Feeling Stressed? Simplify Your Diet

According to research featured in the Nutrition Journal eating less meat, poultry, and fish can improve your mood. Many Ayurvedic practitioners are also vegetarian and, here at Banyan, we are always interested in the link between diet and our physical and mental state.

Ayurvedic healers believe that our levels of stress are directly connected to our diet. They hold out the promise that if we improve our diet, we can reduce our stress. At the heart of this conviction is the critical principle of Ayurvedic medicine that many diseases can originate in the digestive system. This means that your diet is of the utmost importance to keeping you healthy. Indeed, you may even find yourself in a double bind.

This vicious circle develops in subtle ways that you may not even notice. For example when you are feeling very tired and are overworked, physical stress will leave you lower in energy. The same applies with respect to emotional stress. If you are going through a difficult period in your personal life, it will have an impact on you physically too, leaving you exhausted and having reduced energy. This means you will also have less energy to digest the food you are eating.

Poor digestion can lead to a number of problems which can exacerbate physical and emotional stress such as indigestion, heartburn, or sluggishness, which can then lead to more serious conditions like gastric ulcers. So, it is important that you make the right diet choices.

If you are lacking energy, your digestive system will not be able to digest as much, and it is important to eat lighter foods. If you are stressed out and tired, do not eat “heavy” foods, such as potatoes and others high in carbohydrates, as they will not be digested as well, and will not give you the energy boost you are looking for. Eat fresh vegetables, rice, and soup rather than anything more substantial. Your health will benefit greatly from doing so and help you to improve the strength required to prevent you from having more serious health problems.

In addition to changing your diet, there are a number of Ayurvedic remedies that will facilitate the relief of stress. Ayurvedic healers often recommend ashwagandha. When you take ashwagandha as a supplement to your meals, you help to calm your body and support a healthy nervous system. In addition, ashwagandha offers other benefits such as contributing towards the maintenance of a healthy immune system, fostering healthy sleep patterns, and sustaining energy levels. So, maybe you might consider eating more vegetables and fruits and less meat and poultry in conjunction with ashwagandha. This versatile herb can be taken in either powder or tablet form.

For suggestions about the best way to take it, please visit our page on ashwagandha where we offer advice and guidance. Above all, learn more about Ayurveda as there are several thousand years’ worth of invaluable ideas about how to promote calm and well-being!