Prakriti and Vikriti are elementary ideas in Ayurveda that assist perceive a person’s inherent constitutional physique kind and their present state of well being. These ideas are used to advertise steadiness and wellness by personalised approaches to weight loss plan, way of life, and remedy.
In easy phrases, Prakriti refers back to the pure structure we’re born with, whereas Vikriti represents our present well being situation
Each Prakriti and Vikriti are primarily based on the three doshas: Vata, Pitta, and Kapha, which kind the physique’s structure. Every particular person is a singular mixture of 1, two, or all three doshas.
This text delves deeper into the ideas of Prakriti and Vikriti, explaining their significance and functions in Ayurveda.
On this article, we’ve defined the ideas of Prakriti and Vikriti intimately.
Understanding Prakriti
The phrase Prakriti is derived from three parts: the prefix ‘Pra,’ that means “origin”; ‘Kri,’ that means “to do”; and ‘Ti,’ that means “to accentuate.” Collectively, Prakriti refers back to the entity that manifests on the time of origin.
Prakriti represents the unique physique structure or the inherent mixture of doshas that an individual develops on the time of conception.
It’s the nature you might be born with and is exclusive to you. Every particular person’s structure is predetermined at start and influenced by varied traits, together with look, persona, habits, and dietary preferences. Prakriti determines an individual’s bodily and psychological traits and stays fixed all through their life.
In line with Ayurveda, this occurs as a result of an individual’s Prakriti is decided at start by the panch mahabhutas (air, hearth, water, ether, and earth), doshas (vata, pitta, kapha), and trigunas (sattva, rajas, and tamas).
Doshaja Prakriti
On the time of conception, the predominance of 1, two, or all three doshas determines a person’s Prakriti, often known as Doshaja Prakriti.
Doshaja Prakriti is additional categorised into three classes: Eka Doshaja Prakriti, Dwandvaja Doshaja Prakriti, and Sama Doshaja Prakriti.
- Eka Doshaja Prakruti – Because the identify suggests, people with a predominance of 1 (eka) dosha have an Eka Doshaja Prakriti. This kind is comparatively uncommon. Amongst these:
- Vata physique kind is taken into account inferior (heena).
- Pitta physique kind is taken into account reasonable (madhyama).
- Kapha physique kind is thought to be superior (uttama).
- Dwandvaja Doshaja Prakruti – That is the commonest kind of Prakriti, the place a person has a mix of two doshas. There are three variations:
- Vata/Pitta (or pitta/vata) – Vata main and Pitta secondary (or Pitta main and Vata secondary).
- Pitta/Kapha (or kapha/pitta) – Pitta main and Kapha secondary (or Kapha main and Pitta secondary).
- Kapha/Vata (or vata/kapha) – Kapha main and Vata secondary (or Vata main and Kapha secondary).
- Sama Doshaja Prakruti – Among the many rarest Prakriti sorts, people with a Sama Doshaja Prakriti have a balanced mixture of all three doshas. That is thought of the best (sreshta) physique structure. Nonetheless, it’s difficult to keep up as a result of fashionable unhealthy life and dietary habits.
Manasika Prakriti
Manasika Prakriti refers to a person’s psychological or psychological structure, which is decided by the mixture of the three Gunas Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas. In consequence, an individual’s Manasika Prakriti will be categorised as Satvik, Rajasik, or Tamasik.
Understanding Manasika Prakriti is essential for choosing the proper strategies to assist psychological and emotional well-being, similar to yoga, meditation, or tailor-made dietary and way of life practices.
Equally, realizing an individual’s Doshaja Prakriti helps an Ayurvedic practitioner perceive their persona, temperament, traits, and general well being, enabling them to advocate applicable remedies and interventions.
What components decide the Prakriti of a person?
The formation of Prakriti is linked to completely different components, similar to earlier karmas, the bodily and psychological well being of the mom and father on the time of conception, the mom’s weight loss plan and train routine, social milieu, the apply of wholesomeness by the mom (throughout being pregnant) and little one within the postnatal interval, and several other others.
Owing to the above, the next are the first components that decide the Prakriti of a person:
- Sukra-Shonit Prakruti (situations of sperm and ovum)
- Kala-garbhasaya Prakruti (time of the season of conception and situations of the uterus)
- Matu-ahar Prakruti (weight loss plan and way of life habits of mom)
- Pancha Mahabhuta Vikara Prakriti (affiliation of the 5 primary components)
Different components that additionally affect the Prakriti are:
- Jatiprasakta (Race/caste/ Occupation)
- Kulaprasakta (household/ancestry)
- Desha-anupatini (geo-climatic components)
- Kala-anupatini (time scale)
- Vaya-anupatini (age) – determines the dominance of dosha
- Pratyatmaniyata (individuality)
How you can establish a person’s Prakriti?
A questionnaire is often used for Prakriti evaluation. It contains questions on your habits, look, physiological processes similar to digestion and excretion, in addition to your moods and general nature.
The evaluation includes a medical examination utilizing three strategies: scrutiny (Darshan), palpation (Sparshan), and questioning (Prashna). It examines three elements:
- Construction of the physique (Rachanaanusari) – Bodily traits.
- Physiological (Kriyaanusari) – Bodily capabilities.
- Psychological (Manoanusari) – Psychological and emotional traits.
The variations in these traits collectively outline a person’s Prakriti.
To precisely decide your Prakriti, it is strongly recommended to seek the advice of an skilled Ayurvedic practitioner. They’ll assess your physique kind primarily based on the solutions offered throughout the Prakriti evaluation take a look at.
Whereas there are quite a few on-line questionnaires, quizzes, and exams obtainable, they need to be used with warning, as they might lack the precision of an expert evaluation.
Significance of Prakriti in Ayurvedic remedy
In fashionable utilization, the time period Prakriti usually refers back to the bodily structure, often known as Deha Prakriti. This structure is decided by the distinctive dosha ratios that every particular person is born with.
The Ayurvedic idea of Prakriti is crucial for sustaining well being, understanding illness, and guiding remedy. Ayurveda emphasizes that by understanding your Prakriti, you’ll be able to establish the components that affect your well being and well-being, enabling you to steer a wholesome, completely satisfied, and fulfilling life.
Understanding your Prakriti helps you preserve well being by following the suitable weight loss plan and every day routine. It additionally means that you can recognise what would possibly disrupt your steadiness, resulting in illness or sickness. With out this self-awareness, you might wrestle to keep up steadiness, stop sickness, or handle imbalances to revive well being and wholeness.
Moreover, information of your Prakriti might help you in a number of methods:
- Adapting your way of life to stop or handle dosha imbalances.
- Making use of preventive well being measures to keep up equilibrium.
- Customizing your weight loss plan based on your dosha to reinforce nutrient absorption, digestion, and elimination.
- Guaranteeing you eat the correct meals in the correct quantities and on the proper instances.
- Personalizing your sleep patterns for higher relaxation and restoration.
- Selecting the best train routine to remain match and wholesome.
Understanding Vikriti
In Ayurveda, a person’s state of well being or imbalance is known as Vikriti. The Sanskrit phrase Vikriti, that means “after creation,” refers to an individual’s organic state, which will be influenced by their atmosphere from the second of conception.
A Vikriti evaluation in Ayurveda is used to establish how exterior components have impacted an individual’s bodily, psychological, or emotional well being. Vikriti will be considered the manifestation of any present doshic imbalances.
After fertilization, the human embryo is uncovered to and influenced by its atmosphere. Optimum growth happens when the embryo grows in a secure atmosphere. Equally, after start, a baby thrives in a perfect and nurturing environment, selling well being and well-being.
Nonetheless, in an atmosphere or way of life that’s lower than excellent, the three doshas can fall out of steadiness, inflicting a deviation from the person’s Prakriti. This state of imbalance is Vikriti.
Not like Prakriti, which stays fixed all through life, Vikriti is dynamic. It could possibly change from everyday, with the seasons, or throughout completely different life phases. Thus, whereas Prakriti displays a person’s inherent structure, Vikriti represents their present state of imbalance.
What components decide the Vikriti of a person?
To make selections to revive our equilibrium, it’s useful to know the traits of every of the doshas. This permits us to acknowledge what has gotten out of steadiness or what has accrued.
Vikriti or doshic imbalances can happen as a result of a number of components similar to weather conditions, dietary habits, way of life, sleep patterns, frequency of train, stress, and lots of exterior components.
The aggregation of a selected dosha will be felt throughout quite a few seasonal modifications. We often purchase traits of the prevailing dosha all year long due to how carefully tied our physiology is to the world round us. Because the seasons change, this accumulation is most noticeable.
For instance, your prakriti is Pitta which comes with good digestion and a secure thoughts. Nonetheless as a result of a seasonal change, your digestive system might flare and you might expertise psychological fog, an indication of Vata vitiation. In such circumstances, although your Prakriti has not modified, the dominance of the vata dosha is figuring out the imbalances prompted in your physique.
Significance of Vikriti in Ayurvedic remedy
Understanding an individual’s Vikriti after which determining what parts of that particular person’s atmosphere have led to the disruptions is among the key targets of Ayurvedic remedy. The time period “atmosphere” right here refers to each the particular person’s way of life and the inputs they get by their 5 senses.
To establish the basis signs of a illness, vikriti evaluation is step one in all Ayurvedic remedies.
One approach to establish the underlying causes for sickness or illness is to correlate the ratio of Vata, Pitta, and Kapha in an individual at any given second with their physiological composition. One can evaluate it to the particular person’s inherent prakriti and have a look at operational indications like digestion, elimination, or sleeping patterns.
As soon as understood, the objective is to remodel the setting.
Figuring out an individual’s Prakriti is vital for understanding their elementary tendencies, however understanding their Vikriti is vital for making a remedy technique.
Distinction between Prakriti and Vikriti
Now that we’ve understood some primary ideas of Prakriti and Vikriti, we are able to summarize the distinction between the 2 beneath:
- Our intrinsic structure is named Prakriti, and the imbalance that develops after we don’t dwell in accordance with that construction is named Vikriti.
- Prakriti refers back to the mind-body type or structure. Vikriti interprets to the current state of affairs.
- Within the Ayurvedic perspective, one’s Prakriti is often seen from the angle of dosha predominance within the physique structure. However, the vikriti is regarded into the imbalances or vitiations occurring within the doshas structure throughout the Prakriti.
- Understanding our Prakriti helps us grasp what our elementary nature is. Studying our Vikriti gives us with the flexibility to take cost of our well being path.
- To find out prakriti, components similar to situations of sperm and ovum, time of the season of conception and situations of the uterus, weight loss plan, and way of life habits of the mom, and affiliation of the 5 primary components are seen. Whereas, the components regarded into when figuring out vikriti are – the basis explanation for the dysfunction, vitiating variables, vitiated components, structure, location, time, power, and signs.
How do imbalances in Prakriti and Vikriti manifest?
Doshas play an vital function in relation to imbalances within the physique and thoughts. Although most of us are a twin doshas structure (bi-doshic physique kind), the Prakriti is dependent upon the dominant dosha.
So, when your dominant doshas are vitiated it could possibly result in a ton of bodily and psychological sicknesses, illnesses, or illnesses. Furthermore, the imbalance can be prompted when the second dosha overpowers your dominant dosha.
For instance, you’ve been recognized as having a Vata-Pitta physique kind with vata because the dominant dosha. Because of this you’ve a Vata Prakriti. When your Vata is imbalanced, you’ll expertise restlessness, fatigue, poor circulation, bloating, joint ache, and many others. There might also be an opportunity that the pitta dosha has develop into imbalanced and also you would possibly expertise signs like indigestion, acidity, pimples, pores and skin rashes, anger, irregular sleep, and many others.
Nonetheless, you also needs to perceive that we might or might not be capable to hyperlink our imbalances to our organic construction. There are additionally possibilities that you just may need a vata-pitta prakriti with each doshas dominant when in comparison with the kapha prakriti.
In such circumstances, if an individual reveals indicators of sudden weight achieve, it might recommend that they might be experiencing kapha vitiation.
The manifestation of imbalances in Prakriti and Vikriti additionally is dependent upon the present way of life, seasonal modifications, and the atmosphere you might be residing in.
Merely put, the imbalances within the prakrit and vikruti are manifested within the type of bodily and psychological issues on account of vitiated doshas.
- In case your vata is imbalanced, it might result in extreme issues with circulation, broken tissues, crackling joints, improper digestion, constipation, extreme weight reduction, psychological chaos, or insomnia.
- In case of pitta imbalance, ulcers, extreme sweating, sunburn, acidity, hair fall, vertigo, egoism, a rise of adverse feelings, and many others could also be skilled.
- Individuals with a kapha imbalance will discover lethargy, weight achieve, lack of urge for food, oily pores and skin and hair, melancholy, lack of motivation, stubbornness, and many others as signs.
One other level to recollect is that in case your vata will get vitiated, there’s a excessive chance that the opposite doshas would possibly get affected as nicely. It is because Vata is liable for circulation throughout the physique and between the organs. So if the circulation is blocked, the organs will be unable to work on the optimum degree.
Conclusion
To sum up, Prakriti is the mixture of doshas you might be born with, influenced by components such because the situations of the sperm and ovum at conception, the well being of the mom’s uterus, and the time and season of conception.
Vikriti, however, refers to your present state of being, which is dynamic and modifications based on your atmosphere. It’s usually thought of an imbalanced state of the doshas.
An Ayurvedic practitioner diagnoses your well being situation primarily based in your Prakriti and Vikriti by a sequence of questions. This helps decide which doshas want consideration to revive steadiness.
From the traits of Prakriti and Vikriti, it’s clear that the objective of Ayurveda is to accumulate the information needed to acknowledge when a Vikriti imbalance arises, serving to to stop sickness or illness. Ayurveda additionally aids in creating practices and rituals that maintain our Prakriti balanced.