I feel really blessed to be writing today. It has been a while since I have been able to sit down and share my musings on Ayurveda and life from an inspired place.
I have been creating and running my online programs – things I have been so happy to invite you into and share with you, but between all that sharing, I haven’t been able to create much new content. Plus, I am 6 months pregnant, and my self care got very much pushed aside with all this work. And it was taking it’s toll, and then, I was able to return to what I needed…dropping a lot of things along the way. I also look forward to sharing more about these experiences as my vitality returns.
So today, as I am fielding a lot of comments from my lovely Spring Cleansers, I write again about cleansing. About what really comes up during a cleanse, the deeper challenges. The emotional stuff that tends to come up when we deliberately change our habits and our diet. The experience of the real and deep shifts that come along when we step onto the path of self healing.
We are complex beings. A cleanse is much more than just what you eat..or don’t.
We are in day 6 of our 7 day Ayurvedic Cleanse, (congrats my loves!) though I started thinking about this writing on just day 3. Day 3 is only the second day of eating our mono-diet, our ‘fast’ of kitchari. And much of the group were feeling big shifts already this early on – and many in an uncomfortable direction.
How can this be, after changing your diet and habits for only a day or two? This brings up some questions I like to explore around our relationship with food, and the process of self-healing and transformation.
We have such busy lives. I love that I can reach out to people interested in Ayurveda, around the world, something I would not be able to do without the internet. And the online courses I offer can easily be signed up for, and joined from the comfort of home. Certainly, part of the transformative process, part of the healing , begins upon registration. But the monetary exchange – that’s actually the easy part. Changing our lifestyle, our diet, and stepping onto our healing path is often uncomfortable. Whether we remember it or not, it’s what we wanted – the mind and body do not like to be uncomfortable, though the uncomfortable moments are the moments of true transformation.
The vibrations I am feeling from the cleanse group feel like frustration, with waves of calm and understanding, and then perhaps even resignation. Then up again as the energies continue to change.
Questions that come up for me are:
1. Is food really this powerful?
Well, let’s explore yes. That’s what we’re here to talk about right? How food is actually so powerful, it is medicinal – the choices we make can bring us closer to homeostasis, mentally and physically and energetically, or further from it. In fact, this is what first drew me to learn more about ayurveda (and I am sure most of you, too) – especially the idea that the food we eat affects our state of consciousness. And for it to do this, it’s an obvious connection that what we eat influences our thought patterns, our emotions. Because it is the emotions and thoughts which make up our mind.
Removing certain foods and sensory stimulations is perhaps even more difficult than adding something new. The nature of the mind, according to Dr. David Frawley in his great book, Ayurveda and the Mind, is dualistic. Meaning it has a tendency to understand things in pairs of opposites: love/hate, yes/no, good/bad etc. It is prone to extremes. He suggests that in order to balance the mind, we must not try to force the mind in any particular direction, nor train it with negativity, but to seek to calm it from any extremes. (Side note: This is one reason that in my programs, I try to stay away from saying anything is good or bad. By understanding the energetics of things, we can simply make a judgment as to whether it will bring us towards or away from homeostasis.)
Let’s come back and get grounded in the physical body. Foods have different energies and strengths. Like, for a strong example, think of a cup of chamomile tea vs. a cup of whiskey. Okay. Of course these things are going to affect the body (and inevitably due to the real mind/body connection, our mind) in different ways. Comparing a bowl of kitchari to a bowl of kickin’ buffalo wings – which is more like the tea, which is more like the whiskey? For those of us who are used to whiskey, it might be the chamomile tea that feels more disturbing in the body at first.
I work with quite a few clients with powerful coffee addictions who expect to be ‘drinking chamomile tea for a week,’ if you’ll continue on the metaphor with me. These are often the clients who get physically ill during the process, perhaps intense migraines and nausea or vomiting. So many of us like to blame it on the kitchari, on the new thing we invited in. Though really it’s allowing/forcing us to look at what our current state of homeostasis really is, or was. The caffeine was affecting the body that deeply, it was keeping them in a false state of homeostasis. They are just now finding out their true state of energy, that the reliance on substance was hiding.
‘Impure foods’ (I dare to use this terminology, before I dive into the Ayurvedic categories of Sattva, Rajas and Tamas) that pull us from homeostasis come in many forms. If we are stuck in a loop of needing certain sensory stimulations, we are not in control of our own body and mind. Food, again, exerting much power. The more we learn to release our emotions that come up around food, which can be done through periods, or a slow change in cutting out foods with these sorts of energies, the more we can feel more in balance, find our homeostasis, in all aspects of our lives. When we do this as individuals, the selfishness and fear in communities can lessen, and this is the real healing.
2. Is this safe?
Before a cleanse, I field some important questions around it’s safety. There may certainly be times when a kitchari fast is not appropriate – say, extremely low blood sugar, pregnancy (1 or 2 days may be okay for certain individuals), or extreme depletion. Most of us are NOT in these categories. I do lead people through deeper home cleansing, and there are more cautions with this, because there are purgative practices to be endured, before rebuilding.
And this said, human beings are incredibly resilient. I believe that many of us get lost in the perspective of our culture – not having seen or experienced the levels of mental and physical stress that many in other parts of the world (or simply other socio-economic status’s) must endure. This is not to lay any blame or cause guilt. For one, I want us to connect with and trust our bodies more – to trust the signals we receive from them. Two, a little discipline can gain us a lot of perspective.
For those concerned, kitchari does offer daily protein, and the added vegetables of your choices provide plenty of other easily accessible nutrients. There is never a limited amount you must eat or not eat. And important to remember that you are always in control and can go back to your old habits whenever you so choose – if you choose to.
3. Is it all in our mind?
I have done a seasonal cleanse for years – and the hardest part each season is picking a start date. We all have busy lives. There is rarely a perfect time to set aside. Sacrifices are always made – and again, this is all part of it. The sacrifices, whether sensory, social, or otherwise, are part of the practice of letting go. Part of the practice for the mind to be content with what is, whatever that may be, that allows for deper mindfulness and fulfillment throughout our whole lives.
Yes, the body ‘knows’ there are some changes upcoming before a cleanse. Though mostly, for the body, it’s getting the good end of the deal – rest, oil massage, a break for digestion, etc. It is really the mind that knows we’re undertaking an adventure that will disrupt its habits/patterns, and so it resist until day one – and then once the cleanse we begins, each time it becomes easier to surrender, and I am just in it.
Ayurveda and the Mind
There so many gems in this book I mentioned by Dr. David Frawley. Three important terms used to discuss Ayurvedic psychology are known as Sattva, Rajas and Tamas. I am sure many of you are familiar with these from yoga, or from Ayurvedic reading. Foods can be talked about the have Sattvic, Rajasic, or Tamasic influences, which is how we look at how they affect the mind, on another level than the elements/gunas, and how they affect the doshas and our physical body.
Transformation often involves going from Tamas towards Sattva. Dullness and ignorance towards peace and calm. It is rajasic energy that is the catalyst for transformation and change. Both Tamas and Sattva are still, though one is in darkness, the other in light and clarity. It is inevitable that we must move through discomfort, frustration, action, to move from one to the other.
Dr. Frawley describes healing in three stages. First, personal healing, which really is about moving from Tamas to Rajas.
“Fire is necessary. We must wake up, act, and begin to change. Deep-seated patterns of attachment, stagnation, and depression must be released.” As a part of this, he explains that we must recognize our suffering and our pain, and learn from it, and that creating a new sense of who we are and what we do is required. And Rajas, or Action is indicated. A seasonal cleanse may from the outside, seem benign, but anyone who is in it, knows this is certainly a powerful transformative action!
For now, let’s stay focused on our self-healing through this cleansing action. One step at a time. One foot in front of the other. Know it’s not designed to be easy. And that this action and transformation is something you’re fully, humanly, capable of, and perhaps even here for.
I’d love to hear more of your thoughts and experiences. Leave your comments below.
Love,