What is Vyayama (Physical Exercise) in Ayurveda?
Have you ever worked out and left feeling as though something was not quite right? Perhaps you followed a fitness routine that worked for you in the past, but this time it leaves you feeling restless and anxious. In Ayurveda, vyayama (physical exercise in Sanskrit) is not seen as one size fits all, and the type of exercise that best suits our needs can change over time. One’s dosha composition, lifestyle, and age, as well as other factors such as the season, determine which type of vyayama will be beneficial for you.
Purpose and benefits of Vyayama in Ayurveda
Vyayama is first mentioned in the Charaka Samhita, Ayurveda’s oldest medical text, in the 1st millennium BCE. While yoga is suggested for the mind, body, and soul, vyayama is suggested for the body. In this text, vyayama is outlined as capable of curing or minimizing over twenty types of kaphaja (phlegm) related diseases, as well as obesity and diabetes. Not only can vyayama help in the process of healing and recovering from disease through boosting immunity, but it can also contribute greatly to the quality of life in balancing out the properties of mind, body, and spirit.
Vyayama brings bodily strength and stability, increasing one’s capacity for physical activity. It stimulates the digestive system and increases metabolism, and can help alleviate constipation and gas within the body. Vyayama can act as a natural sleep aid, increasing the quality of one’s sleep and preventing the development of insomnia and inflammation due to a sedentary lifestyle. Proper implementation of vyayama can foster stability, lightness, and positive self-esteem in oneself. It prevents stress and depression and improves overall mental health. Through consistent and appropriate integration of vyayama into your life, exercise can become a tool for alleviating the impurities within the doshas and contributing to your growth and development as a complete and multidimensional being.
Vata-Balancing Vyayama Practices
Those who are vata dominant or have a vata imbalance benefit from more gentle and restful forms of vyayama. Oftentimes, those with high vata dosha constitutions will gravitate towards intense and topical movements, which often lead to dryness due to perspiration, exhaustion (being quick to tire), muscle weakness, and anxiety. As such, a gentler and more restorative approach to working out, such as yoga, qi-gong, or going on walks, is encouraged.
Pitta-Balancing Vyayama Practices
Those who are pitta dominant or have a pitta imbalance benefit from more cooling, slow, and calming forms of vyayama. Oftentimes, those with high pitta dosha constitutions will gravitate towards endurance sports and competitive sports. This can lead to excess heat in the body, so cooler activities such as water sports, surfing, and vinyasa yoga can cool down hot energies while still providing opportunities to practice focus and engagement within exercising.
Kapha-Balancing Vyayama Practices
Those who are kapha dominant or have a kapha imbalance benefit from more rigorous and activating forms of vyayama. Oftentimes, those with high kapha dosha constitutions will gravitate towards calmer, slower activities. This can lead to lethargy and weight gain, so taking part in more social, spontaneous, and high-energy activities such as dancing, hiking, kickboxing, and other aerobic exercises and team sports can help foster movement and fit into one’s daily routine.
Preventing Injury in your Vyayama Practice
To decrease injury or overextension from exercising, we must avoid long periods of inactivity. Instead of sitting for long periods of time due to work, driving, or watching TV or scrolling social media, take breaks to stretch your limbs and move your hips, offering opportunities for the muscles and joints to decompress and preventing stiffness or energetic stagnation. Downward, upward dog, as well as cat-cow are great yoga poses to try in order to keep the joints loose and lubricated.
What to Eat for a Balanced Vyayama Practice
Eating foods that complement the type of vyayama you are doing is essential to maintaining a healthy vyayama practice.
If you are engaging in rigorous vyayama practices such as weight lifting or other forms of personal training, it is important to incorporate high protein and good fats into your diet. This is to provide you with the proper nutrients needed to build muscle. For a post-workout meal, you can eat healthy fats such as avocado and cook with oils such as coconut oil, ghee, avocado oil, and olive oil. Animal proteins such as chicken and salmon are great ways to incorporate protein into your post-workout diet. Salmon is particularly great, as it is not only a good source of protein, but is also rich in omega-3 fatty acids.
When engaging in more gentle and restorative vyayama practices, post-workout meals that match the season and incorporate healthy fats are great. Since it is pitta season, now is a wonderful time to have a light, cooling post-workout smoothie with seasonal fruits, and incorporate healthy fats such as avocado or Greek yogurt into your smoothie mix.
When to Eat for a Balanced Vyayama Practice
When you are hungry or thirsty, it is not the right time to exercise. Make sure to stay on top of your health by eating at consistent mealtimes and exercising within appropriate time frames in between meals. Do not eat at least an hour before exercising. Never exercise on a full stomach, as this can lead to indigestion, causing uncomfortable and dangerous symptoms such as vomiting and stunting the full purification process of vyayama. Wait at least 30 minutes before eating after vyayama.
When is the wrong time for Vyayama?
Just as it is important to know what to provide ourselves in order to maintain a healthy and beneficial vyayama practice, knowing when it is best to take a break from exercise is just as important. Never work out while you are overly stressed or overly emotional (angry, feeling deep senses of grief, anxious, etc.). Working out while in an emotionally or mentally heightened state can aggravate the vata and pitta dosha, where vyayama only further inflames the heat created by these mental and emotional states. It is also important to avoid engaging in vyayama while you are tired, hungry, or thirsty. This can also aggravate and cause imbalances within the vata and pitta dosha. We want to be in cool, calm states of mind, while being well rested and well fed before entering a vyayama practice.
