Antiinflammatory Foods
Any disease with an inflammatory component such as mulitiple sclerosis can get ramped up during the summer months due to the hot quality that gets even more expressed We’ve chosen eleven ingredients we like that cool Pitta dosha particularly during the hot summer months If we’ve missed one of your favorites, please let us know in the comment section below
river cooling
11 Ways to Cool Off
1. Coconut
There are so many ways to use coconut and so many coconut products to enjoy – coconut water, coconut non-dairy milk and the traditional coconut flakes. Be aware that the oil, while it is certainly cooling, is not recommended for Vata and Kapha
2. Cilantro
Use as a garnish, stir chopped cilantro into a soup or toss with your salad greens.
3. Mint
Mint makes an amazing tea, loved by many. Toss fresh mint into your salad, on fruit or dessert.
4. Fennel
Fennel is wonderfully aromatic with its anise or licorice scent. Saute the seeds in oil to add to your favorite soups or stews. Add the powder to your chai or favorite hot beverage, or sprinkle onto your salad or dinner entree.
5. Rose Water
Add a dash to smoothies, rice puddings or a bowl of fruit. Substitute rose water for vanilla extract in recipes.
6. Pomegranate Molasses
The sugar that condenses when pomegranate juice is cooked forms pomegranate molasses and is quite heavenly. Add to salad dressings, dips and spreads, and use in marinades.
7. Sunflower Oil
This oil is traditionally used externally in Ayurveda as a cooling oil for Pitta. Enjoy sunflower oil as a substitute for vegetable oil. It is mild and light.
8. Maple Syrup
Use this cooling sweetener as you would any sugar. Would also be delicious in salad dressings and marinades.
9. Ghee
Ghee is clarified butter. It is beneficial for all three doshas (kaphas should use in moderation). It is delicious and easy to make. Use as you would butter or oil.
10. Turmeric
Turmeric has certainly seen a lot of press the past few years for it’s amazing health benefits. And fortunately it’s not difficult to add to your diet. Rice dishes, or potato or egg salads all taste delicious with some added turmeric. And of course there is curry!
11 Chyawanprash is a tasty Ayurvedic jam usually taken with warm water, milk, milk substitute whose prinicipal ingredient is amla derived from a berry that has very high Vitamin C but is not acidic It's very valuable in high Pitta conditions and therefore antiinflammatory Here's a link http://goo.gl/NMly6a
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Nutritional Likes and Dislikes
We all have likes and dislikes in our nutritional diet, don't we? In the energy science we call them cravings that are physiologic and nonphysiologic The former should be satisfied like being thirsty after sweating a lot But the latter are problematic for us and often stem from our past history, friends, teachers, but some are darn right desires that try as we might we can't explain why we avoid or are attracted to them.
So we like things such as coffee, tomatoes, carbonated drinks, hot spices everyday, animal foods such as beef, duck, lamb, pork. We all have that salivation list.
If we look at these through the lens of an energy science nutritional approach we find them as yea and nay, that is yes for you but not for another; and vice versa no for you and yes for the other.
But there are foods and drinks that are universally Nay for everyone and Yea for everyone. Take a look.
Nays Raw tomatoes, bread with yeast(not toasted), miso, store bought yogurt, pork and lamb, chocolate, coffee, hard liquor, carbonated drinks, icy cold drinks, white sugar, and poor food combinations.
Yeas Sweet apples, applesauce, sweet berries and cherries, cooked beets, cooked carrots, green beans, cooked leeks, okra, cooked peas, sweet potatoes, summer squash, seitan, sprouted wheat bread(nonyeasted), split mung dal, goat's milk cottage cheese, egg whites, freshwater fish, ghee, aloe vera, sweet berry juice, tea, grain coffee, grape and mango juice, peach nectar, all the cooling spices, supplements such as calcium magnesium and zinc in moderate amounts, chlorella.
Three observations come to mind for me. There are more yeas than nays. YEA!
Secondly the nays have a lot of attractiveness to them for us in general. White sugar, chocolate are screamers but bread with yeast(if not toasted), and carbonated drinks are also engaging as well.
And lastly, the message is that no matter what energy pattern combination you are as revealed at foodsheal.com there is plenty to eat without risking nutritional imbalance. What a deal, huh?
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5 Ways to Deal With Chronic Pain
In the energy science of Ayurveda imbalance of qualities such as hot, cold, heavy, light affect the metabolic fire called agni When this happens the end result is a toxic morbid substance called ama This is essence is how disease occurs in the energy model discipline
In chronic diseases the qualities lead to early symptoms of the disease complex but as progression occurs more qualities become involved and deeper tissues become affected due to the mounting amount of ama
Clogging of Energy Channels
When energy channels become obstructed with ama then there is no free flow of energy in the mindbody This leads to a buildup of the Vata energy pattern which is freely circulating in the channels(common channels we know from a Western perspective are the GI tract, large vessels like the aorta or vena cava, neural pathways, and the respiratory system)
Vata, when obstructed in the channels, causes pain In Ayurveda there is no pain without Vata So in the chronic disease pain is related to clogged channels from ama accumulation and the blockage of the free flow of Vata Often this is neurologic like pain and follows what I have written about in earlier blogs about the origin of any syndrome associated with pain
As you can see, keeping the channels open is essential for keeping vatagenic pain in check It is also important for immunity, and overall health To keep the channels open, it is important to eat fresh food with spices that help digestion so that ama is not formed When ama (partially digested food) is formed, its sticky nature blocks the channels and aggravates vata Also spices in your food, give a general warming effect to the whole body which helps to keep the channels open, and vata flowing
5 Ways to Prevent and Clear Pain
Staying warm The Vata energy pattern has the qualities of cold, light mobile, dry, rough, subtle, and clear so when we don't stay warm this can increase the Vata guna of cold and increase our pain Think about it....if you get cold the mindbody contracts Don't let your feet get cold Don't eat cold food and drink You might think ice cream is vata-pacifying because it's dairy but it's not It is actually vata-aggravating Anything cold you put in your system closes the channels and blocks the flow of vata That's why you get a headache if you eat cold things quickly
Transdermal creams can be used for pain control with reasonably good effect One has to be consistent, persistent, and disciplined in their use but if applied properly they can be very effective
Nutrition that causes pain Large beans, bananas, winter squashes and extra heavy foods are all known in Ayurveda as visthambi, (clogging to the srotas or channels) Avoid these items in your diet and you will find your channels are more open, and your vatagenic pain is less Also, avoid the nightshades (potatoes, tomatoes, bell peppers, eggplant) because these toxic plants block the vibrational channels (nadis), which can subsequently cause the physical channels (srotas or channels) to shrink
Avoiding leftover foods or pre-packaged foods is important too These foods are not easily digested by the body and result in ama right away This promotes clogging of the channels and lessen the free flow of Vata
Daily schedules Regular routine is Vata pacifying so daily schedules are irregular and hectic(Vata provoking) there will be a tendency to increase the Vata energy pattern
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“I Think I’ll Order the Inflammation Today”
As I muse through the menu at my favorite restaurant, I can hear myself in the process of selection
"Hmmm, this looks particularly good-lots of congestion and inflammation there"
"Or maybe some cooling? Oh no no, that's not tasty enough"
"Well maybe just this time"
From an energy science view, the effects of the foods that we consume begin before we even put them in our mouths Does that sound surprising?
Our unconscious behavioral eating patterns begin in the mind so it makes sense that the health of our mindbodies bedome directed by our unconscious choices
This concept is so far removed from our current matter science or molecular approach which is devoid of being able to factor the mind in the equation of foods and their selection
Let's pause and consider that whatever we are putting in our mouths at any point in time has the ability to make us sick or bring about balance
We currently don't have the concept from our matter science model of healing that disease begins with the ingestion of taste(energy) If I'm a PK and snarfing down a banana I'm inflamming my physiology and asking for congestion
And is it wrong to have a banana? No, not from an energy science view The key as we have discussed in the past is to be aware of how the foods impact us from a sensory point of view
We intellectualize about foods from a matter science view but from an energy science view the ingestion of any food has the capability of teaching us more about ourselves
Have you had the experience of food making you feel bad? Did this become a recurring theme? Did it take a number of days before the ingestion of a particular food made you feel bad?
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All Diseases Begin In the Gut
Hippocrates 460-370 BC
The traditional healing systems such as Ayurveda from India and the Traditional Oriental Medical system both saw the body as an energy field and built elaborate healing sciences around the concept that the body is an energy field. Today we know from Einstein that this is indeed correct, that what is energy is matter and what is matter is energy, from the famous equation E=MC2.
One of the greatest gifts that the energy science of Ayurveda gives us is the understanding of how all diseases begin in the body. Ayurveda began with this understanding 5000 years ago and the Greeks who were students of the medical disciplines of India began to realize this as well, hence leading to the above quote from Hippocrates that all diseases begin in the gut.
And this has been my experience in practicing the matter field discipline of urology in the office over the past 7 years. I have even written a scientific paper showing among other things that acidity in the gut as experienced with acid indigestion is associated with increased acidity in the urinary tract as experienced with nonbacterial cystitis or interstitial cystitis. Or using acid as the molecular marker, this same gut imbalance can lead to elevated PSA.
So this simple observation from the energy science healing traditions can give our current matter field healing discipline valuable insight as to the propagation of disease and the interrelationship of disease.
And this observation is why nutrition is central to prevention of disease! Eating foods that resonate with your own physiology on a regular basis, avoiding poor food combinations, ensuring a good digestive fire to burn slip ups, and paying attention to the interrogatories of nutrition will ensure optimal health.
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Foods and Feeling Bad After Eating
Foods can create unarguable imbalances in the physiology which over time leads to disease And for the most part some of food's effects may not be associated with ill feeling
However my point is that all foods have the potential for creating imbalances in the mindbody if they don't resonate with our energy makeup Because of different factors these imbalancing choices don't give us symptoms
Feeling Bad After Eating
Haven't we all had the experience of eating a meal and not feeling well afterward? Sometimes we attribute it to food poisoning which might be the case but most of the time it is a physiologic consequence that defies an easy explanation.
From an energy science perspective the reason is imbalance. The vibrational frequencies consumed have created an obvious dis-ease in the physiology. When we eat a hot spicy meal, sometimes the result is heartburn. There is a chemical burning in the stomach experienced near the heart we call heartburn or acid indigestion. This increased acidity in the stomach is a result of the increased vibrational frequency of hot among other vibrational frequencies.
But what if we can't associate something eaten with feeling bad after a meal? Does that mean that there isn't a imbalance of vibrational frequencies? From an energy perspective, the answer would be that an imbalance or an increase of specific vibrational frequencies have accumulated and are causing obvious dis-ease
The Salt Story
Salt-written-on-spilled-saltLet's take an example of the complex vibrational frequency of salt. If we ingested three tablespoons of salt, there would be clearly physiologic consequences or imbalance. We would become very thirsty, our blood pressure would transiently rise, our saliva would increase and we would urinate more frequently. Hot sensations would occur with flushing and acid indigestion might occur. Since the salty taste has a laxative effect, it might stimulate a bowel movement. So all of these changes occur in the body because of the consequence of excess salt.
If these changes can occur with excess salt, why couldn't simple ingestion of salt lead to imbalances if preexisting imbalances possibly already exist? From an energy perspective this is one of the reasons why food can produce physiologic consequences of imbalance soon after eating.
Basically we should never ignore a message from the body telling us of distress even though we can't explain it. And the most frequent explanation of the dis-ease in the mindbody is a result of imbalancing choices that we make through our nutritional choices
The Energy Science View of Disease
From an energy science view all disease begins in the gut so you can see why it's so important to eat according to our mindbody energy makeup even though you may feel OK Or do you?
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