Good Digestion = Good Life

Our digestive systems’ ability to give our body the nutrients it needs to be strong and healthy depends in turn on our body’s energy level.

Digestive problems arise when the body’s energy levels are low or diverted to another bodily function like the nervous system.

Our physical energy levels are affected by our genetics, our activity level, our emotional state and our mental tendencies. Therefore some solutions are more suitable for different people (Dosha types in Ayurveda) and situations.

Kaphas experiencing digestive irregularities will find that the most likely underlying problem is a slow digestive system, in other words slow metabolism. Kaphas do things slowly. They will feel more energetic when they experience change in routine or in increasing activity levels.

Therefore the goal is to increase metabolism. Early morning aerobic exercise is a great way to jumpstart the body’s energy and metabolism. During morning exercise you can aid digestive fire by including abdominal exercises.

Before meals, take deep abdominal breaths. If digestion still needs help, a spice /herb combination call Trikatu is recommended in Ayurveda. I use Trikatu when the weather is very cold and damp (Kapha weather)or when I am eating a high carbohydrate or fat meal (Kapha foods). Banyan Botanicals, an organic line of Ayurvedic herbs makes Trikatu ( http://www.pureandsimple.ca/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=shop.flypage&product_id=1256&category_id=233&manufacturer_id=0&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=27 ).

Vatas have lower digestive energy. Therefore in Ayurveda, it is recommended that they eat mainly cooked foods. Eating foods warm especially in cold weather or times of stress is highly recommended. Since they tend to be slim with a high metabolism, Vatas need to eat more or eat richer to maintain their physical energy. To support adequate digestive energy, Vatas need to create calm before eating. This can be as simple as deep breaths before eating.

To increase the body’s energy to support better digestion it is recommended that Vatas do Pranayama, Chi Kung or Meditation regularly to calm their mind. More energy can be saved if their minds can be disciplined to not waste energy with needless worry and nervous activity.

To support their digestive fire Vatas can take Hingvastek, a combination of organic spices especially formulated for them from Banyan Botanicals (http://www.pureandsimple.ca/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=shop.flypage&product_id=571&category_id=233&manufacturer_id=0&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=27 before meals. I use Hingvastek before meals often as I am predominately a Vata types ( see past blogs for more information on the 3 Doshas) but especially when the weather is cold and dry or when I am mentally or emotionally exhausted.

Pittas are born with good metabolism. Their high fire element give them the advantage of good digestion. But when they over do their strengths in leadership, competition and organization their digestive systems fight back with excess acid and lower digestive fire.

While cooked food is easier to digest Pittas can oily suffer from the inflammation cooked foods can cause. Cooked food can result in excess mucous that can further negatively affect the digestive system so when digestion is compromised or when you are tired lightly cook food. Do not eat oily or rich foods like red meat and oils.

Two books I recommend to help you incorporate good digestion with a better way of life are “The Slow Down Diet” by Marc David (http://www.amazon.com/Slow-Down-Diet-Eating-Pleasure/dp/1594770603 ) and “unwinding the Belly” by Allison Post and Stephen Cavaliere (V http://www.amazon.com/Unwinding-Belly-Healing-Gentle-Touch/dp/1556434782/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1271433971&sr=1-1 )

Poor Digestion? You have an Energy Crisis

Digestion requires energy. How many of us can willing sit quietly to eat? How many of us believe eating is a time to multi-task?

As urbane ambitious people we spend very little energy to digest our food. Our greedy ambitious brains grab at least 20% of our body’s energy output and we willing give it more as we read or work as we eat.

Then many of us are concerned about our weight or body measurements so we choose to lower our caloric food intake resulting in lower energy intake. To further lower our calorie (energy) utilization, we are choosing harder to digest raw or almost raw foods. A high percentage of the raw food we eat is not digested.

But diets of raw, low fat, low carbohydrate foods have become popular as we have come to believe those foods to be best for our health.

A good example of how diet demagoguery can use science to promote it. The Paleo Diet ( http://paleodiet.com/). Proponents of the diet eat the foods of our hunter gatherer ancestor. A diet that our ancestors ate sounds like an good diet for us longing for the simple life. This combination of the raw food diet with Atkins sounds inviting to those who are nostalgic about the past. With visions of wholesome unfettered food and the simple life, we start to stock our freezers with meat (guess the hunter ancestors we are envisioning were living in the ice age) and our refrigerators with vegetables ( with gathering is so much easier with a supermarket near by).

Those of us who have tried low carbohydrate or Atkins diets have found that we can become very dehydrated and those less fortunate found our kidneys really hate protein overload.

But who hasn’t wanted to eat our food in its most natural form, raw, only to find that our stomachs were not so nostalgic.

Raw food and high protein diets take more energy to digest and many of us are just not ready to change our lifestyles enough to accommodate it.

So what diet is best for us. First there is no one size fits all so seeking out professional help is advisable. Call a school of holistic nutrition i.e. http://instituteofholisticnutrition.com/ihn.asp or a directory http://www.enviromedicine.com/index1.htm

To improve our digestion, we need to get more energy to our bellies but where is that energy going to be coming from?

If you are an extreme athlete, are you willing to reduce your practice to give your digestion the extra energy it needs?

If you are on an ambitious run in your career, are you willing to slow down to improve digestion?

Or if you are a consummate thinker or worrier do you have a strategy to lower your brains demands on your body’s energy supply so you can improve your overall health?

If the answer to any or all of the above questions is yes, then you are all set to better digestion. And don’t need to read further.

But if the answer is no or if you chronically experiencing low energy, then instead of redistributing energy we need to increase the amount of energy.

We can add energy directly to the digestive system with digestive enzymes, spices and herbs and by cooking our food. Taking a full spectrum digestive enzyme (my best performing one is Genestra’s Digest Plus) with your meals will give your stomach support in metabolizing the foods you eat.

You can help digestion by starting the metabolic process outside of your stomach by cooking or marinating (vinegar, lemon as in a salad dressing) or salting it.

Yes, cooking reduces the nutritional value of your food but it will add digestive energy to the food. Cooked food is more easily digested and allows our body to utilize more of its nutritional value.

We can also increase our energy supply to our bodies which can increase our digestive energy. They include increasing the time or quality of our sleep, practicing Chi Kung (Chi Kung is the only exercise that nets you more energy), meditation and Pranayama (yogic breathing exercises) and increasing the amount of calories in our food intake.

Each one of us will benefit from some of the above suggestions more than others. i.e. cooking our food is great for those of us who are mind active while exercising the belly is better for those of us with slow digestive metabolism..

Some of the suggestions are not suitable for some of us. i.e increasing food intake is not recommended for those with slow metabolism or cooked food is not so beneficial for those of us who suffer from inflammation.

The more aware you are of the characteristics your body and mind, the more effective your choices will be. In the next installment I will try to help you choose some of the suggestions with the help of Ayurveda.

Stick Your Belly out if you want Good Digestion

There is probably no bodily function we have some influence over that is more critical to our personal success than digestion. We all agree that digestion is the foundation of good health which we are now beginning to link to beauty and ability to succeed.

In Skincare, poor digestion is usually one of the main causes of acne, inflammation and dull wrinkled skin. For more information on causes of skin problems refer past blogs.

During my visit to New York City, I had the serendipitous opportunity to attend the seminars at the New Life Expo (http://www.newlifemag.com/ ).

“Yoga for Healthy Digestion” with Dedee Benrey ( http://www.dedeebenrey.com/ ) was of great interest to me both personally and professionally. I am a longtime sufferer of poor digestion with food allergies and food intolerance and the bad skin that is the result of it.

I had attended a “Yoga for Digestion” workshop at the Yoga Studio at Yonge and Eglinton (http://www.yogastudio.net/home.html ) a couple of years ago with a very supportive Yoga Teacher, named Cat. It was a great 2 hour class that took us through yoga poses that improved different digestive issues. But except for the “Reclined Cobblers Pose” ( a reclining pose I take when my digestive system disagrees with what I had chosen to eat) I have not practiced the many poses Cat showed us. Like many people, I wanted better digestion, I just did not invest the time to achieve it.

So why do we have to bring more energy to our belly’s so we can be relieved of digestive problems? Because we gave the bulk of our body’s energy to our passions and achievements.

Dedee’s seminar demonstrated some convenient poses (Dedee is in the photo above doing the Pigeon pose that extends out our abdomen) that we can do at work or infront of a computer like Spinal Twists done on a chair. – to get more energy to our stomachs to help with digestion.

The big take away here is to do twists and to do poses like “The Bridge” to open up the area of our abdomen so that there is more blood flow to our stomachs.

So if Yoga is not your thing think of other exercises you can incorporate movements that focus on the belly. Concentrate on the belly movements from your favourite activities like dance or floor exercises. Why not take up belly dancing. Most of us type A’s want more from our exercise than physical movement. The great thing about Yoga, Tai Chi and Primal Dance is you can derive spiritual, emotional and mental growth along with physical health.

Physically giving our bellys more bloodflow and energy is just part of the story. Where are taking that energy from? We will discuss this next week.