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december 2018 / january 2019yogajournal.com.sgCHILLING OUT
Huh. I myself am a pitta type, and
something about this scenario sounded ... a
bit familiar. My ears pricked up as he
outlined the cure: “Pittas need to be
soothed; they are inflamed. You can only
get so inflamed before you incinerate
yourself. You’re like an engine running,
running, running. You have to shut off so
you can cool down.”
I know the truth when I hear it. I was a
pitta out of control. I needed to do what
people come to spas to do: let go, unwind,
and turn myself over to someone else to
manage for a little while. Create space.
Surrender. See what would happen.
And I did. For my two remaining days,
I stopped striving and angling for control.
I let the Chopra Center recommend my
treatments and enjoyed a balancing
shirodhara treatment, a soothing
abhyanga massage, and a completely
blissful sound-therapy/massage hybrid
treatment called Gandharva, with glorious
crystal singing bowls—something I
would have never selected for myself (too
frivolous).
I had the great fortune to meet with
David Simon, the late neurologist who was
the medical director, CEO, and co-founder
of the Chopra Center. He recommended
that I simply create some space in my
schedule every day—five-minute “buffer
zones” before and after each of my many
meetings and endless tasks. That would,
he said, go a long way toward creating
balance and helping me tap into my own
compassionate heart.
For the next two days, I ate well; I drank
tea. Between spa appointments, I did—
amazingly—nothing. I sat by the pool. I
sipped cucumber water. My head began
to clear. I felt a little better. But though I
was relinquishing control, I was still soaking
up information. The best mind-body spas
send you home with the tools you need
to balance your life outside their rarified
walls. I was learning what I needed to
know about how to eat, sleep, exercise,
and keep a cool head even as I kept a
warm heart.what pittas need
CALM FOR THE MIND
“We see a lot of stressed-out pittas at Exhale in
New York,” says Robert MacDonald, the spa’s
director of healing. “They are the people who
are ultrasuccessful on Wall Street. They literally
thrive on stress. But the body can’t tell the
difference between stress you love and stress
you don’t. So you have to work to offset the
impact.”
Pittas have a lot of stamina, says Greenspan,
which is both good and bad. They can push
themselves right up to the point of collapse.
“They need to learn cooling techniques so they
don’t scorch the earth around them—so they
can be compassionate and loving instead of
so pointed and direct,” he says. The greatest
cooling tool in the arsenal? Meditation.
“Meditation soothes and calms; it allows
you to have stillness and silence instead of
reactive responses,” Greenspan says. “It can
allow a pitta to live life with great grace and
ease. It can create a huge shift.”
At the spa, good choices include treatments
aimed at healing (pittas benefit enormously
from creating the intention to heal) and those
that address heat-related complaints. Cool-
water therapies are good choices, as are Reiki
and other gentle forms of energy work,
massages, and facials. Choose avocado or
coconut oils for a massage, and work with
essential oils of sandalwood, jasmine, or rose.
treatment to try
SHIRODHARA
Shirodhara is the classical soothing Ayurvedic
treatment in which a continuous stream of
therapeutic oil is applied to the head. It’s the
perfect antidote to the pitta tendency to think
too much—it cools down an overheated head
quickly. As a bonus, shirodhara also brings
down excess vata, thereby reducing any winds
that might be fanning your flames. (“If you
have a fire going and you add a lot of wind,
suddenly it’s a bonfire,” Greenspan explains.
“You often need to address vata and pitta.”) If
you’re angry, irritable, or agitated, indulge in a
shirodhara treatment and say goodbye to those
little puffs of smoke that have been blowing
out of your ears.
SUSTAINABLE TRANSFORMATION
And that, says Robert MacDonald, an
acupuncturist and massage therapist who is
director of healing for the Exhale Mind Body
Spa (with facilities in New York City and
other locations around the world), is what
makes a visit to the spa transformational.
“When you embrace therapies like yoga
or acupuncture or even bodywork, you’re
really reaching for tools that can elevate you
to a higher level of functionality,” he says.
“If you go off to a spa and you just have
treatments and don’t learn anything, it’s
like going on the Atkins diet. It’s great when
you’re using it, but when you get back to
your regular life, it all falls apart. But a good
spa is about sustainable transformation.”
For Seane Corn, an occasional spa visit
is part of her ongoing pitta-management
plan. Corn is a busy yoga instructor, social
activist, workshop coordinator, creator of
DVDs and audio courses, and c0-creator of
the nonprofit Off the Mat, Into the World.
“I’m a Type A personality, and my pattern
is go-go-go-go, crash,” she explains.
“When I go to the spa, there’s a reason for
it—I need to be in an environment geared
to relaxation, feeling, and introspection. It
allows me space to let go and receive.”
An occasional spa excursion fits right
in with Corn’s yoga. “I think that anything
that helps bring you back into the present
is a valid form of practice,” she says. “It is
a luxury and a privilege—and optional—
don’t get me wrong. A $95 herbal wrap
is not going to get you any closer to God.
But we live in a culture of stress, and you
should do everything you can to bring
yourself into alignment.”PROFOUND PEACE
For most of us, that means slowing down.
We are overscheduled multitaskers,
addicted to doing and not so big on just
being. Natasha Korshak was at one point
the director of yoga, meditation, and
mindfulness training at the storied Miraval
Resort in Catalina, Arizona. “We see all
types here at Miraval, but I think of it as a
playground for pittas,” she says. “Many of
our guests have high-level positions and are