Understanding the Relationship Between Yoga and Ayurveda

Reflections by Melina Meza

by Ram

A lot of questions/comments are being raised in this blog regarding Ayurveda and yoga, so Nina asked me to address these issues. While I think that the science of Ayurveda and yoga is better addressed and understood in a verbal format—akin to a didactic exchange of information—through this article I will try to lay out the main principles that govern both these sciences.

Thanks to Swami Vivekananda, yoga came to the West in 1893 and was welcomed by a very receptive audience. While people embraced yoga, its counterpart Ayurveda, was left behind in India. This despite the fact that both yoga and Ayurveda are two very similar paths sharing a close relationship, so closely related that they are often described as two sides of the same coin. Both these sciences, which have their origin in the Vedic texts, address health and health practices. If Ayurveda is the healing aspect, yoga is the spiritual/practical side of the Vedic teachings. Together they emphasize a complete approach to the wellbeing of the body, the mind, and the spirit. In fact, their close relationship has even led to some scholars arguing that Patanjali, considered by many to be the father of yoga, and Charaka, often considered as the father of Ayurveda, may have in fact been one and the same person known in Vedic India by different names during his travels to spread the teachings of these ancient sciences.

Both sciences have common underlying principles: the well being of an individual at the level of body and mind and the aim of helping an individual re-connect to their true nature through direct and personal experience (pratyeksha in Sanskrit). While yoga prepares the body and mind of the individual for eventual liberation and enlightenment, Ayurveda describes the various ways to keep the body and mind healthy. Both sciences emphasize our close relationship with the environment and how to alter our environment in such a way that it is harmonious with our deepest nature.

In today’s world, yoga is often thought of as “asanas only,” something like a stretching tool to keep the body limber and agile. People are drawn to yoga as a way to keep fit even though the idea behind the physical practice of yoga is to help the mind to become clear or pure and develop deeper mind-body awareness. A clear mind is not affected by stress and a clear mind produces a healthy body thus creating a greater connection with one's own pure, essential nature. Similarly, Ayurveda brings with it the knowledge of how to keep the physical body healthy and how this relates to one's spiritual journey. It addresses our entire lifestyle, including exercise and yoga. However, Ayurveda is highly individualistic and sees each individual as unique and an individual's path toward perfect health as a unique path. Hence, what is right for each individual is unique to that individual alone. This could be described as person’s unique genetic background or constitution or dosha in Sanskrit. An individual’s constitution describes who the person is at the most fundamental level.

The above concept is remarkable because as a result of this understanding, Ayurveda prescribes a unique, “tailor-made” program to each individual based upon his/her constitution and the nature of the imbalance, and avoids the “one size-fits all” concept that is followed in many systems of healing. As Dr Marc Halpern, director of the California College of Ayurveda, points out:

While Ayurveda does not agree with the "Fits all" concept, it subscribes to the philosophy that “nothing is right for everyone and everything is right for someone.”

Thus, Ayurveda is based upon understanding individualized needs and what is right only for the individual - not the masses - and fulfilling those needs to bring complete harmony.

As with diet, herbs, colors, aromas, etc, Ayurveda sheds light on which specific yoga asanas are best for each individual based on his/her constitution. With the knowledge of Ayurveda, a practitioner of hatha yoga can refine his/her practice so that it is in harmony with their internal balance of energy. Some yoga postures are best for one person while others can cause greater imbalance. By knowing one's constitutional balance, an individual can use constitution-specific asanas to reverse their imbalances and improve their health and wellbeing. Indeed, if we can understand our constitution, we can control our choices and choose only those that will lead us toward optimal health.

How does one get to know their inherent constitution? There are several alternative health journals or web sites that analyze your constitution based on your answers to a specific set of questions. Chances are that your alternative health practitioner (who does not hold a proper certification in Ayurveda studies) may have made a passing remark about your constitution. Do not rely solely on this analysis, instead take it all with a grain of salt. Before jumping to any conclusion about your constitution and changing your diet, asanas or lifestyle, it is always best to consult with an Ayurvedic health professional who will help to determine your constitution, help you to understand the nature of any imbalance, and establish a plan to bring you to balance thus providing guidance toward success in establishing a disease-free lifestyle.

Despite my opposition to separating these two sciences, let me emphasize that when it comes to the Yoga for Healthy Aging blog, we have a general policy against writing about anything except yoga and the science of aging. Not all the staff of Yoga for Healthy Aging are trained in the area of Ayurevdic sciences and we would like to keep this subject off limits. So we’re going to have to decline to address questions on specific diet, herbs, or general Ayurvedic medical advice as it is a highly individualized system. Besides we cannot provide Ayurvedic advice without examining you in person in a private setting and this, after all, is a yoga blog! So, we hope you understand.

Namaste.

Dr. Timothy McCall Joins Yoga for Healthy Aging!

by Timothy

I am happy to be joining my friends Nina, Baxter, and Brad on the Yoga for Healthy Aging blog! They’ve been doing fantastic work, and it’s great to become part of it. Since many of you may not know me or know me well, they’ve asked me to write a brief introduction with some information about my background and what I’m interested in.

Like Baxter I’m an M.D. who practices and teaches yoga. The focus of my teaching and my writing is yoga therapy, that is, using various yogic tools, including postures (asana), breathing practices, meditation, chanting, visualization and even philosophical ideas to help prevent and treat a variety of health conditions. I was trained in conventional internal medicine and practiced for about a dozen years in the Boston area before devoting myself full time to writing and researching the scientific basis of yoga and yoga therapy, starting in the year 2000.

Chives in Flower by Michele Macartney-Filgate

Boston, or more precisely Cambridge, was also where I started to practice yoga in 1995. I met someone at a party who mentioned she liked a local yoga studio, and I ended up checking it out. Although I didn’t know who she was at the time, it was my great fortune that the teacher who ran that studio was Patricia Walden. Even better, Patricia starts a new beginner’s class once every decade or so and my timing was perfect! Seven years later I’d finished a two-year teacher training with her, and began to assist her in that class. Also around that time, she and I began teaching workshops together on Yoga for Depression.

It was at one of those workshops Patricia and I did at a Yoga Journal conference in Estes Park, Colorado, where I first met Nina Zolotow. Nina went on to help me in numerous ways as I was in the final stages of writing my book Yoga as Medicine, including orchestrating the photo shoot (not an easy job)! Another year at that same Yoga Journal conference I met Dr. Baxter Bell. Bax and I became friends when I moved to the SF Bay area in 2006, and he ended up being one of the yoga models for Yoga as Medicine.

Yoga is, in my opinion, an ideal tool for those looking maintain or even improve their health and well-being as they get older. Yoga is a close to one-stop shopping as you can find. The practice can make you stronger, more flexible and better balanced—both mentally and physically. It can boost your mood, improve your immune function, improve cardiovascular fitness, and help you sleep better. It can teach you how to relax and concentrate in ways far deeper than what most people mean when they use those words.

If you have a serious illness, yoga can be a wonderful complement to conventional medical care, one that can render its treatments more effective and that is less likely to cause debilitating side effects. To cite just a single example of that, studies are now finding that those who do yoga while undergoing chemotherapy and other cancer treatments have less fatigue and better mood than cancer patients who don’t do yoga.

Pink and Green DO Go Together by Michele

In additional to yoga, in recent years, I’ve also been studying Ayurveda, the traditional medical system of ancient India, and I’ll undoubtedly be bringing an Ayurvedic perspective to some of my upcoming blog posts. Ayurveda is a natural complement to yoga, and I believe that even a basic understanding of it can help you better personalize your own yoga routine or practices you recommend to others.

The foundation of Ayurveda is in using simple dietary and lifestyle habits to keep yourself in balance. It’s natural, incredibly safe, and like yoga, surprisingly effective for a wide range of healthy conditions. And like yoga therapy it’s strong medicine but slow medicine. I’ve personally been following some of its dietary and lifestyle advice, and doing twice-weekly oil massages for half a dozen years, and feel it’s made a tremendous difference in my both my yoga practice and in my overall health and well-being.

Ayurveda is all about living in alignment with nature’s cycles: daily, seasonal, and time of life. Yoga for healthy aging is in part about adapting your yoga practice to meet your changing needs as you get older. Thus, a practice that may have suited you well at age 25 or 35 may no longer be appropriate at 55 or 65. Indeed many yoga injuries happen as a result of people doing practices or classes that no longer are—and sometimes never were—ideal for their bodies. That doesn’t mean that your practice can’t be strong and vital as you get older, only that you need to be wise about what you do and how you do it. And that is something I’m looking forward to writing about in the months ahead!