Vatsala Sperling - The Ayurvedic Reset Diet: Radiant Health through Fasting, Mono-Diet, and Smart Food Combining

THE
AYURVEDIC
RESET DIET

Vatsala Sperling has gathered a lifetime of cultural influence, serious study, and daily practice into this book. I have sat at Vatsalas table and eaten her food. She knows how to create a life-affirming, healthy, peaceful oasis and offers wisdom and guidance on how to accomplish exactly that. Ayurveda means science of life. In this remarkably thorough work, Vatsala provides all the knowledge required to bring life into your kitchen and your home. This is beautiful stuff.

CHRISTOPHER S. KILHAM,AUTHOR OF THE FIVE TIBETANS AND THE WHOLE FOOD BIBLE

In Ayurvedic Reset Diet Vatsala Sperling presents practical tools and authentic Ayurvedic guidance with precision and insight. The book is replete with practical methods that one can integrate into everyday life with ease to achieve better health and wellness.

SHUBHRAJI, FOUNDER OF NAMAH VEDANTA CENTER AND AUTHOR OF IN THE LOTUS OF THE HEART

The Ayurvedic Reset Diet is an easy-to-read guide to using basic Ayurvedic principles to achieve health. Most people, especially in the West, have been conditioned to eating in ways that actually rob them of vibrant health and often lead to illness. This book offers a way out of that routine. Vatsala explains very clearly how and why to follow simple dietary guidelines to recover health in a very down-to-earth way. By explaining the rationale for the guidelines, the author makes it even easier to apply them. This is one of those books that can make a big difference for anyone motivated to achieve better health. I recommend it highly.

ALAN V. SCHMUKLER,CHIEF EDITOR OF HOMEOPATHY 4 EVERYONE

I have met many doctorsallopathic, Ayurvedic, and naturopathicand the best have one thing in common: they were raised by healers. They grew up in a living tradition, imbibing everyday wisdom from a parent or grandparent. Vatsala falls into this category and seamlessly combines her medical knowledge with traditional know-how. For those of us who didnt have the good fortune to be raised in such an environment, this book provides the next best thing.

SIMON CHOKOISKY,AUTHOR OF THE FIVE DHARMA TYPES

Acknowledgments

The foundation for this book was laid decades ago, when I was just a little girl and a very ardent student eager to learn everything my mother could teach me by way of being a living example. If mothers are considered our first teachers, I was very lucky to get a fantastic one. She knew the art of living and the science of life as explained in Ayurveda, Homeopathy, and the ancient culture of India, and she taught with love. To this mother, I will be forever and always grateful.

My gratitude also flows in the direction of my father, Shri Ramnath, my brother Shri Bala Subramaniam, and my dear sisters, Meenakshi, Rajalakshmi, Bhuvaneshwari, and Vijayalakshmi. Each one of them has shown me the way to live with love and respect for nature.

My in-laws, Helen and Julius Sperling, were always charmed by my activities in the kitchen, and my father-in-law found many parallels between the Jewish kosher laws and the science of food preparation based on Ayurveda. My sister- and brother-in-law, Debora and Bob Kanig, both die-hard devotees of everything organic, natural, and sustainable, filled me with enthusiasm for the subject of organic foods in the United States, and I was happy to recall that I was raised on seasonal homegrown, cooked-from-scratch organic foods, way before the word organic became fashionable in the United States.

My background in Ayurveda comes not from a college degree in the subject but from having watched my family and even my neighbors live their lives according to the principles laid out in Ayurveda. To these individuals, I will be grateful always.

How I became a homeopath is a different story altogether, and for it, I am forever in debt to my dear husband, Ehud C. Sperling. His love of learning, his curiosity, and his relentless striving to keep his family in the fold of alternative medicine and an unconventional lifestyle propelled me toward an education in Homeopathy. His lifelong passion for exploring and understanding other cultures and other ways of being infected me too and led me to study the life of our hunter-gatherer ancestors and explore the possibility of integrating Ayurvedic principles into my practice of Homeopathy.

Our son, Mahar, has been asking Why? ever since he began speaking, and in order to give him correct answers on Ayurvedic food rules, I had to do research and educate myself on the facts. He keeps me on my toes and for that I am grateful.

My thanks are due to my dear friend Leslie Blair. She has unconditionally loved and supported me through every adventure in my life, be it Ayurvedic vegetarian cooking, writing, or practicing Homeopathy.

My thanks are due also to Isabel and Vilma Solano Rojas. Their selfless and devoted service has enabled me to follow my heart without a care in the world and avail myself of extended periods of time, which I could devote to research and writing.

I am very happy to have the great opportunity to be published by Inner Traditions, Ehuds book publishing company. The former chairman of Tata Steel, J. R. D. Tata, once said, A company is only as great as the people who work in it. If this is indeed the yardstick for measuring a great company, then I am delighted to say that the people at Inner Traditions, from those at the front desk to those in the corner office, are some of the best in the industry. It is my pleasure and honor to have them publish my book.

Finally, my gratitude and heartfelt thanks are due to Swamiji Bhoomananda Tirtha, my guru since I was five years old. On occasions when I was stuck and needed assistance, he helped me with no strings attached. Without his timely support, I do not know what I would have done. Swamiji, I am forever grateful to you.

VATSALA SPERLING, MS, PH.D., PDHOM, CCH, RSHOM

Annapuurnne Sadaa-Puurnne Shangkara-Praanna-Vallabhe |

Jnyaana-Vairaagya-Siddhyartham Bhikhssaam Dehi Cha Paarvati ||

O Mother Anna Poorna, you, who is always full of gift of food and blessings, you, who is the the beloved of Shankara;

O Mother Parvati, please grant me the alms of your grace, for awakening within me spiritual knowledge and freedom from all worldly desires.

Maataa Cha Paarvatii Devii Pitaa Devo Maheshvarah |

Baandhavaah Shiva-Bhaktaash-Cha Svadesho Bhuvana-Trayam ||

My mother is Devi Parvati (Anna Poorna) and my father is Deva Maheshwara (Shiva).

My friends are the devotees of Shiva, from my country and all the three worlds.

(FROM ANNA POORNA STOTRAM COMPOSED BY SHRI ADI SHANKARACHARYA)

INTRODUCTION

Food as Friend or Foe?

An Ayurvedic Perspective

MY DEAR READERS,

When I was growing up in Jamshedpur, India, we lived a life based on Ayurveda, an ancient system for understanding disease and health that considers food that is grown, cooked, and eaten with reverence as both nutrition and medicine. My parents explained the meaning and purpose of our household rituals and traditions in such a way that we children, six of us, could embrace and carry them forward into our own future. One of my most vivid recollections from my years at my childhood home is the set of rituals my family followed around food, which I now try to emulate. Our parents taught us to talk to the plants that grew year-round in abundance in our front and back kitchen gardens as well as on our rooftop and ask for the plants forgiveness before cutting, plucking, pruning, or necessarily uprooting them. We were trained to thank the plants for providing us with fruits, vegetables, and flowers and to take only as much as we needed at any given time; thus harvesting was a daily process.