Have you ever asked yourself why you prefer stews in the winter and salads in the summer?

We experience four seasons in our latitude: spring, summer, autumn, and winter.

All seasons place other demands on our bodies, making us behave and feel differently. Ayurveda explains brilliantly why this is the case and how we can harness each season’s strength to stay healthy throughout the year.

A simple introduction to Ayurveda

According to general belief, Ayurveda is complicated. But when focusing on its core principles, it becomes pretty simple. Let’s have a look.

The universe comprises five elements: space, air, fire, water, & earth.

 Each element has specific qualities:

• Space: cold, vast, dry, light, subtle.

• Air: cold, dry, mobile, rough, light, subtle.

• Fire: hot, sharp, light, spreading, slightly oily.

• Water: cool, smooth, heavy, liquid,

• Earth: cold, heavy, slow, slimy, oily, steady.

These elements, with their qualities, form the base for the doshas, the biodynamic energies. 

• Space and air elements = Vata dosha

• Fire and water elements = Pitta dosha

• Earth and water element = Kapha dosha

And, of course, with their respective qualities, these biodynamic energies are present inside our bodies and outside throughout nature.

They filter into the days and divide them into slots of 4 hours during which the different doshas with their qualities are present: 

The same also applies to the seasons:

There is one other fundamental principle in Ayurveda that we need to observe:

We need to balance with the opposite quality.

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How does this apply to our day-to-day life?

For example, if it is cold in the winter, we need to eat and drink warm food and drinks, plus wear warm clothes to balance the cold.

Should we eat cold food and drink cold drinks, we increase the cold quality in our bodies. In return, this leads to Vata-specific imbalances, which are cold hands and feet, feeling anxious, indecisive, bloated, gassy, and constipated; we can experience stiffness in the joints, random aches and pains throughout the body, and lower back issues, just to name a few.

 

How does Ayurveda help us?

Ayurveda is a universal science; it is seasonal, local, and applicable wherever we live. And wherever we are, nature provides the food we need.

Here is a mind-blowing fact:

With her seasonal harvest, Mother Nature provides precisely the food we need to eat to stay balanced!

Yes, let’s repeat it in case you think you’ve misheard: The seasonal harvests where you live right now provide the food you need throughout the different seasons to stay balanced.

It sounded like a simple yet genius miracle when I first learned this.

Before I carry on, let’s look at another piece of relevant information regarding the doshas and the seasons. Ayurveda distinguishes 6 tastes: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, pungent, and astringent.

And you probably guess what comes next: the elements create the base for the different tastes as well:

• Sweet – earth & water.

• Sour – fire & earth.

• Salty – water & fire.

• Bitter – air & ether.

• Pungent – fire & air.

• Astringent – air & earth.

We balance the qualities of the seasons by introducing tastes of the opposite quality.

How does this work in the Seasons?

Spring is governed by Kapha dosha, the earth and water elements. Now, looking back to applying the opposite principle to stay balanced. For Kapha, the opposite/balancing tastes are bitter, pungent, and astringent, as its own/unbalancing tastes are sweet, sour, and salty.

During the summer, governed by Pitta dosha, fire and water elements, the same/unbalancing tastes, so the ones to avoid are sour, salty and pungent. The opposites are needed to balance sweet, bitter, and astringent.

Autumn and winter are Vata dosha, space and air elements. Its own, to avoid, tastes are bitter, pungent, and astringent. The opposites, to favour, are sweet, salty, and sour.

Returning to nature’s harvests, in the spring, the first edible plants are nettles, dandelions, and rocket salad. They are all bitter in taste, just what we need. The crop is sparse, which benefits us as we must let go of the additional weight we put on during the nourishing winter months.

The summer harvest offers an abundance of berries, juicy, soft fruits, cucumbers, leafy green veg, salads, asparagus, and zucchini, just to name a few, to keep us cool and hydrated.

Likewise, in the autumn, we have sweet apples, bears, grapes, the main grains, potatoes, and sweet and dense root vegetables to make tasty stews, balancing the light and dry qualities of autumn and winter.

Change of Seasons

As seen above, with the seasons, the tastes change too, which leaves our digestion the most vulnerable; we need to change from one set of tastes and food to something different. Temperatures fall or rise, and it gets more windy, dry, or damp.

Ayurveda has identified these transitional times as when we need to eat light or cleanse the body to free up energy for the change and to digest and eliminate Ama, toxins resulting from half-digested food that we have accumulated in the body. That makes the winter/spring change the most important for cleansing the body.

We must nourish our bodies during the autumn/winter to create resilience against the cold. Sometimes, we might nourish more than needed and move less through the cold and dark months, resulting in a few pounds more than planned. So spring is the time to shed the excess weight and cleanse our body of Ama.

During these transitional times, we stay light and eat food that our body can digest easily, such as rice, dal, and leafy green vegetables. We sip hot water throughout the day, drink ginger-lemon tea (ginger helps to digest Ama, and the lemon helps to flush it out), and stay clear of alcohol, caffeine, meat, cake, chocolate, you know, the culprits.

As mentioned above, these days are of eating easy-to-digest and nourishing food, vegetables that help to clear the system, and spices to stimulate the digestive fire and help to digest the toxins.

Ayurveda is clear in its recommendations and why. Understanding and acting on these basic principles helps us stay healthy and bounce back faster.

How Seasonal Living Reduces Stress

You might say, well, that sounds all good, but how does it help me to reduce stress?

Well, glad you asked?

Uncertainty naturally increases our stress levels. In a day-to-day situation, this can be as simple as not knowing what to cook in the evening or what to shop for or prepare.

The seasons come and go, no fail. Ok, they might shift now more than a few decades ago, but the elements and their qualities will always stay the same. Therefore, the principles mentioned above always remain the same.

For example, we are in the winter, moving towards spring. You know the harvest is sparse, and you need to eat food with predominantly bitter, pungent and astringent tastes. That is an excellent opportunity to reduce weight if required, to move more and faster. You can plan your days accordingly and plan your meals ahead of time so you know what to shop, prepare, and when.

Compare the above scenario with this one when you ask the daily question: “What’s cooking today?” Should you get an answer, you might not have the right ingredients at home, so you or your kids might not be happy; maybe some readymade meal will do or order in to keep everyone happy.

Mealtimes can be stressful, so this is one way to eliminate this stress factor.

Another is more on the physical side. You now know that eating seasonal food keeps you healthy. Eating out of season stresses your body. When you eat salads during the winter and spring months to feed into the cold qualities of both Vata and Kapha (the same attributes will unbalance them). As a result, you experience bloating, constipation, restlessness, regular colds and coughs etc. This stresses the body and impacts the immune system.

Eating regular processed food creates inflammation, which stresses the body.

Final Thoughts

In wrapping up, adopting an Ayurvedic approach to sync with the seasonal cycles presents a gentle, yet effective strategy for enhancing our health. It's about making small, mindful adjustments to our diet and lifestyle that resonate with the changing environment, fostering a natural equilibrium within our bodies. The idea of balancing the doshas by choosing foods that nature provides seasonally is not only intuitive but also accessible. It invites us to listen to our bodies and respond with nourishment that suits the current season. As we learn to embrace the shifts in nature, we also discover a path to a more balanced and peaceful state of being, minimizing stress and enhancing our overall vitality.

Moreover, the stress-reducing benefits of living in tune with the seasons cannot be overstated. In a world where constant change is the norm, finding stability in the natural cycles provides a comforting predictability that can significantly lower our stress levels. By aligning our eating habits and lifestyle choices with the rhythm of the seasons, we reduce the guesswork and decision fatigue associated with daily living. This seasonal blueprint not only simplifies our choices but also supports our body's natural inclinations, leading to a smoother internal balance and reduced physiological stress. In essence, seasonal living acts as a guide, offering a structured yet flexible approach to well-being that reduces stress and promotes a sense of harmony and ease.

So, in short:

• Eating seasonal food keeps the body naturally balanced, which reduces stress.

• Avoiding processed food avoids inflammation in the body, which reduces stress.

These are reasons to reduce unnecessary stress and easy to eliminate.

Have you learned something new? Can you relate to it? Let me know. You can leave a message below, on Instagram, Facebook or even good old email.

I love hearing from you! 

Katja x

 

P.S. After seasonal living, healthy eating habits are the next on the importance ladder.