self-care 101Your Best Diet
A nourishing Ayurvedic regimen
naturally guides you to the body
weight that’s right for you.WHILE LIVING IN an ashram in Northern India years ago, I loved
playing auntie to two young girls—Chaya and Lakshmi—from
a nearby village. When Lakshmi neared puberty, she started to
gain weight. As she grew softer and wider, her mother continued
her usual mealtime practice of putting balls of rice and lentils
into Lakshmi’s mouth, well past the point of satiety. The family
became more and more delighted, parading her ahead of them
as they walked to temple, showing off their daughter’s fleshly
abundance. “Look how round and healthy she is,” they’d say.
“She’s going to catch quite a husband!”
Meanwhile, back in California, the wo men in my own
extended family were worried about a distant cousin—a
beautiful, creative girl who happened to be a little chubby
in her elementary-school years. “We’ve got to help her con-
trol her weight,” they’d whisper with desperation. “We
don’t want her to feel bad about herself for being heavy.”
Despite their good intentions, both families showed
more commitment to cultural norms than to under-
standing the needs of their girls’ bodies. A person’s
perfect weight can’t be sized up by the eye or measured
by a scale. According to the principles of Ayurveda,
the ancient Indian science of health, everyone has
an ideal weight that’s unique to their prakriti, or
constitutional nature, made up of the three life
energies, or doshas: vata, pitta, and kapha.
Because your ideal weight is unique,
it can’t be compared with your
sister’s, your neighbor’s, yourPHOTOS: SHERI GIBLIN; FOOD STYLIST: ERIN QUON
self-care by Niika Quistgard
VATA-CALMING BUTTERNUT
SQUASH AND SWEET POTATO
SOUP (RECIPE ON PAGE 107).