Welcome to the first of my Ayurveda ‘shorts’

What is Ayurveda?

Welcome to the first post of my new series, Ayurveda ‘Shorts’. Reading time 2 minutes.

AYURVEDA, A NATURE-BASED approach to health, is over 5000 years old and recognises the subtle energies that underpin our life and health. It comes from ancient India.

This ancient science teaches us that we nourish the regenerative abilities of our body and mind through the food we eat, as well as through every single thing we consume through each of our senses—how we live our lives.

Ayurveda has a 6-stage model of disease, it isn’t until stages 5 and 6 that Western medicine is able to label an illness. This is what makes this nature-based approach to health such an incredibly powerful preventative healthcare model—by recognising when we are starting to move onto this continuum through symptom recognition, we can reverse what is happening through our choices.

Between stages 1 and 2 reversing the conditions that are causing the symptoms is easy. Between stages 3 and 4 this is usually possible but it takes longer, requires commitment and habit change. By stages 5 and 6 an illness will have developed that can be labelled, and it is not always possible to reverse the condition.

It takes time to create the conditions that lead to illness.

For instance, the Ayurvedic view of cancer is that it is the end result of living out of balance with our biological rhythms, and other biologically stressful conditions; for many years. We don’t need to beat cancer or make a war on cancer, we need to stop creating the conditions that cause cancer. But, this is hard in a culture that undermines our ability to do this in so many ways. Taking an Ayurvedic approach to preventative healthcare can help here.

While Ayurveda is an incredibly complex science, the basics are simple once you understand a few things. And, those basics can mean the difference between physical and mental health; or illness. This will be the subject of my next book ‘21-Day Ayurvedic Journey’ which I will be serialising the first draft of, for you, on this substack.

If you have any questions please do ask. Next week my Ayurvedic short will look at the history of Ayurveda.