While working my way back to health, I learnt many Ayurvedic principles that played a crucial role in retrieving my vitality. These are ancient principles that have helped people (in our country) keep good health, in the past. Many of my patients, friends and family members have also benefited immensely by following these simple things and have been able to roll back many of their variously labeled dis-eases.
Mid-age changes: The most important change in the body after 40-45 (in some cases, it could begin after 50, depending on the body type or health condition) years of age is the increasing dryness that causes several problems that look very serious but arise out of a lessening of Kapha and Pitta in the body. You have to understand Kapha as water, Pitta as the ‘chemical’ digestive fire and Vata as wind or movements. With increasing dryness or high vata, the rasa or nourishment in the body does not move around well. There is a kind of sapping up of the peripheral parts of the body, decreasing circulation and the supply of energy to the vital organs.
The body’s intelligence likes to maintain optimum supply of energy to the vital organs and also maintain a balance among the same. In the depleted conditions, energy from the periphery (limbs) is withdrawn to keep the vital organs replenished with the limited supply of energy available. This causes pains and weakness in the limbs.
The dryness affects the nervous system very badly and therefore one sees the confusing symptoms that show up at different times. The nervous system is the communication network – the PCB of the body. At times, kind of mixed up signals are seen due to the weakness caused by dryness in the nervous system. These mixed up signals could be misinterpreted as symptoms of some ‘auto-immune disorder’ or ‘degenerative disease’ by the modern medical system.
Abhyanga: It is Abhyanga (not apple) everyday that keeps the doctors away. Abhyanga means that you rub a few tea spoons (5-7 depending on the body size) of oil (til or gingely oil is highly recommended) everyday on the entire body, before bath. Do not forget to include the ears and soles. Wait for 5-10 minutes and wash as usual and towel. Do not soap and wash too much out so that some trace of oil remains in the skin. If for some reason, you cannot do this every day, the hands, legs (including the soles) and ears are to be done daily without fail. With this, peripheral circulation of energy in the body improves tremendously, relieving a lot of aches and pains. For many circulatory problems/ ailments, such as, asthma and high blood pressure, this can be THE remedy. A more effective improvement over this is to add two spoons of finely powdered salt into the oil and rub the oil and salt together once in a week. Very weak people as well as those with nervous disorders need to rub this oil and salt on their head as well, so the brain gets more nourishment and energy. (Though this makes the hair look rather sticky, it reduces hair fall and slows down graying.) Ayurveda says that one should have abhyanga every day.
With circulation improving, the vital organs begin to recover their vitality and equilibrium. In particular, abhyanga improves the liver, digestion and the eyes. The nerves begin to get nourished and strengthened and many aches and pains disappear. Abhyanga also keeps the blood thin and healthy and you will notice this yourself when you have a cut and bleed. Daily abhyanga slows down ageing remarkably both inside and in outward appearance.
In addition, put 2-3 drops of oil deep into the ears with the help of the grooved handle of a spoon or some thing like that. This will strengthen your neck , shoulders and arms. This also helps strengthen your heart, liver and kidneys because it nourishes and strengthens the base of the brain (the hippocampus)– the part of the brain that controls these organs. By strengthening your nerves, this will also improve the quality of your sleep and hearing. Oil in the ears infused with a little garlic essence is a great and quick remedy for headaches, pain in the shoulder and arms and toothache as well. Please note, NO OIL SHOULD BE PUT IN THE EARS IF THERE IS AN INFECTION OR ANY OOZING OR DISCHARGE IN THE EARS OR THE PERSON HAD SUFFERED CHRONIC EAR INFECTIONS IN CHILDHOOD.
Travel and long daily commute causes more dryness as your body is exposed to the blowing wind. Therefore, you should have more abhyanga when you travel. The other practices that increase dryness are driving, riding two-wheelers, sitting under fans and being in air-conditioned spaces. I really feel very sorry when I see children take a ride sitting/standing in the front of two-wheelers. It may be a major cause of sinus and respiratory problems appearing in them at an early age.
A couple of things not so nice about abhyanga are that it makes one’s clothes a bit more difficult to wash and over time, they might acquire a quaint smell. (It is not any offensive smell like tobacco, alcohol or perfumes). Over a longer period of time, your bathroom drain can get clogged (instead of your arteries) by a deposit that looks rather like Mysore pak that needs to be cleaned. It is a small price to pay for the countless benefits of abhyanga. (I discovered that an easy way to reduce this deposit in the drain is to put washing soda with hot water into it. The soda reacts with the oil turning it into a soapy substance.)
Cough: What might have been alright when you were younger may not be so any more after 45-50 years. For example, gargling with salt and/or turmeric may not be the appropriate remedy at this age (50 or 60+) for dry cough or congestion in the throat. Taking ginger and honey may not be good in the long run or suitable in all weather conditions. They could be even counter productive in the dry seasons. Try this instead: apply some ghee into the nostrils with your little finger. You can do this twice a day if your cough is bad- once in the afternoon and then again before going to bed. This will help you sleep well, with no irritation in the throat and you will not wake up with a cough. This lubrication is needed in the dry seasons and whenever your nostrils feel dry inside. Younger people who ride two-wheelers may also do this, to get rid of dry cough or throat irritation.
Now, very briefly about food and eating: All these apply to everyone, irrespective of age, “healthy” or otherwise. One thing with food/eating is that the effect of eating something is seen more on the following day than on the same day. When you are very weak, something unsuitable might get thrown out immediately. But when your health is better, the unsuitable food goes in and the body tries to handle it to the best of its ability. But it suffers in the process. If you take any ‘digestive’ medication, the harm may remain unnoticed longer.
Our bodies change constantly. There is a saying that every seven years, all your rules have to be overhauled. What might have been causing loose bowel movement earlier, could now cause constipation and gas – eg., brinjal (aubergine), okhra, guava or large amounts of vegetables or greens. Again, remember it is the next day that you suffer. Incidentally, apple is not recommended if there is constipation. You should observe what happens with your body to really understand it and you can do this best yourself.
More often than not, it is the lower half of the body that gets affected before the upper half – that is chest and throat areas. Problems in the upper part cause more acute discomfort for which effective and quicker relief can be had by first clearing the problem / congestion in the lower part. For example, constipation could be the cause of chronic cough or breathing problem.
Bulk of your intake at this age (45+) should be what is called kaphic food- “snigdha, ushna and sneha”, says Ayurveda. That is, sticky, warm and with fat. Fats could be cold (unheated and whole) oil that gives you your good cholesterol or omega fatty acids and ghee. Always eat simple, freshly cooked food. NEVER EAT REHEATED OR FOOD RETRIEVED FROM THE FRIDGE. Ideally, food is to be eaten within three hours of cooking. After that period it becomes ‘heavy’ for digestion. Reheating food renders it unwholesome and indigestible. Just because some things go in and some things come out of the body every day, do not assume that your digestion and bowel movement are good. Undigested food is the root cause of most toxins and disease in the body. I would like to share what my doctor said when I asked, “How can we waste food (that is expensive)?”
“You want to save that Rs.10, pay me Rs.100 and suffer for Rs. 1000?”
Isn’t that strange? We think that what we eat, when it is neither nourishing nor necessary is ‘not wasting’. It wastes our bodies and causes disease!
Ayurveda has elaborate rules on pre-cooking (such as fermentation), cooking and combinations. For example, we knew from our (grand) parents that milk and sour taste should not be had together or in quick succession. When unwell, one should eat light, freshly cooked simple food – not what everyone else eats. Eat rice with rasam or kichdi instead of pulao, chapathis or idli/dosa when unwell. In fact, even when one is well, flour products should not be eaten everyday as they burden the body’s digestive system.
Milk and ghee are good but perhaps not butter or cheese. Curd is heavy and may be suitable in limited quantities. Kheer or some milk sweet is particularly good in cold and dry season but it should be taken at the start of the meal, and as a part of it, during the day. Fruits should be eaten before the meal or separately on their own. Do not eat raw vegetables and fruits in the same meal. Beginning with sweet, moving on to sour, salt, hot and ending with astringent/ bland, like buttermilk, is the right order of eating. This order (sweet first) is a source of great comfort.
It is good for your meals to include all the six tastes – sweet, hot, sour, salt, bitter and astringent. Rice or chapathi would be considered ‘sweet’ and should form the predominant part of your meal. Most vegetables, like beans, greens etc., would be astringent. Both bitter and astringent tastes increase dryness in the body. You may not feel very good taking large quantities of them, particularly, in the dry season or if you are of a thin body type. But those two tastes have other virtues that can be used with benefit for specific purposes.
All things in the preparation of which water is taken out increase vata and dryness, eg., fried or roasted things, biscuits, puffed rice and such other stuff. Even dry chapathis are not good. Wheat itself increases dryness in the body and chapathis more so. You must eat it with some oil or ghee. It is better to stick to one grain only in a meal. Combining two or more (rice, wheat, ragi etc.) is not good for the colon. Multi-grain is multi problem. It is also advisable to stick to food and oil that has been traditionally used in the family. Not that you cannot break that rule ever. But it is better to habitually eat one’s traditional food and avoid fads (oats for eg.), however attractively advertised.
Night meals: The body’s metabolism slows down towards the evening. Therefore, the night meals should be very light and always cooked fresh and not spicy. Ideally, it should be eaten NOT later than an hour and a half after sunset. If you eat things made from flour, the meal should be even earlier. No curd or buttermilk should be taken during the night meals. This applies to everyone – the so-called healthy persons also. Fermented things like idli or dosa or bread and coarse food, such as large helping of vegetables, are not recommended in the night meal. Neither Ayurveda nor any of the oriental health systems recommend eating of raw vegetables. Fermented flour products (idli, dosa, bread) are also contra indicated in many body conditions.
Drinking boiled water while it is hot helps in digestion as it peps up the liver. It should be had hot (like tea). Like food, water too should not be reheated. I have seen this simple step itself cure many problems. Ayurveda also says ‘Do not eat/ or drink anything within three hours of the previous meal or snack and do not starve beyond six hours.
OIL: One other thing, if you are not aware, is that refined oil is very bad for health. It affects the liver, your arteries and heart, eyes and the nervous system. It is the source of your LDL and triglycerides. If you are using it, please switch over to non-refined oil immediately. There is a study that says increase in the incidence of heart and coronary artery diseases in India followed the introduction of (‘cheap’, imported) refined oil that killed the local, healthy oil industry.
No oil from a vegetable source contains the ‘bad cholesterol’ but they could be fattening and when heated (as in frying) can have a negative effect. Incidentally, the Allopathic medication for cholesterol is very harmful with serious side-effects. Please avoid it. There are good herbal alternatives for lowering cholesterol, if needed. Now even the American Heart Association’s thinking has turned around and is recommending all that it said was terrible. Now Americans are taking coconut oil to improve health of the nervous system and heart. Even butter and ghee are recommended highly. Body needs good amount of fat to keep healthy. But one whole generation has lost health due to deprivation of good fat.
Eating and Bath: It is best to bathe before you eat or drink anything. However, if it cannot be, allow one and a half hour after you have had a drink and two and half hours after you have eaten, before you bathe. If you bathe when what you have eaten is still in the stomach, digestion is stopped as the bath makes energy flow outwards to the skin. The undigested (parts of) food is the main source of toxins that cause all the problems.
For non-veg eaters: Non-veg (including eggs) and dairy products should not be eaten in the same day. All the demonizing of dairy products is happening because of the new habit of everyone eating all kinds of mixed up diets. I remember, some 20 years ago, non-vegetarians did not consume dairy products, as a rule. In our neighbouring countries where vegetarianism is unknown, one always had black tea and fresh milk was not available. In India, unlike now, even meat eaters ate meat occasionally, a few times in a year.
Focus on opposites: Ayurveda has the object of improving one’s health as opposed to Allopathy’s ‘fighting or managing’ the disease’s symptoms. Even when the body’s vitality is highly compromised, say, by diabetes or heart disease for example, a good Ayurvedic physician will try his best to conserve the vitality of the kidneys and the liver and save your eyes. S/he will not prescribe anything that will compromise the vitality of your major organs.
As long as you try and maintain the vitality and balance of the liver, heart and kidneys, you can have a great level of comfort and efficient functioning of the body. If you follow the suggestions given above, you are bound to have that level of health.
To reiterate, one thing that helps improve your health most is daily abhyanga and one thing that does most harm is wrong food. (I am leaving wrong thinking and feeling, for the moment.)
For such of you who think ‘I am still alright not doing any of these’, I must share an insight an Ayurvedic doctor provided. I told him that I had done such terrible mistakes for such long periods of time (eg., taking honey in hot water). I am surprised that I am still alive and kicking. He smiled and said, “But you have also done some right things, such as eating ghee.(!)” (That I have done and continue to do in plenty.)
SARVE BHAVANTU SUKHINAHA, SARVE SANTU NIRAMAYA. SARVE BHADRANI PASHYANTU, MAA KASCHIT DUKHABHAG BHAVET. (May everyone be happy and free from disease. May all see noble and good things and may none be unhappy.)
Ayurveda and Ageing – a Healer’s Viewpoint
