by alexa berman
Ayurveda encompasses a vast understanding of how the body, mind, and soul work together to maintain harmonious health. At its very core is the most important puzzle piece to that knowledge – digestion is the key to your health.
For those of us in the West this concept may sound shocking, or even silly. We often take this system in our body for granted until we, for some reason and all of a sudden, cannot digest our favorite foods anymore. But in most traditional medicines, especially in the East, this concept of paying very close attention to your diet and ability to digest is part and parcel of how you thrive in life.
How digestion works
Ayurveda is aware that the digestive system is one of the most pivotal in your body. Food holds vitamins, nutrients, and life energy, prana, that we can only access through the process of digestion. Some foods hold their nutrients more readily available for us, such as fruit or sprouts, while others are much more dense and take much more energy to extract them.
No matter how readily available life energy is, food has to be transformed into an absorbable form for our bodies to assimilate what we need. When your body cannot digest and break down the food and drink you consume into an absorbable form, the rest of your organs and systems in the body fail to extract the vitamins and nutrients they each need to function and thrive. If our body cannot extract nutrients from food then we cannot generate energy, which leads to a decline in our whole vitality and spirit for life.
Agni – The fire within
We call the concept of digestion Agni in this medicine, which is a reference to the god of fire in Hinduism. Fire as digestion is very fitting because Agni represents the transformative energy behind the fire that is responsible for digestion, metabolism, absorption, assimilation, and therefore, overall vitality within the body.
Think of a campfire. When you build yourself a campfire, there are certain ways you care for it so that it can ignite and stay at the perfect size for your campsite’s needs. It needs a relatively clean area, and proper kindling with a good mix of the air element to start burning. It will then need slightly larger sticks to create hot coals that can burn the larger, more dense logs you put on top. You don’t want the fire to get too big and too hot because it will burn through everything too quickly and you won’t be able to sit and enjoy your fire for as long. You also don’t want it to be too small or have wet logs on it because then you will be cold and left feeling unsatisfied.
Now apply that to us digesting our meals. You need the right clean environment free of undigested foods in your gut to be ready to handle your next meal. To have a clear feeling of hunger to digest what you will eat you may need some digestive teas, herbs, spices, or other helpers. This will aid in igniting the fire to a strong enough level to help things get going. At the same time, this helps you to build the coals, if you will, that then support you in digesting your heavier fats and proteins.
If your digestive fire is burning too strong and too hot, you will burn through your meals too fast and your body won’t have the ability to absorb what it needs from your food. This eventually leads to imbalances of too much fire in the gut like diarrhoea, IBS, Crohn’s, GERD, or haemorrhoids. If your digestive fire is burning too small then it won’t have the strength and energy it needs to break down those larger, denser meals and you will end up feeling dull, heavy, slow, and gunked up. This leads to weight gain, obesity, diabetes, water retention, and a general inability to eliminate toxins in the body through its preferred channel, bowel elimination.
How to optimize digestion
You can see that the ability to digest what we consume is at the heart of how we function — if you have health concerns or imbalances, focusing on your relationship with your digestion is of the highest priority. When you can lovingly do that and create a supportive environment for your body to communicate whether or not it is ready for your next meal it will absolutely change your life.
In this digestive series, we will dive deeply into what proper digestion means for us in our unique bodies and how to care for it throughout our day and throughout the seasons. At the same time, you will be able to determine where your digestive system may need support and how to apply these concepts right away for your health.
So stay tuned cause this is a series you don’t want to miss.
Disclaimer: The information contained in this article is intended for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your qualified healthcare provider with any questions or concerns you may have regarding a medical condition.
picture: istock
