“Lactose Intolerance”-Why blame milk? Diet & Nutrition- The Ayurveda way.
Eat right!!!!
Ayurveda emphasizes on the use of right kind of food, in order to stay healthy and to get rid of the disease. Ayurveda states that, the use of medicine or therapies alone is not enough for riddance from diseases. In fact, medicines and therapy, only in combination with the right kind of food intake is what cures. Such is the importance attached to right food.
Now, what is “eating right”???? Let’s see how ayurveda looks at DIET & NUTRITION,
The cotemporary science also has the concept of balanced diet or diet and nutrition, which people are willing to follow promptly, even merely to loose some kilos, which is only small part towards gaining good health. But, when it comes Pathya(dietary rules of ayurveda) , it gets scary.
Is it not something similar to what the contemporary science says?
Is it not all about how much calories you eat and how much you burn??
Yes, there is a huge difference in the way Ayurveda looks at diet and nutrition and the way contemporary science does.
Let me elaborate this for you,
Before we go into the concept of diet and nutrition, it is important to know, what constitutes our body/what our body is made up of, according to Indian sciences. According to ayurveda and all ancient Indian sciences, we (all the creatures) are made out of the five fundamental building blocks, the pancha mahabhootas, Earth, water, fire, air and ether.
“We are this universe and this universe is us”
The universe is made of the same five basic elements and so are we, as we are all a part of the same universe. That is, right from the most subtle to the grossest part in you, is made up of these five basic elements. So, it is quite natural, we need something made of the very same five elements as “food”, that can nourish us and help us grow. So, the panchabhoutik substance(food) can only nourish the pancha bhoutik body. By the argument of the five basic elements, the flora and fauna which we consume as food, too are made up of the same five elements.
“Diversity in unity” –reason, why banana is not orange….
If we, for an instance agree to this, there comes a question, If everything in this universe is made of the very same five elements , all of us, or for that matter every other creature or object should have looked just like the other . There should have been no distinction between the objects. Every human being should be looking like any other human. Which is obviously not the case…
The varied presentation or distinction between the objects, is due to the different permutations and combinations among the five basic elements in forming an object. Now, this is why you do not look like your friend or why banana is not orange…
How is it relevant to today’s topic ?
As I have mentioned earlier, the food which is paanchabhoutik, nourishes and helps the body to grow. The component present in a food article nourishes the one, which is analogous/similar or akin to the component of the body.
Say for example,
1.Water when consumed nourishes the water element portion present inside the body
2.Meat when consumed nourishes the muscle, fat etc components in the body.
So, the process of nourishment basically follows this very rule of similarity/sameness, which is termed as “samanya” in ayurveda.
Now, this is something which both, ayurveda and contemporary science accept.
“Here, they diverge..”
But, the point where they largely differ is that, the diet and nutrition in ayurveda is patient/person centric while that of the contemporary science is substance or disease centric. That is, every food article is measured in terms of how many calories it yields, what are the micro-nutrients you get out of it. Basically, a food article is recommended on its nutritive value. Say, you have iron deficiency , you are supplemented with iron rich food, You lack vitamin b12, you are supplemented with the same through food or through some supplements.
While, ayurveda, too has detailed the properties of several food stuff.
But, it does not recommend its use based purely on its properties, but attaches utmost significance to the needs of the body and the ability of an individual to digest and assimilate it.For example, a person if is very lean or malnourished, will normally be advised to drink milk or take some nutritious food like fruits — meat- nuts and so on. Now, is this wrong?? No, it is not… But, is only half true…. ok, we spoke of milk …..
“And Now comes the lactose intolerance ….”
Ayurveda, directs the physicians to check several other things, before actually recommending milk, meat or any such heavy food stuff. Milk is heavy(Guru) by nature ,hence is difficult to digest. Only a person with a strong digestive fire will actually benefit from intake of milk , not otherwise. What if, I use it otherwise?
If your digestion isn’t optimum and in such a state if you are using heavy food stuff like that of milk-meat etc, it is only going to further harm you as it is not going to get digested fully, it is only going to add to toxin levels. If used in conditions where the digestive fire is low or when there is dominance of kapha(bodily humor) , it will surely have an adverse effect, one such adverse effect of many , that is very common these days,is the lactose intolerance .
What we fail to understand is that, every food article cannot be good/bad all times to everyone. It is the needs of the body and the ability of it to completely digest and assimilate the given food, which is important as, only after proper digestion, will it yield some benefits.
It is time, we stop blaming the food articles for causing allergies/discomfort, as it is not the problem with the food article to be causing allergies in you, it is your system that is resisting it as it not able to digest and assimilate it completely.
SOLUTION, is not to make an endless list of what all food stuff cause allergies in you, but to “CORRECT” your system, making it capable of assimilating it.
Nutrition Profile- The ayurveda way.
Every food substance is categorised as either light, or heavy depending on its digestibility. The food article which predominantly constituted of earth and water elements are heavy to digest (normally) and those composed of the rest of the five elements, the air-fire and ether are light to digest. Now, this is the composition or, in layman terms the nutritive profile of a given food substance, as the heavy food stuff are nourishing (increase the body mass) by nature and light ones are usually of depleting kind.
Now, just because a person is lean, we cannot simply advise him to use a lot of food stuff which are composed of earth and water, as they increase the body mass. Because,
Do you have that “FIRE” in you???? Well, sadly , most of us don’t.
The capacity of an individual to digest and assimilate the same is what ayurveda is more concerned about. This capacity of an individual to digest and assimilate is attributed to the functions of AGNI- the fire element. Agni is that energy, which is there in us that breaks down the food we eat. It is that medium which actually converts the external five basic elements and makes it available for the body to assimilate it. Hence, the concept of diet and nutrition is patient centric and is specific to condition of the disease and patient and not merely disease centric.
Did you just turn 35….your bones are starving for calcium, give them some….
These days, a generic advise is given to women in their thirties to drink milk, as it is a rich source of calcium. Here the criteria is only the age. It is true that the bones are going fragile these days. Drinking lots of milk or taking calcium supplement isn’t going to bring in a lot of calcium to your bones. Root cause for this fragility is to be found out and treated.
Malnourishment v/s Overeating- Which do you think is worse????
These days, most of the deficiencies are not due to malnourishment, but are due to excess and improper food intake. Can you believe ??? From excess eating…. really!!!!!
Milk is definitely rich in calcium, but the more important thing to be considered is, whether the body is ready to digest and assimilate it. If the very Agni which converts the food we eat, milk for instance, is not functioning optimally, the undigested food will only accumulate in the form of toxins, causing a disease sooner or later. Hence, diet and nutrition in Ayurveda is basically structured on the concept of five basic elements and more importantly AGNI, the force that converts it, which makes it different from the present day concept of diet and nutrition.
Your food should be tailored for you….
Now, this also answers why there cannot be a generic goods and bads related to diet, as a heavy food stuff (Guru) when used in the condition of impaired agni can be harmful to one individual while is beneficial to the individual with good Agni. Hence, the concept of diet and nutrition needs to be customised, considering a person’s bodily constitution, disease, climatic conditions and so on.
Ayurveda, is attached with a stigma of imposing too many restrictions on food and other habits. Most of you at some point in time may even have avoided seeing an ayurvedic physician, thinking that it is difficult to follow ayurveda physician’s advise and it is not your cup of tea. If you have heard such things about ayurveda, you have heard the just the right thing. This is one thing about ayurveda which is neither misinterpreted nor overrated. All good things, come with some price and here the price is in the form of some restraint and control over your senses, which is not very high, in return for good health.
It is only since a decade or two that, we all have started thinking about the nutritive value of the food we eat.
Before you actually switch over your diet to, full of vegetables — fruits- yoghurt etc..diet, please check if you can really digest and assimilate it as, such a switch over could be doing more harm to you than good.
