Starting your day in an inspiring and invigorating way profoundly impacts your overall health. Ayurveda recognizes the power and potential of morning practices to teach you to truly take your health and life into your own hands.
Prior to beginning my Ayurvedic practice, I used to wake up feeling anxious. My mind would be racing, often filled with dread and worry about all the things I needed to get done. I wanted to simply cover my head with my comforter! I would look at my phone and write emails while still in bed. All of this only reinforced my constant stress and anxiety.
The practices I share with you in this chapter have greatly transformed my health and freed me from years of anxiety. They have given birth to a feeling of true freedom and empowerment from within and provide me with the strength, courage, and wisdom to navigate my life and serve others from the depths of my being.
Our mornings tend to be rushed and harried. We often race to work or school, without even eating breakfast, much less incorporating any other kind of practice. The practices in this chapter don’t take very long. Even if you have many family responsibilities and/or a demanding job and aren’t getting adequate sleep, you can still apply one or more of these practices and thereby transform your mornings.
One of the best ways to curb negative thinking and depression, connect with nature, and increase sattva (mental clarity and positivity) is to wake up early, between 4 and 6 a.m. Doing so helps you connect with the sun, a symbol of our eternal, expansive, unlimited being.
The ancient seers or sages (rishis) of the yogic and Ayurvedic traditions have long regarded the early morning as a spiritually charged time. The rishis recommend that we wake up early each morning to soak in the abundant blessings of this time of day, which is considered the most auspicious time for meditating, contemplating, practicing yogic poses and breathing exercises, and performing other practices in this chapter.
When you wake up between 4 and 6 a.m., you are blessed with abundant sattvic vibrations, which infuse your day with positivity, hope, and peace. Sattva is a quality connected with clarity, compassion, balance, purity, health, happiness, harmony, and a sense of universal love. Ayurveda teaches that you are naturally full of sattva — it’s just a matter of reconnecting with it. Nature offers you free medicine at this time to do just this!
If you’re accustomed to waking up much later than 6 a.m., gradually adjust your waking time. Set your alarm back 15 minutes each day or every other day, until you’re waking up comfortably at 6 a.m. or earlier. In addition to all the mental health benefits of waking up early, doing so also strengthens your ability to fall asleep earlier at night — and improves your sleep quality, too.
The art of the Ayurveda way of life is all about restoring your innate connection with the natural world, as a way to connect with your own true inner nature, which is a repository of health, wholeness, and unlimited freedom and power.
“Waking up early was a process. I went in 15-minute intervals. Rising early makes a difference, and when I sleep past 6 a.m., I’m sluggish and don’t have a lot of energy. It’s natural medicine.”
— Ruby
Your first thought upon awakening in the morning can set the tone for your entire day. I think of life as being like an empty canvas. Your thoughts, speech, and actions are the palette you can use to paint any picture you want. Why not, then, paint a picture of personal power, abundance, and creativity?
As soon as I awaken each morning, I gaze at my hands while affirming that personal power, health, abundance, creativity, and knowledge all lie in my own hands. Having struggled with anorexia nervosa as a teenager, I felt powerless for a long time. My insistence on eating as little food as I could was about personal control. What my ego fooled me into seeing as a spiritual quest for self-mastery led to a wasting away of my bodily tissues in reality. The real change needed to come from a deeper space, from a place within.
Through this morning ritual, I affirm that I am held by an all-pervading spiritual power, which reminds me I am never alone in facing obstacles. I cannot control what happens to me, but I’m in full control of my response to the hardships of my life. Learning to respond instead of react to challenges has and will continue to mold me into a stronger, wiser, and more compassionate person.
As you think, so you become. A popular expression from the Upanishads, an ancient Indian spiritual text, beautifully expresses how you can:
Sow a thought, reap an action;Sow an action, reap a habit;Sow a habit, reap a character;Sow a character, reap a destiny.
By making your first thought in the morning one of affirming the abundance, creativity, and power that reside in your hands, you plant powerful seeds to help manifest these qualities in your character. This morning practice helps you affirm that your health, life, and destiny all truly lie within your own hands.
Ayurveda reveres the sun as the ultimate bestower of amazing health. The sun is, literally, the source of all life. We are solar-powered creatures, and living in harmony with nature’s rhythms, as dictated by the course and direction of the sun, empowers us to live the healthiest and happiest lives possible. Anchoring my mind in the sun has meant, first and foremost, greeting the sun upon rising to offer my prayers, gratitude, and desire to embrace my innermost nature, which is as strong and powerful as the sun in the sky.
We can learn a great deal from the sun. The sun is completely independent: it shines whether or not it receives recognition or approval for doing so, simply because the nature of the sun is to shine. Like the sun, we are the source of our own light. A big source of mental stress arises from our expectations and desires not being fulfilled by others in our lives, whether our parents, siblings, friends, teachers, lovers, children, or coworkers. If we let go of these desires, we can fill ourselves up with love from the inside and actually become love itself. The Vedic spiritual tradition teaches that we are filled with abundant, universal love and light at the truest, deepest essence of our own being. Being love is about acknowledging our fullness, and acting from a space where we feel full, rather than empty or lacking.
A beautiful universal Vedic sun practice called Arghyam consists of respectfully offering water to the sun from a copper vessel. To do it, go outside on a balcony or in a garden. Pour the water around yourself in a clockwise circle, look at the sun, and touch your heart with your hands. In doing so, you affirm the inherent power and freedom of your own being.
Our minds are incredibly receptive in the morning hours. When we spend the early morning in the company of great texts, or listening to inspiring talks, we plant many powerful seeds of insights in our consciousness for the day ahead.
I love taking my journal off my bookshelf in the morning and copying statements out of universal spiritual texts like the Upanishads as part of my morning practices. It feels so grounding to curl up with the positive thoughts outlined in these and other texts.
Because what we pay attention to tends to increase in our lives, it’s a great idea to spend quality time studying the lives and teachings of great saints and leaders from different traditions.
Copy down a passage from your favorite book of wisdom today. You will also notice over time how this wisdom settles deeper into you and impacts you during the times you most need it.
I have personally deeply benefited from spending hours listening to audio recordings of my teacher’s lectures and transcribing them, word by word. For example, when my teacher’s beloved dog Sakhi became sick, it was hard to face losing her. I had taken care of her often and grown attached to her. When facing Sakhi’s last days, my teacher’s lessons on letting go of attachments, which I had listened to and transcribed during my morning practice, returned to me. I was able to recover from this loss much more quickly because my study and contemplation of mindfully letting go of attachment became a practice I put into action during this difficult time.
Writing in a journal is a powerful way to do self-study; it also helps you process your experiences and gain greater insight. Writing and contemplation go hand in hand. In the Vedic spiritual tradition, contemplation is a critical step in the process of acquiring knowledge; it’s the link between receiving knowledge and acting upon it.
Acting in wiser ways starts with the habit of carving out a little silent time in the mornings to provide space in which your creativity can flow. Writing in a journal helps strengthen a beautiful cycle of personal evolution and transformation. I’ve found it powerful to write personal affirmations, along with my resolved intentions. The act of writing down what I intend has a way of strengthening my resolution to accomplish whatever I set out to do; it’s a fuel that sparks my motivation to change.
As you read this book and identify practices you’d like to adopt in your life, I encourage you to write down your intentions in a journal. It’ll be very rewarding to look back and track progress toward your goals. By writing about your experiences applying Ayurveda to your life, you can start to write your own story of health and freedom.
This ancient Vedic water practice (called Sandhya Vandam) is an incredibly powerful way to consciously let go of mental negativities, navigate personal transitions, and feel lit by your spirit. Because Vedic rituals typically take years to fully learn, I’m including here a simplified version that you can use to bless yourself every morning.
This is a heartfelt universal practice of connecting simple positive affirmations with water, to increase their potency. Water has an amazing cleansing effect, helping you let go of that which needs to be let go while affirming and strengthening what is positive in your life.
To do this practice, you can use any small vase or pot. Traditionally, a kalash (a copper pot with a large base and a smaller mouth, shown here) is used.
Fill your vessel with water. As you hold your vessel in both of your hands, chant any mantra you wish into the water. You can chant OM if you like, or you can simply silently affirm to yourself any mindful intention (sankalpa).
I love silently affirming the words on the next page. You can simply hold your vessel in your hands while you do this, or you can place all of your fingers (except your thumbs) into the water and then touch each named part of your body with the water as you affirm each of these universal blessings.
May my head be filled with the light of wisdom.
May my eyes see what is auspicious.
May my ears hear that which is auspicious.
May my mouth be free from eating disorders and food-related conditions.
May my throat be blessed with truthful words.
May my heart be free to give and receive love.
May my navel be free from anxiety and digestive challenges.
May my hands and feet guide me to perform positive actions in the world, which bring myself and others greater health and freedom.
Starting your day by chanting uplifting mantras builds strength and discipline. By focusing on a specific elevating statement or words early in the morning, you plant seeds of positive thinking that return to you throughout the day. The practice of chanting mantras in the morning has transformed my anxiety. It has given me the ability to be present in the moment with whatever I’m doing.
To help recite the mantra, you can use a string of 108 beads, called a mala in Sanskrit. Chanting mantras with the aid of a mala is a powerful practice for gaining self-mastery. In practical terms, the beads on the mala help you count the number of times you have recited your mantra.
We typically offer mantras in a multiple of 3, whether 3, 9, 18, 27, or 108. Just one mantra, offered with feeling and intention, however, can do wonders to shift your consciousness.
First, mentally call on a witness who inspires you, as we need support in fighting our negative thoughts and emotions. This witness can be a relative, a teacher, a deity, or even the sun, moon, fire, or a beloved animal. Imagine their presence in your heart and mind.
Then make a mindful intention to offer mantras on your mala. You can either whisper the mantra aloud, which can help focus your mind, or chant mentally. I usually chant the famous Vedic Gayatri Mantra. The Vedic spiritual tradition considers the Gayatri Mantra to be the most powerful medium for awakening health and consciousness. The mantra goes like this:
Let us meditate upon the supremely great luster of the Sun. Let that inspire our intelligence.
While the Gayatri Mantra has been incredibly powerful for me, you can chant any mantra, in any language and from any tradition you like. The intention is always far more potent than the particular words you choose to chant.
“At the beginning, my mind isn’t completely focused. By the end of 108 rounds of a mantra, I’ll be in a space where I’m engulfed in the mantra and the meaning behind it, and I am ready to contemplate within my spiritual space.”
— Clint
In the universal Vedic tradition, the number 3 symbolizes completion: the beginning, middle, and end. The cycle of the day (morning, afternoon, evening) and of your life (birth, life, death) happens in intervals of 3. The number 9, which is 3 times 3, and its multiples (like 108) are thus considered very auspicious. We gestate in our mother’s womb for 9 months. This book has 108 practices and can be thought of as a mala of inspiring practices for giving birth to a new and improved you.
Practice the yoga posture Simhasana (named after simha, meaning “lion”) to connect with the spirit of the lion, making you feel strong, vigorous, majestic, and powerful. Physically, Lion Pose positively impacts your sense of hearing. It clarifies anger and enhances your ability to recall, understand, and implement knowledge at the right time, when you really need to, by allowing prana (subtle life force energy) to travel from the base of your body to your mind, where it enhances your mental functions. Lion Pose also increases your digestive power as you apply gentle pressure to the abdomen with your elbows.
Lion Pose is excellent to practice if you’re feeling fearful. It’s particularly beneficial for public speakers, as it helps cure stammering and stuttering, and it reduces the fear of speaking before a crowd.
Because this pose is more advanced, I highly recommend learning it directly from a teacher, then referring to the following steps as review to practice on your own. As with all the yoga poses in this book, it is more important to connect with the intention and experience of being like the lion than actually doing the steps shared below.
To practice, sit on your knees and spread them open. Place your hands on the ground in front of you and turn them inward, so that your fingers face your body. Tuck them under your legs, below your thighs. Lean forward, like a lion about to attack, with the weight of your body against your arms. Inhale deeply through your nose. Then, open your mouth wide and stretch out your tongue, open your eyes wide, and exhale with a sound that resembles a lion’s roar. Gaze in front of you and repeat this roaring action three to five times, pausing in between each roar to gently massage your throat. You can also do this pose in a chair.
I love connecting with the spirit of the lion each morning. Lion Pose has improved my digestion, helped me gain healthy weight that makes me feel better in my body, and literally and figuratively strengthened my voice. I know of no better way to go within myself to reclaim my personal power than roaring in Lion Pose.
Watch online videos of lions roaring. It helps to spend time observing the lions’ behavior. They’re wonderful teachers of how strong and powerful you can be when you take steps to reclaim the mighty positive force you have deep within.
It’s essential to spend time connecting with the feeling of being as powerful and strong as a mighty lion. The first time I did Lion Pose, I felt silly. I was in my teacher’s garden and couldn’t roar because I got stuck thinking: “I’m a woman and I’m small.” I had to close my eyes and really believe that a lion lives inside me. Once I was able to connect with that, I scared my German shepherd friend Sakhi with my roar!
I love watching the sunrise each morning. The sun is a potent symbol. It represents personal power, perseverance, strength, courage, health, wealth, wisdom, and life itself. As I watch the sunrise while doing the meditation below from my great teacher Baba, I love imagining each ray filling me with its special blessings of abundance, knowledge, creativity, and abiding health.
I often find myself smiling or even crying tears of joy upon seeing the sunrise. It’s a reminder of the opportunity to have a fresh start each and every day. Every ray creates a unique art exhibition, and tickets to nature’s exquisite art show are free.
Remember that you have all of the power and strength of the sun within you. Even if you can’t see the sun rising in the sky, you can still practice this meditation. Close your eyes. Imagine the sun filling your heart with its brilliant rays. Observe your body, from head to toe. Notice any discomfort you may be holding on to anywhere. Breathe into it. Imagine that the sun’s rays, filled with abundance, health, creativity, knowledge, and lasting joy are bringing healing into the areas that need it.
Rather than trying to completely clear your mind of thoughts, simply notice what thoughts are naturally arising. Through the power of observation, you have the ability to gain awareness of the nature of your thoughts, and to start to transform them. What comes to the surface of your mind to be seen can no longer hold power over you. Hence, this practice of simply observing your thoughts, without judging them, is a powerful step in the direction of self-mastery and spiritual transformation. Feel the sun shine into the recesses of your mind and spirit as you observe your thoughts.