Health Tips : Pujya Gurudev

Health Tips :

Your Health: Guidelines from Ayurved

=Pt.ShriRam Sharma Acharya

Prevention and Cure by Diet Restraints : Ayurvedic treatment emphasizes more on fasting and diet restraint rather than on consuming medicines to fight out the diseases. Ayurveda asserts that half the disease is cured simply by appropriate diet control. As the principles of diagnostics and therapeutics under Ayurveda are based on the identification of the level of tridoshas vata, pitta and kapha, so are the disciplines of fasting and diet. Let us first look at the recommended diet for the maintenance of generally good health. Followed by this are some common guidelines for major classes of diseases and disorders due to the three doshas. 

What is generally recommended as good or edible? Wheat among the cereals, green kidney-bean pulse (green-gram) among the pulses, and vegetables like green gourd, raw papaya, pointed gourd, round gourd, ridged gourd, bitter gourd, cabbage, spinach, carrot, green fenugreek, sprouted beans, etc cooked with some ginger and / or a little quantity of green chilly, etc are most commonly recommended for people of all age groups. Except for variations in the mode of preparations, these are also suitable as food ingredients for patients as well. Cow-milk and ghee of cow-milks butter, are regarded the best for maintenance of vigorous health.

In case of non-availability of cows milk, it could be replaced by buffalos milk. The generally recommended fruits are naturally ripened apples, papaya, chikku, pomegranate, guava, sweet lime, blackberry, pears, etc. Those in the category of dry fruits are cashew nut, chestnut, dates, figs, small and big resins, chilgoza (pine-tree fruit), dry dates, and fox-nut. 

The lists of edibles and non-edibles in different classes of diseases are as follows. 

The diseases caused by excess of vata dosha: The diseases under this category include gastro problems, arthritis, rheumatism, joint-pains, spondylitis, etc. Vegetables like flower of silk cotton or kidney-bean, flowers and fresh beans of drumsticks, green fenugreeks, cabbage and pointed gourd, prepared in steam with a little amount of ginger, garlic and aniseed are supposed to be excellent in reducing the vata dosha. Avoid taking black gram (horse bean), red gram (masura), dry grams and beans such as chana (black gram), rajama (red kidney bean), rice, cauliflower, potato, green peas, cucumber, tomato, lemon, orange, grapes, and carbide ripened fruits which are usually mango, banana, papaya, etc.

Sour substances like curd, butter-milk, pickles should also be avoided. The patients having bone related ailments due to vata, should not bathe with cold water. Fomentation of the swollen parts of the body (e.g. near the joints), using salt in hot water, helps allaying the pains. 

The diseases caused by excess of pitta dosha: Acidity and related ailments of the digestive system, some kinds of blood related diseases, chronic fever etc, are common manifestation of the disorders due to pitta dosha. Light diets of the eatables listed for generally good health are also beneficial here. Thin chapatis of whole wheat, daliya (meal prepared from coarse wheat-flour), easily digestible boiled vegetables, and oil-free watery pulses prepared from green gram, etc are supposed to be good in reducing the pitta dosha. Coconut water, cold diluted milk, big resin or figs soaked in milk are excellent supplements. While coconut water is good, its cream (core) is harmful in the pitta diseases; so are vegetables like brinjal, green and red chilies and deep fried, oily and spicy eatables. These should be strictly avoided. Use of green chilly, garlic and ginger should also be stopped or kept to a minimum as per the Ayurvedic doctors advice. 

The diseases caused by excess of kapha dosha: Cough, cold, asthma, and other ailments of the respiratory, chest and throat-nose-ear system, etc fall under this category of diseases and disorders. Warm and fresh food prepared using the items listed in common category of edibles is suitable here. Drinking warm milk, which is boiled with small quantities of turmeric and dry-ginger (sauntha) or dates, big resins, dry dates, etc is good antidote for the kapha dosha. Black pepper is also a good remedy; if possible one may just keep one or two of its seeds in the mouth or some pieces of harada (chabulic myrobalans). However, care should be taken that these two things are not suitable in case the patient also has problems of piles or acidity. Chapati prepared from mixed flour of wheat and roasted gram (chana) with bathua saga (vegetable prepared from leafs of white goose - foot plant) is also beneficial. The non-edibles listed for vata problems are usually harmful in case of kapha dosha as well. Butter, oil, ghee and other fatty substances should also be avoided. Mustard or sesamum oil in small quantities could be used for preparing the vegetables. 

Thanks GOD, Thanks Sadguru,

Shiv Sharma