What is Ayurveda & how can it help me?

We grew up with yoga and Ayurveda. We teach Ayurveda as part of our teacher training programs. We have done wellness courses, detox plans, workshops on this topic… What is Ayurveda? How can it help you? Read this blog to get a little more insight on this holistic approach to YOU. Ayurveda is the sister science to yoga and considers the whole individual when assessing health.

Ayurveda is derived from two Sanskrit words: Ayur meaning life and Veda meaning knowledge. Ayurveda is the science of life and longevity. Ayurveda is the sister science to Yoga.

Ayurveda Background What is Ayurveda?

It is a holistic system of healing that heals the physical body, relaxes the mind, soothes the soul and renews the spirit.
It respects the uniqueness of the individual.
It is deemed the oldest form of healthcare being a 5000 plus year old tradition.
It treats the body as a whole – in Ayurveda the mind and body are never treated separately.
It emphasizes preventions and offers natural ways of treating diseases and promoting health.
It empowers everyone to take responsibility for their own well-being.
It has no side effects.

In other words, Ayurveda looks at the person as a whole — emotional health, physical health, spiritual health when assessing balance and imbalance.

Toxins and Diseases

How is health and disease assessed within Ayurveda?

Think of health as order; and imbalance is disorder and disorder creates disease. Health and disease are processes. Disease is a process of abnormal movement of the doshas (we will talk more about Ayurveda Basics and Dosha in the next blog post promise :)), while health is a process of their normal functioning.

Ayurveda is based on the premise — everything (pretty much) stems from the “fire” that governs your metabolism —> so in essence, the power of your gut – but we are talking about emotional, physical, mental….read on….

Agni, is the biological fire or heat energy that governs metabolism. It can be compared with digestive enzymes involved in breaking down, digesting, absorbing and assimilating our food. Agni maintains the nutrition of the tissues and the strength of the immune system.

Toxic food, water, air, toxic emotions like greed, envy, fear and toxic relationships cause a formation and accumulation of toxins in the body.

This accumulation in turn impairs the body’s agni and leads to the creation of ama, undigested residue. Once ama is present the process of disease begins and if not caught early and cleansed from the body ama can spread to the rest of the body. Therefore, when the body’s agni is weakened poor health is the result.

The Power of Ayurveda

Ayurveda is a tool in your kit — when you are in balance, you maintain balance, your agni, through practicing Ayurvedic choices that balance your unique make-up. These choices include simple things such as you when you go to sleep, wake-up, what kinds of food you eat during the day, etc.

When your body is in imbalance, you first assess what are the causes of the imbalance (what is causing the ama build-up) and then use Ayurvedic choices to create balance within.

Cool right? More in our next blog – we will talk about the Basics of Ayurveda — including how to determine your unique blueprint.