Ayurvedic wellness knowledgeable, Avanti Kumar-Singh, MD, is on an necessary mission to bridge the traditional therapeutic practices of Ayurveda and the fashionable science behind Western drugs to coach her readers (and listeners!) about enhancing longevity. Dr. Kumar-Singh is the host of the highly-rated ‘The Therapeutic Catalyst’ podcast and creator of ‘The Well being Catalyst: The right way to Harness the Energy of Ayurveda to Self-Heal and Obtain Optimum Wellness’, which got here out in 2022.
Now, she’s again with one other objective: to coach us on the advantages of decreasing irritation and growing mobile restore in her latest guide, ‘The Longevity System’, which will likely be printed by Sounds True and obtainable for buy on December 17, 2024. On this unique excerpt under, Dr. Kumar-Singh shares the fundamentals of Ayurveda, the worth of connecting with nature, and the way a critical well being prognosis reminded her of the significance of therapeutic.
Over 5 thousand years outdated, Ayurveda is taken into account one of many oldest techniques of therapeutic and was first recorded in India within the Vedic texts in 3000 BCE. The essence of Ayurveda, translated as “the science of life” or “the information of longevity,” is that we’re not separate from nature; as a substitute, we’re a microcosm of the macrocosm. As a result of it incorporates the roots of many different therapeutic techniques, together with conventional Chinese language drugs and Western drugs, Ayurveda is taken into account by many to be the “mom of all therapeutic.”
Whereas Ayurveda has been round for hundreds of years, many people don’t perceive its multitude of longevity and well being advantages. At the present time, we regularly solely look to and take into account the info and scientific research to inform us what to do to alleviate our signs and reduce sickness. However what if we additionally began to look to collective human expertise to inform us what to do to heal and improve our total well being?
Not like different modalities, Ayurveda reveals us how you can stay with the day by day and seasonal rhythms of nature, how you can use meals as drugs, and how you can improve the move of significant vitality, or prana, to steadiness our signs by medical, naturopathic, and anecdotal means. It’s a common, collective reality that has been handed down for hundreds of years and is part of our important essence and humanity, whether or not you deliberately use it or not.
Opposite to what many individuals imagine, nevertheless, Ayurveda shouldn’t be against Western drugs. Actually, as a result of it’s holistic, Ayurveda welcomes the mixing of medicine, procedures, and surgical procedures when they’ll assist the affected person. As well as, Ayurveda shouldn’t be synonymous with pure, different, or complementary drugs. It might use such remedies, however it additionally makes use of standard remedies.
In 2017, the Nobel Prize was awarded to scientists for analysis on circadian drugs, the ideas of that are discovered within the Ayurvedic clock that particulars how you can stay in sync with nature. Proof of the “gut-brain” connection has been duplicated in dozens of research as nicely, giving scientific proof that digestion is certainly the seat of well being (extra on this later). And the instruments of yoga are maybe probably the most well-studied and well-accepted Ayurvedic treatments utilized in right now’s Western drugs. There’s simple proof of the therapeutic results of breath, postures, and meditation on virtually each system within the human physique and thoughts, and Ayurveda has famous these advantages for millennia.
If I requested you what nature is, you’d most likely inform me that nature is the solar, moon, vegetation, bushes, lakes, oceans, animals, and bugs, proper? And also you’d be appropriate; nature is all of these items. However what if I instructed you that we, as human beings, are additionally nature?
In Ayurveda, nature is all the pieces outdoors of us, and it additionally is us.
We’re one with all of nature on the most basic degree as a result of we’re manufactured from the identical uncooked supplies—the 5 parts in several mixtures—area, air, hearth, water, and earth. In different phrases, we as human beings are a microcosm of the macrocosm of nature.
Sadly, many people have misplaced our connection to nature and, because of this, have misplaced our well being. Many people go to work early within the morning when it’s nonetheless darkish outdoors and go away late at evening when it’s darkish once more, fairly actually by no means seeing the sunshine of day. We stare at our telephones and screens all day and develop into blue-light poisonous, which indicators the unsuitable hormones and prevents our our bodies from functioning correctly. We eat strawberries and blueberries in winter by freezing them in the summertime. We eat mangoes that don’t develop the place we stay by having them flown into our grocery shops. We prepare dinner with microwave ovens and eat meals that’s in bins and wrappers to save lots of time. We climb rotating stairs and stroll on transferring belts for train. The checklist goes on and on. Our days have been designed round know-how and comfort that was meant to enhance our lives however as a substitute has destroyed our well being. All as a result of we’ve misplaced our connection to nature.
One of many keys to therapeutic with Ayurveda is sustaining our connection to nature and residing in concord with its day by day and seasonal rhythms which can be created by the motion of the earth in relation to the solar—rhythms of nature created by nature. After we rise, sleep, eat, play, and work in concord with the sunshine of day, the darkish of evening, and the change of seasons, we’re related to what’s outdoors of us—the solar and the moon, vegetation and bushes, lakes and oceans, animals, and bugs . . . all of nature.
After we don’t stay in concord with nature, we progress from toxin overload to signs to sickness and, lastly, to power illness. In Ayurveda, the highway from well being to sickness shouldn’t be a straight one however as a substitute a development by six levels that lie on a continuum.
Well being and sickness usually are not black and white constructs in Ayurveda however as a substitute have many shades of grey.
The highway from well being to sickness begins with the buildup of poisons, and when toxins overwhelm the human system, signs seem. These could be low-grade, nonspecific signs resembling “not feeling nicely” or “not feeling proper” or extra particular signs resembling anxiousness, melancholy, GI misery, weight achieve, complications, sinus congestion, joint ache, and so forth. If we course-correct and start to lower the poisonous load at this stage of the method, we are able to keep away from development to sickness and power illness. In the end, the journey in Ayurveda is the day by day apply in fact correction between toxin elimination, which creates well being, and toxin accumulation, which creates sickness.
Ayurveda takes the 5 parts of nature and combines them into three energies (doshas). Area and air mix to create the vitality of Vata, which is all about motion. Hearth and water mix to create Pitta, which is the vitality of transformation. And at last, Kapha is the mixture of water and earth, which is the vitality of construction. Every of those energies has a main operate that correlates again to the weather that mix to create it. These three doshas are how a standard Ayurvedic practitioner (Vaidya) classifies a affected person to make suggestions of treatments for imbalances exhibiting up as signs.
I point out this as a result of lots of my college students inform me that they’ve taken “dosha quizzes” however don’t know how you can use this data. For those who haven’t taken a dosha quiz, please resist the temptation. And if you have already got taken a dosha quiz, please ignore the outcomes you acquired for now. On this guide, I’ve purposely offered these ideas in a approach that’s extra accessible and helpful, emphasizing the qualities as a substitute of the doshas themselves as a result of understanding the qualities is the way you heal with Ayurveda.
So, what does all of this should do with longevity? I’m attending to it, I promise.
I’ve spent my whole life dedicated to the artwork and science of therapeutic, first as a Western physician after which dipping again into my roots as an Ayurvedic practitioner. Although I had already written a guide about Ayurveda, I began occupied with this guide on longevity as I used to be approaching my fiftieth birthday. I used to be reflecting on my life up to now— the profession path I’d chosen, the apply I’d constructed, the guide I’d written, the podcast I’d created, the household I’d grown, the chums I’d made, the relationships I’d maintained, the locations I’d traveled, the experiences I’d had—and I used to be desirous to step into the subsequent section, or period, of my life.
4 months into penning this guide, I felt a small nodule in my proper breast.
No different indicators. No different signs. I assumed it was nothing greater than a cyst, as I had a historical past of fibrocystic breasts since my early twenties. Once I went in for my routine mammogram, I wasn’t alarmed when the radiologist stated he wished to do a breast ultrasound, as this was the drill I’d gone by many occasions earlier than with my “dense” breast tissue. Nevertheless, when the radiologist started taking extra photographs and measurements in the course of the ultrasound than regular, I turned more and more apprehensive as a result of I knew he had discovered one thing unsuitable.
Two days later, I had two biopsies in my proper breast and one other in my proper axilla, and every week later, I used to be assembly with a standard oncologist, an integrative oncologist, and a breast surgeon. A lot to my dismay, my physique was identified with breast most cancers, and all of a sudden, all the pieces I believed was put into query. How did I, somebody who practiced integrative drugs, who had so many instruments for therapeutic, who had lived her life based mostly on the ideas on this guide, now have a breast most cancers prognosis?
I’ve by no means smoked, I hardly drink, I eat a wholesome vegetarian weight-reduction plan, and I handle my stress nicely. I’ve no household historical past and no genetic components for breast most cancers. With this shock prognosis, all the pieces in my world shuddered to a halt. I used to be confused, scared, and overwhelmed by all that comes with the phrase “most cancers.” All we ascribe to it. All that it means in our Western world. As an alternative of panicking, I stilled myself and requested what my physique was attempting to inform me. Had I been so busy constructing a life and a household, writing, instructing, doctoring, and going, going, going that I had stopped listening to my therapeutic? Had I inadvertently stopped connecting with nature and myself?
As I examined my life, I noticed that although I built-in wholesome instruments, I additionally lived in a polluted city metropolis that didn’t usually join me to nature every day. I had an elevated poisonous load, a crammed schedule, and extra stress than I most likely favored to confess. I had feelings I had by no means handled—anger and loneliness from my childhood, anxiousness, and worry from the well being challenges of my now grownup youngsters throughout their teen years, and deep grief and unhappiness from the lack of my beloved canine, Mia, simply 4 months earlier than my prognosis. Whereas constructing my profitable life, I’d let slip a few of the very ideas I do know to be true.
I assumed in regards to the development from well being to sickness that Ayurveda teaches: maybe the elimination of poisons by my day by day meditation, nutritious diet, and deeply significant work couldn’t preserve tempo with the buildup of poisons created by my surroundings, schedule, stress, and undigested feelings. Whatever the causes behind it, my prognosis was a reminder for me to return to my roots, return to what I do know, and heal my physique and thoughts.
First, I made a decision to clear my schedule of all the pieces—social occasions, affected person consultations, scholar workshops, podcast recordings, and even penning this guide. For nearly six weeks, I finished all the pieces and targeted solely on therapy and restoration. In stopping all the pieces, nevertheless, I noticed that I additionally stopped the move of life. I had stopped transferring with life and had stopped the move of prana, the ever-moving, ever-creating life pressure vitality that permeates all of us. Like a river, whether it is blocked, it should create new pathways to proceed its path ahead. Whether it is allowed to move freely, it should wash away what shouldn’t be wanted and supply water and vitamins to what’s. After we transfer with nature, we transfer with life. It’s crucial that we transfer with the important life pressure vitality that’s inside us and that wishes to move by us. That is what creates well being. As a result of all of life is a therapeutic journey.
Longevity requires this motion.
Motion of our bodily our bodies. Motion of our ideas. Motion and evolution of our souls. Longevity additionally requires connection. Connection to nature. Connection to ourselves. Connection to others. Connection to the next energy. Connection to the Common life pressure vitality, prana. The secrets and techniques to longevity are literally in plain sight after we look to historic therapeutic modalities like Ayurveda.
That is what this guide will educate you. Past the science of longevity and the mechanisms of ageing, you’ll learn to transfer the life pressure inside you to create well being and stay higher longer. It took a most cancers prognosis to remind me how magnificent the physique actually is and the way all of us have the capability to heal, whether or not it’s from a stomachache or a illness.
As I write this, I’m nonetheless in therapy, however I’m assured that I’m studying and re-learning what I have to stay an extended, higher, more healthy life and that if I return to what I do know—that I’m nature— the therapeutic will come.
I hope it comes for you too.
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