3 Ayurvedic Tips to Boost Your Immune System

With spring around the corner, and the wild temperature swings, there’s no better time to give your immune system a little extra LOVE.

As a Yoga Health Coach™, I want to share 3 simple Ayurvedic tips to support your immune health so that it can support you in keeping you vibrant and well.
For 5,000 years Ayurveda has been teaching us to utilize the laws of nature, in all its forms, to create a unique map to find your most ideal state of health, which in my book, is what immune health is all about. 

These are three tips from an Ayurveda perspective to boost your immune system:

1- Strengthen your Digestive System.

Per  Ayurveda, a strong digestive “fire” is the key to year-round health.  AND the first thing is to strengthen your digestion by eating meals at regular times and choosing foods that are easy to digest.   How do you know you’re digesting well? For me, it’s pretty simple. I just feel good: no discomfort, no gas, no, bloating, no tiredness, and no heavy mind.   I feel light, comfortable, and at ease.  

Ways to strengthen your digestion? Here are my two go-to:

Be sure to include immune-boosting foods in your diet. You can think of foods that boost the immune system in two ways—foods that are easy to digest and foods that offer support. Foods that are easy to digest are  kitchari, a traditional Indian dish made of rice, mung dal, and spices. It is so easy to digest that it is often given to the elderly, to those who are ill, and even to babies.  Other similarly easy to digest foods are soups, stews, and broths.  

Foods that offer support include things that are rich in vitamins and minerals, such as turmeric, ginger, echinacea, and vegetables & fruits.

Be sure to avoid foods that are cold, oily, and heavy. This includes things like cheese, ice cream, yogurt, potato chips, and fried foods.  Yep, I said it and you read it.  

2- Get Good Quality Sleep

If I’m not getting enough sleep, I immediately notice a snowball effect of feeling more and more tired and run-down- think hangover without the fun memories.  There are tons of books and articles about it, but in summary you’ll get good quality sleep by going to bed and rising at the same time daily, aiming for eight hours of quality sleep per night.  A little side note- you can’t force good sleep, you can only invite it.

3. Have a Daily Supportive Routine

Having a supportive daily routine is way more important than you’d think.

Remember last time you went on a trip?  Remember you end up needing as many days to recover?  Well, it’s not always just because the airplane was dirty. It’s because your body is totally confused from being stressed out, from staying  up too late, waking up too early and eating weird foods.   Creating stability through healthy ]habits will make all the difference and keep your body from being out of balance.   Ayurvedic habits to include in a daily routine are things like scraping your tongue, oil swishing, daily self-massage with oil and so on.

If you can nail these 3 basics, you're likely to experience a huge difference in how you feel.   

Lastly, I want to remind you to give yourself permission to slow down, nourish, and take care of yourself.  This is one of the most powerful ways to avoid depletion and support both mental and physical health.

Drink Warm Water to Awaken Your Digestive Fire

Drinking a glass of warm water cleanses and awakens the digestive tract, hydrates the tissues, and encourages a bowel movement. Ayurveda Wisdom

When I was eleven years old, my mom decided to follow a “naturista,” which is like a wellness & health guru via plant-based diet and not a naturist, which is nudism, which my mom would have never approved or followed.  The first wellness guideline from the “naturista” she implemented in our household was room temperature water.  She placed “tinajas” or clay jars around the house and we drank water from these for a long time, eventually the “tinajas” went away and we just drank room temperature water.   So by the time I was introduced to the Ayurveda’s concept of not drinking cold water, I had had over twenty years of practice.  So this is why I am telling you this story: it does take time to switch and move the temperature of the water you are drinking to a warmer degree, but it can be done.  

In Ayurveda, water intake is very important.   Ayurveda recommends keeping water drinking separate from the meals, and adequate hydration is emphasized at least thirty minutes outside of your mealtime. I think we can all agree that the proverbial 8 glasses of water a day is a good place to start.  So let’s explore why cold water is not preferred.

In Ayurveda, an incredibly important concept is agni (your digestive fire). Agni is the transformative power in the body—digesting food, thought, and emotions. It is hot, sharp, light, subtle, luminous, and clear.  To simplify:  agni is fire, fire is hot.  Ayurveda’s principle of “like increases like, and treat excess with the opposite” explains, then, that the ice cold water will decrease the strength of your fire or agni. Likewise, if you want to augment agni you will probably want to drink hot water or hot teas.

There was a small but interesting study done in the 1980’s, where they measured how long it took the stomach to empty its contents when the individual drank cold (39°F), room temperature (98°F), or warm (122°F) orange juice. They found that the stomach temperature dropped after drinking the cold juice and it took nearly 20–30 minutes to return back to normal temperature. They also found that the cold drinks increased the emptying time.1  You could say that the agni had to work harder to maintain its proper energetics so that it could digest properly.

What we are avoiding by maintaining a strong agni is the production of ama (toxic, metabolic wastes). When foodstuff sits undigested in your trashcan, it ferments. A similar process can occur in the gastrointestinal tract. 

I know drinking warm water may be a big ask, but here is a place to start: Drink one glass of Warm Water first thing in the morning. Drinking a glass of warm water cleanses and awakens the digestive tract, hydrates the tissues, and encourages a bowel movement.  So maybe you aren’t ready for warm water (I wasn’t for years), start with room temperature water till it’s a routine and then start mixing it with warmer water till you find the right temperature for your new habit.

Why Scraping Your Tongue

Tongue scraping is as basic as toothbrushing in Ayurveda. It’s a MUST, really. Tongue scrapping was my introduction to Ayurveda’s daily routines over twelve years ago and it has changed my health as it has become a cornerstone of my morning rituals.

Why the emphasis? To start, in western science, dentists point to post-nasal drip as the cause of bad breath. The post-nasal drip coats the back of the tongue with mucus that is rich in dying, bad bacteria, resulting in volatile sulfur compounds that create bad breath. The white coating on the tongues is what in Ayurveda we call ama (or toxins). Any toxin that has that sticky and heavy quality, causing dysfunction in the body, is ama.

In Ayurveda, our tongue represents our entire gastrointestinal tract and what is going on there. As the body processes the ama and puts it back into the gastrointestinal tract for elimination, it also spits ama out onto the tongue. So scraping the tongue daily is like cleaning the lint from your dryer before you use it.

So for sure with tongue scraping you’ll be eliminating a big cause of bad breath. But bad breath is only one benefit of scraping your tongue. Doing so will support your entire body by helping maintain a healthy bacterial environment in the mouth and by stimulating the cleansing of the entire gastrointestinal tract.

It is also a great way to stay in touch with your health. By cleaning your tongue daily, you will quickly get into the habit of taking note of the coating on your tongue. You will notice a thicker coat after a heavy meal, sickness, or after eating a lot of dairy products the night before. Your tongue becomes a mirror to your digestive health.

If a tongue scraper is not right next to your toothbrush and floss and it is not already part of your daily routine, now is the time to start. You can get your at any health food store or good pharmacy.

Connect with your Nature ( or why a plant-based diet)

Would you guess what is the most frequently asked question I get as a Yoga Health Coach?  Yep, you guessed it: WHAT SHOULD I BE EATING? Every time one has to ask that, one should be translating it as I AM DISCONNECTED FROM MY NATURE.  

Everything we consume becomes us.  All food has a sustaining force, a force that animates and activates, a life force that we yogis call Prana.  The moment we aren’t consciously connecting with the state of our Prana, we’re moving away from ease and towards dis-ease. If you want to connect with your life force and experience good health, energy, trim physique, a livable planet, compassion and deliciousness - a PLANT-BASED DIET is an excellent path for you.

While vegan and vegetarian diets are defined by what they exclude, a plant-based diet is defined by what it includes:  lots of plant foods.  What this means is that you tap into the abundance of PRANA-rich veggies, beans, peas, fruits, lentils, whole grains, nuts, and seeds AND you eat less animal products and processed foods.  

My Yoga practice ushered me to become a vegetarian and my Ayurveda studies got me to go beyond being a consumer of vegetables and be more of a collaborator of my Prana intake.  The only way to really experience this connection with your nature is by experimenting and feeling how the Prana that you consume affects you, how it becomes you.

Maybe you need more motivation to try a plant-based diet,  here are my five reasons to eat a Plant-Based Diet.

1. It’s good for your health.

Unless you are living under a rock, research and statistics confirm what yogis have known for thousands of years: eating plants make you feel good!  But in case you need some formal convincing:

• Dr. Dean Ornish’s research showed that eating a very low-fat, plant-based, vegetarian diet and other lifestyle changes could, in fact, reverse heart disease. Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn also succeeded in reversing heart disease in patients who were seriously ill.

• The Adventist Health Study-2 found that vegetarians had a lower risk of Type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure. While about 50 percent of Americans will develop high blood pressure by the age of 60, research shows that populations that consume a diet comprised mostly of vegetables or who are vegetarian have “virtually no increase in hypertension with age.”

• Eating red meat (beef, pork, and lamb) is associated with increased rates of cancer and heart disease. And the American Cancer Society recommends eating a healthy diet for the prevention of cancer “with an emphasis on plant foods.”

2. You will feel and look trim.

Let face it. If you are eating a lot of plant foods, which have less calories and move with more ease through your diggestive track, you are going to lose weight. If you eat plant-based foods instead of fast, fatty, processed, and sweet foods, you will cut out a ton of calories — and the best part is, you will feel satisfied and less inflamated.  

3. You are helping the environment.

According to an article by Elizabeth Weise for USA Today, it takes about 15 pounds of grain to produce 1 pound of beef and about 5 pounds of grain to produce 1 pound of chicken. You can see how we would use less water and other resources if we ate the grain ourselves.

An article in Scientific American reveals that the amount of beef the average American eats in a year creates as much greenhouse gas as driving a car from NYC to Denver!

4. You will become rich!

OK, maybe not immediatly, but you will imediatly save lots of money.  Many people think eating a Standard American Diet (S.A.D.) is the cheapest way to eat. But actually eating plant-based foods can cost even less.

For example you could have lentil soup, salad, fruit, and sparkling mineral water for four people for about $10!

Beans, peas, and lentils are some of the cheapest foods you can buy.  Even buying organic fruits and veggies at premium health food stores is more economical than one may think.  Do the math.

5. You’re moving away from animal cruelty.

I know it can be devastating to think about the cruelty and unfairness that goes into acquiring all the goods we purchase at the grocery (or fashion) store. I think it is important for all of us to understand how animals are treated so that we can make a conscious choice.  If nothing else, a Plant-Based Diet is all about raising one’s consciousness.

No guilt. No shame. Here is one example as a case study: gestation crates for pigs. Once the sows are artificially inseminated, they are put in crates with just enough room for their bodies for their entire pregnancy. As the sows get larger and larger, they often develop pressure sores. They urinate and defecate through slots in the bottom of the crate.  Once the sow delivers, it is back in the gestation crate. When the animals are spent, they are taken to slaughter. They use these horrific practices to save money and produce more meat. But at what cost? Pigs are intelligent animals, and who wants to be part of this kind of suffering to save a few dollars?

I am not a vegan and I do occasionally eat animal products, but when I do eat them I go out of my way when possible to buy products from animals that have been humanely raised. Yes, I pay more for them. However, for the very small amount of animal products I do eat, it is worth it and does not break the bank.

It’s hard to argue with a plant-based diet when it benefits your health, waistline, environment, wallet, and conscience. Any movement toward more plants and less meat is a big step in the right direction. Why not skip the meat and eat some veggies today?

Spark Up Your Life (or is it time for a cleanse?)

No matter how much we work on staying at my optimal health, living in a big city and career obligations catch up with my body and mind.  That is what brought me to my first cleanse many years ago. I was feeling overwhelmed, overweight and overextended. As a yogi I can’t praise enough the practice of regular cleansing in the year to observe, pamper and thank my body.  

After studying and trying many ways to cleanse, this is what I know as a Yoga Health Coach, a good cleanse has to address both internal and external toxins. It has to deal with the toxins we eat, drink, breath and put on our bodies AND also with the internal toxicity created by the body as it performs its normal everyday functions.

I believe that cleansing isn’t about starving yourself or skipping meals.  Ayurveda offers a straightforward approach to detoxing and to me the most efficient and with long lasting results because Ayurveda encourages your body to do it’s thing.   

So how do you know if it’s time for you to try a cleanse?

YOU’RE FEELING SPENT, TIRED AND WANT MORE ENERGY

If you’re feeling lethargic and drained and don’t have the energy to live your daily life with vibrancy, your diet could be the culprit. A cleanse clears your system of any foods that are squashing your energy (the biggest culprits are usually sugar, dairy and caffeine) and gives your digestive system a reset.

YOU’RE CARRYING EXTRA WEIGHT, FEELING BLOATED OR PUFFY

If you want to lose weight in a way that nourishes your body and gets you on the right track for changing your habits for the long term, a cleanse can be a great place to start. By cutting out the foods that triggers weight gain and learning to find healthy replacements, you’ll be setting yourself up for sustainable weight loss.

YOU WANT TO CLEAN UP A SLUGGISH DIGESTION

If you often feel constipated, bloated, gassy, or have stomach aches and indigestion, it may be time to clean up your gut with a cleanse. A healthy digestion is one of the cornerstones of Ayurveda and an indication that you’re living optimally a cleanse can ignite your digestive fire.

YOU WANT CLEARER, GLOWING SKIN

Your skin is a mirror of the internal state of your body. If you’re having breakouts or other skin issues, it can be a sign that something on the inside isn’t right. Skin issues are often a result of inflammation in the body, so removing anti-inflammatory foods on a cleanse can result in your skin clearing up and having a healthy glow.

YOU’RE FEELING ADDICTED TO CERTAIN FOODS

We all know the feeling of being attached to foods – needing that coffee, glass of wine, cheese or chocolate. If you’re relying on certain things like caffeine and sugar to get through the day, a cleanse can help you reset, and begin to crave things that truly nourish you.

YOU WANT TO KICK-START A HEALTHIER LIFESTYLE AND NEW HABITS FOR THE LONG TERM

Sometimes, being disciplined for a short period of time can help you find the middle way. If you want to create a lifestyle that is healthy, but you don’t even know where to start, a cleanse might be a great option. You’ll learn new healthy ideas, and reset your days to be more health-supportive.

WHEN SHOULD YOU NOT DO A CLEANSE?

If you’re feeling weak and run down, or your body is underweight, cleansing may not be the best choice for you.