Marisa says Ayurvedic healing must keep in mind your current symptoms, original climate or prakruti and the nature of the medicine, that’s how finely calibrated it is. And if you don’t, well…
“Let me share with you something that happened in my life in regards to this concept and has served to provide quite a learning experience!
Several years ago, when I first was studying Ayurveda at the California College of Ayurveda, my father-in-law approached me on a busy Christmas Day with a health problem. Specifically, he was experiencing heart burn and wanted to know if I had any suggestions. Now, I had only been studying Ayurveda for a few weeks, and at the California College of Ayurveda we strongly emphasize that students are not to begin practicing on other people until they enter internship. And it is because of this very situation that I’m about to describe that this rule is so important!
Well, in my eagerness to help my father-in-law, I decided to bend the rules and give him some advice. In my mind, I thought “well, how could it hurt? This is harmless enough”. And I was so eager to go into practice! So, I said “sure, I can help you”. I decided that a tea would be a good choicefor helping him and I settled on some ginger tea for him. I had heard that ginger is great for digestion.
And my father-in-law was having digestive issues – so voila! I was confident I was making a good choice.
I proceeded to brew my father-in-law a nice cup of ginger tea which was made with dried ginger… And after that I got busy with the festivities and lost sight of him.
A couple of weeks later, I saw my father-in-law again and asked him about his digestive issue and if the tea that I gave on Christmas had helped. He sheepishly chuckled, smiled, and said “well… something I need to tell you. After I drank the tea that you gave me, my heartburn got so bad I had to go lie down and I wasn’t even able to eat the Christmas dinner”.
Oh my goodness! What had I done? I couldn’t imagine. I felt terrible about this! He had a digestive problem, I gave him digestive tea, what could possibly have gone wrong? As my studies continued and I began to understand the concepts of Ayurveda better, I realized my mistake. My father-in-law was having an overheated digestive issue. That’s what heartburn is; it’s a case of too much heat in the digestive tract. What he needed was a cooling digestive herb. I didn’t properly understand this concept at the time, and I gave him a tea containing dried ginger, which is actually quite hot. It’s like I poured gasoline on a fire!”