Ayurvedic
Guide to Wellness
Seven
Basic Steps to Health and Longevity
before
or during a meal. Ayurvedic healers also recommend spice teas--water
boiled with therapeutic spices--for added health benefit. Also,
remember that it's important to drink water-milk, caffeinated
and alcoholic drinks do not count. Fruits and vegetables with
high water content, fruit and vegetable juices and clear soups
suited to your constitution are helpful, but it is also important
to drink just plain pure water each day. Make sure the water you
drink is pure; have your drinking water tested for purity and
use a good filter.
Eat
right
This is an exhortation ayurvedic healers never tire of voicing
over and over again. The right kind and quantity of food is so
important that it is accorded an even higher status than medicine
in ayurveda. "Annaha brahmaha" goes the ayurvedic saying--"Food
is divine." Eating inappropriate foods or following poor
eating routines and habits not only have short-term repercussions
on energy levels, mental clarity and emotional well-being, they
also seriously damage health and well-being over the long-term
sometimes causing irreversible damage to the physiology and shortening
our life-span.
Ayurvedic
healers do not have a "one-size-fits-all" approach to
diet and nutrition. Your dietary needs are unique to you, and
you have to develop the diet that is ideal for you over time.
There are general guidelines for food choices for people with
more or less of each of the three doshas--vata,
pitta and kapha--in their
prakriti (original constitution) and vikriti (current state of
the doshas), but within these general guidelines you can choose
what works best for you. Listen to your physiology carefully and
it will guide you to the foods that enhance not just your physical
but also mental and emotional balance. Whatever your food choices,
eat pure, fresh, whole, natural foods.
Follow
a good eating routine. Do not take short-cuts with your meals,
sandwiching them between other activities. Treat mealtimes as
sacred. Prepare and cook your food with loving care and attention
and eat in silence or in a harmonious atmosphere. Prepared lovingly
and eaten with gratitude and reverence, the food will turn to
ojas in your system--the substance that ayurveda defines as the
essence of life and the finest product of the eating and digestion
process.
Sleep
Another basic for health and longevity, sleep is becoming a rare
commodity for many in our frenetic, 24/7 society. According to
ayurveda as well as modern science, sleep is essential for our
minds and bodies to recharge and prepare for the next day. Lack
of sleep impairs the digestion, contributes to ama accumulation,
clouds the brain and places greater demands on every part of the
physiology with each passing day. Modern science has linked sleep
deprivation to elevated blood pressure, obesity and depression.
Ayurveda
does not prescribe eight hours of sleep each night for everyone.
You have to determine the sleep quota that is adequate for you
to function at peak levels by monitoring your sleep and activity
levels over a period of time. Times of extra pressure need to
be compensated with extra sleep time.
continued
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