It’s your turn. It’s time to shed the toxins (ama) you’ve accumulated over the years from improper digestion of food, emotions, experiences, and environments. Did you ever think it was possible that your body could be given a second chance to start fresh? Can a person really return to innocence and reprogram their body’s cellular intelligence? The answer is yes! And it’s through panchakarma (PK). That’s the reason I do this practice at least yearly.

Ayurveda recommends cleansing at the change of each season, but the fall and spring are especially beneficial times to cleanse because the shifts in the environment are greater at these particular transitions. Of the two, the fall is when vata is more likely to get aggravated and in turn aggravate the other doshas, suggesting that the fall is the time that many latent illnesses emerge and manifested diseases are provoked. In order to avoid such vata aggravation, I think that there is no better time for PK than now, during the transition into fall.

A simple 9-day home PK can be used to avoid illness and can skyrocket a person towards their wellness goals — whether those are weight loss, decreasing pain, anxiety, or insomnia, awakening more mental clarity, or managing a disease such as diabetes or high cholesterol. It’s also a great way to invite Ayurveda into your life if she’s not already a welcome guest in your home. Many women also do PK 3 months or more before conceiving (and it can actually help with infertility) because it rids the body of toxicity and creates a welcoming space into which a soul wishes to enter.

An important part of PK is rasayana (rejuvenation). The idea is that once the body is cleansed, it can be rejuvenated. (You don’t dye a shirt until you’ve laundered it.) When the body’s cells and channels are no longer clogged with ama, the agni (intelligence) of each cell is awakened. In Ayurveda, ama is actually the root cause of all disease. For example, in autoimmune disease, ama coats cell membranes, disguises our cells, and interferes with cell-to-cell communication and recognition of self. It thereby causes one’s immune system to attack one’s own body. Rheumatoid arthritis (an autoimmune joint disease) is actually referred to as ama-vata in Ayurveda and responds wonderfully to PK. Ama also plays a role in cancer development. Ama-clogged bodily channels lead to stagnation in the tissues, and stagnation plays a principal role in tumor formation.

Removing ama from the body’s channels, great and small, enhances the free flow of prana, and the juice of health and vitality (ojas) always follows prana. (That’s why you may have heard a yoga teacher telling you to breathe into a site of pain. I remember thinking my lungs are up here – how do I breathe into my big toe? Prana is not just our breath, but is more importantly our attention, and ojas follows prana. Hence, panchakarma is a cornerstone of Ayurveda because it not only manages illness and disease but also rejuvenates and regresses the aging process.

You may be wondering why this 5000-year-old tradition focuses so much on maintaining health and living longer with vitality? (Did you ever think old age could mean vibrance?!) Well the reason is, if your back hurts, and you’re anxious, then you can’t meditate. Your attention will be deviated outward toward the body and senses and away from inner peace. Ayurveda is primarily concerned with healing the body and mind so that the spirit can fulfill its true purpose in this life – to transcend limitation and experience the bliss of oneness with all of creation. In Ayurvedic tradition, the Creator himself is said to have communicated this knowledge for the benefit of humanity.

You don’t have to believe in these divine origins to receive Ayurveda’s benefits. This is also true of yoga. The word “yoga” means “union” – of the spirit with the divine; the initial steps start with asanas performed with a meditative mind, syncing body, breath, mind, and spirit.

So, what does this path of detoxification and rejuvenation entail? Some of you may have heard of the five (pancha) actions (karmas) of panchakarma and be thinking “that’s not for me.” The five therapies refer to the five traditional means of releasing excess dosha and ama from the body. In the US, a modified PK more adapted to a western palette is commonly performed, incorporating two or three of these five therapies. A home PK is the gentlest, yet still a highly effective way to cleanse. Before I go into exactly what’s involved, I want to give you a little background so you better understand the reasons behind the process.

Each of the 3 doshas has its home in the GI tract. Kapha lives in the stomach, pitta in the small intestine, and vata in the colon. If doshas accumulate due to aggravating factors in one’s diet and lifestyle, exceeding the capacity of the GI tract to house them, they spill over and begin to circulate in the blood and lymph. It is at this stage that one has the prodromal symptoms of a disease. When a dosha is in its home, it’s happy, and it minds its chores as it should. When it is forced out of its home, it’s angry, looking for a new home, and ready to set up camp in someone else’s if it wanders homeless long enough.

Dosha keeps circulating till it finds a weak spot (defective space or khavaigunya), where it then lodges. It’s almost as if the dosha goes knocking at the door of each major bodily tissue, and the strong tissues say “go away” and don’t let the dosha in. However, a tissue weakened by genetic predisposition, previous disease, trauma, or ama doesn’t have the will to say “no, go away” and lets the dosha in. Because each of us has particular defective spaces, we tend to recurrently suffer in the same way, whether it’s repeated sore throats or repeated pulled muscles in the same location. Once dosha enters a tissue, it starts to amalgamate with the tissue and alters the characteristics of the tissue to match those of itself (A little like a virus — it takes over). For example, vata is dry and rough; so, when it enters the joints it changes the qualities of the joint spaces to those of itself – making the space dry and rough. This then leads to cracking, popping joints, and if the process is not reversed, it will one day develop into osteoarthritis.

So, the theory behind panchakarma is that it beckons excess dosha and ama out of the tissues and back home to the GI tract, where it can be purged and released from the body for good. How do we reverse the flow of dosha back to its home?

1. Internal Oleation. Start with ingesting graduated quantities of ghee or oil, which lubricates the channels within the body so that toxins are softened, more readily released, and glide smoothly back to the GI tract. (Dried food stuck to a dirty dish sponge is more readily released if you lubricate the sponge first.)

2. External Oleation. Do self-oil-massage (abhyanga) with long strokes from your extremities towards your center, gently assisting the release and journey of the toxins. In Ayurveda, the seven layers of skin correspond to the seven major bodily tissues: lymph, blood, muscle, fat, bone, neural, and reproductive tissue. The skin is, therefore, a medium through which to administer medicine, allowing oil to penetrate deeply and nourish all the way down to the neural and reproductive tissue.

3. Sudation or sweat therapy. Induce at home by following the abhyanga with a hot shower or bath. This helps the oil to penetrate deep into the skin and also assists the release of toxins through the sweat glands.

4. Virechana. Purge the small bowel midway through the cleanse to rid the body of accumulated toxins and dosha that has been brought home for release. (ie. about half a day of 4-5 liquid stools)

5. Nasya. Instilling medicated nasal drops removes residual excess dosha.

All of the above except internal oleation and virechana are performed daily for the majority of the cleanse. During this time, a mono-diet of lentils, rice, and vegetables is recommended (a light yet nourishing and sustaining combination of protein, grain, and fiber). The idea here is that digestion is a significant consumer of our daily energy. If light, easily digestible food is consumed, the body has more energy to devote to the digestion and release of toxins. Also, to conserve energy for this purpose, you should try to slow down during your cleanse and minimize stress and vigorous exercise. Pre and post-cleanse, a lighter diet is recommended, ie. avoiding meat, alcohol, and processed food. This prepares agni for its coming task and allows it to rekindle healthfully after the job is done. Although the actual cleanse only lasts about a week, once the process has been initiated, we continue to release ama (physical and mental) for several weeks after, and a lighter diet allows us to continue to manage and process this ama.

Cleansing leaves our bodies like a baby’s – new, vulnerable (and super-soft after all the oiling) and as such, should be treated tenderly. Post-cleanse, we enter the rejuvenation phase, which is the time to really nourish our bodies and spirits with healthy foods and practices. Because the body is receptive to new patterning, it’s a great time to reprogram and implement new behaviors that we may have been struggling with making part of our routine. It really is a fresh start! The intelligence of each cell is awakened. Not only will your will be strong, but it will be fully aligned with your true, divine, unattached nature.

And after, you are left feeling like I did after my last cleanse – clear, grounded, peaceful, and strong.

Nisha Khanna, M.D.

(I’m guiding a number of clients through home cleanses this fall. Contact me if you would like to see if now is a good time for you to cleanse as well.)

Fall Cleanse