Stress and Chi

Well first I would say that while there are perhaps faster and more efficient avenues to health, any one aspect of Chinese Medicine - tai chi, acupuncture, herbs, etc. can go a long way to resolving any imbalance. Tai chi, qi gong, meditation, etc. will change brain chemistry, hormones, and other aspects of a persons body. In other words, "qi" is a concept which really means a persons energy, their hormones, their brain chemistry, their whole system. There is no distinction between "qi" and the workings of a persons body and mind. The smooth flow of qi essentially means the absence of disease and imbalance both physically and mentally.

Now when you combine acupuncture, tai chi, perhaps herbal medicine, etc. with a competent practitioner you can greatly speed up the process of change and personal development.

With regards to treating "stress" - or just an imbalance without a western defined illness this is fine within the paradigm of Chinese Medicine. In reality, Chinese Medicine does not treat any "conditions" at all - rather it treats patterns. These patterns can have symptoms which are serious western medical conditions, or just a predisposition towards having more definable symptoms in the future. Having a condition in western terms is largely irrelevant from a Chinese Medical perspective. In some ways, Chinese Medicine is really a preventative medicine - picking up on tendencies and small symptoms that seem unrelated from a western perspective and regulating them long before illness develops.