Modify the Cause: An Ayurvedic Strategy for Preventing Illness

Modify the cause. Potential causes of illness and imbalance are constantly arising, both within us and on the outside. The weather is changing, our surroundings are changing, our thoughts and feelings are changing, and stressful situations are coming and going. In response to these changes, we have to act skillfully.

As the Bhagavad Gita says, “Skill in action is called yoga.” I have to be smart enough to know my previous history and to learn from it. When I eat garbanzos, I get a stomachache, so this time I should not eat them. Or if there is nothing to eat except garbanzos, then I can add cumin powder, ghee, and a little mustard seed, and it will be suitable for me to eat. The garbanzos’ dry, light vatagenic effect will be modified by the moist, oily ghee and the warming spices.

A substantial part of the Ayurvedic pharmacy is the Ayurvedic art of cooking. Adding specific seasonings changes the property of food and can cause a “forbidden” food, one that might have provoked imbalance, to become acceptable. Some people, for example, are sensitive to potatoes. Potatoes give them gas and little aches and pains in the muscles and around the joints.

But if they peel off the skin and sauté the potato with ghee and a little turmeric, mustard seed, cumin powder, and cilantro, it mitigates the vata-provoking property of the potato and the body can then handle it. One can take action to modify the cause; the body’s response will be different, and that particular causative factor will not have an adverse effect. This principle applies equally well to psychological factors. You may know that watching violent movies upsets you and gives you nightmares.

The violent imagery disturbs your doshic balance, provoking anxiety and fear. You have observed this happening to you; the next time you are confronted with the “opportunity” to subject yourself to a violent movie, you can just say no. It keeps coming down to the same central issue: consciousness, awareness, finding out, “What is my role in this situation? What do I know?