Rethinking Wellness: Ayurveda’s transformative power – Anu Paavola

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I'm Dal, The Happiologist, and I am doing this on purpose.

Hi everyone, it's your pal Dal, thanks for joining us today.

So I'm so psyched to talk to you all about the exciting world of Eastern

derived and holistic medicine.

So Ayurveda is a traditional system of medicine that originated in India.

And Ayurveda is an ancient system of life and also the oldest surviving medical

system in the world from what I'm aware.

So Ayurvedic science is not merely a traditional Indian form of medicine, but

a kind of perennial naturopathic system of healthcare that has survived the test

of time, as well as the onslaught of modern science and methods of treatment.

So today we're going to get really deep into the understanding of how it can

benefit us mentally and physically.

And who better to do that than Anu?

So happy to introduce you today to author and Ayurvedic practitioner, Anu Paavloa.

Anu is author of this fantastic book, Ayurveda Detox where she

demystifies Ayurveda, making it really accessible to everyone.

to heal themselves.

And Anu also runs an amazing organic wellbeing practice in Northwest

London called Jivita Ayurveda.

And she runs numerous and very popular retreats.

She's also very well qualified in Ayurveda and has a BSC qualification in it.

So we are in really good hands.

And Anu's approach to healthy wellbeing is based on ancient ways of living

and is focused particularly on how to discover and harness the body's ability

to self heal and recover and thrive.

So welcome Anu, so happy to have you join the podcast today.

I personally have written a lot of posts about Ayurveda because I'm

fascinated by it, as are my followers.

And as I hit my fifties and I see the negative impact Western medicine can

have, and I'm always getting Western medicine thrust at me every time I go

to the GP, just to have a basic check.

But, you know, I've gone fully alternative and I feel so much better for it.

And you only have to look at the numerous health benefits in the news

and batch research to see that there's a shift back to nature and natural

practices like Ayurveda for healing.

So, you know, these are ancient Eastern practices, you know, as you,

you know, know better than any of us.

And, you know, us Asians, you know, have access to it.

It's been passed down from our ancestors.

And as a brown girl, there are, you know, you know, lots of practices which

I feel hugely proud of and that we are seeing that are being adopted more by

Western society today all over the world.

And we're seeing, you know, a rise of it, you know, especially

even celebrities endorsing it.

Personally, you know, I didn't know as much as about it as I would like

to have, as I was growing up, I knew, you know, for my grandparents.

that, you know, sometimes when I had a cold or flu, they pull out the spices

and the ginger and the turmeric when I was younger and I had no idea when I

just wanted some basic cough medicine.

So there's so much to delve in, especially, you know, how it's changed

my life and millions of others.

So if it's okay with you, I'm going to start with the basics.

So the basic question is what is Ayurveda and why should we care about it?

Thanks Dal thanks for having me.

What is Ayurveda?

Over the years, I've tried to formulate a perfect answer for this because

there's so much Ayurveda offers.

And to put it in one nutshell, it is a bit of a bit of a challenge, but the closest

I have come to define Ayurveda is that it is a system that promotes self regulation.

The body mind's Ability to heal itself.

Like you just said, in your introduction, it really is about

letting the body to do its own work.

And Ayurveda intends to remove barriers away from that healing

using diets and lifestyle, herbs, body treatments and detoxification.

And these activities, they need to be paced with natural cycles of life.

If you use them correctly, you should be able to achieve long life.

Without major disease and and die without pain imagine that you know passing over

with clarity in mind And this is a problem nowadays that the end of life experience

is not thriving You know, but it's often suffering and if we live you know, mostly

in, in Ayurvedic ways, because you can't be 100 percent always, but most times do

the right things the way nature intended.

Then as a result, you can expect this life without much much health issues

and then having a thriving old age.

Wow.

That's fascinating.

So I guess it's a lot about healing your own body through this more natural

process, which I think in Western society.

Ring the alarm bells for us, because we've not known how to

recover our bodies naturally.

So it's quite a scary world for people to get into.

But I know a big element of what you certainly you've written about and

you endorse is a lot about detoxing.

So just a quick one in terms of, you know, what are toxin and how

does Ayurveda help with that?

I mean, I mean, I suppose what is toxins?

How does it affect us?

And then how does Ayurveda help with that?

Okay, so we often think about toxins being something like heavy metals

in your brain, but the most dangerous toxins that we have they lodge in our

guts as a result of bad digestion And I would bet the majority of people

now have some some sort of gut issue.

And when the gut activity slows down, then you have residues

and these residues can ferment.

They can even putrefy and then cause all sorts of problems as they

get seeped into the circulation.

So it's the most important thing is to always have a clean gut.

And when gut is clean, then the body's able to clean the internal

environment in the tissues as well.

So Going into these kind of detoxification processes where you address an organ or

organ system such as the liver or the brain, they really need to start first

from a good gut cleanse because only then the body has intelligence of being

able to clear other areas of the body.

So yeah.

So Amma is the name in Sanskrit for these residues and digest.

Or that can get into the system and then cause problems because

their body doesn't recognize.

There's a lock and key system with the with nutrients when they come to

the body and undigested particles when they manage to get into the blood.

circulation, there is no lock where the key can go and then

sludge into joints or, you know, spaces that then start manifesting,

you know, signs of ill health.

And is that a lot to do?

You hear a lot about leaky gut.

So when you say particles going to the bloodstream, is that a big part of

that when people talk about leaky gut?

So that's toxins getting into your bloodstream and then

causing havoc, basically.

That's exactly what it is.

And That's a result of having really bad eating habits.

Not eating timely, eating processed foods, eating bad fats,

snacking, eating in the evenings.

So all these activities that lots of people have in their lives as a norm

are really damaging to the gut lining.

And the gut then gets inflamed.

their inflamed tissues are not strong to hold together.

So those kind of tight junctions between the cells and the gut lining,

they start opening up and then these big particles that should not

get in there, they get in there.

And then obviously, of course, this, these this is symptomatology that comes from.

These undigested particles floating in blood.

wow.

And I think kind of medically, they say a lot around the gut being your second

brain, and you know, obviously I'm a positive psychology coach, so I talk to a

lot of people about mental health and well being, and actually I don't think people

still appreciate the importance of making sure that our gut is healthy, to enable

us to be not only healthy from the inside, but, you know, feeling mentally happy too.

So the gut has a lot to answer for from our physical and mental well being.

Absolutely, and I would say it's the first brain.

Gut is able to perceive danger before your brain does.

So you have this sudden feeling, something's wrong, you know,

that comes from your gut.

And so if you think about how, how evolutionarily things have evolved,

not only in time, but also let's say, you know, how fetus forms.

First, It's the gut to form and from there the brain forms and

there's a tight link they never separate so they're one and the same.

Whatever is going on in the gut is going in the brain and so you can influence

one and the other from each end but it's much easier to deal with the guts

than the brain, because brain might have, you know, conditionings that

have been there since early childhood and to change those, it's a bit of an

endeavor, let's say to change your ways, but you can influence your guts and,

and renew your gut lining in three days.

Therefore, you can also influence the the mental moods.

Amazing.

I hear a lot about Doshas and Gunas being important, so in Vatapita and

Kapha, and I understand they're key to understanding the body's constitution,

so it'd be really great if you could just give us a real kind of Noddy's

guide in terms of what Doshas and the importance of Gunas are, and what should

you do once you establish what they are.

So Dosha theory is a really interesting alternative of looking at our

psychology and physiology, both of them.

And so we consider the Doshas being three different forces, three different energies

that influence every living being.

And living being are single cells and complex organisms.

And so if something has a life, so they're born, they have a life,

and they die, that's a life cycle.

So anything that has a life cycle is influenced by these three doshas.

And and they, you know, they're responsible for all

the Functionality of our body.

And as you mentioned then, Vata, Pitta, and Kapha, these Sanskrit terms are the

names of these three different forces.

Vata is an energy that moves.

It means wind.

This theory is very ancient.

And in those times they didn't have microscopes.

They didn't have, you know, the scientific paraphernalia to understand

the workings of the, of the universe in, in the way that you, we look

at it now in the Western science.

However, they realize that they are these forces and they are very minor things.

We can't see them, so they called them with metaphors.

So this energy called Vata is, is called wind by a term that they

thought it, it works like wind.

So Vata energy moves.

It's a propulsive energy.

So it pushes, if you think about wind in an autumn day, it blows the leaves.

Yeah.

And what happens is where it creates movements and behind

it leaves an empty space.

Yeah.

So Vata creates movements and creates space.

in the body.

So for example you have food coming in and food going out.

That's a movement, yeah?

So when you go to the toilet, you empty your gut.

So you move the feces out and you leave an empty space behind and that

creates a sensation of lightness.

Yeah, when you think about people blow on your hand and you feel what does it

feel like it feels cold and soon It feels dry and and if you go, you know blow long

enough It becomes rough and then so so Vata is an energy a dosha that has a set

of qualities We describe it by the sets of qualities that are the same as you

would qualify the wind with so it's cold.

It's dry It's irregular as well wind blows irregular.

You never know when the wind blows Whereas sun comes up regularly, we know,

if you look at millions of years back, we know exactly when the sun came up.

And this is this, the, the regularity element, the guna

is a guna of pitta dosha.

So we have first dosha is vata, second dosha is pitta.

And pitta means fire.

Fire is we qualify that fire.

Fire doesn't have any weight, it's light, and it's obviously hot.

So light, hot, fire is intense, and tens as well, and so it creates that.

But it's a transforming element, because if you burn something, if you put heat

somewhere, then you have a change.

You burn wood, and it becomes ash.

You boil a potato, from hard it becomes soft.

So heat, the pitta element, transforms.

It's all the transformative elements, so the digestion and metabolism

in the body is governed by Pitta.

Whereas Vata, the movement, the whole nervous system and movements, you know,

to circulation and detoxification and menstrual cycle and hormone circulation.

Pitta is a transforming function that then helps.

To transform the food into nutrients, to energy.

Wow.

And then Kapha is the third dosha.

And Kapha means phlegm.

Yeah.

But, you know, if you see that every cell has phlegm, but it's again, a

metaphor and phlegm is like glue.

It holds together, it binds the the cells together and holds

the structure strong together.

So if you see that there is one organism, Food is coming in, food is

going out, and then in the mid, in the process it's turned into energy.

And what holds the whole thing together is the kaffa and dosha.

So this is how they, how they act in every single organism.

A single one and a complicated one.

And every single need, you know, kind of cell needs this energy.

So other times there's no life.

And they, kind of every cell is an individual as well.

So we've got different kinds of cells, we've got nerve cells, musculoskeletal

cells, we've got skin cells, and all these, they have a different, you know,

proportion of these doses in them.

If you think about how many cells do you have in your body, you've got

about 10 trillion cells in your body.

10 trillion individuals coming together and then that's an individual you, not,

you can't replicate yourself, but you are, you know, a very unique person

and kind of a collective of individuals that decided to work as a human.

And that's then when you have been conceived.

When you've been conceived that's when your nature, your

constitution of doshas come together.

And that defines what are the qualities, the gunas in you.

I mean, this is fascinating.

It's blown my mind.

Absolutely blown my mind.

And you know, the thing that worries me is, Anu, is that when

we go to the GP, they never talk about this kind of thing, right?

So we're all treated, it's a one size fits all.

Yeah.

You know, medicine's a thrust on us without having any context in terms of

how our bodies are working within us.

And actually, you know, from what you say, is we need to have a

really good understanding of, of those elements within our body to,

to tell us how we need to fix it.

So, as I say, we're so reliant on Western medicine, even more.

you know, so today than ever before.

So I think it's really important for us in order to create, as you

say, this harmonious balance you know, these doshas because having an

imbalance will contribute to all the health issues, you know, that we face.

So how, how do we get to, how do we get to know, understand a bit

more about what our doshas are?

And what's the easiest way to find out?

It's to look at those gunas.

How does your body feel like?

Ayurveda is all about feeling.

It's not about knowing.

It's about feeling so if you would do a dosha test, for example, something

that you can find in abundance online, if you just go on dosha Anulysis or

dosha tests, there are some simple ones and some, some complicated ones.

There is one in my website as well.

So you can just go and have a look and fill those questionnaires in

and you can start looking at, ah, there's a patterns I sent in to have

dryness or I tend to have heaviness.

I tend to have.

Signs of heat.

I tend to have this.

And so then you can start looking at in my behavior, in my physicality, in my,

you know, psychology, I, I often bring about that kind of manifest equality.

And and so therefore you would.

See that you could categorize and look at that quality and then categorize it under

one of the doses depending on what the quality is Let's say if you have lots of

dryness, you would say hmm That is most likely a Vata imbalance or let's say you

say you've got a lot of mucus and Let's say that's very thick and heavy mucus.

You're like, ah, that's a That's something that's, you know, if that's a tendency,

general tendency in your body, it would say, okay, hmm, I might have that

kapha in my constitution to be the most prominent one is you have the older three.

You need to be kept in balance, but some one of the doses is usually a bit more

one or two might be a bit more dominant.

However, it's much easier to find balance for doshas if you practice

seasonality, if you practice proper time.

And, and then the doshas will just keep in balance naturally.

And then understanding what is that, what are those couple of gunas, the

qualities that tend to come up easily.

And have diets and lifestyle that pacifies those gunas.

And And pacifying them early enough, quick enough, like on a daily basis.

You know, if you see that heat is rising, cool quickly down.

And that's where your Ayurvedic duty has been done.

Before it becomes a problem.

But yeah, we balance these doshas in a changing environment.

And that environment has a routine.

It repeats on a pattern.

It's been repeating on a pattern since the universe, you know, organized itself

in, in this cosmic order between in our universe of the sun and the earth.

that cause the days and seasons.

So we have been all humans have not only humans, but anything that started,

you know, from billions of years ago, evolving and eventually became humans.

They always been in a rotational movement of nature.

And so it's very natural for us to be on an inner routine and work.

on a clock and, and do the things that are nature intended, and

so our doses keep in balance.

Well, I mean that's again another fascinating some really

fascinating points there.

The bit that I'm really interested in is around the importance of Ayurvedic diet,

and I know that you've got your wonderful calf and you're always experimenting, you

know, with lots of great foods and menus.

So I really wanted to focus a bit more on that.

And I hear a lot about the kind of six tastes and the general

principle of Ayurvedic nutrition.

So I think the six tastes are sweet, sour, salty, pungent, bitter, and astringent.

I think that's right.

In every meal to having that, to make sure it balances.

So.

Can you tell me a little bit about that?

Perfect Ayurvedic diet would be what we used to eat as hunter gatherers.

If you think about what could be, what, what, what was that diet?

It was always seasonal, obviously.

And it was, there was nothing non organic and it was always local.

Yeah.

So Perfect Ayurvedic diet.

So what should be on your plate?

Is from those three parameters of seasonal, organic, local.

And in fact, until about a hundred years ago, we still used to eat this way.

So to jump out of this bandwagon, you know, really recently.

And and now we eat food that is not local.

You can eat strawberries at Christmas that do not grow in here at this time.

They're not going to kill you, but they're not intelligent food.

Ayurveda aims him always at eating intelligent food.

Seasonal food is always intelligent, it is your superfood.

If you're looking for superfoods, that's what you go for.

Seasonal food, preferably as local as you can.

So occasionally you can have something as a treat, but mainly

you should resort to seasonal.

Organic, obviously.

As organic as you can, and as local as you can.

And so The thing about seasons, it ties into those tastes is that

the food that grows in season is exactly provides the flavors that

you need in those period of time.

Very, very clever system between the qualities, the Gunas that we talked

about before, that's the Gunas, the qualities of the climate are exactly

opposite to the qualities of the diet.

So what grows in nature in spring is exactly opposite to the

climatic conditions and the same in summer and same in autumn.

So for example, spring, nothing grows in spring.

So that's a natural time for the, for us to lighten up because.

Spring is a heavy period and it's a cold period and everything that grows in

nature in spring is warming so it heats up the body, so it stimulates the body,

it makes body cleanse, natural cleansing detoxification period is during spring

and naturally kind of the Season's food provide that, and the flavors, the

six flavors that come in that season, they are more on that bitter, pungent,

and astringent line, cleanse the body.

And then in the summer, we have a warm period, sun is drying, so all fruits

and vegetables are juicy and sweet to Calm down that heat and then winter and

autumn we have diet that is heavy, full of fats and proteins to put on a little

bit of that layer to, you know, keep us warm during the winter, but it has to

come off in the spring and by resorting to spring diet, which is like Weight

watchers or veganism and less and you cut down dairy, you cut down meat, you

cut down all those heavy items and then you cleanse your body and you come to

summer and you have abundance of food that is sweet and juicy and full of sugar.

So that's a carb season.

We need those because the sun is out more.

We have, you know, the days are longer.

And then again, we come to this period in here where we put those preserves

from the summer for in storage so that they become, you know, winter

foods and they're heavy and they're nourishing and they're calming.

So that's the kind of rotation of the, of the season and the, and the the

Gounas, but the flavors, if you think about them, like you mentioned, you have

to have the six flavors in every meal.

Each season you have them in, you know, in the different proportion, they

could kind of food pyramid of Ayurveda.

It's actually a flavor pyramid.

And that flavor pyramids changes.

Every season, but generally you would say sweet is the main staple of every plate.

Then you have sour, then you have salt, then you have bitter punt and astringent.

The food could be anything as long as it has these flavors.

It's a perfect diabetic dish if it's seasonal.

So you would say plate of pasta with tomato.

It can be a perfect Ayurvedic dish in, you know, end of summer and, and, you

know, winter, and that's a heavy meal.

And so you would have sweetness from the pasta and tomatoes.

You've got sourness from the tomatoes as well.

You've got salt, obviously.

You've got bitter from basil black pepper.

And olive oil is bitter as well and pungent from pepper if you want chilli

and astringent as well in the spice.

So it's actually a perfect Ayurvedic dish

Okay, so there's quite a lot of information packed in there, really

interesting and I love the point around seasonal foods because I

never would have thought about that.

But is there any way that you can kind of condense that and make it a bit more

simpler for us to kind of understand and I suppose take going forward?

Absolutely.

Yeah.

So Ayurveda you know, living naturally is simple.

It shouldn't be very complicated.

Obviously, there is a there are dynamics in nature that are interesting to study.

But all in all, all you have to remember is this acronym S.

O.

L.

S.

O.

L.

Seasonal, Organic, Local.

That's what should be on everyone's plate.

Yeah.

S.

O.

L.

Seasonal and also how to eat.

is really, really important.

And for that I have another acronym, and this is SSS.

Simple, Slow, and Seasonal.

So if you apply these S O L and S S S in your, you know, cooking and,

and, and behavior around food, You're doing perfect Ayurveda already.

So you can't get it very, very far.

S.

O.

L.

is the Seasonal, Organic, and Local.

So that should be on your plate.

And then remember, triple S.

Simple, Slow, and Seasonal.

Make food simple.

Don't combine too many ingredients.

Don't make massive soups.

Salads or, you know foods that have been cooked in different you know,

pots, you can have one pot foods.

So that's one item.

It might have 40 ingredients in there, but when you put them together, it's one item.

And then you have rice.

Or pasta, or other grain, or bread, or you know, whatever it

is that you you know, add to it.

So, have like two items is, is great.

More than that, it starts getting more complicated.

And more complicated, it becomes harder it is to digest.

And then eat slowly.

Yeah, don't do anything around it.

Just focus on eating and eat with your you know, your mind in that food.

A really nice actually an, an experiment everyone can do is

eat with their eyes closed.

Put a scarf around your eyes and, and see what happens when you eat.

You probably won't be able to finish your plates because your mind when it's where

the action is and when it's monitoring what's in the, in going down, your taste

sensation leaves when you've had enough.

Even if it's a piece of food, you just can't taste it anymore.

It's interesting.

And also you will be chewing.

As much as you need, as necessary.

So, the body won't allow you to, to swallow.

if the food is not ready to go down.

So what you need to do is just kind of every, every time that you can,

just close your eyes and eat your food and see, see what consistency the

food needs to be when it goes down.

But if you're watching television doing something, distracted by something else

during a food, It's two bites, then you drink a little bit of water, then

you've eaten the whole plate and it's like, hmm, I'm not really satisfied yet.

You go for a second serving and then you go for a pudding and suddenly

you realize that you've overeaten.

Whereas, you know, just focusing on that eating, being so good,

beautiful, delicious, seasonal, well cooked for your own personal needs.

Eat them slowly.

And so there you are.

Perfect.

I don't want to complicate things too much.

Almost being the present moment, which is so great on a

number of levels and, and keeping us kind of grounded, I suppose.

And one of the things that you and I have talked about regularly before, and you

gave me some advice on was especially for IBS is intermittent fasting.

And we're hearing.

So much about at the moment.

So, you know, it's such a huge topic and one which, you know, the brilliant Dr.

Mindy is pioneering at the moment.

And we're learning so much about the impact of food and when, you know,

we should be eating and particularly around stabilizing blood sugar, which

is a massive problem, I think, you know, certainly Western society.

you know, how we can balance our immune system and epigenetics.

So again, going back to the point around getting rid of toxins which I

know as you say is huge and I evade it, but can you just talk to us a

bit about the importance of fasting?

If your gut is empty, all energy can go to healing.

That's it basically.

And if you fast at the right time, then you have huge potential of

healing anything in your body.

So if you eat, stop eating solids after five o'clock

that's the, that's the solution.

Morning fasting is only damage control for evening eating.

Evening eating is one of the most damaging things for your health.

It's, it really messes up with your body clocks.

It puts the body into an inflammatory state at night.

Nighttime is health growth and restoration.

That's what should be healing, repairing tissues and rejuvenating, you know, from

the wear and tear of the day before.

And, and the body will do it.

If it's given a chance to do that, but the digestion takes

all the energy away from healing.

So in that way, morning fast for people that are fasting in the mornings, it's

necessary if they have late evenings, but really their small intermittent

fasting rhythm should be that eight to 16.

You have eight o'clock light breakfast, hefty lunch, because your digestive

power is at its strongest at lunch.

And then you have five o'clock supper.

And that should be your light, light, light meal and which you will be then

digesting for the rest of the evening.

And then go to bed with an empty stomach.

That will then promote self regulation.

What happens at night is then your liver will basically deliver all that nutrient

that has been broken down during the day.

So your daytime is breaking down.

Nighttime is delivering that to your tissues.

So you get energy, you get calming and grounding for the night ahead.

After that you have a detoxification period, so after 12 o'clock, between

12 and 2 more or less, the brain detoxifies, the arms detoxify, and the

legs, and it all comes to the gut and in the morning you go and eliminate.

And so, if your gut is full of food, the liquids, the lymph can't come from the

brain and the arms, and in the morning you wake up puffy, you're stiff, you've

got less energy, you might have some brain fog, you can't get out of bed.

Fast in the evening, you go and you nourish yourself, you have nutritional

deficiencies, you have detoxified naturally, and then you know at night

your body temperature goes down.

It's a systemic anti inflammatory period.

Wow.

So consequently, you have healed anything that needs healing.

Or at least it has started and you kept your gut in that state

that you can deal with anything.

So there's no residues, no none of the armor that we touched upon earlier.

So you've nourished your properly, yourself properly.

You have no toxins in you.

You have no less pain or no pain, and you wake up energized.

You don't have hunger because you've been.

So, generally, you say that you have this fasting window

of 16 hours after 5 o'clock.

That would be the ideal thing to do.

And then you have the Feasting window for eight hours for nine

o'clock one o'clock and five o'clock.

So that would be your thing You don't even have to change your diet

only if you do that You will have great results already and obviously

no snacking in between those meals.

That's that's you know, snacking Okay snacking and evening eating

Yeah, I think you know a lot of us are seeing this a lot more

education around this and like you say When you're in that fasting period,

your body obviously can heal faster because all the energy is going, you

know, to the places where it needs.

The one thing that I think I've certainly found hard is we are, you

know, now I'm hitting my fifties now, so it's a lot more difficult, but you

know, I'm kind of hardwired to, you know, my socializing is usually in

the evening, meeting friends, family.

You know, traditional sometimes with friends and family sitting by the

table at six o'clock having a meal.

So how do we change our mindset around that?

What's the best way for us to do that?

Because it's a food can be very social and we get hungry.

All right.

So what's your tips around that?

First of all, if you want to meet your friends, meet them at lunch.

Well, you know, obviously I go out in the evening as well and I go and see

friends, but I do it occasionally.

I know if I, most of the times I do the right thing.

Then I'm able to deal with that load of food and possibly wine as well.

You know, so my system out of whack and I can recover easily

and next day I can lighten up.

I can fast in the morning the next day.

So, so it's all about, you know, doing most of the times the right thing.

But there is definitely this problem that the business hours have, you

know, determined that social time with families in the evening.

People sit, sit down at the table with the family and they,

it's, it's a sacred time almost.

We don't want to interfere with that and, and it is a big hurdle

to go around, but you can.

So I have lots of clients who have done that.

They I, what I advise is that especially kids, when they come

from school, they eat immediately.

Kids are always hungry when they come from, come from school, give them a proper

meal and then a snack in the evening.

Rather than a snack after school and then big meal in the evening.

So turn that around yourself as well in the office, you know, wherever you

are at four o'clock, you are a peckish again, you know, you want to reach out to

the coffee or the biscuits or whatever, then have another meal at that time,

like a lighter one, you know, bring.

Even if it's not the ideal thing to do, but just kind of have that, you

know, light of meal at that time.

And then when you come home, you're not ravenous.

Cause that's, that's a thing as well, that people have one o'clock meal,

and then there's a big gap in there.

So 1, 2, 3, until seven o'clock, then you can eat anything.

I mean, either it goes down the drain and then you're eating

anything from the fridge.

And, you know, it's just.

Timing things right, knowing, you know, how to mAnuge that hunger

and also thinking about if you are eating three meals a day

You're not going to die of hunger.

If you're finished at five o'clock, you're not going to die.

You know, just have to go through that blood sugar management period at

this, when you start practicing that.

And your body will get used to it, won't it?

Can you drink water and some people say can you drink coffee?

Is there anything you can Do or should you just completely not have anything?

Yeah.

Yeah, that's a good question.

You can have something but not solid.

Yeah Right.

Okay meal would be great a soup light soup or You know for meat eaters bone

broth would be great But you know something like a golden milk turmeric

latte with a dollop of ghee or butter or coconut oil In a mixer, so it's really

nice and nourishing delicious meal.

And so But yeah kind of Solids, especially carbohydrates in the evening, you know,

refined carbohydrates, especially.

So avoid those.

So we can train our bodies.

Like you say, it takes a bit of time, but, you know, after a while, our

bodies will start to get used to it.

So I guess the point is around perseverance.

And then the bit I really wanted to get into a little bit more was about,

you know, how we incorporate a more Ayurvedic lifestyle into our own life.

So, you know, you touched on ghee there, so really interesting.

There's a lot of research around the importance of ghee.

It'd be good to get a sense of, you know, what you think, some of the basic

things that you can bring into your diet.

So you talked about golden milk.

So if you could tell us a bit about that Tongue scraping.

You know, people talk a lot about tongue scraping, whatever that is,

you know, drinking plain hot water.

I know, you know, I've heard a lot about putting a, a dollop

of honey in your hot water.

First thing to clear your stomach.

So what are some of the kind of basic things which you incorporate in your

life, which you absolutely, you know, make sure that you do on a daily basis?

First of all, I have lots of ghee.

Right.

Ghee has had a quite bad rap over the years because it's been industrialized and

it's become cheap and widely available for everyone, so poor quality, cheap ghee, if

you go into the supermarkets and get that in the tin, you know, it's rancid already.

Obviously it's inflammatory and bad for your health.

If you make ghee home buy organic butter and you know separate the

solids, the proteins out of it.

And you've got this beautiful, you know, it's, it's like a ritual, you know,

the whole gear making, it's so simple.

And then you have the slightest fats, which has a high smoking point.

So you can cook anything with it.

And it's, it tastes really good when you make it at home.

It's not rancid and it keeps forever.

So you, you get the organic butter and you melt it.

Sorry, so a lot of people probably won't know how to make their own ghee.

It's super simple.

Yeah, you just put it at the lowest temperature you can, on a thick

pot, just put the butter there and let it slowly, slowly melt.

And then you discard the white solids that separate from the fat.

Sometimes they come on the surface if the temperature is higher,

you can't get it low enough.

But if you can get it really low, then the solids, they just stay

at the bottom and you can just pour it through a cheesecloth.

So you pour the liquid through the cheesecloth and

then you leave the solid behind.

Those solids, you know, they're proteins.

If you're making protein shake, put that in there.

Ah, okay.

So you can still use, you can still use that.

Okay.

Interesting thing about ghee is that it's called what it is, is butyric acid.

And butyric acid is already a product that your body makes.

So as a result, when you eat like roughage, like celery, that's roughage.

So it's our insoluble fiber, the end product of insoluble fiber digestion.

So in the colon where the bacteria come in and start eating those fibers, byproduct

of that digestion is butyric acid.

So your body makes ghee on its own

. Dal: So it's natural.

It's naturally what we produce ourselves.

When you have ghee it's very well recognized and it's

a very good anti inflammatory.

And you can drink it neat like that or how would...

That's when you go into Panchakarma, the Ayurvedic Detox

program, the signature program.

That's where you drink ghee.

But other than that, I use it on bread.

I use it in my cooking.

I put it in my coffee.

That makes coffee less sharp.

Yeah, it's coffee and it makes it really nice and creamy.

So to cut that sharpness of coffee, just it's called bulletproof coffee

often, but that's a, that's a really, really beautiful way of,

of having your morning coffee.

Anywhere, I bake with ghee and put it anywhere.

Loads of uses for it.

And you talked about golden milk, which is basically turmeric in warm milk.

Is that right?

And I put Cardamom and saffron and ginger and ghee.

And then, I usually add some maple syrup or jaggery, the cane

sugar, and then just have that.

It's so delicious.

That's so healing.

It's medicine, you know, in the evening, cold, you can't, you're

coming down with something got sore throats, you know, you feel like

you caught a chill, turmeric latte.

It's, it's one of the best things.

In fact, you can have that on the go.

It's our special recipe.

Heaven in a cup.

Amazing.

I will have to come and try it at the cafe soon.

And you can get it, this is a thing, you can buy it in Starbucks

and places like that now.

So it's becoming readily available.

And the other things I was going to say, I'm sure there's lots of things

you do, and there's loads in your brilliant book Ayurvedic Detox, but I

hear a lot about kind of tongue scraping and what, what's your views on that?

Well, you think about, you know, from your lips until downstairs,

you've got, that is your gut.

Yeah.

That is your digestive system.

So your mouth.

is part of your digestion, yeah, so chewing is, is, is the most

important part, in fact, of digestion.

And you want to keep that area clean.

If you but, you know, your tongue is very, you know it's not smooth.

It easily you easily get trapped into it.

And so it's good to scrape it away, just put that, put the scraper at the

back of your tongue and then gently pull out all that mucus that easily

gets stuck in there, on the tongue.

But generally if you look at your tongue, it tells the tale

of what's going down in there.

So it's, it is the same tube and what is on the, on the tongue is

also on the lining of the gut.

So if you have white coating on the tongue, you can say, all right,

my gut is also lined by this.

I need to detoxify.

I need to stop.

Let's see.

Because that's the best way to get rid of this.

So do the small intermittent fasting rhythm.

Don't eat after five o'clock and that tongue will clear, but you can in the

meantime, and as a daily habit, it's just a really good thing to do is scrape

your tongue, take the bacteria away.

It helps your, you know breath to be a bit clearer as well.

So I was actually going to ask you just moving on from that,

you know, what's the best way that Ayurveda can help heal diseases?

You know, how do we move away from Western medicine?

And I think one of the things that I certainly took from what you've you shared

with us is around how intermittent fasting is a really good way to rejuvenate.

And I know people have been healed from diabetes, no cholesterol problems,

blood pressure issues, mental health.

So I think, you know, one of the things I know that you, You know, most

definitely endorse with your clients is around kind of intermittent fasting.

And then it's like you say around the foods that you eat,

which we've just discussed.

Is there anything else that from a kind of herbal medicine perspective

that people can start looking at?

I mean, I've used tinctures in the past to kind of help heal.

And, you know, now I think I'm on the right vitamins as well.

But is there anything else to talk about food, to talk about fasting?

But is there anything else that you say?

can help heal that we don't have to reach for the medicine cabinet

with all those kind of nasty Western medicines and drugs that you feel

that we should be looking at?

And we always come back, as you said, into the small

intermittent fasting routine that needs to be set in stone first.

You can't expect healing if you keep eating in the evening.

That's the thing.

If you keep eating constantly, you can't expect healing because the

gut is the root of all healing.

So if you don't leave the gut time to recover and replenish, address

immunity, address, you know, to kind of reinforce immunity and and

eliminate the toxins, that's when healing becomes very difficult.

You can take herbal medicines, but It has to be, you know, compatible.

The herbal, herbal medicine intake has to be compatible with your,

with your diet and lifestyle.

So this is, and saying that all Ayurvedic teachers say

first thing to their students.

Herbal medicines are great, but only if they're compatible with your life.

So if you don't need your life, don't have herbs.

And if your diet and lifestyle are set in stone, you don't need herbs.

But the but obviously, you know, they boost your, your process.

They boost the process of recovery and you can target certain organs and organ

systems and certain specific diseases.

And it's like Jurmar is a fantastic herb.

It's called J U R M A R and that's a really good blood sugar regulator.

Neem is the blood sugar regulator.

So let's say you have gurmar and neem in your diet, take it in the

evening, you fast it in the evening, you take it in the morning as well.

Jurmar is fantastic because it takes your sweet cravings away.

Oh wow.

And we all need that.

Exactly.

It's a thing nowadays where they, they fly off our shelves all the time.

We all do.

It's like, no, we don't have gourmet because it's, it's such a fantastic herb.

So when I teach people to come out of the snacking and eating late routine,

I always introduce gourmet to their diet because that just takes the, it

affects the taste buds on your tongue.

But yeah, so when you go into the small intermittent fasting

routine, you notice that your blood sugar levels will fluctuate.

Because they should, you shouldn't have up here because it predisposes you to insulin

resistance to really hold on to the highs and lows without losing your cool.

You should be, you know, able to mAnuge focus and energy levels,

even if you're, you know at the low, low state of blood sugar.

So if you're fasting, for example, it shouldn't be that makes you unable

to perform your tasks of the day.

So you become energy efficient and you have metabolic flexibility.

So those two that come as a, as a result of small and smitten fasting

and, and, you know, really nice herbs that are then chosen for your

specific needs, such as controlling blood sugar levels or cravings.

Mm.

And cholesterol is a big problem these days as well.

A lot of people suffer from that certainly as they get older.

Any suggestions on what you can do to manage that?

That's, that's quite an interesting question because already years

ago, the United States government defined that cholesterol is not

a major threat to health anymore.

So there has been 70 years or more of, of indoctrination

that cholesterol is bad for us.

In fact, there is bad cholesterol, obviously, but the problem with

cholesterol is inflammation.

Cholesterol is, you know, can be in quite large, quite kind

of high amounts in, in blood.

If you don't have inflammation, it probably most likely is

not going to be a problem.

The problem is that we have, we're inflamed.

And so best way to lower down inflammation is, guess what?

Fascinating.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So that will sort out inflammation.

Yeah.

If you look at inflamed blood vessels, they become rough on the, on the,

you know, their, their lining.

And inflamed vessel then catches that, that cholesterol and

that can start accumulating.

But if the, I mean, if there's no inflammation in the cardiovascular system.

It all just, you know, floats around happy matching to any

point and causing a, a health, you know, even a serious health issue.

But first of all, you need to figure out if there's inflammation and

especially requests, particularly that low grade inflammation markers,

your usual tests for inflammation.

They don't often count those low grades and most of us nowadays.

have low grade inflammation going on.

Yeah, yeah, that's what my diet's had in that condition.

Right, okay, that's really interesting.

Right, I'm going to ask you really quickly because I'm looking at you and

you've got the most beautiful skin and I'm sure people are, are wondering as

well, those that are actually watching this on screens, but any tips in

terms of beauty and healthcare tips?

You know, people use a lot of essential oils and things like that.

Is there anything you incorporate in your Daily routine especially as we age.

So i'm 51 now And my routines throughout the years have been just I

put a toner and oil on my face morning and evening That's all I I do have, you

know, I makeup remover an organic one.

But the It's the evening fasting again

all down to that.

Because you, you drain your, your lymph and so you don't have any

breakouts and you have luster and you've got, you know brightness in your skin

that, you know, that it's not inflamed.

Fasting is really important, but then lots of greens.

Lots of greens.

Yeah.

We need to think about, we used to eat greens all the time, so if you're a

hunter gatherer, that's what you find.

Greens.

Greens.

Greens.

And of course, there's meat.

Yeah.

And fruits or vegetables.

But it's greens.

And those are missing in our diets.

And it has a huge impact on liver health.

And liver is always reflected to your skin health.

And also.

Also, remember that your external skin is a reflection of your internal skin.

So the way your gut is expressing itself, it also shines, you know, comes

out in your, in your external skin.

So it's always stuff, so for small intermittent fasting and detoxification

that happens naturally during the night.

And then don't use moisturizers.

Moisturizers are, create a film on your skin.

And then, yeah, you know, to a certain extent stop evaporation

of, of liquids out of your skin.

So, hydration.

They can hydrate.

They hold on to the hydration that is already there.

Usually it's just a film that is created on your skin.

If you put first toner, you get the hydration.

And then you mix a bit of oil into it.

You don't need as much oil because your face is moist already.

So the toner gives hydration.

Oil gives moisture and softness.

And so if you're thinking, I don't want to put oil on my face because it's so sticky.

But if you put this moist, the, the, the toner on it, you leave less of the oil.

And then you just massage it in.

It's.

nicely, you know, tonifies the face into the cellular space where it helps

the cellular metabolism to lower down inflammation or increase the, you

know, cellular activity and, and so on.

So it's oils.

That's fascinating.

I'm just looking at your skin.

It looks amazing.

There is so much to unpack there.

I think, I feel like we've got another couple of episodes that

we need to do on that specifically alone, but we're quite short on time.

So I was just going to do what I normally do at the end is just do

a couple of quick fire questions.

And as a happiologist, obviously I'm always keen to know, you

know, people's views on happiness.

So in your view, in a very kind of quick fire kind of way, what's

your what's your key to happiness?

Contentment.

So, surrender, accept things as they are, and happiness is

a byproduct of contentment.

So once you have contentment, lots of things become, you

know, a source of happiness.

You, you appreciate things so much more, and they bring that, and eventually

that sensation of joy, you know, that really kind of celebration of

life, where you just sit and look, everything is in its right place.

Contentment means that you might have lows in your life, but you don't lose the

touch of understanding the meaning of it.

There is meaning.

When you have meaning in life, you have contentment.

You have contentment, you have happiness.

And then you have also joy.

And yeah.

And you can get there, you can get there with this are you ready life.

When you have, when you have seasonality, then you're, then you start beating

with the rhythm of the universe.

You're doing the things the way mother nature wanted you to do.

Mother nature intended.

Yeah, I love that.

And just one more question.

If you knew now what you, you do now, what would you tell your 20 year old self?

What advice would you give your 20 year old self?

Now with all your wisdom and knowledge?

To be less obsessed about, you know, myself or, you

know, other people's opinions.

Be more focused.

I think I've spent lots of time just being distracted, being guided by

my mind to just kind of Do whatever mind gets, you know, interested

in, rather than holding on to my thoughts and working on my talents.

It took me quite a long time before I found my thing, probably because I was

just practicing distraction all the time.

Yeah, I love that.

What amazing advice.

So obviously you've got your book here with lots of really great information.

Anything else you've got going, coming on this new year?

Anything you've got going on that we can tune into?

Well, the Ayurvedic Panchakarma retreat is in Dorset

in January, obviously, now.

And then we have another retreat coming up in April in Sicily.

Fantastic.

And that's brilliant.

And then you've obviously got your practice in Kensal Rise in London.

Yes.

And you've got your cafe, too.

I would definitely encourage people to go along if they can.

Listen, it's been fantastic.

I know I've really enjoyed today.

it gives us a lot of food for thought in terms of how we can focus on ourselves

and focus on a healthy body and mind.

So a huge thank you, really grateful.

Thank you for today and for everyone else, wishing you love and light.

Thank you very much.

It was a pleasure.

Thanks for tuning in lovely listeners.

Any questions or thoughts?

Drop me an email and follow me on my social media, The Happiologist, to stay

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