Understand your Nature and Shine with Ayurveda

Ayurveda, the science of longevity, is an elegant, complete system of medicine originating in India thousands of years ago. It's teachings describe those things which lead to health and happiness and those which lead to disease and misery. It's protocols have been supporting individuals in all stages of life for thousands of years. Especially effective as preventive medicine, Ayurveda also shines in its understanding of constitutional differences between living beings.

The current research in longevity science suggests that the earlier we begin living wisely, engaging the three pillars of health: diet, sleep and stress reduction/energy management, the more benefit we'll get down the road. There's a saying that the best time to begin was 20 years ago. The next best time is now.

Wise living, according to Ayurveda, is all about alignment with Natural rhythms and with your unique nature. In Ayurveda, Nature as a whole and your individual nature are both called Prakriti.

Individual prakriti is your genetic inheritance. It's determined at the time of conception, modified through gestation and early life, and then set as you move through your lifespan. Ayurveda recognizes 7 distinct constitutional types, or prakritis, based on combinations of the three doshas, vata, pitta and kapha. The doshas are combinations of the 5 great elements, space, air, fire, water and earth, which are themselves made up of various qualities.

When we live in sync with our nature, we feel happy and healthy, and when we live out of alignment with ourselves, we decline, feel unhappy, and get sick. Think of two dogs: a chihuahua and a lab. Which would benefit more from a five mile walk?

While both need exercise to thrive, the chihuahua would eventually wear down with that much activity, just as the lab would suffer if we only walked her around the block. Both would show signs of stress, from living out of sync with their nature.

We've all likely suffered from following standardized health advice that didn't work for our unique system and situation. Statistical averages can only take us so far. That's even more true for women since most research into the body has been done on men. That's changing, but it's still largely the case!

Throughout a woman's lifespan, and certainly in major transitions such as peri-menopause and menopause, understanding your unique nature makes decoding and treating symptoms easier.

One woman may have hot flashes, and more frequent cycles during perimenopause, while another may have trouble falling asleep, have less frequent cycles and cycle for a shorter duration. In both cases these differences can be understood through an Ayurvedic lens and treatment will be grounded in those constitutional differences. The same shift in life stage or disease impacts different bodies differently. Treatment therefore is not focused on the disease per se, but on the the individual experiencing it.

Things are always changing within and without and your organism is registering and adapting to those changes. Homeostasis is dynamic. The doshas, vata, pitta and kapha, reflect these shifts and rise in prominence accordingly.

When the doshas within you increase, causing a set point different from your original nature, prakriti, it's called vikruti, which means "against nature." Vikriti is your present state of imbalance, which can be minor, like getting over heated standing in the sun too long, or more chronic, like having hot flashes for months. Treatment is always about finding and removing the cause (often multiple causes), and bringing in balancing qualities through diet, lifestyle and herbal medicines.

Perimenopause is a kind of vikriti. As we transition in hormonal levels over a decade or more, our body-mind organism is in a constant state of adaptation to these (at first) subtly changing conditions. And like summer's heat giving way to the coolness of fall, Perimenopause is a natural movement from one phase of a woman's life to another. The ways that she adapts and meet this changing inner season will support or oppose what's trying to happen within her. Constitutional medicine at this time makes things easier.

According to Ayurveda, anything can be medicine and anything can be poison, it all depends on the context. A steady diet of the 5 mile walk is medicine for the lab and poison for the chihuahua. If our chihuahua is training for the dog olympics, that context modifies our response to his daily 5 mile walks for a time, and we could look at ways to support his constitution and mitigate as much as possible the depleting effects of so much exercise on his more delicate constitution.

Context is everything. In terms of life stage, what worked for us before perimenopause may not work during perimenopause or after. We need to meet our body-mind-spirit where they are NOW in order to make a good response. The three pillars of health, diet, sleep and energy management/stress reduction need to be adapted to our present situation. We can't exercise like a 20 year old at perimenopause and expect to feel well.

Learning to decode your symptoms using an Ayurvedic lens is empowering. Instead of feeling overwhelmed by the many little things that can be out of balance at once, we can relax and focus on what we know to do to support our organism as a whole in returning to balance.

Ayurveda is like other art forms in that there are certain basics we return to and refine again and again as we progress along the path. In this case, progress on the path is our very health and wellbeing, body, mind and soul! How we learn to care for our instrument allows us to more fully offer our gifts to the world, in whatever big or small ways we do so.

Would you like to better align with your body wisdom every day so you can feel your best?

You can start by taking this quiz to determine your ayurvedic constitution. Take the test once for what's been true for the majority of your life (prakriti score) and once for what's changed, or true in the last 6 - 12 mos (vikriti score). Total all the columns and give yourself a score for K, P and V).

Then, read this article wrote describing the doshas and body-types in more detail with some general ways to support imbalance you may be experiencing.

Wanna talk about how an Ayurvedic approach could support you in feeling your best? Schedule a complimentary discovery session here, and you can tell me what's going on, and I'll let you know more about how I work with women in perimenopause and beyond.

Here's to feeling your best through every life stage so you can shine in this world.

With gratitude for all the wise beings who have brought Ayurveda forward, which originally came from India, And to all of my teachers who have taught me and invited me to share this knowledge with others.

XO,

Shannon