacy in treating and preventing everything from stress and tension headaches and migraines to general pain in the body and even chronic illness and allergies, digestive disorders such as Crohn’s and irritable bowel syndrome, hormone imbalance, PMS, menopause, infertility and the list goes on.

It is a natural form of therapy using hair-thin needles that are inserted gently into known trigger points along very specific energetic pathways that travel closely along the same pathways as our blood vessels and nervous system throughout every square inch of our bodies. These points, when needled on a consistent and regular basis, gently tap our hair-like nerve endings stimulating our bodies to increase our natural pain blockers, our endorphins, raise our serotonin levels, reduce inflammation, and increase blood flow to that area of the body where we may have blockage and pain to free up that “clog in the pipes” so to speak.

Acupuncture taps into our body’s natural endocannabinoid system, which comprises a network of chemical signals and cellular receptors densely packed throughout our brains and bodies and impacts functions such as learning and memory, emotional processing, sleep, temperature control, pain control, inflammatory and immune responses, and eating. With acupuncture, patients can experience a natural high like a runner’s high. This is especially beneficial for pain patients who can’t move and exercise due to pain and swelling and limited range of motion. In some cases, acupuncture can provide a natural remedy eliminating the need for pain medications or surgery. When treatments are done closer together, they have a cumulative effect on the body and strengthen the body’s ability to heal faster by increasing blood flow to that area and reducing inflammation and kicking up those natural pain blockers.

LP: You mentioned that acupuncture treats the whole person. Where does the spiritual component come in?

Acupuncture is an energetic medicine that can influence a person’s overall being and spirit. We are all spiritual beings, not just made up of skin, bones and muscles. There must be a constant flow of energy moving through our veins to keep us alive and feeling alive and that can, of course, mean different things to different people. This is where having compassion and a keen understanding of the human psyche, in addition to having the knowledge of basic human anatomy and biology, comes into play. And then being able to look at the person, taking into consideration all the other aspects of what makes us human—like lifestyle, work, family, nature vs nurture, and how that plays a role in each and every individual that comes into my space—truly makes my job so special and requires a lot of attention to detail. I feel overjoyed with the gift I believe God has given me. I am blessed to meet and work with people of all different backgrounds and paths that entrust me with their stresses and ailments. And I am humbled every day with what I get to do for a living.

LP: What keeps you grounded and centered?

I stay grounded by practicing what I preach. I believe in the power and principles of acupuncture and oriental medicine. It’s about self-care and preventive care, and if I didn’t live, eat, and breathe everything I preach to my patients, then I wouldn’t be able to authentically give my best treatments or put my head on my pillow every night and sleep well. Taking time to slow down and spend quality time with family and friends helps keep me balanced as well as grounded. My strict and loving parents and my faith in God have brought me to where I am today and given me the strength to get up each day and share my energies and spirit with everyone around me, including my husband, my dog, my family and friends.

Une-Hi Song is a licensed acupuncturist and proprietor of Hello Gorgeous in Fort Lee, New Jersey.

This article appeared in the Autumn 2024 issue of Living Peace.