How to Ensure a Healthy Transition with the Change of Season

Spring is almost here, but we are still experiencing the cold and dark conditions of the winter. Ayurveda defines rutu sandhi as the transition between two seasons, which generally consists of the final 15 days of one season and the first 15 days of the next. As we move from winter to spring, this “door” or pathway between seasons offers a great opportunity to switch out the old season’s clothes, lifestyle, and attitudes for a fresh new start. This seasonal juncture is an excellent time for a cleansing treatments like panchakarma. Chances are we have accumulated excess kapha in our system during the winter. This imbalance can be aggravated by the arrival of the spring, which like winter is a kapha-dominant season. Ayurveda recommends incorporating certain foods, practices, and herbs into our daily routine at this time of year to keep kapha in balance. 

Spring is the king of the seasons. During this time, Mother Earth awakens to bring new life after the dormant winter months. Spring is mild, moist, and full of color. It is a wonderful time for testing new skills, growing intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually and starting a new lifestyle. Spring is also a blooming season, when flowers shed their pollen and infuse the air with their glorious fragrance. While the transition to warmer weather and burgeoning plant life can be a delightful experience for some people, it can have a downside for kapha individuals (especially those with pollen-based allergies) and for any anyone else who’s accumulated excess kapha.For these individuals, the irritation of mucous membranes and the buildup of mucus associated with kapha can lead to an onslaught of colds, allergies, sinus infections, asthma attacks, and hay fever symptoms. Their discomfort often intensifies when the warming spring air liquifies the congestion, inducing runny noses and wet, phlegmy coughing.  

To alleviate excesskapha in the throat, you can gargle honey and hot water or a cup of hot water with 1 teaspoon of turmeric and 1 teaspoon of salt. Another helpful formula for this time of year is a combination of ginger, black pepper, and pippali (piper longum) known astrikatu. This spice blend not only clears mucus from the body but also increases digestive fire and helps eliminate toxins. Adopting a kapha-pacifying  diet during the pre-spring period can also lower the incidence of allergies, hay fever, and colds. 

Regimen for Spring

•  Adopt a diet dominated by bitter, pungent, and astringent foods. 

• Eat lightly, and consume easily digestible foods. Favor soups and cooked vegetables.

• Use small amounts of raw honey as a sweetener.

• Fast for one day a week, preferably on Monday or Thursday (for astrological reasons).

• Drink warming, cleansing herbal teas, such as ginger, cinnamon, cardamom, clove.

• Practice yoga, meditation and pranayama.

• Keep warm and dry.

• Rinse nasal passages with warm saltwater and herbs. By taking just a few seconds to do this, you can avoid days of misery from sick sinuses.

Things to Avoid

• Fatty and fried foods

• Excessive amounts of sweet, sour, and salty foods

• Large, heavy, breakfasts

• Between-meal snacks, except for dried fruit

• Cold or iced beverages

• Daytime naps

•  Exposure to dust, dirt, and pollen

• Cold drafts and air conditioning

Foods for the Season

• Legumes, split peas, red lentils, chickpeas, pinto beans, and fresh soybean products

• Amaranth, barely, buckwheat, corn, millet, oats, quinoa, 

• Radishes, spinach, artichoke, asparagus, beets, broccoli, carrots, lettuces, okra

• Apricots, berries, cherries, dark grapes, mangos, peaches, pears, pomegranates, and raisins

Disclaimer
The sole purpose of these articles is to provide information about the tradition of Ayurveda. This information is not intended for use in the diagnosis, treatment, cure, or prevention of any disease. 

Ayurvedic Fasting

"The greatest discovery by modern man is the power to rejuvenate himself physically, mentally , and spiritually with rational fasting." 

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Fasting is considered an important medicine in Ayurveda, as long as it is not a long-term fast that would deplete the individual. It’s nature’s ancient, universal remedy for numerous ailments. By expelling ama (toxic buildup) from our digestive system, fasting frees up energy for healing and  strengthens the immune system. 

In modern life, we are bombarded with many new fads in fasting, juice cleansing, lemon fasts, water fasts—the list goes on. It’s hard to know which are helpful and which are harmful. In Ayurveda, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to fasting. Furthermore, some of these popular fasts can actually be detrimental if they’re incompatible with an individual’s unique constitution. A fast that may be good for one person isn’t necessarily good for another. It is important to take your constitution into consideration when choosing a fast. 

Fasting in a larger context means to abstain from that which is toxic to the mind, body, and soul. One way to approach fasting is to think of it as the elimination of physical, emotional, and mental toxins from our being, rather than simply cutting down or stopping food intake. Fasting for spiritual purposes usually involves some degree of removal of oneself from worldly responsibilities. It can mean complete silence and social isolation during the fast, which can be immensely restorative to those of us who have been directing our energy outward. When fasting with a spiritual intent, one withdraws from everything that is toxic to the mind, body, and spirit. This allows the mind to become freer, to achieve higher states of spiritual communion, and to release ama from the mind and the body. 

Ayurvedic fasting is an effective way to kindle the digestive fire and burn away accumulated toxins from the body and mind. It also eliminates gas, makes the body light, improves mental clarity, and preserves overall health. Ayurveda favors regular, short-term fasting over infrequent, long-term fasting. Short-term fasting could entail fasting on the same day each week or setting a few days aside each month to fast, depending on your constitution and cleansing requirements. Ayurveda suggests that  a more extended fasting is best at the change of each season. According to Ayurveda, fasting for up to a week can cause metabolic imbalances that can take months to rectify. 

In determining the appropriate type and length of a fast, it’s important to take into account your constitution, digestive strength, level of ama, and overall vitality. It’s never advisable to deplete your energy during a fast. If you’re new to fasting or have a chronic illness, we recommend consulting an Ayurvedic practitioner for specifically tailored guidance.

If you are of vata constitution you should never fast on water or undertake any other severely restricted diet, nor should you fast for more than two days at a time. Consuming light foods, such as kitchari and conjee, is a good option for the vata constitution. Vata individuals can fast once a month or at the change of seasons. 

Pitta individuals can fast on liquids, such as, fruit or vegetable juices and broths or on lightly cooked vegetables, but never on water alone. Pitta should never skip on quantity. Ideally they should consume diluted fruit juices, like prune, grape, or pomegranate. Cucumber juice, which is both astringent and bitter in taste, is another good choice, and they should avoid strong, sour-tasting juices. Fasts can last two to three days, and it is suggested that pitta types fast only four times a year, at the change of the seasons. If you are of vata-pitta constitution please add kitchari to your fast, or focus on grounding vegetable broths. 

Kapha individuals can easily do prolonged water fasts if they so choose. Otherwise, they many use raw juices or warm vegetable broths. For kapha people to maintain good, strong digestion, they should do weekly fasts, picking one day each week to fast. Kapha types should avoid strong-tasting sweet and sour juices.  

Sipping warm teas throughout the day is also a highly effective way to flush out accumulated toxins from the body. Simply place the ingredients in a medium saucepan with 4 cups filtered water, bring the water to a boil for 5 minutes, and then steep for 2 to 5 minutes. Always add the lemon while the tea is steeping. Strain into a teapot or thermos.

• 1 teaspoon cumin seeds

• ½ teaspoon coriander seeds

• 1 cinnamon or licorice stick 

• 10 fresh basil leaves 

• Squeeze of lemon juice

Simple fresh ginger tea and a squeeze of lemon is a good option as well. 

Note: In juicing, please do not combine fruit and vegetables juices, and be sure to use no more than two different fruits or vegetables at a time. Otherwise slow digestion and bloating could result, and you could reverse the beneficial effects of fasting. It’s best to choose a fasting period in which you’ll be able to follow a peaceful, nonstressful routine. We recommend following daily and nightly routines based on Ayurvedic principles. It’s also important always to break your fasts properly. The most important rule to remember is to begin eating again gradually, slowly working your way up to solid foods.

Disclaimer
The sole purpose of these articles is to provide information about the tradition of Ayurveda. This information is not intended for use in the diagnosis, treatment, cure, or prevention of any disease. 

Spring Cleaning

Our ancestors lived in harmony with nature’s changing seasons. Today we have lost our connection to that wisdom. The frenzied pace of the modern world, our increased exposure to environmental toxins and a growing alienation from nature have caused most of us to fall out of alignment with an optimal state of health and happiness. But each new year brings another opportunity to perform the time-honored ritual of internal cleansing. 

Spring, which celebrates rebirth is the perfect time for detoxification. Detoxifying in spring is an important part of the Ayurvedic seasonal routine. Spring is the Kapha season, because the wet and cool weather reflects the moist, cool, heavy qualities of Kapha dosha are predominate during this time of year (March-June). Biologically, nature supports cleansing the body in the spring. In winter the digestive fire is high, and people eat more sweet and heavy foods. Most the time they aren’t able to assimilate these hard-to-digest foods, so Ama (toxic product of indigestion) starts to accumulate.

When warm weather melts the snow, it has a similar effect on the body. In spring the Ama melts and the volume of Ama becomes so great that the channels of the body become clogged. If you don’t assist these toxins in moving out of the body, you can become prone to flu, colds, cough, or allergies. Or you may feel unusually fatigued, sluggish or drowsy after lunch, or lose your normal appetite.

Sharp headaches, dizziness, mild tremors in the limbs and unexplained muscle aches especially in the calf, can also be symptoms. Your tongue may be coated, and your throat may be sore. The skin can be less radiant, heavier and more oily. You may also find that you break out more often, are more prone to sunburn, and have dry patches on your skin. If you suffer from indigestion, constipation, bad breath, disturbed sleep, PMS or any of the above, a spring detox could be just the thing to get you back on track.

Spring is the best season for detoxification, because nature is already trying to de-clear out the toxins in your body. Its the time to help the body to efficiently detoxify the channels and the body tissues. A Kapha pacifying diet and lifestyle is the best at this time. If you avoid eating heavy, cold, hard-to-digest foods, and avoid or reduce the sweet, sour, and salty tastes, your digestive system will be more efficient in burning away the accumulated Ama. 

You can sip hot water ( if you do not have a Pitta imbalance) to help melt the digestive impurities that have accumulated. Sweet juicy fruits can help cleanse the body, although they should be eaten before sunset, as they have a Kapha-increasing effect after the sun goes down. You can add spices to your food -- such as coriander, cumin, turmeric, and fennel -- to help stimulate the digestion and detoxify the skin. Daily exercise, and avoiding day sleep will also help. 

According to yoga’s sister tradition, Ayurveda, health means a body that is clear of toxins, a mind that is at peace, emotions that are calm and happy, organs that function normally and wastes that are efficiently eliminated. Panchakarma, an Ayurvedic method of detoxification, aids in reversing the effects of daily living and restores good health.  Spring is the perfect time to partake in a Panchakarma. The core regime of Panchakarma consists of adherence to a diet that is appropriate for your psychosomatic constitution, sweating and purgation therapies and internal and external oil treatments. These methods gently cleanse the body’s tissues of toxins to open the subtle channels and bring life-enhancing energy that increases vitality, inner peace, confidence and well-being.