Ayurveda On the Road: Balance while Traveling
Ayurvedic Practices for Balance On the Road
Whether you are a van lifer, an avid traveler, or simply spend a lot of life on the road, it can be a beautiful mix of exhilarating and exhausting. Curiosity guides us to faraway places, foreign lands, new relationships, rituals unknown, food we’ve never tasted, novelty experiences…you name it. There is no shortage of movement and change.
Ayurveda is an Ancient science of health and longevity that is all about learning to navigate the changing seasons of life. We move through transitions: cycles of creation, preservation and destruction. Similar to the ways in which change is an inherent part of life, it is also a prevailing quality of travel and life on the road. Ayurveda offers an ecosystem of self-care practices that can bolster our immunity, enhance physical and emotional resilience and support integration when life offers us spontaneity.
In Ayurveda, there are three energetic forces called the doshas: vata, pitta, and kapha. As a science rooted in the laws of nature, each of these doshas are composed of elements.
Earth and water make up kapha
Fire and water create pitta
Air and ether coalesce into vata.
Let’s understand travel through the lens of Ayurveda: Vata
Vata embodies the idea of movement, and so vata and travel go hand in hand. Periods of life that involve change, transition, endings can aggravate vata. Since it is the subtlest of the doshas (made of the elements air and ether), vata is easily thrown out of balance, which means taking extra attention and care to practices that bolster resilience, strength, stability and groundedness.
Vata imbalances due to travel can show up in the mind and body as:
Inconsistent bowel movements or constipation
Irregular digestion such as gas, bloating,
Difficulty sleeping, insomnia
Dry skin or eczema
Worn down, fatigued, exhausted from movement
Anxiety, worry, panic attacks or inability to endure uncertainty
Hypersensitive, susceptibility to mood swings
Time/Motion as a cause of disease
In the Ancient Ayurvedic text, the Caraka Samhita there are 3 causes of disease: Failure of our Intellect (Prajnaparadha), Misuse of our senses (Asatmendriyartha samyoga). Movement (Parinama). Movement can be understood as the natural shift of time and seasonal change (for example, aging is an inherent process too all things). But movement can also be understood in a dynamic sense too: the idea that the more we move, the greater affect it has on the mind and body. Movement of thoughts, spiraling story, excessive thinking drain our energy levels, affect the nervous system and the body’s immune response. Movement of body in excess (be it a lot of travel, overexertion of physical activity or other) can also wear on the body over time. When we travel, we have to be mindful of the amount of movement we endure, especially in a dynamic sense.
As someone who currently lives a nomadic lifestyle, I often anchor myself in one location for longer periods of time as opposed to traveling non-stop. This helps me feel more emotionally resilient and steady.
Ayurveda Rituals on the Road
Alas, here are several practices and rituals you can experiment with to help cultivate ease and balance while on the road or traveling. Consider these all suggestions, Ayurveda is an individualized science so some may work wonders while others will not. You know yourself best, so simply notice how each practice affects you: how you feel mentally and physically? Trust your intuition, you will be the best guide for your own rituals.
Align with the rhythms of Nature.
One of the benefits of traveling or living on the road is the ability to immerse yourself in Nature, rise with the sun and sleep with the moon. Light pollution has a subtle effect on our circadian rhythms and can disrupt sleep cycles, so going to bed in Nature can help restore sleep. Campsites offer safe spaces with simple amenities. The Bureau of Land Management areas (BLM) are often gorgeous, free public land that allows up to 14 days free camping.
Tip: To locate a sleeping spot, try freecampsites.net or the app: iOverlander. For campsites in National Parks, check out recreation.gov to make a reservation.
Hydrate more than you think.
Obvious as it may seem, it often gets neglected when we travel. Traveling not only elevates the air element in our bodies and minds, but we may pass through varying elevation and climates that have effects on the body’s hydration. Humidity is lower at higher elevations, sweat evaporates more quickly, the body works harder (think over 5,000 ft) and we are often exposed to greater elements.
Tip: to stay hydrated, sip water throughout the day as opposed to chugging it. One of the perks of road trip travel is the opportunity to fill up at natural spring sources. Be mindful of excess caffeine intake or carbonated beverages as these can aggravate energel levels and digestion.
Support healthy elimination with warm lemon water.
Travel aggravates Vata dosha which can throw our digestive rhythm off. Have you noticed that when you begin a trip or get off an airplane you might not go to the bathroom like you usually do? Begin your day with a glass of warm lemon or lime water.. This promotes peristalsis and encourages morning bowel movement - an important part of our body’s process. our digestive rhythm can be thrown off.
TIP: Try the digestive herb Triphala before bed or first thing when you awaken to help encourage bowels. (I use Banyan Botanicals, but you can find it at a natural grocery store too).
Enjoy warming, grounding and moderately spiced foods.
Cooked foods, root vegetables, spices will serve you well. Having foods that are warm help ground the body and mind and are easier to digest than raw foods. Having a few staple spices can alter the qualities of your foods to make them more easily digestible.
Go to road spices: black pepper, cumin, cayenne, cinnamon.
Do not eat while you drive. Eliminate airy road snacks.
Ayurveda is big on mindful eating. Often how you eat can be more important than what you eat because it affects our digestion. If you munch while driving, your prana, life force and attention is split between paying attention to the road and assimilating your food. No bag of chips, crackers, or popcorn. All these foods have more air element, aggravate vata dosha and can affect digestion.
Support digestion with CCF tea.
Coriander Cumin and Fennel is the classic go to tea to kindle agni, digestive fire and promote assimilation of nutrients. It helps with gas, bloating, constipation and other common digestive issues. Other teas you can experiment with include ginger, mint, licorice, chamomile and dandelion. (Banyan Botanicals sells amazing CCF tea blends).
Incorporate Yoga Asana and light stretching.
To balance the hours in a seated or driving position, a simple 10 minute practice can make all the difference in body-mind health. A few poses to incorporate:
Heart openers to combat the hunched shoulders
Backbends to energize
Low and high lunges to stretch the hip flexors
Hip openers such as Lizard and Pigeon Pose offer emotional grounding and enhance apana vayu, the downward and outward flow of prana that helps with digestion
Enjoy a slow, mindful abhyanga self-massage.
This self-care practice helps build what Ayurveda calls “ojas” or our immunity boosting life-force. It improves circulation, calms the nervous system and promotes longevity. It is particularly beneficial for grounding Vata imbalances often caused by excess movement. Practice long strokes towards the heart and feet. Spend extra time massaging the soles for additional grounding. Here is a how to guide for performing abhyanga as well as creating your own oil blend.
Calming pranayama to ground your energetic body and support the nervous system.
Nadi Shodhana, also known as alternate nostril cleansing, is a breath technique that cleanses your energetic channels. It is a calming breathing practice that fortifies the nervous sytem and shifts us into rest and digest. Bhramari or bumble bee breath is another calming breath that can relax and promote restful sleep.
Practice meditation
When we travel, we are presented with endless opportunities to quest into the unknown, which can be both exciting and times dysregulating.A daily meditation practice helps widen perspective, deepen flow states, improve emotional regulation and build physiological resilience amongst many other benefits. Yoga Nidra can be a particularly helpful practice that has dramatic effects on nervous system resilience and calming the mind. With access to Nature, a simple mindful walk can do wonders.
TIP: Create a traveling meditation altar. Collect a few sacred items that hold energetic importance and harness your presence. This can be mala beads, special stones, personal items of symbology and more. Perhaps they rest on a cloth or scarf. Set up your sacred space before you practice. When you finish, you can put your items in a small pouch for your next sit.
Incorporate aromatherapy or incense to ground.
Aromatic molecules bind to nerve receptors in the passages and sinuses and directly affect neural pathways. Aromatherapy is a powerful ritual that affects the limbic part of the brain: responsible for emotional regulation. Add a few drops of essential oil into your abhyanga oil blend, or keep a roller near your dashboard. Additionally, lighting some incense can not only offer aromatherapy benefits but also energetically clear the space.
Vata balancing scents include: Lavender, Vetiver, Cedar, Sandalwood, Patchouli, and Frankincense, which all soothe and ground. Ginger, and Cinnamon help warm.
Create consistency in the bookends of your day. Consciously wind down.
Often, travel is marked by spontaneity, movement, elements of the unknown and uncertainty. Routine can be hard to keep during a road trip, yet simultaneously its the thing that enables us to enjoy the surprises that unfold before us. The late Gabrielle Roth, founder of 5 Rhythms once said “it takes discipline to be a free spirit.” To fully enjoy the freedom of travel and the road, it helps to create consistent rituals to begin and close your day. A few practices in the morning help set the container for your day. A few rituals at night enable deep rest and integration of all the experiences.
Slow down, reflect and journal.
In a society of constant doing, it can be easy to stack travel with no time for pause. A pause, journaling practice or other reflective activity can help creative cohesion, assimilation and integration of life on the road. Similar to the need to digest our food, reflection allows us to digest our experience. Journaling offers many benefits, one of which enables us to conjure a cohesive understanding of the pieces that makes us whole. This in turn we can lower our physiological reactivity and increase our sense of wellbeing.
Support your sleep rituals.
Sleep is considered one of the three pillars of life according to Ayurveda. It is a time for integration and regeneration. Whether you are changing time zones or switching up your routines, travel comes with disruption in sleep cycles. If you are stealth camping, that can add a layer of subtle anxiety to night, with uncertainty if you will be woken up by authority. Deliberately choosing a sleep site that will be uninterrupted can have palpable effects on your rest. Support your sleep by going to bed before 10pm (prior to the pitta time of night), decrease visual and mental stimulation in the hours before bed.
TIPS: nutmeg mixed with milk offers a sleep aid. Other supportive herbs that calm the nervous system and promote rest include ashwagandha, chamomile, brahmi, or kava root.
These are just a few of many various practices you can incorporate into your travel rhythm. If you have questions, do not hesitate to ask. This article was created in direct response to someone asking how to implement Ayurveda on the road. Hope you enjoy!