Michael Riversong and Ayurveda????

[Guest guest]

Michael,

I would love to learn more on Ayurveda body types - with what little I know I am thinking I am a "Kapha" type. I am doing a search on the net but thought maybe you could point me in a good direction. I am also curious as to where in the wilds of Wyoming you are??? I am in Eastern Utah in the Duchesne area and can really relate to those wild winds we have had recently.

 

Patricia Howard

[Guest guest]

Learning about Ayurveda can be difficult. I first got into it through a

seminar by Deepak Chopra which was given at the Mile Hi Church of Religious

Science, i believe about 1990. This was just before he broke with the

Transcendental Meditation organization and went off the deep end into New

Age spiritual babble. If you can find any books of his written before then,

those are good. His tape set, " Weight Loss " has the basic principles in a

practical form.

 

Dr. Vasant Lad is much better. Any books or tapes by him that you can find

will be good. Before studying his material it is best to have a good

working knowledge of basic human anatomy and physiology.

 

I also had the privilege of private conversations with a couple of Ayurvedic

practitioners and students in the Denver/Boulder area, and some of these

people may still be giving seminars. I would recommend John Douillard highly.

 

I haven't checked out Web resources on this subject. What little i've found

so far, is sites where you have to pay a lot to take online courses. These

are easy to find.

 

The biggest problem with Ayurveda is its psychosocial component. The

history of Hinduism has included many gurus who were teaching what may be

called early forms of psychology. These people have seriously muddied the

field by combining solid medical knowledge with these unprovable and often

destructive doctrines. Still, to some degree the psychological typing that

goes along with body types does work. But only to a degree, since

individuals vary so widely due to other factors, including upbringing. Of

course upbringing in India is very different from anything we experience in

the USA. Certain emotions, especially anger and hatred, must never be

demonstrated in public, although it is considered acceptable nowadays in

some quarters to go with a mob and destroy the shrine of some other religion

or the house of someone who practices Islam or Christianity. That's a new

development, which is greatly disturbing. It is my impression that

currently, due to the caste system, Ayurvedic medicine is only available to

some members of the highest castes, and is not part of the common knowledge

of most inhabitants of India. Most people i meet from India, who are

necessarily of medium to high caste levels, know nothing about it.

 

My cabin is 25 miles west of Cheyenne, where the trees begin on the way to

Vedauwoo. The winds can get really heavy here -- in fact when i moved here

there was a basketball backboard attached to a power pole, but it blew off a

couple of years later, damaging the door to my pickup truck. Last night the

winds stopped, and we got a little snow, which is very welcome, even if it's

still not enough to ski on.

 

At 09:48 PM 1/13/02 -0700, you wrote:

>Michael,

> I would love to learn more on Ayurveda body types - with what little I

know I am thinking I am a " Kapha " type. I am doing a search on the net but

thought maybe you could point me in a good direction. I am also curious as

to where in the wilds of Wyoming you are??? I am in Eastern Utah in the

Duchesne area and can really relate to those wild winds we have had recently.

>

>Patricia Howard