The Secret of Your Body’s Blueprint: Discovering Ayurveda

Transcript generated by AI:

Elizabeth Winkler: 0:16

Welcome to this other within an hour to be a little bit of a bit more as we are unique.

davidji: 1:04

Hi, davidji Oh, hello there, Elizabeth.

Elizabeth Winkler: 1:07

So today I really would love to hear from you on a topic you know so much about Ayurveda. Oh. Mm-hmm. Are you okay with that? Yeah. Okay, good.

davidji: 1:19

I love Ayurveda.

Elizabeth Winkler: 1:20

So there’s all these different ways that Ayurveda is framed, and I think it’s really helpful for people to understand. And so I’m really gonna let you lead on this because you are the expert.

davidji: 1:33

Well, for those of you who’ve been interested in Ayurveda, and it’s perhaps the oldest healing system on the planet, certainly in the top few. We’re going back at least 3,500 to 5,000 years. And Ayurveda has its foundations in two words. It comes from two Sanskrit roots, Ayus, which means life, and Veda, which means wisdom. We get the word wisdom from the Sanskrit word Veda, visdom. Pretty amazing. There’s so many words that we get in the English language, and they’re from Sanskrit. We always think, oh, it’s got to be Greek or Latin, but Sanskrit really is foundational. And I’ll talk about a few more of these. But the premise of Ayurveda is that modern Western science believes that health is the absence of disease. So let’s say you’re experiencing something like fibromyalgia or MS or lupus, pick a diagnosis. Let’s say you’re experiencing that. You have all these tests and nothing shows up. So the doctor’s response is, I guess you’re good to go. Because it’s the absence of disease. Ayurveda believes that health is physical and emotional balance and integration. And that’s really, really powerful because the fractal of it, the starting point of this ancient healing uh tradition, is really about balance and integration. And all that mind-body stuff that we talk about has its foundations in ancient Ayurveda. So whether we think of that as the wisdom of life or the science of life, this ancient healing principle and teaching, and we can go back thousands of years. There’s books on brain surgery. Imagine this. The Charaka Samhita has brain surgery, how to perform it in these ancient Ayurvedic texts. There’s so much deep stuff in there. And the premise of Ayurveda is that the universe was created. Everyone’s got their creation story, whether God created the universe in six days, and on the seventh day he rested, or whether it’s in Hindu that Brahma is in the process of exhaling right now, and that’s how the entire world it’s been going on for several hundred million years. It’s a long exhale. And so maybe that’s how we know the Big Bang Theory. You know, everyone’s got their stories. Ayurveda says in the beginning, there was space. Space. What does space do? It just hangs out. It just holds space. But after billions of years, even space, even space wanted to experience itself. Wanted to sort of kind of hold up the mirror and check itself out. And so it began to move. Damn, check it out. And that movement created air. And air started moving through the cosmos. Right? This is just hanging out with space for billions of years. Suddenly there’s this movement here. It moved more quickly and more quickly and more quickly, and that air ultimately kept bumping into itself, and that created a little friction, which then sparked fire. And as fire raged through the cosmos and it licked the walls which had been freezing cold because there was no heat prior to fire being birthed, and condensation started dripping down the walls of the galaxies, which created water. And then as that water began to accumulate and crystallize, it became earth. And so Ayurveda is based on this premise that space, air, fire, water, and earth were all created in the beginning. And because of that, just like we know that the earth is made up of the same stardust that was in some supernova that exploded four and a half billion years ago, and we know that we’re made up of that same stardust, the premise of Ayurveda, and Ayurveda said this five thousand years ago, is that you and me and everyone listening right now is made up of these five master elements. In Sanskrit, they’re called the Maha Budas, the master elements, the great elements. And so space, air, fire, water, earth. And the premise is that when you were conceived, some divine hand sprinkled a little bit of space, air, fire, water, earth into what your organic makeup would be. And because it’s a little sprinkle, uh mine’s a little different than yours. And the next person’s, and the next person’s, and the next person. We all have these five master elements space, air, fire, water, earth. And here’s a cool thing. In Sanskrit, there’s about fourteen different words for fire. One of those words is Agni, Agni, and we get the word ignite ignition from that ancient Sanskrit word, Agni. So suddenly we start to realize so much of our world really is resting on the foundation of Sanskrit. Let’s take Ayurveda a little further. So you and I have different sprinklings of these five master elements, and Ayurveda says, if you have a concentration of space and air, we would call you like an airy type, a spacey type. And if you have a little concentration of fire, we would say you’re probably pretty fiery. And if you have a concentration of water and earth, we would say you’re pretty earthy. That’s how mud is created from that combination. So each of these elements has very, very cool translations and understandings outside of us and inside of us. So I’ll just share this component. I could talk about Ayurveda for a couple of months, Elizabeth. You didn’t know that you would unleash it. I’m loving this.

Elizabeth Winkler: 8:02

I’m just sitting back and listening. I love it.

davidji: 8:05

All right. So every one of these has an expression externally and an expression internally. So space. What’s space? Outside of our bodies, space is actually in every single atom. If you looked at an atom, it’s 99% space, 1% matter. So this microphone that I’m speaking into, the chair that I’m sitting on, technically 99% space. And inside of us, space is represented by all the hollow parts, right? Our nasal cavity, our stomach, you know, all the different hollow aspects of who we are. Air, outside of our bodies, it’s represented by the wind, the gentle breeze, or the wild hurricanes or tornadoes inside of our bodies, it’s represented by our own breath. Fire outside of our bodies, represented by the sun, which fuels everything on the planet. Inside of our bodies, we have this inner fire. Like what’s the thing? Think about this. What is the thing that keeps our body at like 98 degrees? How’s that even possible? How could your body and my body both be around the same degrees? We ate different things, we’re from different places, we’re wearing different things, but some people are more fiery than others. They’ve got all the five master elements, but some people are more fiery. So outside of our body, it’s the sun inside of our body, it’s that digestive fire that’s inside of us. And that fire, that digestive fire, is called Agni. Water outside of our bodies, it’s represented by the 72% of our planet, that is, oceans and rivers and rain, which it’s all being recirculated. And inside of our body, we are about the same thing, about 72% water. The synovial fluid that’s in our joints, our heart is in this bath of liquid called the pericardium. Our brain is sitting in a bath of liquid. So suddenly we realize there’s a lot of water going through me outside and inside. And Earth, Earth is represented outside of us by the hard parts of the planet that we walk upon, the ground right now that we’re standing on. And inside of us, Earth is represented by the hard parts of us, the solid parts, our bones, our muscles, the non-hollow parts. So the premise is that Ayurveda’s outside of us and it’s inside of us, and it’s flowing in every moment, and everything. This room has a certain blend of that. And when something has a high concentration of either space and air, right? What is space all about? Space is all about infinite possibilities. It’s just space. What’s air about? Movement. What’s fire about? Transformation. What’s water about? It’s protection. What’s earth about? Its stability. And so you can mush all these elements together and they create each one of us in our own special and unique way. And that’s just mind-blowing. Right? It’s just so spectacular. It’s so beautiful. And so Ayurveda, because it’s a healing system, we can say, oh, you’re supposed to be based on your mind-body constitution, your little blend of these five master elements. This is what your predilection is. So if someone is fiery, we know that person, they’re moving from point A to point B. They’re probably a really good leader, but they can also scorch the village when they’re out of balance. We look at an airy person, they’re very, very creative. They like to move, they’re lighthearted, they like to move through the world. But a little too much air, and they can become squirrel, squirrel, squirrel, squirrel, squirrel. And if you don’t know what that is, you know, distracted. Distracted, overwhelmed, confused. And earth people, uh, they can be earthy, steady, reliable, consistent. A little too much, you start growing roots. A little too much after that, start getting needy. A little too much after that, you’re stuck on the couch for a month. And so we can really look at each of these those are called doshas. The air principle, the fire principle, and the earth principle. They’re called doshas. Essentially, that’s our natural, basic nature. It doesn’t mean we have to be like that, but that’s pretty much from that little sprinkling and that combination of all those five elements, that’s pretty much what it’s become. So you can put people in boxes and say, oop, that’s definitely a fire person. Oh, that’s definitely an air person. Oh, that’s definitely an earth person. And we could use Sanskrit too to confuse you even more. The air people are called vata, the fire people are called pitta, and the earth people are called kafa. And of course, some of us are, well, I’m I’m sort of like a combination of two of them, and we call that bi doshik. And then there’s people who are like, they’re like an even blend of all three, and we call them tri-doshik. So there’s some famous people who are tri-doshik, and just so you can try to understand that, uh, we would say Oprah, tri-doshik. We would say Barack Obama, Tridoshik. And again, I’m not trying to label people, but it means they have an equal blend of all these components in there. So right now, you might want to be thinking, we’ll put the Dosha quiz on our page so you can take this quiz and find out what’s your mind-body personality. But right now you might be thinking, oh yeah, I’m pretty fiery, or I’m pretty spacey, or I’m pretty airy, or I’m pretty creative, or I’m pretty steady. And of course, we need all three of these energies in our life. If everyone in the family was just fire people, the apartment would burn down. And if everybody was just earth people, everybody’d be sitting on the couch all day and all night. And if everybody was just air people, they’d all be like, oh, let me read this poem to you. Oh, I just wrote this thing. Let’s go dancing. Let’s move here. Let’s do this. Let’s do that. Oh, look, there’s a squirrel. Oh, look at that cloud. It’s moving across. Hey, I’m cold. I’m hot. Uh, I love those shoes. Oh, I love my shoes. Hey, what’s going on? And so we’ve all we’ve been giving Vata a bad name. I’m very Vada. No, but just remember, just remember, when they are balanced, they are rock star creators. They are the creative people of the planet. You look at most of the artists or actors or musicians, they have a large amount of vata. They’ve got a lot of space and air because they need that creativity, and that’s what’s sparking inside of them. But like anything else, a little too much. Don’t get defensive, Elizabeth. You’re just right. So is that a Oh, it’s amazing.

Elizabeth Winkler: 15:11

I mean, I love it. I’m taking notes, of course. So one thing I’ve learned, because I’m like Vada Pitta, I think my my least is kava. If you’re looking at like your business and you’re very Vada, I’m speaking about myself. So it serves me best to have someone who assists me or helps me who’s more kha, right? Because they’re very like grounded and they can bring things into, you know, I have creative ideas. I get like these ideas out of nowhere. And then I can see it, but I need someone to help me bring that into material world, right?

davidji: 15:44

So this is just like chakra stuff. You know, the second chakra is the creative chakra, but it’s just creating. And on its own, it doesn’t do anything with that creativeness. Right. With that creativity. And that’s why the Manipura chakra, the solar plexus chakra, that takes the creative nature of the second chakra, locks it down, gets it done, follows through.

Elizabeth Winkler: 16:08

Yeah. So I do have a question because I did feel like totally younger before I was meditating regularly. I was not, I did not feel like a grounded person. And when I started regular meditation, that completely shifted. So I felt more grounded in my body, more coffee in my body. So I feel like my dosha changed a bit. Now, so is that something that happens that people, as they take a dosha quiz, it’ll change over time. It’s not like a solid thing. Yes?

davidji: 16:39

Your dosha never changes. That’s a beautiful thing. You are born, well, you are con you are conceived, born through your teens, 20s, 30s, 50s, 70s. Your basic nature stays the same. However, as we move through different stages of life, specifically with women, pre-menopause, perimenopause, menopause, postmenopause, you know, the the where the your physiology and oh Ayurveda says, oh, just a temporary imbalance. By the way, easy, easy for Ayurveda to say that. Um they’re not living it. You know, they’re not living the the the upset or the surprises uh of changing that. But the premise is that we are pretty much conceived and die as the same dosha. However, all of us start with a little more khafa, a little more earth and water in us, and as we move through life, we move towards uh vata. So we become drier, we become um less grounded. You know, if you look at like you know, take a a a little baby, you know, whose you know, babies are moist and clammy and cute and peeing all over themselves and all that kind of stuff. And your basic nature changes as you grow up and you move towards that, but still within along the spectrum of your basic nature. So I look at you and I would think that you are vata pitta.

Elizabeth Winkler: 18:20

Yes.

davidji: 18:21

And a vata pitta is someone vata, you have all that creative energy, but the pitta aspect of you is the part that says, let’s go, step into my power, let’s keep moving. And so it’s uh it’s a beautiful combination. And yes, you could be out of balance in both of those areas. You know, if you’re out of balance in vata, then you’re gonna be a little overwhelmed, or you’re gonna Or all over the place. Starting a whole bunch of things and never finishing anything.

Elizabeth Winkler: 18:49

Oh, I don’t know anything about that.

davidji: 18:50

Right.

Elizabeth Winkler: 18:52

But you know Francesca can attest.

davidji: 18:54

But I’m sitting here right but I’m sitting here right now in front of all your little lemon stickers, just gonna like peel through these. Where’s love and forgiveness? Maybe, maybe not. This too shall pass. Let me be. I can handle this. I have a choice. I’m fine with it. Let your thought be a drop of water. You are on a planet. These are all little stickers, reminders. These would be very helpful for vatas when they forget that they have suddenly spun out. We all start off grounded and balanced. But it’s the breeze that pushes us all out of balance. It’s vata that pushes everyone out of balance. So let’s say you’re a vata, all right? Let’s say you’re a vata pitta and you’re primarily space and air based. Well, introduce a whole bunch of airy things and you’re gonna get overwhelmed.

Elizabeth Winkler: 19:46

Aaron Powell So airy things would be things such as conversation, what what more topics.

davidji: 19:51

If I said to you, okay, Elizabeth, these are the 100 topics that we’re gonna talk about on the podcast today, you would totally freak out. Right? And uh someone who’s a coffee would say, Oh, a hundred things, let me put them in their hundred little baskets and organize that entire thing. And right, but coffers aren’t known for their creativity. Vatas are known for their creativity, which is why you need all these other people in your life to pick up the slack where you are not excelling or where you might be vulnerable. So vata people, airy people, I think you told me that you’re gonna be traveling a lot over the next six months. You know, like you know, that’s so vata deranging. It’s the worst possible thing any vata could do. But don’t worry, I’ve got like some really great tools for you to use while you while you’re doing that. So number so this is for not just vatas, but especially vatas. If you’re gonna be on planes and if you’re gonna be crossing the country or doing stuff, and you mentioned to me like five different trips that you’re taking, number one, you must meditate on the plane. Number two, if you have like an old school watch, then you need to wind it, keep you in the current time as you move through the various time zones. It’ll help keep you present. And if you have a setting on your phone that just says, just give me the time zone whenever it is, that’s really, really helpful. So whenever you look at your laptop or or your your tablet or your or your phone, you’re in the current time. Whatever that time is, as you’re flying over it. And the third thing is you need to drink your weight in water in ounces.

Elizabeth Winkler: 21:30

So I drink so much liquid. Is that a very vada thing? Is that something that we are inherently dry?

davidji: 21:38

So it’s good. It’s good.

Elizabeth Winkler: 21:39

You should just that’s a way to balance the vada. Okay, got it.

davidji: 21:43

Yeah. I mean, we think space and air. What’s the qualities of space and air? Um it’s essentially like being on a plane and hurtling through space with air being blown on you. There is nothing more drying. And space and air have no heat of their own. There’s no right, there’s no heat in space. I just read this article that they’re going to start putting all these AI computers into space because they don’t need cooling. Because it’s so cold in space that, you know, here, any type of computer or data bank, they need constant cooling mechanisms, air cooling, water cooling to keep, you know, the computers and the chips from frying. Put everything in space, everything’s nice and cool. But that’s the downside of someone like you, someone like me, who’s a little hotter. I’m primarily pizza.

Elizabeth Winkler: 22:36

But speak to that.

davidji: 22:37

You know, so my basic nature is that I’m hot. Your basic nature is your hands are gonna be.

Elizabeth Winkler: 22:43

Yeah, so if your hands are cold, so like I have to do it.

davidji: 22:46

Cold hands, cold tush, cold nose.

Elizabeth Winkler: 22:48

I get numb. My hands get numb and my yeah.

davidji: 22:51

So Classic Vata. Classic vata. Classic vata. Yeah. My hands have never been numb in my entire life. You know, I can I can cook an an omelette on my palm. You know. So we’re all different. I’ve actually taught Ayurveda at companies like Pepsi and ATT as a team building.

Elizabeth Winkler: 23:13

It’s great.

davidji: 23:14

It’s team building. They don’t they didn’t know what was gonna happen. It’s fantastic. I taught it at Bank America. Yeah. It’s just fascinating. We realize it helps you understand the real diverse nature of people. And this is not about racial diversity or gender diversity. This goes even deeper. Yeah. This is your elemental. This is elemental diversity. And so it’s so, so powerful.

Elizabeth Winkler: 23:37

And it reminds me of astrology because astrology is the same thing, you know, like I’m an air sign, by the way. I’m an Aquarius, which is an air sign. But my rising sign is Earth, Taurus, and my moon sign is air. So I’m double air, which is Vada, right? And then I have some Earth, which help is good. But then there’s all these other things, you know, all your all your planets are in different signs. So you can also look at it through the eyes of astrology and see if you go on astro.com and put your information in, there’s a little box and it shows it has like an F for fire, a W for water, and E for Earth and A for air. And you can look at how many things you have in air, how many things you have in fire, how many things you have. Yeah. So that shows you where you are dominant. It would be interesting to look at that and see if you’re curious, you could do that.

davidji: 24:29

Yeah. I mean, I had limited my self-definitions to pitta taurus type a New Yorker. Now that I’ve revealed that I have to move, you know, because it’s it’s it’s too much. It’s so intense. But through the practices of meditation, through the teachings of Buddhism and Vedanta and the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, I’ve actually been able to ground myself, even knowing that my basic nature is fire. But you see this? I’m pointing a malabide. No. Pittas are never supposed to wear red.

Elizabeth Winkler: 25:10

Yes.

davidji: 25:10

Ever, under any circumstance. But these are red coral. And because they’re from the ocean, that actually takes fire off of me and absorbs it into that. I know you’re thinking this is definitely kooky and woo-woo. But someone with a fiery nature can balance. And then they only get the best part of the fire. Someone with an airy nature can balance, and then they only get the best part, the creativity of the air. And someone with a coffee nature, earth and water, you know, can balance that. And they are steady, they’re loyal, they’re reliable. So suddenly we realize, wow, if I can have a steady, loyal, and reliable person, and I could have a fiery person who just is a great leader and just empowered and moving forward without stepping on everybody’s toes. And if I can have a creative in the mix, that’s the dream team.

Elizabeth Winkler: 26:06

Yeah.

davidji: 26:07

That’s the dream team. And that’s why, you know, we we really don’t speak about this enough that this is why diversity is so important in businesses, in the family unit, in the people that you surround yourself with, because when we can have it all, what can’t we do? When we can have all those levers to pull. Malcolm Gladwell, in his book, The Tipping Point, writes about this. Of course, he doesn’t call it Ayurveda, and he doesn’t call it Vata Pitta Kafka. He refers to the Vata energy as connectors. These are the people who are always looking to connect. They love being with people. We could call them the most extreme extroverts. He refers to that pitta energy as the energy of the sales person. And that’s the person who’s always trying to compel or convince with their words. And he views the kaffa as the person who he refers to it as the maven. It’s the expert. But they’re not moving anywhere, they’re not traveling anywhere, but they are the font of all the expertise. So he says, when you can get that level, connectors, those would be your marketing people, salespeople, those would be your salespeople, and mavens, that would be your knowledge base of your organization. Then you can have all three of those things. And he says, if you’ve got all three in even amounts, that’s the Rockstar team. Yeah. And you could look at your family this way, and I tell people, don’t do dosha quizzes for other people. Right. Because and tell them about it. You might want to do it by without ever telling them. But don’t do it like on your partner and go, honey, I just checked what your dosha was. Right. You know, because there’s so much assumption that goes into that. It’s so funny. Hay House was the publisher of my first three books. There used to be a lot of like Hay House events. And you know, Hay House, whenever you go to Hay House, there’s lots of people who channel, and there’s lots of people who are, I don’t know, it’s a kooky tribe. You know, not everybody who’s a Hay House author is is is kooked out. But there’s people who are talking to angels, and there’s people who are creating Oracle cards. And so I was at this party, and I think there were like 15 of us Hay House authors, and then like, I don’t know, another like 500 people. And this woman comes up to me and she says, Oh, I read your book, Secrets of Meditation. And I said, Oh, it’s that’s great. And I leaned my hand forward to shake her hand, and I shook her hand, and my hand, you know, is about a thousand degrees, and her hand was an ice cube, and she said, Well, you know, this is a party. There’s all these psychics and clairvoyance here. Are you that? I can, you know, I can see Auras and I’m fairly, you know, sensitive. But in this moment, I figured, all right, let me lean in. And I went, Oh, and I’m still holding her hand at this point. You know, I’m like, hmm, hmm. I said, Well, I know that you haven’t pooped in a week. And she’s like, Oh my God. And she grabs her uh husband, who he’s a Marine, and he was like in military garb, and I’m like, oh great. Now this Marine’s gonna kick my ass, you know. And she goes, Honey, honey, even he knew that I haven’t pooped in a week. And I’m like, and cold nose, cold tush? She’s like, Yes, how did you know? And I said, and you have a very, very tender digestion? She’s like, Yes, how could you know this? You’re channeling everything. And really, I was just sharing.

Elizabeth Winkler: 29:33

Because she’s a Vada. She’s a Vada. I said cold hands.

davidji: 29:35

Yeah, her hands were so cold that I just went down, you know, the list. Yeah, the list. Like Pittas. Pitta’s our our stomachs are not tender. We can eat rocks and cans. We’re like goats. You know, it doesn’t even matter. But a Vata’s belly, no, you need to be very, very kind to that belly. But it was just like a really hilarious moment. I love it. And she was like, oh my God, you’re the most psychic person I ever met in my life. And I was like, Well, takes all kinds. And me and really I had just written Secrets of Meditation, so I hadn’t even ventured into that, into that world.

Elizabeth Winkler: 30:08

So I want to bring something up that I learned when we did when I did your Masters of Wisdom teacher training. We talked about Ayurveda. We learned a lot about Ayurveda. That’s why I wanted to talk about it, because this is so such a wealth of information. So you taught the teaching is that there is ojas, right? Which is sweet vital nectar. Yes. And there is ama, which is toxic residue. Yes. Okay. And so again, you know more on this than than I do, but my remembering is that we can either bring ojas or ama into our experience. Yes? Yes. And so something to practice is to be mindful, thoughtful, aware of in my conversations, in my interactions in the world, it could be driving through traffic. Am I leaving any ama wherever I go? Yes? Is that the teaching? I’m sure there’s more. I think it’s much deeper than this.

davidji: 31:09

No, I think you nailed it. I and I this comes back to what that Sanskrit word agni, which is our digestive fire. So imagine everybody has a digestive fire. It’s resting right in your in your stomach. And according to Ayurveda, from 10 to 2, 10 in the morning till 2 in the afternoon, you need to be feeding that fire inside. And if you’re feeding it with food that’s nourishing and uh that can be digested, then the your fire is burning brightly.

Elizabeth Winkler: 31:42

That’s the pitcher time of the day. 10 to 2.

davidji: 31:45

Right. 10 to 2 is fire time. It’s we’re we’re in that, all of us. Now it’s also 10 to 2 from 10 PM to 2 a.m. What happens then? Your emotions get digested. And I always wondered, is that really happening? But you know, I have an aura ring, and I’ve been using the aura ring O-U-R-A, not A-U-R-A, but aura ring, it tracks my sleep, it tracks my deep sleep, my REM sleep, my heart rate variability, it tracks my steps, it tracks my pulse, it tra it’s tracking everything in my life. And when I look at the app, it’s from ten to two that all my deep sleep occurs. And it’s from two to six that all my rem sleep occurs. So Ayurveda knew this before there were apps and before there were rings that you could wear. I’m a fan of data and a fan of trackers. But you know, the beautiful thing about this is that our digestive fire is burning brightly, which is why we must be asleep from 10 to 2, because the fire is burning. And if you’re awake watching TV till midnight, you’re sc you’re missing two hours of your emotions being digested. And this is deep sleep, and I can track it. If I go to bed at 9 30, at like 10 to 10, boom, my deep sleep begins. And it rolls to like two. And if I go to sleep at midnight, it takes probably like another 20 minutes before I get deep sleep. So I’m trading in like potentially four hours of deep sleep, you know, to get one hour. So that’s why I recommend I’m a fan of television. I think everyone should watch as much television as they possibly can. However, you need to be in bed at 10 o’clock, or you won’t get your deep sleep. So this concept of Agni, you’ve made a bonfire or you’ve put fire in a fireplace. Everyone’s done that. And you know what it’s like. If you put wet leaves on a fire, it smolders, it smokes, it’s not really gonna burn those leaves. And if you put really dry kindling or tinder on there, it’ll go up instantly. So this is the same premise with your own internal agni, your own digestive fire. If it’s burning brightly, you will digest your emotions perfectly and your food perfectly. And if your agni, if your fire is not in its best place, but well let’s look talk about digesting emotions. Maybe you’re holding a grudge, maybe you’re irritated, maybe you can’t see, you have no empathy for the other person. There’s so many reasons why we would not actually integrate all our emotions and allow them to be digested. So many. Just taking stuff personally is probably the number one aspect of that. And that could have been going on for like 30 years. Oh, by the way. But if you are able to receive and be empathetic and be compassionate to yourself as well, you can take all these emotions and really, really ingest them, digest them, and release them. It’s no different than when we eat food. Ideally, we eat a sandwich, you know, it drops into our acid bath, our agni center, that fire, and burns in. There’s still people who take tums. There’s still people who take antacids because their fire is not burning so well. And if there’s a problem at that area, then when it moves through the 22 feet of your small intestine, and then up your ascending colon, across your transverse colon, down your descending colon, if everything’s working great, then we let go. Except that woman that I met at the hay house event. You know, clearly she had not, you know, that’s a thing. That’s a thing for vatas. They’re so dry that their intestines and colons are dry as well. So they need I’m not a doctor, but this herb, I love this herb. It’s called trifla. You can Google it. T-R-I-P-H-A-L-A. Trifila. It’s just an herb. And it’s a great lubricant for your intestines. Anyway, if the fire is burning brightly, then you will digest everything. And you will release what no longer serves you. And we can say that’s emotionally as well as physiologically, physically. So we do the same thing with food as we do with experiences. And so that’s why if our fire is burning brightly, we will be left with ojas, sweet vital nectar. And if the fire is sputtering, we’re eating bad food, we’re eating food with too much fat in it, we’re eating at the wrong times of the day, uh, we’re not really nourishing ourselves, we’re eating while we’re standing or while we’re driving. I can go on and on with all the different ways that we take emotions and food into our bodies and don’t honor our bodies in that process. But what will be left over is toxic residue, AMA. And so we can always ask ourselves after the fact, after we’ve left a room, after we’ve hung up the phone, after we’ve sent a text or an email, after the fact, we can ask ourselves, what did I just leave behind? What did I just leave behind? And if you left Ojas, pardon. Celebrate it, sweet vital nectar, score. Celebrate. If you left AMA, you should go back and clean it up. Not always so pretty, but you need to apologize. Because if you don’t, it’s gonna be torturing you perhaps for the next twenty years. When you think to yourself, why am I ruminating on this thing over and over again? It’s been like days or weeks or months or years, and it just keeps coming into me. It’s because it was never fully digested. And that’s why you should then reach out to Elizabeth Winkler, because she is the therapist to the cosmos who can help you move from where you are to where you’d like to be.

Elizabeth Winkler: 37:44

There’s a good mantra that you uh taught us. Uh Agni Mile Purohitam. Yeah.

davidji: 37:52

Agni Mile Purohitam. I surrender to the fire of transformation. So I think that’s a good that’s a good mantra. It’s actually the first three words in the Rig Veda, the oldest book in history.

Elizabeth Winkler: 38:04

Those are the first three words. Yeah. Okay, no big deal.

davidji: 38:07

Yeah.

Elizabeth Winkler: 38:07

Right. So, yeah. So just talking about that today. First three words ever written. Yeah. So if you want a mantra to practice to get to stoke the fire within you, Agni Mile Purohitam.

davidji: 38:23

Agni mile puro hitam. We’ll spell it out in the notes as well.

Elizabeth Winkler: 38:28

Another way to stoke the fire would be breathwork. Is that right? I feel like that is good for you.

davidji: 38:33

You certainly could. It’s gonna heat up, probably be very good for a vata, not a pitta.

Elizabeth Winkler: 38:39

Okay, okay.

davidji: 38:40

A friend of mine, he was like, I don’t understand it. I am so angry, and I have been scorching the village, and I have been so rude to my wife, and I just three three clients fired me, and I go, What’s going on in your life? He’s like, I don’t know. I wake up, I meditate for a half hour, then I go to my hot yoga class. I’m like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, time out, time out. What do you mean, hot yoga class? You’re already on fire when you wake up, and then you’re going into the furnace. No, you can cut that one out.

Elizabeth Winkler: 39:10

Right. Yeah. And like, so there is something called a breath of fire. I used to do that a lot. So that that could be really good for someone who needs more fire. Just trying to give some takeaway, you know, tools.

davidji: 39:21

The vata breeze is gonna push everyone out. A vata needs to be relaxed. All right. If they’re not relaxed, if they’re not calm, then they’re gonna spin out. So anything that’s going to spiral.

Elizabeth Winkler: 39:37

The spiral.

davidji: 39:38

Right. Anything that’s going to calm you or relax you if you are primarily vata. If you’re pitta, pittas need to be soothed. That’s a combination of cooling. So there are foods that we could eat that would cool us. Watermelon. Watermelon’s actually a cooling thing. Competitive sports, not so great. Non-competitive sports, great. Or less competitive sports. Just looking at the different components of what keeps us in balance and what doesn’t, and what knocks us out of balance. So pittas, it’s cooling and space. Pittas are the people who leave their house at 10 o’clock for a 10 30 meeting, knowing it’s going to take 45 minutes, and then they’re pissed off the whole drive. And they’re honking on the person who’s driving slowly in front of them. Or they’re sitting at the light and they’re like, oh they knew. They knew the moment they did that. So they need space. Pitters need space and cooling. And coffers actually need invigoration. Because left to their own devices, they’re very, very comfortable chilling on that giant couch or whatever. So if we can just invigorate them, like, hey, let’s go for a walk. Hey, let’s let’s walk around the couch. You know, whatever, whatever, whatever that is that’s gonna, you know, make something a little different in there. That’s when they’re out of balance. When they’re in balance, they’re perfect. They’re just perfect. Amazing. So I ask myself a lot, what did I just leave behind? Whenever I leave a room or like end an interaction, I ask myself, what did I just leave behind? And if I think I left behind some good OJAS score, I clean things up a lot more quickly and I express myself a lot more directly with compassion because I don’t want to be lying in bed at night thinking about that thing that I could have solved or apologized for three weeks ago.

Elizabeth Winkler: 41:37

Yeah. So what’s today’s takeaway? So many things. Thank you for sharing. This was amazing.

davidji: 41:43

What’s today’s takeaway? Today’s takeaway is that we are all unique, yet we’re all made up from the same five elements. It’s a good holding up the mirror exercise to ask yourself, how am I showing up right now? Am I showing up with creativity? Am I showing up with purpose and transformation in mind? Am I showing up with chill and relaxation? This is really just self-assessments. It’s and it’s not about judgment. But if I’m a little too fiery, I’m gonna do some things. And of course, we we could talk about this for n for another five years. There’s so many different ways to balance. We balance through the senses, we balance through color and visuals and sounds and we balance with foods and liquids as well. But basically, if you can slow the breeze in your life, you’ll come back to balance. Well, whatever you are, take the quiz, it’s gonna be in the notes right here, and find out what’s my basic nature. And this way you can always keep honoring who you actually are. This isn’t about oh, I need to change who I am. This is about, oh, this is just one more piece of information regarding who I am, and that’s gonna make me thrive, and that’s gonna make me heal, and that’s gonna make me transform at a higher level. Thank you. Oh, you’re welcome. From the sweet spot of the universe, this is davidji and Elizabeth Winkler, and we are the Shadow and the Light podcast. This seemed a little lopsided with me prattling on about Ayurveda, but hopefully you found value in it. Jamar, take us to the next galaxy, please.

Music: 43:23

I want to be afraid of the shadows and the dark. They will lead the way to the heart.