Sewing the seeds

As we enter what I affectionately refer to as “vata season” I find the need to tune in and really listen to what my body is telling me, as opposed to what I would do BYE (Before Yoga Era): become erratic, run around and not focus on anything in particular.

If you’re not familiar with Ayurveda, yoga’s sister science here’s a quick run down. Ayurveda treats the whole person as an individual, we are said to be made of three parts to create our unique constitution: pitta (fire), vata (air), kapha (earth). We are born, live and die with this constitution so the more we understand about it and our propensities within it the more we can live balanced and harmonious (sattvic) existence. If we choose to, free will is a whole other discussion.

The point being, that while we made up of these essences, so we see it revealed in the nature we find around us. Autumn and spring are particularly vata times, there’s a lot of change happen, quite literally (eh-hem) a lot of wind flying around. And since I'm particularly vata, I feel this season particularly. We can feel scattered and thrown to the four corners. The beauty of aryuveda is that one doesn’t treat this as such, it merely provides us with a whole range of tools which we can use to bring more balance.

So for me that means, porridge and stews. It means warm drinks. It means a grounded, slow practice. It means time on the sofa under a duvet enjoying my favourite books and giving myself space for contemplation. Because as autumn is a time to slow down it is also the time we plant the seeds we wish to gestage and then grown in the spring. So it’s the time to turn inside and give space for your creativity to be sewn.