October 29, 2024 • 35 mins
Ayurveda, often dismissed as mere "woo woo," might just hold the key to understanding our health in a more holistic way.
In this episode, Austin Vantastic shares his transformative journey from a high-pressure career in film to discovering the healing potential of ancient Indian medicine. Together, they explore how Ayurveda addresses chronic conditions that Western medicine often overlooks, highlighting the importance of balance among the body's three doshas: Vata, Pitta, and Kapha. Austin recounts his own health struggles, the stigma surrounding traditional practices, and how Ayurveda offers preventive solutions through diet, lifestyle changes, and meditation. This episode encourages listeners to rethink their approach to health and consider integrating Ayurvedic principles into their lives.
Check out the shownotes to learn more!
To get in contact with Austin and get your very own one on one Ayurvedic consultation, shoot him an email at austin@ayurvedafor.us or and tell him that the global health pursuit podcast sent ya! You can also learn more at ayurvedafor.us
Takeaways:
- Ayurveda, a 5000-year-old medical system, emphasizes the importance of balance among the body’s doshas.
- Western medicine often provides quick fixes, but Ayurveda focuses on prevention through holistic lifestyle changes.
- The journey to understanding Ayurveda can be transformative, as it addresses mysterious health issues holistically.
- Ayurvedic practices, such as dietary adjustments and meditation, can significantly enhance overall well-being.
- Austin Fantastic's transition from film to Ayurveda showcases the diverse paths to healing.
- Ayurveda encourages fresh food consumption, avoiding leftovers to maintain optimal digestion and health.
______
Support the Podcast: Click here to send in a one-time or monthly donation
Submit a Question: Click here to send in a question!
Join the Podcast Mailing list: https://www.globalhealthpursuit.com/mailing-list
Make sure to follow me on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook!
Email me at hetal@globalhealthpursuit.com
______
Thank you to our partners at CHIMUK: A sustainable and ethical handmade fashion brand transforming women's lives through knitting. Purchase one of a kind, high quality baby alpaca, and cotton handmade scarves, hats, and more! Each product comes with a special QR code linking you to a photo/bio of the artisan who handmade your product! Click here to see the impact you can make by shopping with Chimuk. >>Use the code GHP10 for 10% off at checkout!<<
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
You clicked on this podcastepisode because of one of two things.
You want to know if Ayurvedais completely and utterly woo woo.
Or you realize that maybe myIndian ancestors were onto something
thousands of years ago.
Hey, and welcome back toanother episode of the Global Health
Pursuit podcast.
(00:23):
This episode is a little bitdifferent than my usual content,
but I wanted to highlight itbecause the world of Ayurveda and
Eastern medicine is justfascinating to me.
Because what if.
What if we could prevent ourbody's aches and pains by being more
(00:44):
thoughtful of what we consumementally and physically?
And as I say this, I feel likethis is just a no brainer.
But living in a Westernsociety, taking a daily pill to curb
migraines or suppressheartburn is just easier, right?
It's the quick solution.
(01:05):
So in this episode, I got achance to chat with Ayurvedic practitioner
Austin Fantastic about allthings Ayurveda.
How the Western healthcaresystem let him down, how his body
forced him to find Ayurveda,how he finally healed, and what your
poop eyeballs and tongue cansay about your health and more.
(01:29):
My name is Hetal Bahman andthis is the Global Health Pursuit.
Couldn't help but think theworld of Ayurveda is deeply connected
to India and it's part of my ancestry.
(01:51):
What's interesting to me, Iwas just thinking about this today,
where there's a whole stigmaright around Indian families studying
Western medicine and thatbecoming very prestigious.
And I feel like there's a partof India that's just being like,
so detached to its roots.
I can see, you know, as anAmerican Indians coming to America
(02:14):
wanting to do something morethan where they came from.
Like you said, the prestige ofdoing Western medicine and the doctor
and the white coat and allthose things and the imagery and
making your parents proud andthe familial generational honor and
things like that that go, Ithink is.
It's understandable andjuxtaposed with that.
I thought it was really interesting.
(02:36):
When I was in India studyingAyurveda, so many Indians would come
to me and be like, oh my God,you're here for Ayurveda.
Like, tell me all about it.
And I'm like, I'm here tolearn it from you.
From you.
Yeah.
And, you know, a lot of thathas to do with history, the English
rule and stomping out a lot ofIndian traditions and like, thank
goodness Ayurveda survivedthat time period and it's making
(02:59):
a resurgence now.
Yeah, I think it's Beautiful.
And I hope the future isembracing both sides.
Western medicine is amazingfor trauma care, you know, cancer,
like, really severe life conditions.
And Ayurveda is reallybeautiful for solving a lot of, like,
the mysterious kind of problem.
You know, you go to the doctorand you're like, oh, it hurts here.
(03:21):
And they do all the tests andscans and they say, oh, nothing's
wrong with you.
Go home and you're left in pain.
You know, so things like that.
Ayurveda is great for.
And it's amazing for prevention.
I've been practicing Ayurvedafor five years, and I've been seeing
therapists for probably acouple more years longer than that.
I don't know how many times Ididn't get sick, you know, thanks
(03:44):
to Ayurveda.
But there's just so manythings you can learn and understand
about your body where it'slike, you can see something coming
out on the horizon and belike, let me make a change, you know,
to my diet, or do somethingdifferent today.
You stay healthy.
It's about, you know,navigating this path of health.
I want to really dive intoyour story first because your story
is really interesting in termsof just how you got into Ayurvedic
(04:08):
practices.
And when we first connected,you had told me that you had worked
in film in the very beginning.
So bring us back to that.
Yeah.
Growing up, I chose film andtelevision as a career, my career
path.
I moved to New York City at 21and just hit the ground running,
like, blazing, full steam ahead.
(04:29):
For those familiar with thefilm television show went from a
production assistant to adirector of photography and four
and a half years, which is,like, insane, you know, to move through
kind of all the ranks up toheading the camera department for
mostly TV shows I worked onand, you know, some films and stuff
like that.
But the industry is, you know,your work day on paper is 12 hours
(04:53):
every day.
If your call time's nine, yourbreak time is nine, you know, when
you wrap.
So, you know, that's a lot ofpressure and that's a lot of stress,
and that's just what's on paper.
That doesn't include thecommute to set and back from set
and, you know, all the thingsyou gotta try and figure out for
yourself in the meantime.
So working in film andtelevision, a lot of pressure and
(05:15):
stress from being a directorof photography, dealing with the
network, dealing with thedirectors making the show.
Right.
You know, my own personallife, stress, emotional baggage,
and the lifestyle that I wasleading all those Factors built up
to the point of me getting sick.
And it started.
It was this kind of like, ooh,like, weird pain in my left side.
(05:37):
I thought, oh, maybe I.
Like, I pulled something or,you know, I've been carrying the
camera around a lot, kind ofwrote it off.
And then one night when I wasfalling asleep, it was just like.
It felt like something insideme popped or, like, broke.
And I thought, you know, leftside, you know, your stomach, you're
like, did my appendix just explode?
And, like, I thought I wasgonna die in my bed that night.
(06:00):
Oh, gosh.
Yeah, it was brutal.
So I called 91 1.
I was getting, like, tunnelvision, and I was in bed.
So I grabbed whatever I couldto put on and walked out to the street.
And I was like, if I pass out,at least they'll find me on the sidewalk.
Luckily, I didn't pass out.
The ambulance came quick andgot me to the hospital and figured
it out.
But four hours later, theywere like, oh, we think you had a
(06:22):
kidney stone.
And I was like, what?
And so, you know, four or fivedays went by, and, like, the pain
hadn't subsided, and you werestill in.
Immense pain at this point.
What happened that nighthappened once a month for the subsequent
months.
It was like this shredding,ripping pain through my abdomen.
Oh, wow.
And I would be in bed for,like, two or three days every time
(06:44):
that happened.
And then when I wasn't goingthrough, like, that severe pain,
what it felt like was justkind of like.
It was like a hot iron prod,like, on the inside, like, trying
to push out.
It was just like this burning,like, pushing pain under my left
rib.
So that night at the hospitalwas the beginning of, like, four
or five months of doctor'stests, you know, CT scans, ultrasound
(07:06):
scans, X ray.
They did all the tests on me,endoscopy, you know, And I couldn't
figure out, you know, theylooked at everything.
They were like, there'snothing broken, so you're fine.
Isn't that the worst feelingever, though?
Like, just going to the doctorand feeling pain and then them being
like, no, you're fine.
And you're like, well, I'mactually feeling something in my
(07:28):
body.
So you.
I'm actually not fine.
So can we figure it out?
You know, prior to thisexperience, every time I went to
the doctor, it's like, oh, Igot an earache.
I broke up something.
You know, so it was, like,pretty straightforward.
So people are familiar withthe health landscape, you know, are
familiar with this type ofstory, but it was an entirely new
dialogue for me.
I was not familiar with peoplegoing to the doctors and being let
(07:51):
down in this type of way.
And I was like, you guys, youhave all the machines, like you're
supposed to know you're a doctor.
Where did Ayurveda come intoplay at this point?
Yeah, that was just a magicalaccident, honestly.
So a year ish, you know, priorto all of this stuff happening, it
was somebody who I actuallywent on a date with.
(08:11):
We later ended up becoming friends.
She started telling me aboutthis thing that to me at the time
sounded so hippy dippy.
I was like, that's not real.
She was telling me about Ayurveda.
And so at the time of theconversation, I remember just being
like, huh, you know, whatever.
But what she mentioned waslike, you know, I had completely
transformed her life.
(08:31):
And it was after.
So I'd done all the tests andthe endoscopy was like the last thing
that I had done.
And I gotten the test resultsback from that.
I was just sitting, you know,at my kitchen table looking at my
laptop, just like defeated, so broken.
And in this moment, thatconversation came back to mind and
just her saying, like, itcompletely transformed my life was
(08:53):
the only thing I could think about.
Like, I don't have anything tolose, I've tried everything else.
So I text her and I was like,yo, what was that thing you told
me about, yo?
And she responded back to meand I looked up the woman who she
referred to and I went and sawher, you know, the next available
appointment that I could.
And that was the beginning ofmy journey with Ayurveda through
(09:16):
her.
It started with meditation andthen she referred me to an Ayurvedic
therapist and he startedchanging my diet and telling me about
my dosha, how I could cater tomy health between the dietary recommendations
and the meditation.
I mean, within like a week Istarted feeling better and within
three months I would say I hadcompletely healed.
(09:37):
When you hear about thingslike this without really experiencing
it, you might think it's like,woo, woo, you know, like new age.
But that's just so, like mindblowing to me.
So I want to take it back tothe basics and just ask you, what
is Ayurveda?
You threw out some terms likedosha, where even as an Indian person,
(09:58):
like, I don't even know.
Yeah, so ayurveda is a 5000plus year old medical science from
the greater Indian subcontinent.
It's not defined by thecountry lines now.
And the principles of Ayurvedaare understanding like the body and
how the body operates.
(10:19):
So there's three doshas in the body.
Vata, which is air and etherelement, Pitta, which is fire and
water element, and kapha whichis water and earth element.
So they figured the wholeentire universe is made up of these
five elements.
You can see obviously theearth everywhere you go, the water
everywhere we go, Fire, youknow, is the sun, air, you know,
(10:41):
the wind that blows, and oxygen.
And then ether is space, is nothingness.
So we have space on earth.
You know, they translate alittle bit differently, but, you
know, we can also equate it toactual physical outer space.
So then those five elementsand then the combination of those
elements create the doshas.
And then the doshas governdifferent systems in your body.
And everybody is a combinationof all three doshas and everybody
(11:07):
is going to have somethingthat's more predominant in your body,
which is why we say you arepitta dosha or you are kapha dosha.
And it's not because you'remissing vata dosha.
It just means that the pittais predominant or the kapha is predominant.
Just like in the world, allthe elements need, you know, balance
and counterbalance each other.
(11:28):
Without one, there can't bethe other inside your body.
We want to keep the doshas inbalance so that the body stays in
harmony, our internal universestays in harmony.
So how does that pertain to medicine?
How does that pertain to healing?
Yeah, it's taken me a longtime and all these years of study
and working with peopledirectly to understand the translation
(11:50):
from like Ayurvedic principlesto medical principles.
You know, like I said,Ayurveda is very scientific, but
it has a completely differentparadigm of looking at and understanding
the body than Western medicine.
So there's not a one to onetranslation of like how things work.
You know, it's like we thinkof things like vitamins and minerals
and proteins and nutrients andthings like that.
(12:11):
And then hormonal imbalancesand like this is how we get sick,
you know.
And so we say, oh well, if youhave, you know, low immunity, then
you need to take vitamin C.
Or if your APT is off and youneed more energy, then you need to
take vitamin B.
And they're like, oh well, thevitamin B is not working, so you
need to take vitamin D.
Unless you're getting constantblood tests and scans, how are you
(12:34):
knowing what you're doing toyour body and influencing it?
And in Ayurveda we look at thesystems, the processes of the whole
entire body.
You Know how on the largescale, like, chunking first, you
start with, like, vata dosha,pittadocha, kapha dosha, and you're
like, what are they doing?
And then, you know, we canlook at different things, like kaphas
in the lungs and the heart andthe throat.
(12:55):
So it's like, are you havingan issue there?
And then if you're having anissue, there is kapha dosha.
The culprit of that problem,pittadocha, is in your digestive
system.
So it's your stomach, yourspleen, your appendix, your liver,
your gallbladder.
So if you're having adigestive issue, then we look at
pittsa dosha, and we're like,oh, that's where the problem is happening.
I'm having digestive issues.
(13:15):
But who's causing the problem then?
You know, it could bevatadosha could be causing the problem,
but it's pitta dosha who'sunder attack, you know, and then
vata dosha lives in the colon,in the large intestine, you know,
so you could be havingproblems there.
So, so we.
We chunk first by, like,trying to look at which dosha is
out of balance based on thesymptoms, and then we reverse the
process of disease.
(13:36):
The disease itself is kind ofthe symptom.
We go backwards from thedisease to who caused the problem
in the first place, and thenwe correct it from both ends.
We can work on the conditionssymptomatically, like, what is the
symptom that you're having?
So it's like you're havingdigestive issues.
Then we can start to give yousome digestive herbs, but then we
can also give you therapies tocorrect the dosha.
And then we can meet in themiddle with complete cure.
(13:59):
Wow.
So, okay, you found Ayurveda,and then you basically got obsessed
with it and wanted to learneverything about it.
Right.
Which makes sense, you know,if it's something that totally transformed
your life.
You want to know more?
What was some of the thingsthat really drew you in when you
were going through thelearning process?
(14:20):
Right.
When I started healing, I wasjust like, what is this stuff?
How do I get more?
And I started, you know,reading books and talking to everybody
and trying to find resourcesthat I couldn't.
I didn't know it would lead tome being a practitioner, an ayurvedic
practitioner.
I thought I was convinced Iwould stay in film and television
for my life.
But a few months later, yeah,I had this kind of, like, universe
moment of like, oh, I couldchange my career and do something
(14:42):
different.
That inception moment was Icould change my career as like I
could help people heal throughAyurveda and I could be an Ayurvedic
chef and introduce people toAyurveda through food.
So that was the kind of likethe initial thought process and so
I started taking types ofsteps towards that.
(15:02):
So the first thing is I wentto culinary school.
I went to the CulinaryInstitute of America in Hyde Park,
New York which was an amazing experience.
And I learned a lotinterestingly about like food and
digestion through that schooland like how food works, kind of
like the chemistry of the kitchen.
So at that time I was stilljust self studied in Ayurveda.
And then immediately afterculinary school I took my first year
(15:25):
of Ayurvedic school.
Ayurvedic health counselor consultant.
In the US there's like three levels.
So I did my first year andthen I went to India and I studied
in India for eight months andI was at two different Ayurvedic
clinics there, one inRajasthan and one in Mumbai.
So I did just hundreds ofclinical hours, lots of work.
(15:47):
And then I came back to the USin the end of 2020 and in, I think
it was in 21, I then I startedmy education as a Ayurvedic practitioner,
which you could liken to likegetting a master's degree.
And it's much more.
The Ayurvedic health counseloris more like diet, lifestyle, understanding
(16:08):
the structure of the body,kind of like learning all the working
pieces of Ayurvedic anatomy.
And then this program, theAyurvedic practitioner program is
more like, it's much moredisease involved.
You know, each month of schoolwe just focused on nervous diseases,
mental diseases, reproductivedise is.
I've had so many revelations.
(16:29):
I feel like in Ayurveda it'shard to say that there's like one
outstanding concept.
But you know, modern scienceis starting to look more into epigenetics
and individualized medicine,which is the Ayurvedic model.
From the beginning, before wetreat someone, we seek to understand
that person.
(16:50):
Who are you?
What's going on with you?
How are we going to help you heal?
So it's always been theindividualized approach.
Ayurveda had a system ofbasically understanding epigenetics.
That's the doshas.
I mean it's broken down again.
It's like in these like kindof archaic language.
But where I had the revelationis so we have the five elements.
(17:12):
The five elements Combinedcreate the three doshas, those elements
and those doshas and theirinterplays with each other create
qualities.
20 qualities, the gunas.
And it's 10 pairs of opposites.
So 20 qualities in total.
It's like hot, cold, dry, wet.
One day I was actuallylistening to a book on physics.
It was called the Physics of God.
(17:33):
Something in that booktriggered this moment.
And I was like, the 20 gunasare the 20amino acids in a DNA strand.
Oh wow.
I was like, our DNA, ourgenetic expression.
I was like, Ayurveda was ontothis 5,000 years ago.
And I was like, could this be real?
(17:54):
And so I started doing research.
Is this real life?
I was like, could they, couldthey have really figured it out?
Like epigenetics 5,000 yearsago, before you know, a machine was
ever invented to know thatthere that were that body cells are
even made out of DNA?
And so I did a little bit ofresearch and just some preliminary
study has shown that, yes,that those 20 qualities are in fact
(18:16):
Ayurveda's understanding ofepigenetics and the DNA expression.
And you know, how we eitherprevent or cause disease.
It's like, how could twoidentical twins, one goes bald and
one doesn't, one getsleukemia, the other doesn't.
Like how does that happen?
And it's all because of natureversus nurture.
It's like you're, you're bornwith your nature, that's who you
(18:37):
are.
You're born with your makeupfrom your parents.
That's your genetic code.
But how do you treat thatgenetic code throughout your lifetime
will produce differentresults, it will produce healthy
results or it'll produceunhealthy results.
And yeah, that's the wholeentire Ayurvedic model.
So one of that's beensomething that's extremely fascinated
(18:58):
me and I'd like to go a lotdeeper on that.
Just to be able to kind ofcommunicate that to other people
is like, keep going back tothe same thing.
It's not woo woo.
It's not fake, it's not weird science.
It's science science.
Why is it so hard to comprehend?
No, as like somebody inwestern society who has only experienced
(19:20):
Western medicine.
Why is it so hard tocomprehend that treatments like that
of Ayurvedic treatments isscience, like you're saying?
I think it's just communication.
You know, the way we were raised.
The way we learned things likefor example, meditation.
Right.
There's so many benefits tomeditation, but people are like,
(19:42):
what is that going to do for me?
I do have A pseudo scientificexplanation for why meditation is
good for you.
Your pituitary gland sits inbetween the two hemispheres of your
left and right brain.
And that is like the governorof pretty much all the systems and
processes inside your body.
When you're stressed, yourbrain is creating electrical signals
(20:04):
that are going back and forthwhen you're stressed, it's like a
storm.
And your pituitary gland issitting in the center of that.
And I had always thought of itas kind of like air traffic control.
So like it's on the center ofthe, you know, tarmac.
Tarmac.
I was like, tamarack, what?
(20:24):
So the air traffic control islike kind of in a prime location
of the tarmac and it'swatching incoming planes and outgoing
planes.
Right for the brain and it'scommunicating to everybody.
Like you go here, you gothere, and it's keeping order and
everything organized.
Well, now picture like it'scloudy and foggy and like they don't
have visual anymore, you know,to the planes, but they still have
(20:45):
their instruments.
Well, now add lightning, youknow, and add whatever like strain,
rain and hail.
You're going to startdisturbing all of the controls.
Ability to organize everything.
And so if you're stressed, allthis electrical signals going back
and forth over your pituitarygland, it's going to have a hard
time functioning and sayingthis needs to go there and that needs
(21:06):
to go there and like keepingcontrol of the whole entire system.
So when we meditate, weactually harmonize the left and right
hemispheres of the brain andthey have shown this in scans, whereas
like there's, you know, justthis ton of confusion.
And then, you know, we go intolike rhythmic, like sine waves, you
know, for how the brain islike operating.
And there's, you know, beta,alpha, theta, delta.
(21:29):
It's like the different brainwavelengths in gamma moving the brain
from more chaotic places intomore harmonious places.
And then, you know, thepituitary gland can be at rest and
like organize things a lot better.
I like the air trafficcontroller analogy.
That was good.
It's a pseudo side explanation.
Where do you draw the linebetween treating with Ayurvedic practices
(21:54):
and treating with Westernmedicine practices?
Yeah, I feel like the line canprobably be moving back and forth.
There's not like a staticanswer of where you start and stop.
Eastern and Western medicine practices.
Ayurvedic medicine is amazingfor prevention and it's really great
(22:15):
for solving like thosemysterious illnesses that aren't
life threatening.
In Western medicine, ifthere's a trauma and you have a life
threatening disease, your bestcourse of action is to go with western
medicine.
If you have stage four cancerand you know your terminal, get treatment
through that system.
And this would take a moreindividualized case by case understanding.
(22:38):
But when you're ready, youknow, move in ayurvedic supporting
medicine.
And once you are no longerterminal and you're stable, all the
things that you should havedone to prevent the cancer in the
first place, now you have todo after the fact to heal the body
and heal the tissues and healthose structures and things like
that.
So that's kind of like grandscale, but on a little bit smaller,
(23:00):
like relatable scale foranybody at home, like practical.
If you're sick and you have togo into work and you know, your head
is pounding and you're stuffyand groggy and you can't function,
like, take Dayquil and go to work.
You know, if you have to.
Ideally, you know, you'd stayat home and rest, right?
But you know, the world thatwe live in, it's like we have to
(23:21):
function.
So you're not going to healthjail if you take dayquil, but you
should also be taking herbs,you know, treating understanding
like, well, how did you getsick in the first place?
Like what caused the cold?
And then so using ayurvedicmedicine to treat that at the same
time.
And you know, for me in my ownlife and you know, with my clients
(23:43):
that I work with, that's, youknow, I carry that through.
You know, it's not likesomething I just say, it's like something
I believe in.
I had a client a few years ago.
This was like relatively quick out.
It was when I was studying inIndia, so it was just after I'd finished
school.
She had chronic migraines fortwo or three years before we saw
each other.
You know, at the time that wesaw each other, she was having like
(24:04):
five to seven migraines a weekand like cluster headaches and she's
like totally debilitated.
She was taking all the maximumdosages of the different drugs that
the doctors had given her totry and allay the problem.
She'd gotten to an impasse.
She was like, there's nowherefurther for me to go in western medicine.
(24:24):
So we started workingtogether, we did all the ayurvedic
stuff.
We do the consultation,understand how it started, and kind
of put all the pieces togetherand get a real map basically of her
condition and then started tonavigate her way towards health.
And pretty quickly, you know,with some Diet and some herb changes
and lifestyle changes.
She went down to like threedays a week.
(24:46):
She'd have a migraine, and theintensity went from a 10 to a 6,
you know, so it wasn't as debilitating.
I don't remember what it wasnow, but whatever pills like, she
was taking to, like, relievethe migraines, I didn't stop her.
I was like, go ahead.
I was like, take it.
If you're in pain, take it.
But we're still doing the protocol.
And after about three and ahalf months of working with each
(25:06):
other, she now gets a migrainea couple of times a year.
I think the fact that you'renot somebody who's saying, oh, don't
take Western medicine at all,that's bad.
It makes it so much more easyto implement because, hey, if you're
in pain, sure, take somemedicine that will alleviate it,
(25:29):
but at the same time, let's continue.
So you're an ayurvedicpractitioner and you're taking clients.
What are the conditions thatyou see most of that your clients
have?
It's so interesting that youasked that.
So my marketing andadvertising and a lot of my copy
kind of is around, like, my condition.
(25:50):
So I talk a lot about IBS anddigestive issues, and that's kind
of where I hang out.
But I get clients with allsorts of different conditions.
Of the last four clients I'vejust recently seen, two of them were
IBS and the other two, one wascancer and another one was actually
similar to the migraines client.
(26:10):
He's got vestibular migrainesand tinnitus and vertigo.
Chronic debilitating.
So, yeah, I get kind of like amyriad of different types of people
that I attract.
And I've worked with all sortsof different things, but I think
usually people latch on to,yeah, I have a digestive issue or
something like that and theseother symptoms.
(26:32):
And so that's how kind of likethe spread of clients that I get.
When a client comes to you,like, what is your process in terms
of the consultation?
What does that look like?
And then how do you educateyour clients and motivate them to
(26:53):
make these changes in their life?
When somebody first comes tome, usually it's just a.
It's a lot of back and forth conversation.
You know, it's like, oh, whatdo you have?
How'd you get it?
And da, da, da.
And then they asked me, youknow, how I'm gonna help them.
They're like, well, I don'tknow how I'm Gonna help you right
now until we do a full consultation.
But, you know, I help peoplethrough diet, lifestyle and herbs,
(27:14):
and then usually also tomeditation, if they're open to it.
If not, there's otherpsychological therapies that you
can do in Ayurveda that are helpful.
But I would say meditationamong them is king.
So, yeah, somebody comes to meand let's say, you know, we've gone
through that process.
So they say, like, yes, let'sdo this.
What happens then is I sendthem a health questionnaire.
So they fill everything out.
(27:35):
It's kind of just like you goto a doctor's office, like, what
are you allergic to, what hurts?
Or what are you coming to thisvisit for?
Health history, those sorts of things.
And then the consultationitself, it's about an hour and a
half, long process for most people.
And we go really deep into allsorts of different weird symptoms
that signs that they might have.
(27:56):
And it's weird in the sensethat they seem unrelated.
But in Ayurveda, everythinghas a string.
Do you have aches and pains?
Do you have cracking andpopping joints?
You know, people would thinklike, oh, yeah, my joints crack all
the time.
But what does that mean?
Well, it means you have, like,really high vata, you know, so it's
like, we need to know that todiagnose and understand.
So we go through that wholeentire thing, you know, what are
you eating and how's yourbowel movements?
(28:18):
And, you know, if anybodywho's familiar with Ayurveda, we
know we talk about poop a lot.
I love that.
Yeah, it's important.
We need to know.
And then I do a mixture ofdistant and local clients.
So a lot of people who arevirtual, I'll have them send me photos
of their fingernails, their tongue.
And then now, more recently, Iwas doing it before, but I'm getting
(28:41):
back into it again.
As a picture of your eye, thisis Ayurvedic, like iridology, so
you could read the patterns inthe iris and see what those mean,
the implications for health.
And so between thephysiological evidence, you know,
the look of your fingernailsand your tongue and your eyes, coupled
with the interview, then withall that information, like I said,
I can kind of get a real mapof your state of imbalance.
(29:05):
Where did it start?
How did it start?
How did it progress?
Where are you at right now?
And then I can create thepathway towards healing and then
the healing part with Ayurveda.
So like I said, I use diet,lifestyle, herbs, meditation.
But there's also Stages to that.
So the beginning stage ispalliation and it's usually a bit
(29:27):
more gentle.
What we're trying to do isbring the doshas back into alignment
and harmony with each other.
The reason you have disease isbecause they've gone out of harmony
with each other.
And I think of it as like bone setting.
Right.
So it's like first we gottalike soften the area, prepare the
tissues, make sure everythingis nice and gentle and ready.
So that's the palliation stageand then there's a detoxification
(29:49):
stage which is like the.
You're gonna put it in place.
This reminded me of like a chiropractor.
Exactly.
Yeah.
You're just like crack it andyou're like realign.
You know, it's a veryaggressive but also fast that can
be a few days to a week longprocess of resetting the doshas,
the detoxification process,and then there's the rejuvenation
(30:10):
process stage which is nowthat things are back in line, we
want to strengthen and tonifyand bake in those results in a state
of balance.
What about people who don'tnecessarily have huge issues?
Have you seen any clients likethat that were just like, oh, I just
want to know how to strengthenmy diet or bring more energy into
(30:34):
my life or something like that?
Yeah, I do get some people whoare like ayurvedic, curious.
It's not as strong of a motivation.
You know, people are like inpain, they're like, I'll do anything,
it doesn't matter.
So I do get those clients veryrarely at this point, but for them,
you know, it's interestingtoo, even with those like just slight
(30:56):
differences of how your bodyfeels or like, yeah, I want to like
make my digestion better.
It's amazing how different youcan feel when you follow ayurvedic
principles.
So for one example, like meand my family, my mom is the only
one who's really like boughtin to Ayurveda.
We'll do family parties orsomething like that.
(31:16):
And people try and send mehome with leftovers and I just say
no.
I was like, I won't take food home.
It's one of the big things inAyurveda is like not to eat leftover
food, frozen, canned shelfgoods, preserved, things like that.
Because it's heavy food.
It has a sitting energy.
And so when you put foodthat's been sitting for a long time
(31:39):
into your body, it's going tocreate this heaviness, the slowness,
the static energy and it canreally mess up your digestive system.
And for me, the ayurvedic rulethen is like, you eat fresh food
every single day.
Freshly cooked, you know,breakfast, lunch, and dinner, you
know, fresh vegetables.
If it's meat, then you getfresh meat.
(32:00):
Whatever it is, it's justfresh, so nothing left over.
And for me, having eaten thatway for so long now, if I eat food
that's left over for one day,I might be okay.
But if I eat leftovers twodays in a row, then it messes me
up and I just feel like blah.
You know, I feel heavy and Ifeel gross.
So people who are doing thischronically, that's just how they
(32:23):
understand their body to feel.
If you're eating leftover andpreserved and food out to go and
all these things all of thetime, you don't know that once you
optimize your digestion, youdon't know what it feels like to
have the energy, have theclarity of mind, have the focus,
have all these things.
It's like you're stuck in themire and you don't know that you're
there.
(32:43):
So, yeah, it's interesting.
You know, people come with thedigestive issues, and then they start
to do these things, andthey're like, wow, I can't believe
how much energy I have.
I can't believe how I feel,and I can't believe all these things.
And it's like, you can'tbelieve it because you just don't
know because you haven't tried yet.
Wow, that makes me not want toeat my leftovers.
Yeah, it's honestly, like, Ifeel bad, and it's a big lifestyle
(33:05):
change to.
You know, for me, always bemaking fresh food.
You need to have the time toeven do that.
Yeah, you need to have thetime to do that.
A lot of the health stuffonline, it's like meal prepping and,
like, having all your stuffready to go, and it's healthier,
but it's not that healthy.
There.
There's a lot to it.
But the benefit, the payoff is monumental.
(33:28):
You know, I don't like wastingfood, so it's been a learning curve
to make sure.
It's like, how do you cookjust enough for each meal?
And usually a breakfast issimple because I can make a very
small breakfast and that's fine.
And then lunch, you know, ifthere's anything left over, I can
eat for dinner.
So leftover means leftover night.
So you can eat lunch anddinner the same food the same day,
(33:50):
and that's okay.
But if you put it in thefridge and it goes overnight, that's
considered leftover.
I've conceded a little bit andI'll eat a one day leftover so I
don't waste food.
But I won't go beyond thatbecause then now I'm being wasteful
of my health.
That's interesting to say itthat way.
Yeah.
Wow.
So for anybody who's listeningin who might be curious about possibly
(34:14):
changing their life throughAyurvedic practices, are you currently
open to new clients?
Yeah, absolutely.
I wish I could help everybodyin the world.
I do take new clients and ifanybody wants to connect with me,
you know, Ayurveda for dot us,but it's Ayurveda for us.
You know, they can find me onmy website and contact me through
(34:36):
that.
And so yeah, for people whoare Ayurveda curious and same, you
know, with my website, you cango on there just for blog information
and tips and things and thento work with me.
The best way to reach me isthrough the website.
Amazing.
And I'll put all of the linksin the description so that it's easy
for you guys to find all ofthat information.
(34:56):
Thank you so much.
Austin.
Hey, thank you so much.
It's been such a pleasure.
Ethics and policies of the USGovernment, maybe in a good way or
bad way, depends on how yousee things.
But I'm just here to sharesome dialogue with an expert who's
been on both sides of the equation.
(35:17):
According to theamericanimmigrationcouncil.org, uS
immigration law is based onthe following the reunification of
families, admitting immigrantswith skills that are valuable to
the US Economy, humanitarianprotections and promoting diversity.
Now.
You clicked on this podcastepisode because of one of two things.
You want to know if Ayurvedais completely and utterly woo woo.
Or you realize that maybe myIndian ancestors were onto something
thousands of years ago.
Hey, and welcome back toanother episode of the Global Health
Pursuit podcast.
(00:23):
This episode is a little bitdifferent than my usual content,
but I wanted to highlight itbecause the world of Ayurveda and
Eastern medicine is justfascinating to me.
Because what if.
What if we could prevent ourbody's aches and pains by being more
(00:44):
thoughtful of what we consumementally and physically?
And as I say this, I feel likethis is just a no brainer.
But living in a Westernsociety, taking a daily pill to curb
migraines or suppressheartburn is just easier, right?
It's the quick solution.
(01:05):
So in this episode, I got achance to chat with Ayurvedic practitioner
Austin Fantastic about allthings Ayurveda.
How the Western healthcaresystem let him down, how his body
forced him to find Ayurveda,how he finally healed, and what your
poop eyeballs and tongue cansay about your health and more.
(01:29):
My name is Hetal Bahman andthis is the Global Health Pursuit.
Couldn't help but think theworld of Ayurveda is deeply connected
to India and it's part of my ancestry.
(01:51):
What's interesting to me, Iwas just thinking about this today,
where there's a whole stigmaright around Indian families studying
Western medicine and thatbecoming very prestigious.
And I feel like there's a partof India that's just being like,
so detached to its roots.
I can see, you know, as anAmerican Indians coming to America
(02:14):
wanting to do something morethan where they came from.
Like you said, the prestige ofdoing Western medicine and the doctor
and the white coat and allthose things and the imagery and
making your parents proud andthe familial generational honor and
things like that that go, Ithink is.
It's understandable andjuxtaposed with that.
I thought it was really interesting.
(02:36):
When I was in India studyingAyurveda, so many Indians would come
to me and be like, oh my God,you're here for Ayurveda.
Like, tell me all about it.
And I'm like, I'm here tolearn it from you.
From you.
Yeah.
And, you know, a lot of thathas to do with history, the English
rule and stomping out a lot ofIndian traditions and like, thank
goodness Ayurveda survivedthat time period and it's making
(02:59):
a resurgence now.
Yeah, I think it's Beautiful.
And I hope the future isembracing both sides.
Western medicine is amazingfor trauma care, you know, cancer,
like, really severe life conditions.
And Ayurveda is reallybeautiful for solving a lot of, like,
the mysterious kind of problem.
You know, you go to the doctorand you're like, oh, it hurts here.
(03:21):
And they do all the tests andscans and they say, oh, nothing's
wrong with you.
Go home and you're left in pain.
You know, so things like that.
Ayurveda is great for.
And it's amazing for prevention.
I've been practicing Ayurvedafor five years, and I've been seeing
therapists for probably acouple more years longer than that.
I don't know how many times Ididn't get sick, you know, thanks
(03:44):
to Ayurveda.
But there's just so manythings you can learn and understand
about your body where it'slike, you can see something coming
out on the horizon and belike, let me make a change, you know,
to my diet, or do somethingdifferent today.
You stay healthy.
It's about, you know,navigating this path of health.
I want to really dive intoyour story first because your story
is really interesting in termsof just how you got into Ayurvedic
(04:08):
practices.
And when we first connected,you had told me that you had worked
in film in the very beginning.
So bring us back to that.
Yeah.
Growing up, I chose film andtelevision as a career, my career
path.
I moved to New York City at 21and just hit the ground running,
like, blazing, full steam ahead.
(04:29):
For those familiar with thefilm television show went from a
production assistant to adirector of photography and four
and a half years, which is,like, insane, you know, to move through
kind of all the ranks up toheading the camera department for
mostly TV shows I worked onand, you know, some films and stuff
like that.
But the industry is, you know,your work day on paper is 12 hours
(04:53):
every day.
If your call time's nine, yourbreak time is nine, you know, when
you wrap.
So, you know, that's a lot ofpressure and that's a lot of stress,
and that's just what's on paper.
That doesn't include thecommute to set and back from set
and, you know, all the thingsyou gotta try and figure out for
yourself in the meantime.
So working in film andtelevision, a lot of pressure and
(05:15):
stress from being a directorof photography, dealing with the
network, dealing with thedirectors making the show.
Right.
You know, my own personallife, stress, emotional baggage,
and the lifestyle that I wasleading all those Factors built up
to the point of me getting sick.
And it started.
It was this kind of like, ooh,like, weird pain in my left side.
(05:37):
I thought, oh, maybe I.
Like, I pulled something or,you know, I've been carrying the
camera around a lot, kind ofwrote it off.
And then one night when I wasfalling asleep, it was just like.
It felt like something insideme popped or, like, broke.
And I thought, you know, leftside, you know, your stomach, you're
like, did my appendix just explode?
And, like, I thought I wasgonna die in my bed that night.
(06:00):
Oh, gosh.
Yeah, it was brutal.
So I called 91 1.
I was getting, like, tunnelvision, and I was in bed.
So I grabbed whatever I couldto put on and walked out to the street.
And I was like, if I pass out,at least they'll find me on the sidewalk.
Luckily, I didn't pass out.
The ambulance came quick andgot me to the hospital and figured
it out.
But four hours later, theywere like, oh, we think you had a
(06:22):
kidney stone.
And I was like, what?
And so, you know, four or fivedays went by, and, like, the pain
hadn't subsided, and you werestill in.
Immense pain at this point.
What happened that nighthappened once a month for the subsequent
months.
It was like this shredding,ripping pain through my abdomen.
Oh, wow.
And I would be in bed for,like, two or three days every time
(06:44):
that happened.
And then when I wasn't goingthrough, like, that severe pain,
what it felt like was justkind of like.
It was like a hot iron prod,like, on the inside, like, trying
to push out.
It was just like this burning,like, pushing pain under my left
rib.
So that night at the hospitalwas the beginning of, like, four
or five months of doctor'stests, you know, CT scans, ultrasound
(07:06):
scans, X ray.
They did all the tests on me,endoscopy, you know, And I couldn't
figure out, you know, theylooked at everything.
They were like, there'snothing broken, so you're fine.
Isn't that the worst feelingever, though?
Like, just going to the doctorand feeling pain and then them being
like, no, you're fine.
And you're like, well, I'mactually feeling something in my
(07:28):
body.
So you.
I'm actually not fine.
So can we figure it out?
You know, prior to thisexperience, every time I went to
the doctor, it's like, oh, Igot an earache.
I broke up something.
You know, so it was, like,pretty straightforward.
So people are familiar withthe health landscape, you know, are
familiar with this type ofstory, but it was an entirely new
dialogue for me.
I was not familiar with peoplegoing to the doctors and being let
(07:51):
down in this type of way.
And I was like, you guys, youhave all the machines, like you're
supposed to know you're a doctor.
Where did Ayurveda come intoplay at this point?
Yeah, that was just a magicalaccident, honestly.
So a year ish, you know, priorto all of this stuff happening, it
was somebody who I actuallywent on a date with.
(08:11):
We later ended up becoming friends.
She started telling me aboutthis thing that to me at the time
sounded so hippy dippy.
I was like, that's not real.
She was telling me about Ayurveda.
And so at the time of theconversation, I remember just being
like, huh, you know, whatever.
But what she mentioned waslike, you know, I had completely
transformed her life.
(08:31):
And it was after.
So I'd done all the tests andthe endoscopy was like the last thing
that I had done.
And I gotten the test resultsback from that.
I was just sitting, you know,at my kitchen table looking at my
laptop, just like defeated, so broken.
And in this moment, thatconversation came back to mind and
just her saying, like, itcompletely transformed my life was
(08:53):
the only thing I could think about.
Like, I don't have anything tolose, I've tried everything else.
So I text her and I was like,yo, what was that thing you told
me about, yo?
And she responded back to meand I looked up the woman who she
referred to and I went and sawher, you know, the next available
appointment that I could.
And that was the beginning ofmy journey with Ayurveda through
(09:16):
her.
It started with meditation andthen she referred me to an Ayurvedic
therapist and he startedchanging my diet and telling me about
my dosha, how I could cater tomy health between the dietary recommendations
and the meditation.
I mean, within like a week Istarted feeling better and within
three months I would say I hadcompletely healed.
(09:37):
When you hear about thingslike this without really experiencing
it, you might think it's like,woo, woo, you know, like new age.
But that's just so, like mindblowing to me.
So I want to take it back tothe basics and just ask you, what
is Ayurveda?
You threw out some terms likedosha, where even as an Indian person,
(09:58):
like, I don't even know.
Yeah, so ayurveda is a 5000plus year old medical science from
the greater Indian subcontinent.
It's not defined by thecountry lines now.
And the principles of Ayurvedaare understanding like the body and
how the body operates.
(10:19):
So there's three doshas in the body.
Vata, which is air and etherelement, Pitta, which is fire and
water element, and kapha whichis water and earth element.
So they figured the wholeentire universe is made up of these
five elements.
You can see obviously theearth everywhere you go, the water
everywhere we go, Fire, youknow, is the sun, air, you know,
(10:41):
the wind that blows, and oxygen.
And then ether is space, is nothingness.
So we have space on earth.
You know, they translate alittle bit differently, but, you
know, we can also equate it toactual physical outer space.
So then those five elementsand then the combination of those
elements create the doshas.
And then the doshas governdifferent systems in your body.
And everybody is a combinationof all three doshas and everybody
(11:07):
is going to have somethingthat's more predominant in your body,
which is why we say you arepitta dosha or you are kapha dosha.
And it's not because you'remissing vata dosha.
It just means that the pittais predominant or the kapha is predominant.
Just like in the world, allthe elements need, you know, balance
and counterbalance each other.
(11:28):
Without one, there can't bethe other inside your body.
We want to keep the doshas inbalance so that the body stays in
harmony, our internal universestays in harmony.
So how does that pertain to medicine?
How does that pertain to healing?
Yeah, it's taken me a longtime and all these years of study
and working with peopledirectly to understand the translation
(11:50):
from like Ayurvedic principlesto medical principles.
You know, like I said,Ayurveda is very scientific, but
it has a completely differentparadigm of looking at and understanding
the body than Western medicine.
So there's not a one to onetranslation of like how things work.
You know, it's like we thinkof things like vitamins and minerals
and proteins and nutrients andthings like that.
(12:11):
And then hormonal imbalancesand like this is how we get sick,
you know.
And so we say, oh well, if youhave, you know, low immunity, then
you need to take vitamin C.
Or if your APT is off and youneed more energy, then you need to
take vitamin B.
And they're like, oh well, thevitamin B is not working, so you
need to take vitamin D.
Unless you're getting constantblood tests and scans, how are you
(12:34):
knowing what you're doing toyour body and influencing it?
And in Ayurveda we look at thesystems, the processes of the whole
entire body.
You Know how on the largescale, like, chunking first, you
start with, like, vata dosha,pittadocha, kapha dosha, and you're
like, what are they doing?
And then, you know, we canlook at different things, like kaphas
in the lungs and the heart andthe throat.
(12:55):
So it's like, are you havingan issue there?
And then if you're having anissue, there is kapha dosha.
The culprit of that problem,pittadocha, is in your digestive
system.
So it's your stomach, yourspleen, your appendix, your liver,
your gallbladder.
So if you're having adigestive issue, then we look at
pittsa dosha, and we're like,oh, that's where the problem is happening.
I'm having digestive issues.
(13:15):
But who's causing the problem then?
You know, it could bevatadosha could be causing the problem,
but it's pitta dosha who'sunder attack, you know, and then
vata dosha lives in the colon,in the large intestine, you know,
so you could be havingproblems there.
So, so we.
We chunk first by, like,trying to look at which dosha is
out of balance based on thesymptoms, and then we reverse the
process of disease.
(13:36):
The disease itself is kind ofthe symptom.
We go backwards from thedisease to who caused the problem
in the first place, and thenwe correct it from both ends.
We can work on the conditionssymptomatically, like, what is the
symptom that you're having?
So it's like you're havingdigestive issues.
Then we can start to give yousome digestive herbs, but then we
can also give you therapies tocorrect the dosha.
And then we can meet in themiddle with complete cure.
(13:59):
Wow.
So, okay, you found Ayurveda,and then you basically got obsessed
with it and wanted to learneverything about it.
Right.
Which makes sense, you know,if it's something that totally transformed
your life.
You want to know more?
What was some of the thingsthat really drew you in when you
were going through thelearning process?
(14:20):
Right.
When I started healing, I wasjust like, what is this stuff?
How do I get more?
And I started, you know,reading books and talking to everybody
and trying to find resourcesthat I couldn't.
I didn't know it would lead tome being a practitioner, an ayurvedic
practitioner.
I thought I was convinced Iwould stay in film and television
for my life.
But a few months later, yeah,I had this kind of, like, universe
moment of like, oh, I couldchange my career and do something
(14:42):
different.
That inception moment was Icould change my career as like I
could help people heal throughAyurveda and I could be an Ayurvedic
chef and introduce people toAyurveda through food.
So that was the kind of likethe initial thought process and so
I started taking types ofsteps towards that.
(15:02):
So the first thing is I wentto culinary school.
I went to the CulinaryInstitute of America in Hyde Park,
New York which was an amazing experience.
And I learned a lotinterestingly about like food and
digestion through that schooland like how food works, kind of
like the chemistry of the kitchen.
So at that time I was stilljust self studied in Ayurveda.
And then immediately afterculinary school I took my first year
(15:25):
of Ayurvedic school.
Ayurvedic health counselor consultant.
In the US there's like three levels.
So I did my first year andthen I went to India and I studied
in India for eight months andI was at two different Ayurvedic
clinics there, one inRajasthan and one in Mumbai.
So I did just hundreds ofclinical hours, lots of work.
(15:47):
And then I came back to the USin the end of 2020 and in, I think
it was in 21, I then I startedmy education as a Ayurvedic practitioner,
which you could liken to likegetting a master's degree.
And it's much more.
The Ayurvedic health counseloris more like diet, lifestyle, understanding
(16:08):
the structure of the body,kind of like learning all the working
pieces of Ayurvedic anatomy.
And then this program, theAyurvedic practitioner program is
more like, it's much moredisease involved.
You know, each month of schoolwe just focused on nervous diseases,
mental diseases, reproductivedise is.
I've had so many revelations.
(16:29):
I feel like in Ayurveda it'shard to say that there's like one
outstanding concept.
But you know, modern scienceis starting to look more into epigenetics
and individualized medicine,which is the Ayurvedic model.
From the beginning, before wetreat someone, we seek to understand
that person.
(16:50):
Who are you?
What's going on with you?
How are we going to help you heal?
So it's always been theindividualized approach.
Ayurveda had a system ofbasically understanding epigenetics.
That's the doshas.
I mean it's broken down again.
It's like in these like kindof archaic language.
But where I had the revelationis so we have the five elements.
(17:12):
The five elements Combinedcreate the three doshas, those elements
and those doshas and theirinterplays with each other create
qualities.
20 qualities, the gunas.
And it's 10 pairs of opposites.
So 20 qualities in total.
It's like hot, cold, dry, wet.
One day I was actuallylistening to a book on physics.
It was called the Physics of God.
(17:33):
Something in that booktriggered this moment.
And I was like, the 20 gunasare the 20amino acids in a DNA strand.
Oh wow.
I was like, our DNA, ourgenetic expression.
I was like, Ayurveda was ontothis 5,000 years ago.
And I was like, could this be real?
(17:54):
And so I started doing research.
Is this real life?
I was like, could they, couldthey have really figured it out?
Like epigenetics 5,000 yearsago, before you know, a machine was
ever invented to know thatthere that were that body cells are
even made out of DNA?
And so I did a little bit ofresearch and just some preliminary
study has shown that, yes,that those 20 qualities are in fact
(18:16):
Ayurveda's understanding ofepigenetics and the DNA expression.
And you know, how we eitherprevent or cause disease.
It's like, how could twoidentical twins, one goes bald and
one doesn't, one getsleukemia, the other doesn't.
Like how does that happen?
And it's all because of natureversus nurture.
It's like you're, you're bornwith your nature, that's who you
(18:37):
are.
You're born with your makeupfrom your parents.
That's your genetic code.
But how do you treat thatgenetic code throughout your lifetime
will produce differentresults, it will produce healthy
results or it'll produceunhealthy results.
And yeah, that's the wholeentire Ayurvedic model.
So one of that's beensomething that's extremely fascinated
(18:58):
me and I'd like to go a lotdeeper on that.
Just to be able to kind ofcommunicate that to other people
is like, keep going back tothe same thing.
It's not woo woo.
It's not fake, it's not weird science.
It's science science.
Why is it so hard to comprehend?
No, as like somebody inwestern society who has only experienced
(19:20):
Western medicine.
Why is it so hard tocomprehend that treatments like that
of Ayurvedic treatments isscience, like you're saying?
I think it's just communication.
You know, the way we were raised.
The way we learned things likefor example, meditation.
Right.
There's so many benefits tomeditation, but people are like,
(19:42):
what is that going to do for me?
I do have A pseudo scientificexplanation for why meditation is
good for you.
Your pituitary gland sits inbetween the two hemispheres of your
left and right brain.
And that is like the governorof pretty much all the systems and
processes inside your body.
When you're stressed, yourbrain is creating electrical signals
(20:04):
that are going back and forthwhen you're stressed, it's like a
storm.
And your pituitary gland issitting in the center of that.
And I had always thought of itas kind of like air traffic control.
So like it's on the center ofthe, you know, tarmac.
Tarmac.
I was like, tamarack, what?
(20:24):
So the air traffic control islike kind of in a prime location
of the tarmac and it'swatching incoming planes and outgoing
planes.
Right for the brain and it'scommunicating to everybody.
Like you go here, you gothere, and it's keeping order and
everything organized.
Well, now picture like it'scloudy and foggy and like they don't
have visual anymore, you know,to the planes, but they still have
(20:45):
their instruments.
Well, now add lightning, youknow, and add whatever like strain,
rain and hail.
You're going to startdisturbing all of the controls.
Ability to organize everything.
And so if you're stressed, allthis electrical signals going back
and forth over your pituitarygland, it's going to have a hard
time functioning and sayingthis needs to go there and that needs
(21:06):
to go there and like keepingcontrol of the whole entire system.
So when we meditate, weactually harmonize the left and right
hemispheres of the brain andthey have shown this in scans, whereas
like there's, you know, justthis ton of confusion.
And then, you know, we go intolike rhythmic, like sine waves, you
know, for how the brain islike operating.
And there's, you know, beta,alpha, theta, delta.
(21:29):
It's like the different brainwavelengths in gamma moving the brain
from more chaotic places intomore harmonious places.
And then, you know, thepituitary gland can be at rest and
like organize things a lot better.
I like the air trafficcontroller analogy.
That was good.
It's a pseudo side explanation.
Where do you draw the linebetween treating with Ayurvedic practices
(21:54):
and treating with Westernmedicine practices?
Yeah, I feel like the line canprobably be moving back and forth.
There's not like a staticanswer of where you start and stop.
Eastern and Western medicine practices.
Ayurvedic medicine is amazingfor prevention and it's really great
(22:15):
for solving like thosemysterious illnesses that aren't
life threatening.
In Western medicine, ifthere's a trauma and you have a life
threatening disease, your bestcourse of action is to go with western
medicine.
If you have stage four cancerand you know your terminal, get treatment
through that system.
And this would take a moreindividualized case by case understanding.
(22:38):
But when you're ready, youknow, move in ayurvedic supporting
medicine.
And once you are no longerterminal and you're stable, all the
things that you should havedone to prevent the cancer in the
first place, now you have todo after the fact to heal the body
and heal the tissues and healthose structures and things like
that.
So that's kind of like grandscale, but on a little bit smaller,
(23:00):
like relatable scale foranybody at home, like practical.
If you're sick and you have togo into work and you know, your head
is pounding and you're stuffyand groggy and you can't function,
like, take Dayquil and go to work.
You know, if you have to.
Ideally, you know, you'd stayat home and rest, right?
But you know, the world thatwe live in, it's like we have to
(23:21):
function.
So you're not going to healthjail if you take dayquil, but you
should also be taking herbs,you know, treating understanding
like, well, how did you getsick in the first place?
Like what caused the cold?
And then so using ayurvedicmedicine to treat that at the same
time.
And you know, for me in my ownlife and you know, with my clients
(23:43):
that I work with, that's, youknow, I carry that through.
You know, it's not likesomething I just say, it's like something
I believe in.
I had a client a few years ago.
This was like relatively quick out.
It was when I was studying inIndia, so it was just after I'd finished
school.
She had chronic migraines fortwo or three years before we saw
each other.
You know, at the time that wesaw each other, she was having like
(24:04):
five to seven migraines a weekand like cluster headaches and she's
like totally debilitated.
She was taking all the maximumdosages of the different drugs that
the doctors had given her totry and allay the problem.
She'd gotten to an impasse.
She was like, there's nowherefurther for me to go in western medicine.
(24:24):
So we started workingtogether, we did all the ayurvedic
stuff.
We do the consultation,understand how it started, and kind
of put all the pieces togetherand get a real map basically of her
condition and then started tonavigate her way towards health.
And pretty quickly, you know,with some Diet and some herb changes
and lifestyle changes.
She went down to like threedays a week.
(24:46):
She'd have a migraine, and theintensity went from a 10 to a 6,
you know, so it wasn't as debilitating.
I don't remember what it wasnow, but whatever pills like, she
was taking to, like, relievethe migraines, I didn't stop her.
I was like, go ahead.
I was like, take it.
If you're in pain, take it.
But we're still doing the protocol.
And after about three and ahalf months of working with each
(25:06):
other, she now gets a migrainea couple of times a year.
I think the fact that you'renot somebody who's saying, oh, don't
take Western medicine at all,that's bad.
It makes it so much more easyto implement because, hey, if you're
in pain, sure, take somemedicine that will alleviate it,
(25:29):
but at the same time, let's continue.
So you're an ayurvedicpractitioner and you're taking clients.
What are the conditions thatyou see most of that your clients
have?
It's so interesting that youasked that.
So my marketing andadvertising and a lot of my copy
kind of is around, like, my condition.
(25:50):
So I talk a lot about IBS anddigestive issues, and that's kind
of where I hang out.
But I get clients with allsorts of different conditions.
Of the last four clients I'vejust recently seen, two of them were
IBS and the other two, one wascancer and another one was actually
similar to the migraines client.
(26:10):
He's got vestibular migrainesand tinnitus and vertigo.
Chronic debilitating.
So, yeah, I get kind of like amyriad of different types of people
that I attract.
And I've worked with all sortsof different things, but I think
usually people latch on to,yeah, I have a digestive issue or
something like that and theseother symptoms.
(26:32):
And so that's how kind of likethe spread of clients that I get.
When a client comes to you,like, what is your process in terms
of the consultation?
What does that look like?
And then how do you educateyour clients and motivate them to
(26:53):
make these changes in their life?
When somebody first comes tome, usually it's just a.
It's a lot of back and forth conversation.
You know, it's like, oh, whatdo you have?
How'd you get it?
And da, da, da.
And then they asked me, youknow, how I'm gonna help them.
They're like, well, I don'tknow how I'm Gonna help you right
now until we do a full consultation.
But, you know, I help peoplethrough diet, lifestyle and herbs,
(27:14):
and then usually also tomeditation, if they're open to it.
If not, there's otherpsychological therapies that you
can do in Ayurveda that are helpful.
But I would say meditationamong them is king.
So, yeah, somebody comes to meand let's say, you know, we've gone
through that process.
So they say, like, yes, let'sdo this.
What happens then is I sendthem a health questionnaire.
So they fill everything out.
(27:35):
It's kind of just like you goto a doctor's office, like, what
are you allergic to, what hurts?
Or what are you coming to thisvisit for?
Health history, those sorts of things.
And then the consultationitself, it's about an hour and a
half, long process for most people.
And we go really deep into allsorts of different weird symptoms
that signs that they might have.
(27:56):
And it's weird in the sensethat they seem unrelated.
But in Ayurveda, everythinghas a string.
Do you have aches and pains?
Do you have cracking andpopping joints?
You know, people would thinklike, oh, yeah, my joints crack all
the time.
But what does that mean?
Well, it means you have, like,really high vata, you know, so it's
like, we need to know that todiagnose and understand.
So we go through that wholeentire thing, you know, what are
you eating and how's yourbowel movements?
(28:18):
And, you know, if anybodywho's familiar with Ayurveda, we
know we talk about poop a lot.
I love that.
Yeah, it's important.
We need to know.
And then I do a mixture ofdistant and local clients.
So a lot of people who arevirtual, I'll have them send me photos
of their fingernails, their tongue.
And then now, more recently, Iwas doing it before, but I'm getting
(28:41):
back into it again.
As a picture of your eye, thisis Ayurvedic, like iridology, so
you could read the patterns inthe iris and see what those mean,
the implications for health.
And so between thephysiological evidence, you know,
the look of your fingernailsand your tongue and your eyes, coupled
with the interview, then withall that information, like I said,
I can kind of get a real mapof your state of imbalance.
(29:05):
Where did it start?
How did it start?
How did it progress?
Where are you at right now?
And then I can create thepathway towards healing and then
the healing part with Ayurveda.
So like I said, I use diet,lifestyle, herbs, meditation.
But there's also Stages to that.
So the beginning stage ispalliation and it's usually a bit
(29:27):
more gentle.
What we're trying to do isbring the doshas back into alignment
and harmony with each other.
The reason you have disease isbecause they've gone out of harmony
with each other.
And I think of it as like bone setting.
Right.
So it's like first we gottalike soften the area, prepare the
tissues, make sure everythingis nice and gentle and ready.
So that's the palliation stageand then there's a detoxification
(29:49):
stage which is like the.
You're gonna put it in place.
This reminded me of like a chiropractor.
Exactly.
Yeah.
You're just like crack it andyou're like realign.
You know, it's a veryaggressive but also fast that can
be a few days to a week longprocess of resetting the doshas,
the detoxification process,and then there's the rejuvenation
(30:10):
process stage which is nowthat things are back in line, we
want to strengthen and tonifyand bake in those results in a state
of balance.
What about people who don'tnecessarily have huge issues?
Have you seen any clients likethat that were just like, oh, I just
want to know how to strengthenmy diet or bring more energy into
(30:34):
my life or something like that?
Yeah, I do get some people whoare like ayurvedic, curious.
It's not as strong of a motivation.
You know, people are like inpain, they're like, I'll do anything,
it doesn't matter.
So I do get those clients veryrarely at this point, but for them,
you know, it's interestingtoo, even with those like just slight
(30:56):
differences of how your bodyfeels or like, yeah, I want to like
make my digestion better.
It's amazing how different youcan feel when you follow ayurvedic
principles.
So for one example, like meand my family, my mom is the only
one who's really like boughtin to Ayurveda.
We'll do family parties orsomething like that.
(31:16):
And people try and send mehome with leftovers and I just say
no.
I was like, I won't take food home.
It's one of the big things inAyurveda is like not to eat leftover
food, frozen, canned shelfgoods, preserved, things like that.
Because it's heavy food.
It has a sitting energy.
And so when you put foodthat's been sitting for a long time
(31:39):
into your body, it's going tocreate this heaviness, the slowness,
the static energy and it canreally mess up your digestive system.
And for me, the ayurvedic rulethen is like, you eat fresh food
every single day.
Freshly cooked, you know,breakfast, lunch, and dinner, you
know, fresh vegetables.
If it's meat, then you getfresh meat.
(32:00):
Whatever it is, it's justfresh, so nothing left over.
And for me, having eaten thatway for so long now, if I eat food
that's left over for one day,I might be okay.
But if I eat leftovers twodays in a row, then it messes me
up and I just feel like blah.
You know, I feel heavy and Ifeel gross.
So people who are doing thischronically, that's just how they
(32:23):
understand their body to feel.
If you're eating leftover andpreserved and food out to go and
all these things all of thetime, you don't know that once you
optimize your digestion, youdon't know what it feels like to
have the energy, have theclarity of mind, have the focus,
have all these things.
It's like you're stuck in themire and you don't know that you're
there.
(32:43):
So, yeah, it's interesting.
You know, people come with thedigestive issues, and then they start
to do these things, andthey're like, wow, I can't believe
how much energy I have.
I can't believe how I feel,and I can't believe all these things.
And it's like, you can'tbelieve it because you just don't
know because you haven't tried yet.
Wow, that makes me not want toeat my leftovers.
Yeah, it's honestly, like, Ifeel bad, and it's a big lifestyle
(33:05):
change to.
You know, for me, always bemaking fresh food.
You need to have the time toeven do that.
Yeah, you need to have thetime to do that.
A lot of the health stuffonline, it's like meal prepping and,
like, having all your stuffready to go, and it's healthier,
but it's not that healthy.
There.
There's a lot to it.
But the benefit, the payoff is monumental.
(33:28):
You know, I don't like wastingfood, so it's been a learning curve
to make sure.
It's like, how do you cookjust enough for each meal?
And usually a breakfast issimple because I can make a very
small breakfast and that's fine.
And then lunch, you know, ifthere's anything left over, I can
eat for dinner.
So leftover means leftover night.
So you can eat lunch anddinner the same food the same day,
(33:50):
and that's okay.
But if you put it in thefridge and it goes overnight, that's
considered leftover.
I've conceded a little bit andI'll eat a one day leftover so I
don't waste food.
But I won't go beyond thatbecause then now I'm being wasteful
of my health.
That's interesting to say itthat way.
Yeah.
Wow.
So for anybody who's listeningin who might be curious about possibly
(34:14):
changing their life throughAyurvedic practices, are you currently
open to new clients?
Yeah, absolutely.
I wish I could help everybodyin the world.
I do take new clients and ifanybody wants to connect with me,
you know, Ayurveda for dot us,but it's Ayurveda for us.
You know, they can find me onmy website and contact me through
(34:36):
that.
And so yeah, for people whoare Ayurveda curious and same, you
know, with my website, you cango on there just for blog information
and tips and things and thento work with me.
The best way to reach me isthrough the website.
Amazing.
And I'll put all of the linksin the description so that it's easy
for you guys to find all ofthat information.
(34:56):
Thank you so much.
Austin.
Hey, thank you so much.
It's been such a pleasure.
Ethics and policies of the USGovernment, maybe in a good way or
bad way, depends on how yousee things.
But I'm just here to sharesome dialogue with an expert who's
been on both sides of the equation.
(35:17):
According to theamericanimmigrationcouncil.org, uS
immigration law is based onthe following the reunification of
families, admitting immigrantswith skills that are valuable to
the US Economy, humanitarianprotections and promoting diversity.
Now.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.