By
Vishal Bhidu
The age-old and rich Ayurvedic and yoga practices hailing from India for thousands and thousands of years have reached every nook and cranny of the world, having overarching benefits for a sound and healthy mind, body, and soul. The Indira Gandhi Centre for Indian Culture (IGCIC) under the mentorship of its director Shri Balwant Thakur is sparing no efforts in ensuring the right education through Ayurvedic and yoga practices trickles to the reach of everyone in Mauritius.
A seminar was hosted on Thursday, September 22 at the IGCIC on Ayurvedic practices, yoga and intestines to the intention of students and guests where the Ayush chair at the University of Mauritius (UoM) Dr. Ish Sharma delivered a talk.
During the opening ceremony, Yoga Guru (teacher) at IGCIC Ms. Sowmya made the following observation: “Education is not the amount of information that we put together into our brain. It is a process by which our character is formed, strength of our mind is increased and our intellect sharpened. As a result of which one can stand on one’s own feet,” as she introduced the centre’s head.
IGCIC director Shri Balwant Thakur remarked: “Yoga and Ayush must go hand in hand since there is an interconnectedness in the way they complement each other coupled with the efforts undertaken to promote such talks. Based upon feedback of the audience, we can make talks pertaining to Ayush and yoga a permanent feature at the centre.”
Welcoming the Aayush chair, the IGCIC director doled praise on him telling that in India there is a stringent process undertaken by all Aayush professors before selecting someone for an international mission, defining Dr. Ish Sharma as, “A highly learned person and the best in India.”
The seminar was an interactive one buzzing with high-level energy and enthusiastic response from the audience where the guest spoke with flair and finesses on the subject matter while explaining the link between anatomy and physiology. He stressed the human body is composed of 30-70 trillion cells, 200 billion cells which are replaced every single day. “We are almost a new person every day with cells under attack by acids and stomach cells replaced every day. The red blood cells are replaced every 120 days while it takes between 5-10 days for red blood cells to be replenished,” Dr. Ish Sharma threw his insightful view on the subject matter.
2 Gs of Genetics, GIT
The gastrointestinal tract (GIT) is seen as being much more important in relation to any other organ such as the brain, heart, or liver which is too obvious as advocated by Ayurveda and has been taken for granted so much that it didn’t fall under the five organs. It makes for quite an eye opener together with the fact that the human body is nothing but an arrangement of organs surrounding the hollow tubes,” he tells.
An interesting aspect about the seminar is that it’s not one-way traffic where the learned doctor called for the audience’s response and a guest cum student at the centre asked how people in their 30s and 40s are suffering heart attacks and brain damage despite being teetotallers and not smoking. The Aayush chair outlined multiple factors starting with genetics where the eldest siblings may be at 90 percent risk to develop diabetes by the time they reach their 40s and 50s. Conversely, for someone who has only one parent with diabetes, the risk of contracting the same is at 50 percent. He enumerates; “The factors constitute genetics, diet or lifestyle calling a need for physical activities, yoga and meditation, pollution and trauma where all leads to ongoing attacks daily on the system.”
Free radicals, wastes and five elements
During the interactive session, Dr. Sharma threw light on free radicals produced as a result of consumables, taking the form of vegetable peels, dirty dishes, or for that matter, factories turning raw materials into finished products. “The thought process and mindset are very crucial as we speak about throwing macro and micro waste coupled with the need to remove the body toxins produced inside the body.”
“In the food eaten, it is composed of micro waste-free radical production and macro waste-urine and stool where the superoxide dismutase (SOD) takes care of pollution produced inside,” Dr. Sharma explains.
There were various questions to the medical expert on yogic practices and healthy life where he underlined a simple fact yet often oblivious to so many of us. “The human body is composed of panch maha bhuta hinging on the five elements such as space, wind, water, fire and earth, combining to form everything.”
He remarked: “Free damage is done to the body, ushering in changes to the DNA structure, change the cell wall permeably where each cell has got a wall, cell membrane and what goes in and out is highly regulated since every cell is a factory.
The moot question is, he asks, where free radical comes from? First stress and secondly, overeating tends to produce the maximum or all free radicals. That is where the self-imposition or mind set comes in a very crucial manner and often as self-imposition or our own limitations limiting the self or else the mind bear no limit since it can accomplish everything.
“We have an average of 15,000 thoughts a day…here the underlying connection between the brain and the GIT coming as a powerful subject. How does the intestine affect the brain and not the other way round?” Fodder for thought.
Covid pandemic, Pranayam and life style
The pandemic is continuing to impact people having a history of suffering from it and being COVID-19 positive or not, it flares up complications in our various organs such as the heart, lungs and liver. On that count, Dr. Sharma advocates Kapalabhati (shining skull) as the best activity one can do for breathing muscles. He explains: “The diaphragm moves minimally when we breathe in, it goes flat and that’s where shaking our organs such as liver, pancreas, stomach and kidney vigorously helps a lot in terms of an improved blood supply, toxins dislodged and lungs to repair faster.”
The regular Pranayam (breath regulation), Dr. Sharma advocates in particular the Kumbhaka (breath retention) entails breathing in and holding the breath in time to go on increasing. “The breathing in for a longer duration is an active process while breathing out. comes with recoil go on contracting in throwing the air out.”
You are what you eat! How many times have we heard this oft-repeated statement that carries a holy grain of truth? Ancestral food remains an important aspect where inference is made to the link from migrating populations to different parts of the globe and often chucking out food that has traditionally been consumed. This abrupt change in lifestyle where shifting away from food traditionally consumed can make a population or community prone to a high risk of developing diseases.
Dr. Sharma sheds light on this issue in reply to a question, “Whatever population migrates and whatever who are not aborigines implies that they do not stay from where they originated from, there is a high risk of diseases. According to the Global Review, the most afflicted ethnicity with high diabetes prevalence is found among African Americans, followed by Asia Americans who are the most suffering population with a high level of blood sugar.” It can be argued the same for Mauritius which had no settlers before 1500 as an island and saw occupants post that period in history.
What becomes one’s body, genes and mindset is linked to that particular soil with water, food and crops becoming more in sync with genetics to keep one healthy. This is where genetics can play a very important role as we speak about alteration in food habits, albeit crop consumed as we witness a drastic lifestyle change can be baleful with the rise in diabetes, obesity and high risk becoming two-three times higher and prone to developing such diseases.
“Very interestingly, the human genes have got very long-lasting memory to hundreds of years coupled with genetic memory that doesn’t end with life where the latter can keep modifying over 500 years and it helps to stick with everything original, be it water, air, food and encompassing everything.”
Kudos to the writer for awesome representation