A for Ayurveda

Welcome to the "Believe it or Not- That's Incredible India!" series. India is home to some of the most astonishing wonders in the world. The rich culture, heritage, food, scriptures, architectural marvels and scores of known and unknown facts come together to create this multicolored melange that is India. Throughout this month, read about the various believe it or not facts about India and know what goes into the making of this incredible country!

                                                    **************************************

India is one of the world’s oldest civilizations and Ayurveda, the oldest Indian indigenous medicine system. Did you know that the earliest description of Ayurveda is in the Vedas- the Rigveda and the Atharvaveda - which are believed to have been written somewhere between 1200-4000 BC ! The knowledge of Ayurveda has therefore been to known to us for about 3000-6000 years! 

Ayurveda literally translates to ‘the knowledge of long life’- Ayu meaning a long life. Ayurveda combines the knowledge of the natural elements and energies centered in our bodies and the aspect of spirituality with the food that we eat in order to promote a long and healthy life! That is to say, the ancient Indians knew that different kinds of food have the ability to produce different effects on our health. They had a knowledge of a vast number of herbs and roots and had the know-how to prepare drugs based on individual needs.

What's unique to Ayurveda is that it understands that every human body functions differently, and thus each person is treated as per the requirements of their body. The mind and the body are seen as being closely related to each other and the treatment is devised such as to bring about a cure in both these spheres. The body, according to Ayurveda is made up of three elements or energies called- 'vata' (air), 'pitta' (fire and water) and 'kapha' (density –like oil, phlegm). It is believed that foods can increase or decrease the level of these elements in our body and therefore, diet plans are made accordingly. The drugs used for treatment are also concocted from natural sources and thus, side effects are lesser with Ayurveda.

Thus, if a person complained of heartburn, their 'pitta' level was said to be high and the person would not just be prescribed medicines made from natural herbs but also put on a diet of raw vegetables, liquids and cooling herbs like mint to bring down the levels and asked to give up on caffeine and spicy foods. They would be guided to perform certain yoga asanas and make changes in their lifestyle thereby bringing about a holistic cure for their problems.

Modern science would be inclined to agree with that today! 

Isn’t it amazing that the philosophy of mindful eating and using food and natural extracts as a means to cure diseases was known to them so long ago? 

Believe it or not- That’s Incredible India!

When the chips are down...

The month of March has been hellish for me (and it’s not even over!) I’ve been through an emotional roller coaster - one whose motor got switched off when I was mid air, and left me dangling upside-down high up in the air, scared of hurtling down any moment.  I have gasped for breath, literally and figuratively, and have felt the palpitations of my heart reach a crescendo before promising to fall deadly still any moment. I never have felt as beaten as I have been this entire month through.

Source: Pixabay free images

Sometimes, you make choices. You go wrong too. But you don’t realize the enormity of the fault in your choices until it begins to haunt you, stealing the sanity of your being, crushing you under its weight and stopping short of nothing but destroying you completely. I made one such choice. 

And it destroyed me. Almost.

As an outcome of that choice, I struggled for a long time, transitioning between sadness to anger to self-pity to depression. There were days when I cried myself to sleep. My chips were down; confidence at an all-time low. I felt pretty helpless. I hadn’t considered talking to anyone because on the outside it didn’t look like such a big issue at all. I didn’t want them to think I was imagining things or exaggerating my emotions. As days went by, I realized that I had started hurting physically too, migraines, acidity, palpitations, breathlessness and fatigue had begun to overpower my body and I was disoriented most of the time.

I couldn’t go on like this. That is when I decided to speak to someone. No matter what they thought of me later, I decided to speak and let my emotions flow.

I’m glad I did.

I confided in two of my friends and they gave me a patient hearing, comforting me, telling me I wasn’t in the wrong at all, and convincing me that everything would eventually be ok over time. Friends are called friends for a reason, I guess. They really know how to gather your chips and put it back. I haven’t been alone in my struggle ever since.

I have never been the one to share my problems with anyone - thinking that if anyone can help me solve my problems it was me. People have called me the strong one – my family, friends and sometimes even random strangers. Having been on the other side of the problem, doling out advice and lending a comforting shoulder to them, I never thought I’d need it myself someday. Perhaps, I thought I’d be able to handle any lemons that life threw at me. But sometimes…even the healer needs to be healed.

So, why am I ranting about all this here? This is for those who are struggling like me. Those who are close to breaking point but haven’t thought of asking for help. No problem is too big or small - if it’s troubling you, it needs to be addressed. Bottled up feelings and pickled emotions will do you no good. Talk to someone. It may not solve your problem, but it will give you the courage to go on. It will bring back your confidence and assure you that you aren’t alone. And most of the times, that is all it takes to jump out of that seemingly bottomless pit.

Theme Reveal for the A to Z April 2016 challenge.

So... that time of the year is here again! The April A to Z challenge! 

This is my third challenge and I'm pretty excited about doing it this year too! But you know, the thing with being excited is that it becomes tough to zero in on a theme, because you are going round and round with the various themes floating about in your head! I wrote about "Being Positive" during my first challenge and my theme last year was 'Love in its myriad hues' where I took leaves out of mythology to weave my stories. Pretty satisfying that was! 

I wanted to do a mythology theme this year too, but then something caught my attention. 
There are so many things about my country that are so fascinating and that I knew so little about. There was this urge to explore more and dig out things that are amazing about India and yet not much is known about them. What better platform to showcase my country than during this all global challenge!


So...that is my theme for this year - "Believe It or Not- That's Incredibly India. I'm not sure I have posts for all the alphabets, but I wasn't sure about it the last year and the year before that too, but I did manage to get stories for all the alphabets and it worked out in some strange way; I am sure that'll happen this year too! 

By the way, have you signed up for the April A to Z challenge yet? If you haven't, then here's where you can sign up for it. Trust me, this will be a great month of endless reading, writing and getting together! 

See you there, then! 

Freedom at last?

She looked at the dove she held in her hand. The white bird fluttered its wings as if begging to be freed. She had held it captive all these years; letting it go now was difficult. She had fed it lovingly every day with the choicest of grains; sometimes an occasional fruit if she was in the mood for an indulgence. But today, as she opened the cage, and held it in her hand, it still wanted to be free – this was how loyal it could be?

So much for emotions, she sighed.

She thought of all the times she had sung to it. She had even read out passages from Macbeth, enacting little bits, to keep it entertained. It would flap its wings when she'd dance and shake its head in a rhythm when she'd sing. She had shared with it, her joys and her sorrows. She'd imagined it understood everything that she'd say. It would turn round and round on its perch if she was sad, it seemed that it was sad too. It would jump from its little swing to the door of the cage and back and keep repeating it, when she was happy, and she thought that it shared in her happiness. So why did it seem so eager to fly away now? She would never know. 

But now it wanted to go and she wouldn't stop it. It was free to do its bidding. She looked at it one last time and then lifted her hand high above her head and put it out of the window, and then she unclasped her hold over the bird. It hovered outside her window for a few minutes before flying away forever. 

Somehow, it was she who finally felt free.  

60 seconds to life...

It’s a busy Friday morning. People zipping past with extra energy—it’s Friday after all!

I drive along with the traffic from the Ashoka pillar circle to the junction where it meets Hosur road. I need to take a right and an immediate left to Wilson garden. About 10% of the vehicles take that road.

Most vehicles either take a complete right turn towards Hosur or a left towards Lalbagh. There’s a small triangular fenced divider at the junction. That should ideally separate the vehicles moving in either direction so they don’t create a jam. But it doesn’t. Traffic rules are not for people.

Many people (read: rule breakers) who ride two-wheelers prefer to go around the triangular divider taking the road that leads to Lalbagh and wait for the right signal. That way when the signal turns to green, they are the first to zip past towards Hosur road.

Risky. Very risky. Not so much for the rule breakers as for people waiting in the right lane.

But today was different. Or should I say a notch higher.

A BMTC bus decides to overtake from around the divider. No one suspects the bus is heading to the right, because it stands on the left side. The signal turns green and we all take a right turn. Some vehicles including myself will take the first left and move towards Wilson garden. Unexpectedly this huge bus comes hurtling towards the right hitting an auto in the process. The auto hits a biker and the biker hits the rear of my vehicle. In the process, my vehicle is violently jerked to the right, and is almost about to fall to the ground. My leg is stuck trying to break the fall, and I can’t move because the bike has fallen on my vehicle.

The biker is in no hurry to untangle his bike from my vehicle, for he is engaged in a verbal dual with the auto driver. All this while traffic continues to flow unabated. Even as I’m screaming for the biker to lift his vehicle, a bus grazes past my head, just an inch in between. This leaves me so shocked that it takes me an hour to get over the trauma and shivering.

The appalling aspect of the whole incident is that there’s a cop manning the junction. He does nothing. He never does. He just watches lives pass by, maybe sometimes literally.

And yes, by the way, I also cross the junction where the Double road turns towards MG road. There’s a cop who sits under the flyover. People drive atrociously, breaking signals, driving when there’s red light, but he does nothing too. He just sits.

When one drives on Bangalore roads, God alone can save you.