Ayurveda mini series eBook

Ayurveda for Grief

This is what the early morning sunrise shared with me yesterday morning.

I’ve just finished writing the “Ayurveda for Grief” eBook which will be on sale soon, but I thought I’d share the content with my paying subscribers first. I share a little with everyone in case you would like to support my work and have access to my books as I write them.

I’m also starting up a monthly Ayurvedic Q&A for my paying subscribers, the first one will be on Friday 24th January at 5pm GMT, unless there are people who would like to attend from other parts of the world. And so, paying subscribers, if you would like me to send you a link to the Q&A let me know, and if you would prefer a different time let me know.

I’m not sure why I began my eBook series with Ayurveda for grief, but it kind of wrote itself. I’m going to be working with an organisation who supports leaders and one of the areas that came up last year was grief—unfortunately the suicide rate has been increasing, especially for young people. And so, this short pragmatic eBook, was a response to those left behind.

Ayurveda for Grief

Ayurveda & Grief

Becoming whole again

Introduction

If you have found your way to this book through losing someone close, my heartfelt care is here for you. Grief can come in many packages but one thing they all have in common, is a broken heart.

Prolonged grief can also trigger depression, anxiety, trauma, as well as impact physical health and immunity. Ayurveda, can address all of these things, and so I am writing this book to connect you with Ayurveda. This ebook is an overview of how Ayurveda can help, and accompany you on your journey.

When you follow an Ayurvedic approach to self-care, things always change for the better. If you are in a place of utter darkness, Ayurveda can hold your beautiful hand along the way to feeling whole again; through gentle, consistent self-care strategies.

I’m not suggesting you follow or engage with everything in this little book immediately, especially if you are at the beginning of your journey. I’m just giving a map, for when you’re ready. You might dip in and out. And then again, you might just decide this is exactly what you would like to do all the way through.

Ayurveda

Ayurveda came from ancient India, a civilisation where people come together in community to support anyone moving through grief, no one is left on their own. In the West there is often a focus on individual coping, and that can block the movement of grief—we get stuck. It can be a very lonely place to find yourself. My hope is that by reading this short ebook, you will come together with others in small groups to practice Ayurveda, to support yourself and each other, to feel whole again.

If you follow these simple self-care practices, slowly getting to know them, one tiny step at a time, supported by a group of fellow travellers; I promise you things will improve. It won’t happen overnight, but there will be a turning point when you are able to hold the pain in the palm of one hand, while your heart starts to glimmer in the other. Eventually your heart will be glowing so brightly again, that the pain will no longer scare or numb you.

Let’s begin

What is Ayurveda?

Ayurveda is a nature-based, holistic approach to health that comes from ancient India, which explains there are different body types; with each needing slightly different approaches to food and life. Our body type defines our biological constitution. Living in balance with this and the world around us, is where health comes from, and the different constitutional balances influence reactions to loss. This means that understanding your constitutional type can help you navigate grief.

Nutrition and nourishment through food and the senses is how Ayurveda supports our physical, emotional and mental wellness. Ayurveda has always been about more than the food we eat, it includes what we are taking in through all our senses; what we are feeding our mind through our experiences, and the environments we are part of. Food is important, it builds our body; while experiences build our mind. The Ayurvedic approach to grief builds a journey of self care that combines both.

An Ayurvedic plan includes food, exercise, sleep and lifestyle protocols, for your particular constitution, and point in life. It meets you, exactly where you are. Ayurveda is about self-care, as the basis for wellness and wellbeing.

Ayurveda & grief

Ayurveda explains that when we experience grief the connection between our heart and mind is broken. This needs to be restored through a gentle daily routine that builds trust again, at a biological as well as emotional and mental level. The three cannot be disconnected.

The Ayurvedic view of grief is that we are consuming an experience that puts us out of balance. It impacts our nervous system, our capacity to digest life and often food too, becomes impaired and our life force, ‘ojas’, is severely knocked.

You need to take a gentle approach to addressing these things, at a time when you probably couldn’t care less about self-care.

Let Ayurveda take your hand, to support you as you move through the grieving process, perhaps in the company of others who are experiencing grief too, as you travel a gentle journey to restore your life force, regulate your nervous system, nourish your ability to digest, and return to balance.

People say this approach has restored their faith in life, in themselves, in those around them and more importantly, they no longer felt so alone all of the time.

And, it takes time.

How Ayurveda helps

Ayurveda helps you to restore your inner balance. This involves slowing down and establishing a daily restorative self-care routine that includes warming foods, abhyanga (self-massage), restorative yoga, a few other Ayurvedic therapies, and living to your natural rhythms in harmony with the rhythms of the natural world.

Self-care

Self-care is crucial for moving through grief, this short ebook is meant to be a gentle journey into how Ayurveda can help you, at whatever pace is right for you. It isn’t intended to replace grief counselling or any other help you have, rather, the ideas you will meet further on, are a supplement, to introduce you to the powerhouse of ancient healing knowledge that is Ayurveda.

There are 7 protocols I use when I work with people and groups that i’ll introduce you to. It can feel like a lot, to begin with its just about playing, to get to know the steps.

Western culture so often causes us to think that we must achieve the ticks on a check list in a certain amount of time. But after decades of holding space for people, I know it doesn’t work like that. I know that the person in front of me, is the best person to know how long the journey will be. And so, in this small ebook, I simply share the map.

The protocols