:: November/December 2004 Volume 3/Number 6

Ayurveda To Go:

By Felica M. Tomasko

Planes, trains, and herbs and massage and almond butter.

We are a culture of travelers. But many of us return home exhausted, sick or needing a vacation. By using precautions and remedies from Ayurveda and yoga, we can experience an itinerary of good health as we wander the globe.

Traveling disturbs the vata dosha, and whatever one’s predominant doshas, we all have vata. Vata is comprised of the elements air and ether (empty space), and is responsible for movement in our body and the surrounding universe. Therefore traveling, by its very nature of movement, increases vata, so many Ayurvedic suggestions to maintain nomadic health involve balancing vata. Others emphasize strengthening immunity.

 If you find yourself on the road a lot you may need  an Ayurvedic survival kit. Pack massage oil or lotion and herbal tea. Travel-supporting herbs include chamomile, tulsi (holy basil), mint, lemon balm, ginger, cardamom, cinnamon, and the Ayurvedic digestive combination cumin, coriander and fennel.  Don’t rely on roadside fast food for satisfaction; instead, bring soothing vata-pacifying snacks like healthy carbohydrates such as almond butter on rice cakes, nuts, fruit or a thermos full of soup. Carry an eye cover for a meditative savasana (relaxation) on flights or an unfamiliar bed.

Oil massage is an explorer’s best friend, as it is so vata-calming. So if possible get, or give yourself, a massage when you arrive at your destination. Perform a self-massage before sleeping, showering or bathing, or a foot massage before bed. Massaging your feet with oil or lotion while roaming creates a grounding effect. Have a dedicated pair of traveling socks for oily feet.

Airplane flights are the most vata provoking form of travel, because they involve moving through vata’s own elements: air and space. To counteract dehydration exacerbated by the dry, recycled air in airline cabins, drink warm liquids and avoid ice.

In any mode of transportation, notice body position to avoid future aches or pains. How are you sitting in the car, airplane seat, or holding your body on the bicycle? Walk often on a plane and stop for stretch breaks while driving.

When roving across time zones, adjust the time on watches, cell phones and computers and become acclimatized to local time as quickly as possible. Jet lag can intensify when constantly ruminating about the time zone we came from rather than being in the time zone we are in.

Constipation can be caused by excess vata.  Pack triphala or amalaki, rather than reaching for drugstore laxatives that can often become habit-forming. Tablets transport easily; alternatively, brew triphala tea. Triphala is tridoshic, so it helps correct any doshic imbalance.

Traveling can stress the immune system, through changing climates along with exposure to different people bugs. Wash hands before eating, drink only pure water and scrutinize the cleanliness of food sources. To protect against a host of parasites and diseases, strengthen the body. Here again, use triphala, while balancing all three doshas it also removes toxins. Chavyanprash, a traditional Ayurvedic herbal jam, also increases immunity.

Sleep disturbance is another bane of wanderlust. Avoid caffeine, drink chamomile tea or take ashwagandha before bed, oil the feet, practice a long savasana, pranayama (breath techniques), restorative asana (poses) and set a routine.

We've learned that yoga practice can help support the immune system, digestion and sound sleep. Test it now! Find a yoga studio, pack a travel mat, or improvise. Practice pranayama or meditation to calm the mind and soothe a travel-weary body.

Although the ancient yogis and Ayurvedic practitioners didn’t fly on airplanes, they did travel. And they used principles of calming vata, drinking herbal teas, adequate preparation and strengthening the immune system to enjoy an often nomadic lifestyle. We can emulate their example to enjoy our present-day journeys.

Sleeping Deeply and the
Art of Letting Go:

By Prashanti de Jager

Sleep, or Nidra as it is called in Sanskrit, is so key to well-being that along with right diet and right use of sexual energy, right sleep is one of the three pillars of health according to the Vedic tradition.

There are hundreds of possible factors to consider in how to get a good night's sleep, and many ways to do this. But the basic idea, as in all of Ayurveda, is to skillfully use a confluence of well-timed techniques, including exercise, diet, herbs, lifestyle and nutraceuticals to increase the chances of the desired outcome.

Another appropriate Ayurvedic tenet is that you make sure long-term lifestyle changes are being implemented to address deeper issues and not just short-term fixes that are merely symptomatic and not therapeutic.  Also realize that there are endless physical and karmic ailments that may result in insomnia that should be addressed individually by an Ayurvedic practitioner or a Vedic astrologer.

Gentle yet mildly vigorous exercise is one of the best ways to ensure sleep as it helps remove stagnation, alleviates vata, increases sattva, and helps move pent up energy, which is rampant in our culture. Flowing through yoga asanas is great along with walks and gentle runs in sattvic, high-prana places. Exercise also helps to move and digest the mental issues that otherwise cause endless ruminations through the night.

These emotional/mental issues tend to be the main reason why people have noisy minds and thus experience poor quality sleep. The type of issues that are the worst culprits are those that tend to ‘move’ the most, the vata states like anxiety, worry and fear.  Pitta states like anger, jealousy and frustration are a close second.  Noisy minds can also arise from what Dr David Frawley calls ‘toxic junk impressions’, the sensory equivalent of ‘junk food.’  These agitating mental impressions are actually ‘eaten’ by your mind and include freeways, advertising, tamasic scenes, TV, etc.

If other people are the objects of our anger, fear and agitation we might be able to use a Metta practice of projecting love to them to antidote these negative emotions.  Another method is identifying yourself as the Witness of these impressions and knowing them as simple objects in your awareness, basic phenomena like a book on a shelf. That way you do not necessarily remove the agitation, which may be very difficult, but you change your relationship to the agitation thereby removing its power to negatively affect you. The more you let go of these thoughts and conditioning and patterns, the easier you will sleep.

The next most important aspect for good sleep is lifestyle. Vata dominates from 2 to 6 AM and PM, pitta dominates from 10 to 2 AM and PM, and kapha dominates from 6 to 10 AM and PM.  So try to awaken before 6 in the morning while vata still dominates.  This will help you rise and move your bowels and get the day moving.  If you sleep past this you have the heaviness of kapha gluing you to your bed and you start the cycle of insomnia.  In fact, it is this same heaviness that you want to harness from 6 to 10 PM to invoke sleep.  Just as vata energy is basic movement, one can loosely say that pitta energy is that movement directed outward like a knife and kapha energy is that movement directed inward like an embrace.  So before pitta arrives at 10 PM to give you a ‘second wind,’ allow the evening’s kapha’s embrace to pull you inward from the outer world of sense objects to the inner realm of deep sleep.

During this kapha evening time take a warm bath in candlelight in a closed quiet bathroom.  Vata has the qualities of cold, dry, light and mobile and this bath is opposite all of these, so it attenuates the vata, calms the mind, and opens a gateway to rest.  A gentle ujjaya pranayama will sweetly assist the process.  The idea is to create a still sacred space, which leads us to the next level of tuning into a deep sleep: Vastu Shastra, or Vedic Feng Shui.

In Vastu Shastra the south is considered the abode of Yama, the God of death.  Sleep is nothing other than a form of death, death to the outer sense world for the night, and so it is best to have your bedroom in the South or Southwest part of your home and your head pointed to magnetic south as you sleep. 

Your bedroom should be simple, used only for sleep and sex, and without the clutter that invokes vata and with the serenity that invokes sattva.  Again, we are back to Let Go!  Let go of the world, of grudges, of attachments, of stuff in your closet, of clutter in your room and in your mind 

Clear inner and outer psychic space by burning a 3 hour beeswax votive in the evenings. Music can have a deep effect on us so choose calming works that entrain your mind into stillness.  The sense of smell is related to the earth element and, like music, can invoke a deep calm.  Use warm grounded scents like sandalwood and resins like myrrh and frankincense.  Tiring the eyes with a sattvic, yet not captivating book can work wonders.  Another helpful addition to your bed will be a silk eye pillow or a raw silk shawl loosely wrapped around your eyes and ears. This reduces vata and is a form of pratyahara practice of shutting out the world.

To no one's surprise, diet can have a large influence on your ability to sleep.  In general your own specific individual constitution determines the diet that is best for you, so here you should be advised by an Ayurvedic practitioner. In general, the main concerns are to stay away from stimulants and eat a diet that pacifies vata and pitta. 

Still, with all of this there is sometimes a need to consider herbs and nutraceuticals for facilitating a good night's sleep. You can easily get capsules of herbal sedatives, but before you do that, realize that most people who have insomnia do not need sedatives, but tonic herbs instead.  So before you simply knock your self out with an herb that creates tamas in your mind, which is anathema to yoga, perhaps it is better to take sattvic tonics that will strengthen your Spirit first.  Ashwagandha, Shatavri, Jatamansi, Safed Musli, and Tulsi are high on the list. 

Oil, especially sesame oil medicated with the above tonics and essential oils like rose and sandalwood, is a wonderful way to both strengthen spirit and calm the body.  In Ayurveda oil is to the body as love is to the soul so a calming massage with this oil warmed, especially applied to the head, is wonderful for the body and spirit.

If all of this does not work, then finally you can pull out the sedatives like Hops, Valerian, Skullcap, California poppy, Kava kava, and Oats. Nutraceuticals that work are Tryptophan and 5-HTP, as they are precursors of seratonin in the brain, magnesium and calcium as they relax the muscles and Vitamin E as it helps build Ojas and ‘thickens’ your energy.  Take all these right before sleep.

Remember, sleeping well is all about creating a confluence of factors and aligning your life with as many of the things that I have mentioned as possible.

After studying Vedic Sciences in India for most of the 90s, Prashanti has helped to grow a large Ayurvedic organic/biodynamic sustainable herb project in India and the U.S. Contact him at prashanti@igc.org or omorganics.com.