Enhancing the Yogic Path through Ayurveda.
As many of you will know, once you journey down the Yoga path, lifestyle changes naturally begin to happen. For me these changes weren’t forced but seemed to organically weave their way into my life as my Yoga practice progressed. I think it is down to the increased body awareness that Yoga teaches us as to why these changes happen. Listening to my body, and noticing what feels good and what doesn’t. This evaluation of “is it nourishing me?” or “is it not nourishing me?” is applied to all areas of my life: Diet, relationships, what I read and watch, what I say and what I do.
It wasn’t until many years after I started my Yoga practice that I came across the word Ayurveda and once I began to look into this, many of the lifestyle changes I had begun to make made sense.
Ayurveda grew from the same roots as Yoga. Formed out of the Vedic culture, in India somewhat 5000 years ago. It is known to be one of the oldest sciences for healing and wellbeing. It places great emphasis on prevention and attaining balance in body, mind and consciousness. Now once I started to look into Ayurveda, it did seem complicated! It works with the 5 elements of Earth, Water, Fire, Air and Space and combines these into 3 types of energy what are called Doshas. Doshas are the tendencies we have that bring us out of balance. Everyone and everything has a combination of all the Doshas. One will be dominant, then you will have a secondary and finally a least dominant Dosha. When you know your personal order of Doshas, this is called your constitution. Here is a brief outline of each of them:
Vatta
Is all about movement, intellect and is a combination of air and space which makes it feel dry.
Pitta
Is all about digestion, transformation, purification and is a combination of fire and water.
Kapha
Is all about structure, slowness and is a combination of earth and water.
There are lots of online quizzes you can take to find out your constitution, which is useful to know, however remember that we and everything else in the Universe is in constant change, therefore we need to adapt to work with the changing elements around us, such as the seasons and the time of day when making choices based on our constitution.
I know my personal constitution and I keep this in mind when making lifestyle choices but this isn’t the only part of Ayurveda. Ayurveda gives us suggestions on lifestyle and it is applying these that have allowed me to see and feel the benefits of following this ancient health system. Here are my favourites:
Good quality sleep. Going to bed no later than 10pm and waking at sunrise.
To eat at regular times and try not to eat after 6pm so the body has a decent amount of time in fasting.
Body brush every morning.
Apply oil to the body. Different oils for different constitutions and times of the year.
Oil pulling for oral hygiene and it also helps to keep your teeth looking white!
Eat fresh and seasonal with warming foods and drinks in the Winter and cooling foods in the Summer. My soup maker is already in use now we have reached September!
Drink water at room temperature or warmer. I add a slice of lemon and fresh ginger in mine during the cooler months. I also love to drink herbal teas, my favourites being Tulsi Clarity by Pukka and Throat Comfort by Yogi Tea.
Practice Yoga! My favourite way to get my body moving.
Meditation. There can’t be a healthy body without a healthy mind.
I hope this has given you a few ideas on how you can start to weave Ayurveda into your life. If you would like to learn more, I can recommend Laura Plumb and Katie Silcox who are both fountains of knowledge and wisdom when it comes to this topic. They also both offer free podcasts/ webinars on their websites. I’m learning more all the time and would love to hear your thoughts or ways of using Ayurveda. Please feel free to share in the comments below.
Love & Light,
Natalie.