Revitalize Your Life With Ayurveda:
Manage Stress & Bring Balance To Your Life
DEEPAK CHOPRA, MD WITH DAVID SIMON, MD

Attend a Renewal Weekend with Deepak Chopra, MD, and David Simon, MD, Claremont Resort in Berkeley this July. By integrating traditional western medicine with the complementary healing arts of the East, Drs. Chopra and Simon offer effective ways to manage stress, calm anxiety, respond to life's uncertainties and bring balance in career, health, relationships and lifestyle.

Are you feeling stressed as you're pulled between your responsibilities at work and home? Is you experiencing anxiety due to uncertainties in life? Are your relationships where they need to be? Are you eating your lunch at your desk while you type furiously to meet a deadline? Do you feel as connected to your body as you once did? Would you like to take a deep breath, smile, and calm the chaos in your life?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, you are not alone. Perhaps it's time to reawaken your unconditioned self and return to the path of wellness where a healthy and balanced body, mind and soul are your natural state.

As more and more women juggle 12-hour days in the corporate world along with maintaining a household and raising kids today – it's not surprising that they are experiencing large amounts of anxiety and imbalance. As more men embrace multi-tasking and push themselves harder to reach their retirement goals, they are shifting their primary attention away from their relationships, their physical and emotional health, and their families and in the process sacrificing their peace of mind.

How can you be the calm amidst the chaos? How can you re-energize your body and your mind? How can you bring peace and balance into your life? The answers are timeless; the tools are accessible; and wisdom can be applied to your daily routine starting today.

July 22-24, Drs. Deepak Chopra and David Simon return to Berkeley for an insightful weekend of rejuvenation designed to help you restore balance in your life, shed some of your less-than-nurturing patterns, and replace them with daily practices that can be the building blocks of a personal rebirth. As the author of more than 40 books with almost 30 million copies in print worldwide, Deepak Chopra has touched millions around the globe sharing timeless wisdom. Along with David Simon, M.D., co-founder and medical director of the Chopra Center, they've integrated the benefits of modern science with the healing arts of the East to help millions of people find that balance and return to their natural state of wholeness. In this feature article, they share a few of the profound and practical tools, techniques, and rituals for reclaiming your health, your purpose, and your peace of mind.

To start on a path of rejuvenation and rebirth, you need to be willing to step forward from the old patterns. You need first to be willing to give yourself permission to make the changes that will serve and nourish you and your life. As creatures of habit, we may find change to be difficult. However, the rewards for jumping into the fire of purification are many. If you begin with small steps at first, you will find you can build on that success as you take each additional step. Begin by choosing just one practice –yoga, meditation, emotional release, conscious communication, proper nutrition, Ayurvedic healing—and then commit to incorporating it into your life.

Ayurveda is a 5000-year old healing science originating in ancient India. In Sanskrit it means the "science of life." Ayus means life and Veda means science or wisdom. Ayurveda describes disease as the final expression of toxic accumulations in your mind-body physiology. Every impulse in life can be considered in terms of whether it brings nourishment or toxicity to the body. A nourishing experience can bring you health and happiness. A toxic experience brings misery and contributes to poor health.

Let's explore a few of these practices and if one resonates with you, then take the first step on the path to balancing your body, mind, and spirit by exploring it further. Whichever one you choose, in a very short time, you will begin to recognize signs of ease, rather than dis-ease, returning to your life.

What's your dosha?
Once you understand your mind-body constitution, you can align your body and mind. The first step in bringing your physiology into balance is to discover your dosha or mind body constitution. This is your customized make-up that makes you different from everyone else on the planet. Once you know this you can choose any strategy to bring balance into your life, and customize it to your body type and your emotional make-up. There are many tests and quizzes to determine your dosha. For a general guide to your dosha, see the chart below:

Vata
Thin build, enthusiastic
Sharp intellect and tongue
Irregular hunger and sleep

Pitta
Medium build, determined
Moves around quickly
Fair and ruddy complexion

Kapha
Large eyes & frame
Healthy hair & teeth
Even tempered

According to Ayurveda, a blissful existence all depends on balance, regardless of your dosha. What we are doing, eating and thinking predicates our state of mind and ultimately our health. Within ourselves we have all the elements necessary to renew and revitalize our body and spirit.

Meditation
Meditation is a core step and the most powerful tool for bodies out of balance. Physical impurities in cells have their equivalents in the mind such as fear, anger and compulsive behavior. These emotions can be as damaging as any chemical toxins. It is not possible to purify the mind by thinking about it. An angry mind cannot conquer its own anger. Meditation is the key. I will discuss an emotional healing techniques a bit later, but meditation is the foundation that allows a person to become unstuck from the toxic residue of their thoughts or emotions. Meditation is not forcing the mind to be quiet but finding the quiet that is already there.
At the Chopra Center we teach Primordial Sound Meditation, where we teach individuals their personal primordial sound – the vibration that the universe was making at the moment they were born. This then becomes their mantra and takes them to deep states of stillness.

Nutrition
Next to breathing, eating is our most vital bodily function. To create a healthy body and mind our food must be nourishing. Ideal nutrition comes from consuming a variety of foods that are appropriately prepared and eaten with awareness. A balanced diet contains all the 6 tastes of sweet, sour, salty, pungent, bitter and astringent. A strong appetite is necessary to help us digest and absorb the food we eat. Improved digestion reduces the amount of toxicity in your system and is directly related to your energy level.

Emotional Cleansing
We need to purify both emotional and physical toxins on a regular basis in order to experience true health and emotional freedom. Addressing emotional toxicity is the first step to total rejuvenation – if we allow toxic emotions to accumulate, the emotional toxicity ultimately leads to physical toxicity as well. Whenever you carry resentment, hostility, regret, or grievances in your heart, your health and vitality are eroded.

Dealing effectively with emotions requires knowledge and practice. Use this seven step process to release emotional toxicity and purify your emotions:

 1. Identify the emotion. Whenever you find your self in a state of emotional turmoil, find a quiet place and identify the emotion. Say to yourself, "I feel _____." It may be angry, sad, hurt, betrayed, etc. As clearly as possible, define and describe what you are feeling.

 2. Witness the feeling in your body. Emotions are thoughts associated with physical sensations. Observe the feeling and allow your attention to embrace sensation. Breathe into the feeling. By allowing yourself to experience the physical sensations, you'll find the charge of emotion dissipates.

 3. Take responsibility for what you are feeling. One of the most important aspects of healing the emotional body is understanding that we have a choice of how we respond to and interpret our experiences

 4. Express your emotion to yourself. You can write about your feelings or speak them out loud in private. Describe the situation or circumstance and the effect that it has on your heart and soul. Allow the words to serve as a conduit to release the emotional toxicity. Studies have shown that journaling about upsetting emotional experiences can improve your immune function, as well as help you gain clarity and insight.

 5. Release the emotion through some physical ritual. Do some deep breathing, get a massage, dance with abandon, or go on a long run. Allow your body to release the tension that is stored with the emotion.

 6. Share the emotion with the person involved in the situation once you have calmed down. If you've processed steps 1-5, you should be able to share it without blame and without trying to manipulate the person for approval or pity

 7. Celebrate. Do something nice for yourself. Reward yourself for uncovering and releasing the pain of the emotion. Nourish yourself: Listen to your favorite music; buy yourself a present; eat a delicious meal.

By following these steps when you find your Self reacting strongly to anyone, and by making a commitment to regularly acknowledge gratitude and relinquish all grievances from your heart, you will feel truly emotionally refreshed and rejuvenated.

Balancing your Body Yoga is the union of body, mind and spirit. Yoga is a state of being in which the elements that comprise your biology are in harmony with the elements of the cosmos. In this state, you will experience enhanced emotional, psychological and spiritual wellbeing. In yoga – in union with your spirit- your desires and the desires of nature are one. At the Chopra Center, we teach and certify instructors in the Seven Spiritual Laws of Yoga, a hatha-based practice that brings body-centered restful awareness into each pose or asana. It is based on the book that Dr. Simon and I wrote earlier this year.