By: Dr Deepa Apte
Jan 5, 2012
Having enjoyed Christmas and New Year celebration, it’s that time of the year when everyone is planning for the best of 2013 including work, profession, health etc. Every one follows a de-tox plan with the aim of getting rid of toxins from the body to ensure weight loss, healthy skin and hair, making the body free from any disease. But have you ever wondered what these toxins are or how they are formed in the body and how they represent themselves?
Have you ever wondered why certain problems never seem to be treated or cured? No amount of medicines, remedies, massages etc seem to be effective. Modern medicine may not have an answer for this but Ayurveda certainly has an explanation. It describes this inability to treat certain diseases through the presence of a peculiar toxin called “Ama” in the body. Getting rid of this toxin not only ensures restoring health but also enables a longer life which is the main aim of Ayurveda through the principles of anti aging therapies.
Ama: The Toxin:
The normal process that should take place in the body is as follows: All the food we eat should be fully digested. Half of it is absorbed into the body as nutrients and the rest of it expelled out of the body as waste products.
But sometimes due to external negative influences (e.g. stress, strain, adverse weather, inappropriate food and habits) not all the food we eat is fully digested. Perhaps just one third of the food is fully digested and absorbed as nutrients; the other third is fully digested and expelled out of the body as waste products. But there still remains a third of the food which is in a half digested condition. Because of this, it cannot be identified as either nutrients or waste products. Therefore it is neither absorbed nor expelled out. This half digested unmetabolised food product circulates in the body as toxins. Ayurveda has named such toxin as “Ama”. The first stage of any disease is also sometimes called Ama.
This Ama acts like a solid barrier between the therapeutics given and the final destination where they needs to act. In the beginning some of it may trickle through this solid barrier and show some immediate relief. But after a while, no more medicine can flow through it and there is no continued relief.
Ayurveda also explains another entity called “Agni”. This word literally means fire. But in this context it means digestive fire. Agni can also be defined as the biological fire or heat that governs metabolism. It can be compared to digestive enzymes and metabolic processes that take place in our body to help break down, digest, absorb and assimilate food. Ayurveda say that a man is as old as his “Agni” or digestive fire. As long as the digestive fire is strong, Ama or the toxins cannot be formed in the body.
