vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
iandthou
()
Date: April 20, 2016 08:14PM I'm a strongly vata type in the ayurvedic categorisation of bodies and minds. My body asks for warm, moist foods. I've tried steaming my salads and adding more oil to them, but that doesn't seem to satisfy this desire.
What do vatas do when they eat a raw diet? After almost a year of experimenting with high raw, I have, at this point, come to a place where I do eat a cooked meal once a day. To me it seems that the raw diet suits the vata type only if you are thoroughly detoxified, and the body doesn't get imbalanced easily and regains balance quickly if it does. For most of us living in this toxic world, that seems unlikely. The day my body is thoroughly detoxified, I will probably have no problems eating 100% raw. Until then, I'd leave that to the pitta types. The hunter gatherer who had never breathed a fossil fuel fume probably had less of a tendency to get unbalanced in his humours / doshas. Natural Hygiene, with its raw food and fasting, is very helpful, but perhaps one should consider combining it with other systems like ayurveda which are meant not for pre-civilisational man but for people living in a world like ours, even though these systems too developed in far less toxic times. Has anyone with vata dosha tried an all raw diet? How do you deal with these complications? Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
lisa m
()
Date: April 21, 2016 02:58PM Hi IandThou
I'm vata too. If you're craving warm moist foods, I'm thinking you could try something like a raw porridge-type thing, you could use sprouted buckwheat or oat groats (bit tricky to get raw, but possible) blended up and mixed with nut milk and something sweet like dates or figs? And warmed up gently. I find herbal teas satisfy my need for warm things. Yes it's a compromise from raw, but still feels very healthy to me. I often make a tea with some wild foods/weeds then blend it with some superfoods like ashwagandha, carob,lucuma, plus some coconut flakes or nuts for creaminess, then strain it (I save the pulp for puddings) It really hits the spot. Free Newsletter: [bit.ly] Facebook: [www.facebook.com] Instagram: [www.instagram.com] Blog: [RawFoodScotland.co.uk] Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
NuNativs
()
Date: April 21, 2016 06:38PM Gabriel Cousens in his book Conscious Eating covers this thoroughly... Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
iandthou
()
Date: April 27, 2016 05:18AM Thank you both for your suggestions. Lisa, I'll definitely try the herbal teas and perhaps also porridge.
I have read the relevant parts of Gabriel Cousen's book and as far as I remember he recommends eating only vata friendly foods but raw, steaming them, and adding oils and vata herbs, if I remember correctly, although I should revisit the book. This doesn't seem enough for my feeling of excess vata, however. Something I have found helpful is to try to balance doshas not merely through food but through other daily rituals. Putting a few drops of sesame oil in the nose and ears in the morning and night, and massaging the scalp with warm oil, and occasionally doing a full body massage are all quite helpful, I feel. Also warm showers, exercise, and sipping warm water. Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
fresh
()
Date: April 28, 2016 04:39PM imo not feeling satisfied on raw foods has nothing to do with doshas
it's simply a matter of not having the proper diet, or not being cleaned out, or being pulled in by addiction or many other reasons. doshas are without any supporting evidence or logic. Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
iandthou
()
Date: April 29, 2016 10:48PM Well, to say that doshas have no supporting evidence is to say that an entire medical system for 3000 years or more, or actually a group of medical systems - ayurveda, Tibetan, Islamic - are just fake.
I suppose that could be plausibly true but in my perspective it would take more than evidence of modern science to convince me of that. I would rather turn it around and say that much of what goes for science - like measuring vitamin levels, and the more clearly flawed things like prescribing pills to take away symptoms, radiating people in the name of diagnostics, etc. - has little supporting evidence in ayurveda. Most of all, I would trust my experience and that of others I know. We are particular types in our bodies and minds. These types determine the foods we are drawn to or averse to. They also determine what makes us healthy and sick. It is really quite simple if you just read about it and then observe your own body and mind. To refute something means to show HOW it is irrational or wrong, by engaging with its basic assumptions or its final claims. To just say "it is wrong", or "there is no evidence" is really not a serious starting point for a discussion. Hope I am not being disrespectful here, fresh. All this is meant in the spirit of friendly discussion and inquiry. And I do not dispute the fact that an unclean body will have cravings that are difficult to manage. I only dispute the fact that that is the case always and that there are no other reasons. Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/29/2016 10:51PM by iandthou. Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
fresh
()
Date: May 02, 2016 05:30AM
>>>>to me it seems that one may believe in ayurveda as a way to rationalize poor eating habits. instead one might just eat cooked and acknowledge that it is not ideal and that it is not a need based on body type. Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
RawPracticalist
()
Date: May 14, 2016 01:07PM
Correct. All of these doshas are irrelevant when you are eating a cleansing raw food diet. There is no evidence that those who were following doshas had a healthy long life. When people are eating an unbalanced and processed food diet then the body is in a totally disequilibrium and they resort to any thing they think can help. But what can really help is to return to simplicity, to a cleansing diet. Our animal friends in the wild have no need for this because they instinctively know it does not help. I guess our domesticated animal friends may need dosha too. Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
iandthou
()
Date: May 14, 2016 02:59PM I agree with you to an extent. In a body with a high level of health, the doshas are transcended. I would not say the doshas do not exist, but rather that the body has a way of balancing them itself.
Most of us, however, do not have that kind of health. Also, in my opinion it is a bit too simple to say that one just needs to eat a good raw food diet and you will achieve a high level of health. The internet is full of stories of people whose health got worse after going raw. As far as I understand, this is because for a very large proportion of people today, raw foods are difficult to digest. The cellulose is difficult to break down and the natural toxins in raw food are not neutralised by the body. If you and I lived in the wild, never having stepped into a city and breathed fossil fuel fumes, a 100% raw food diet might have been the best diet for us. But since that is not the case, I think we all need to work with the raw element in our diet and listen to our bodies to understand how much raw they want. I do not see any other plausible explanations for why people's health goes downhill on a raw diet except this. It is too naive to say that those people were just lazy or unintelligent and hence did not take up the raw diet with the best of information. Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
RawPracticalist
()
Date: May 14, 2016 06:10PM It was never about the diet alone.
We periodically need to stop eating. Fasting is healthy. We can't just keep eating. We regularly need to exercise. We need emotional and spiritual health too. Some people believe just moving to a raw food diet is enough. They think that because it is raw it is always good. They eat nuts, seeds, dried foods, fruits, all day long, It is not enough to run...It is not enough to be on a raw food diet. 1 Corinthians 9:24 "Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize." Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/14/2016 06:11PM by RawPracticalist. Re: vata dosha and raw diet
Posted by:
fresh
()
Date: May 17, 2016 05:41PM
I don't think the issue is a problem with digestibility. Sorry, only registered users may post in this forum.
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