AYURVEDIC MEDICINE

History

Ayurveda is a holistic system of medicine that is indigenous to and widely practiced in India. The word Ayurveda is a Sanskrit term meaning ‘science of life.’ Ayu means ‘life’ or ‘daily living’ and Veda is ‘knowing.’ Ayurveda is a medical system that deals with health in all its aspects; physical health, mental balance, spiritual well-being, social welfare, environmental considerations, dietary and lifestyle habits, daily living trends, and seasonal variations in lifestyle, as well as treating and managing specific diseases (Pole 2006). Ayurvedic medicine was first practiced in India around 800 bce. It has been influenced by the medical developments in the world, and has developed into a complete medical system with an extensive history and philosophical understanding of the interrelationship amongst life, health, and disease.

The basis of Ayurveda is that each individual has a unique constitution established at birth and influenced throughout one’s life. How each person eats, lives, and interacts with their environment is based on this constitution. Ayurveda recognizes that seasons have a profound effect on health and that different seasons affect people differently. An individual’s constitution and the seasons are intimately related. Health is affected by the qualities of the climate; the inner world is influenced by the outer environment (Pole 2006).

The five elements

Everything in life and nature can be explained according to the qualities of the five elements and these elements explain how the internal and external energies are linked together. Chapter 5 explores these elements in detail, but the following are some of the highlights (Svoboda 1988):

• Earth is a stable substance, the solid state of matter. It has the anthropomorphic attributes of stability, fixity, or rigidity.

• Water is a substance without stability. It is the liquid state of matter, whose attribute is flux.

• Fire is form without substance. Fire’s characteristic attribute is transformation, as it has the power to convert a substance from solid to liquid to gas, and vice versa.

• Air is existence without form. It is the gaseous state of matter, whose attribute is mobility or dynamism.

• Ether has no physical form; it exists only as distances that separate matter in space and time. It is the field from which everything is manifested and into which everything returns; the space in which events occur.

The five elements condense into three doshas – vata, pitta and kapha (Table 2.1). Each dosha has unique characteristics and determines a person’s constitution. There are seven typical body constitutions based on the three doshas. Most people are a combination of the different doshas, but one dosha typically predominates. When the doshas are in harmony for an individual, a person will enjoy health; when there is disharmony, the functioning of the body is disrupted and leads to symptoms and disease.

Table 2.1 The doshas (Lloyd 2005, Burger 1998, Lad 1998, Svoboda 1998, Frawley 1989)

The three doshas govern all the biological, psychological and pathophysiological functions of the body, mind, and consciousness. They act as the basic constituents and protective barriers for the body in its normal physiological condition; when out of balance, they contribute to disease processes. Each dosha has characteristic qualities, natural urges, preferences for food, temperature, and so on. They govern the creation, maintenance and destruction of body tissue, and the elimination of waste products from the body (Lad 1998). The doshas are described as follows (Svoboda 1988):

• vata is composed of ether and air. It is the principle of kinetic energy in the body. It controls movement throughout the body.

• pitta is composed of fire and water. It controls the body’s balance of kinetic and potential energies. All of pitta’s processes involve digestion or ‘cooking,’ even if it is the cooking of thoughts into theories in the mind.

• kapha is composed of water and earth. It is the principle of potential energy, which controls body stability and lubrication. The tissues and wastes of the body, around which vata moves, are kapha’s territory.

The three gunas (Attributes)

Ayurveda encompasses the subtle attributes or qualities called gunas (Table 2.2). The doshas are a quantitative look at the qualities, the gunas are qualitative. The three gunas are sattva, rajas and tamas. ‘These three attributes provide for the basis for distinctions in human temperament and individual differences in psychological and moral dispositions’ (Lad 1998). All organic and inorganic substances, as well as all thoughts and actions, can be described based on these attributes.

Table 2.2 The gunas (attributes) (Lloyd 2005, Burger 1998, Lad 1998, Svoboda 1998, Frawley 1989)

Sattva	Rajas	Tamas
The cosmic force of equilibrium	The cosmic force of activity, motion or excitability	The cosmic force of inertia
Expression of essence, understanding, purity, clarity, compassion and love	Mind operates on a sensual level, causes mind to be become overactive and unstable	Manifests in ignorance, inertia, heaviness, and dullness
Normal, balanced state of a healthy mind		Excess causes the mind to become resistant to change
Subjective consciousness	Waves of kinetic energy	Material particles of potential energy
Spirit	Sense organs	Physical body
Ability to discriminate accurately	Excessive mental activity weakens discrimination	Insufficient mental activity weakens discrimination
Expression of essence, understanding, purity, clarity, compassion, and love	Mind operates on a sensual level	Manifests in ignorance, inertia, heaviness, and dullness
Comprehends well and follows their path steadily and consistently, progresses quickly	Full of hyperactivity, twist facts to fit their preconceptions, and convince themselves that they are progressing when they are in fact merely reinforcing external dependencies	Abundant inertia guides their being, they ignore clear evidence of the need to progress and dig in when they are in hope of remaining there
Promoted by healthful, simple, well-digested food and healthful, simple habits	Promoted by intense, stimulating foods and intense activities	Promoted by stale, putrid food and dulling activities (like too much sleep)
Promoted by milk, milk products, rice, wheat, mung beans, and most fruits and vegetables (avoid if allergic)	Promoted by salt, spices, sour foods, meat, fish, garlic, onions, and most legumes	Promoted by heavy, stale, indigestible foods and intoxicating substances
Associated with kindness, forgiveness, truthfulness, good memory, intelligence, ingenuity, courage, share joys and sorrows with others; not perturbed by good or bad, sorrow or joy, likes or dislikes	Associated with falsehood, cruelty, pride, boastfulness, sensuality, anger, cowardice, selfishness, afflicted with likes and dislikes too much, constant desire to be on the move	Associated with grief, unrighteousness, ignorance, foolishness, somnolence, avoidance of mental activity and physical work