Do you ever feel like you are not getting the most out of your day? Out of your body? Out of your own life?!!! Of course, there could be a myriad of reasons for experiencing lassitude in general! However, there is one thing you might want to try before you call your health expert to get to the bottom of things: how attuned are you with Nature?
In other terms, is your daily routine in-sync with Mother Nature’s daily cycles? The relationship between our biological bodies and the environment goes very deep as our bodies and the environment are mutually co-dependent. Nature needs us to care for her, just as she cares for us by supplying us with bountiful blessings. We give back to her when we take care of the gift of life and the miraculous bodies she has endowed us with.
Chose Right!
But sometimes things go wrong because we chose to ignore Nature’s prodddings…! Just because we can! While we can count on the early morning birds chirping outside our bedroom windows, others may be able to count on us to be just as fresh and full of life in the early morning because we might have chosen to work or party through the night. We might have decided to keep on going ignoring our bodies telling us to rest, that exhaustion had set in and it was time to recoup. Instead we had reached out for yet another cup of coffee to pump our body body chemistry and get second wind! Another expample of being out of sync with Nature’s rhythms: our stomachs tell us that the Chinese dish served in the restaurant next door is not really sitting well and causing quite a few physical and even emotional upsets, but the taste of that soy sauce on the deep fried spring rolls is just too irresistible to our palate…
These are small signals that Mother Nature communicates to us through our own bodies. And modern science itself is on to them.
What Science is Saying:
In the 1950s, the term “circadian” was coined to refer to our bodies’ attunement with the cycles of nature. The word “circadian” comes from “circa” = about and “diem” = day, so it is a daily cycle.
In nature, there are large (macro) and small (micro) cycles, that is, some that take a really long time, and others that happen much faster. The circadian cycle is all about what happens to our bodies in one day in terms of metabolism, hormonal balance, etc. It defines the relationship between our bodies and the environment, explaining how and why specific functions and results can be optimal at specific times of the day and not at other times.So we can understand that working through the night on high caffeine is not necessarily a good idea even though we can do so, because our bodies are prone to optimal activity on the physical, mental, emotional, spiritual levels, when specific conditions and situations are satisfied.
But so what if we are a little tired the next day, we can catch up! So what if we get heartburn continuously, we can get some anti-acid tablets etc… Because both science and ancient ayurvedic wisdom confirm that this is what amounts to aging. And aging can be an experssion of an overworked body that has never really gotten the opportunity to recover from constant work; or it can be the expression of mental and emotional exhaustion where an individual simply breaks down even when faced with the minutest of daily happenings. Over time, the cumulative effect of delayed bedtime, of acidic food residues, of non-processed emotional stress work their way into the physiology creating a slump in our personality and outlooks! When this happens, no medicine, no herb, no strong will-power can do anything! There is a biological and chemical reality that has set in that needs to be altered through the original cause. And this is where “lifestyle medicine” becomes so signficant.
For example, in Vaidya Mishra’s Prana Center, many clients have come in complaining of mental fog, overall fatigue, lack of appetite, lack of spirit. Much to their surprise, their recommendation has been to do one thing only: re-schedule their lives to be back on track with the rhythms of Mother Nature. Even modern science is on this! See the diagram below:
Things as simple as correcting the sleeping/waking routines, our eating times and frequency, etc. have much to do with our output and thus pre-determine the success of our actions and the happiness of our lives! In Ayurveda, the importance of being in-sync with Nature’s cycles has always been known. In fact, the discussion of this very important subject is very detailed and interesting, because the understanding of the human physiology and its relationship to Mother Nature is much more in-depth and layered.
The SVA Perspective
More specifically, in Vaidya Mishra’s SVA tradition, we find many unexpected details to help reset our internal metabolic and other clocks, so as to stay on the right path of bliss and balance.
The Charak Samhita explains that there are 3 Upasthambas, or subpillars, of life: Ahar, Nidra, and Brahmacharya. What do these 3 support? They support the reception and flow of Prana. Because, as Vaidya explains, life is defined as the flow of Prana. So health and happiness, in a nutshell, depend on the proper reception and flow of Prana. Then supplying Prana to every organ and system and molecule is the ultimate healthy thing to do. Click here to hear more about the 3 sub-pillars of life with Vaidya Mishra on youtube. The discussion of these sub-pillars of life shows us the value of “lifestyle as medicine” in Ayurveda. We talk a lot about “food as medicine” but lifestyle plays an even greater role as a preventative modality. All the shastras of Ayurveda talk about the importance of balance between rest and activity, about morning routine, daytime routine, night routine, what are good activities to maintain, what would be bad and not recommended activities. In Ayurveda that section is called “Swastha Vritha.” In SVA, the primary recommendations are based on Swastha Vritha, because we believe that unless daily routine and dietary protocols are proper, no herbs or medicine can help correct an imbalance! Although in this day and age, given the rhythm of our daily lives, it is not easy to follow the right lifestyle 100%, sowing the seed of knowledge and its value always give the desire to follow and wherever deep desire is, there Mother Nature supplies the means to follow…
Why to Follow Swastha Vritha? The SVA Perspective:
We know by now that the components of Prana are Soma, Agni, and Marut. Prana is found in the environment, in Nature, and enters our bodies. The environment and our bodies are connected through the flow of Prana and the ratio of Soma, Agni, and Marut in the environment changes on a daily basis as well as a seasonal basis. It also gets influenced by the planets and their orbits, their vicinity to earth. There are thus many varying factors that are constantly changing and affecting the body on a daily basis. That is why it is even more important to try to follow as much as possible, on a daily basis or seasonal basis, all the proper dietary and lifestyle guideline routine so as to keep the body grounded despite all the ongoing changes, since so many activities in the body are of a repetitive nature and thus need constant continuous repetitive feedback as well from us – we cannot survive long without eating, drinking, resting, etc. We have to go through these activities on a daily basis to maintain life…
There are even distinct terms for the different times of day that require specific routines. For example, the daytime routine is referred to as “Dinacharya” while the specific routine for the nighttime is called “Ratricharya.” The lifestyle medicine of Ayurveda is all about teaching us to cope up with the daytime environmental and other changes that affect our behavior and aptitudes; and the nighttime routine is about helping us adjust to the environmental changes at night so that the reception and flow and delivery of Prana are not interrupted in our physiologies.
Samadosha, Samagni and Samadhatu:
If we were to summarize everything that comes under topic, we would say that it is all about maintaining Samadosha, Samagni and Samadhatu. Because, as we have seen, Soma, Agni, and Marut are the raw material for Kapha, Pitta, and Vata, and these doshas, in their turn, govern all the Agni-s (metabolic principles). This is all it takes to maintain perfect health: Samadosha – that all the doshas are maintained in perfect equilibrium so that the body has the opportunity to run all its organs and organ systems optimally; Samagni – making sure that all that is ingested is properly transformed into the next stage, so that energy is gained, and the body is not carrying a load of unprocessed materials that are slowing it down; Samadhatu – so that when the body is functioning perfectly then it renews all its tissues and systems on the physical level, and then the subtler connections that pervade the consciousness are able to thrive supplying more bliss to the mind and heart…
