Naturopathy is a treatment system that recognizes the human body’s innate defense mechanism and promotes the same to regulate and maintain itself rather than by opting for drugs or other intrusive forms of treatment.
Advent of Naturopathy
Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine has been credited with first practicing Naturopathy, even though the credit for coining the term goes to John Scheel in the late nineteenth century.
The Naturopathy movement gained favor amongst the European elite in the nineteenth century and then spread to the US in the early 1900s. Though people have been following this system, it was only in the 1970s it caught the public imagination along with Yoga and other holistic movements.
Naturopathy in India
In India, Naturopathy has been in practice from the Vedic period as our scriptures amply demonstrate. Naturopathy has been reinvented and has found mass appeal in India in the last few decades. It advocates minimizing intrusive treatments while promoting the body’s capacity to self- heal by the aid of appropriate dietary and lifestyle changes. The Naturopath perceives the human body as an intuitive and vitalistic entity and so in its ability to heal itself.
It is based on principles like not harming the body, respecting and promoting the body’s ability to self-heal, identify and eliminate the cause of the illness, educate the individual and promote self-regulation by lifestyle changes, treat each individual as unique and lastly emphasizing the importance of the individual’s responsibility to his community and inspire him to regulate and maintain a healthy body so as to contribute to his society.
Naturopathy Treatments
The actual treatment may vary form acupuncture, biomedical treatments like vitamin supplements and allergy suppressants and homeopathy. Other forms of therapy include ozone therapy, hydrotherapy, fasting, sports medicine and other manipulative therapies, and psychological treatments like mediation techniques, relaxation therapies, etc.
You can depend on the Naturopath to treat you to the maximum extent possible by advising lifestyle changes and dietary modifications and so you can try the therapies with no risk at all, unlike other forms of treatments where you have to worry about side effects.
The Naturopath generally first studies your lifestyle, dietary habits, and patterns of any ailments individually and in your family, before embarking on any treatment. A traditional Naturopath consults and dispenses advice of lifestyle changes that promote your body’s ability to heal itself and educate you to self-regulate.
Using the Ancient Wisdom
The basic premise of the Naturopathy treatments as set down in our ancient texts is that the human body is susceptible to the build up of toxins in our everyday lives, causing imbalances in our systems. This imbalance affects the internal organs and causes diseases and so has to be rectified for the body to regain its health and vitality.
This can be done by regulating the factors which lead to the toxic build up and cleansing the system. The most popular forms of Naturopathy are the Homeopathy treatments, Yoga, Pranayama and other forms of relaxation and meditation therapies for stress release and Pranic Healing.
The basic premise of the Indian Naturopathy is that humans are born healthy and can live healthy lives if they lead nature-friendly lives. Such a natural way of life consists of rising with the sun and going to bed early, eating the way nature intended us to and avoiding too much of packaged foods and oily, spicy foods – in effect, follow a Sattvic diet, and wearing natural fabrics that allows a body to ventilate in our hot and humid climes.
Such a holistic approach to life can help you to live stress and disease free lives even in these troubled times.
Naturopathy in Our Homes
Every Indian mother is a Naturopath as you are sure to remember your mothers’ home remedies for your childhood ailments before being carted off to the doctor. For treating many health issues from the common cold, headache, sinus or heat-related ailments, every part of India has its own kitchen remedy.
Naturopathy is a way of life for most Indians though they might not even realize it, as it is intrinsic to our culture. The fact that thousands of foreigners land on our shores for Ayurvedic treatments every year, spending millions of dollars stands testament to the efficacy of our Naturopathy systems.
