Know Thyself
E196 - Dr. Vasant Lad: Your Tongue Reveals What Your Body Is Hiding (5,000-Year-Old Science)
26 May 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Without self-knowing, life has no meaning at all.
Chapter 2: What does Ayurveda actually mean?
We always live in the dead past.
Chapter 3: How do the five elements and three doshas affect the body?
And we speak from the dead past. We listen from the dead past. Image is created by judgment, criticism, like, dislike. And when image is heard, that unresolved hurt develops crystals.
Chapter 4: What is the significance of Prakruti and Vikruti in Ayurveda?
And the crystals accumulate into the body. If it is deep sorrow, it will be in the heart. Liver is a seat of anger. Kidney is a seat of fear. And through Ayurveda, those emotions, they start liquefying. They literally crawl. My guru blessed me. He said, you will teach Ayurveda to the Western world. Ayurveda is a science of life. Body, mind, and consciousness become one.
You want to go a little witchy on me? I'm gone.
So... Okay, so... Every person's deep nature of his consciousness can be felt through the pulse. Expiration is the death. Inspiration is reborn again. When you practice, it's dying. You're reborn every moment. In that gap between two breaths is an ocean of awareness. And that awareness is freedom. You will be reincarnated, not next life, but next breath.
Hey everyone, welcome back to the Know Thyself podcast. We are at SOHAM in Asheville, North Carolina, a bit of a deviation from the normal studio shootings, and it feels great to be in nature with our guest today, who is the founder of the Ayurvedic Institute, the man who really has pioneered and brought Ayurveda to the West, which is a beautiful over 5,000-year-old lineage.
And he's trained thousands of practitioners, authored several books, and he's the man to dive deep into all things Ayurveda with. Dr. Vasant Lad, thank you for being here. Thank you. Quite the pad. I want to set a bit of the context and the stage for our audience, for everybody who's listening in, who may or may not have known about Ayurveda or don't know it at much depth.
What does Ayurveda actually mean? What does that word mean?
Oh, very beautiful question. The very word Ayurveda, Ayu is the life. and Veda is the knowledge, and that systematized knowledge became science. So Ayurveda is a science of life, in a simpler word.
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Chapter 5: How does the gap between breaths relate to awareness?
And it is so unified, it is so totally one with the universal law. So, according to Ayurveda, the spiritual energy is pure awareness. And awareness is expressing itself is the etheric space, air, fire, water, earth. These are called five great elements. And they are present in every tree, every flower, every human being.
Chapter 6: How do repressed emotions crystallize in the body?
There is a Sanskrit quotation that Sarvani, Dravyani, Pancha, Bhutikani, all organic and inorganic matter is made up of five great elements. These are very important. So in the body, there are smaller and bigger spaces, abdominal space, thoracic space, cranial space.
Chapter 7: What is Panchakarma and how does it work?
So that is etheric space. At cellular level, every cell has a space. And through the cellular space, there is a communication going on. If I want to communicate with you, first I have to create space in my heart and then listen.
Chapter 8: How do Ojas, Tejas, and Prana relate to health?
Then I have direct communication. So space is very important. Space is freedom. Space is love. And space is communication. Then second important principle is air. Air is a principle of movement. In our body, the lungs are breathing, diaphragm is moving, heart is beating. All these movements, afferent, efferent, sensory motor, all these movements are governed by air element.
Air is the principle of movement. Then where there is a movement, there is a friction. Where there is a friction, there is a heat, the fire. And the fire in the body is digestive fire. Liver generates a large amount of heat, so liver is also a seat of fire. That is called Bhuta Agni. Agni is the fire.
And this fire, Agni, maintains hunger, appetite, digestion, absorption, assimilation, and transformation of food into consciousness. All these are governed by fire. Then comes water. Water is the plasma, the serum, the cytoplasm. All that biological substance, plasma, the serum, is water. And without water, cell cannot survive. Water is a universal chemical solvent. It is there. Then come earth.
Earth is a solid ground like calcium, magnesium, zinc, iron, copper. So all these five elements are present in our body. So this is a structural aspect of the body. But biological combination of ether, air, fire, water, earth split into three doshas. Ether and air create vata. Vata is a principle of movement. Fire and water become pitta. Pitta is the biochemical activities.
And kapha is earth and water, the building block material. So all these vata, pitta, kapha, they are present in every RNA, DNA as our genetic code, as our blueprint. And we carry that blueprint in our body. So these three doshas, they were governing this biological structure of the body and psychosomatic expression of the body. These are called three doshas.
And every individual has a unique expression of consciousness. In the true sense of the word, individual is indivisible. undivided, total, unique expression of awareness. So we all are individual. Now, based on our individual Prakriti, which is your constitution, and because of change in the season, change in the time, change in the age, change in the environment,
Our Prakruti ratio, Vata, Pitta, Kapha undergoes change. And that change alter status of Vata, Pitta, Kapha is called Vikruti. Vikruti is present alter status. And Prakruti is your genetic code. And Ayurveda is a science of Prakruti-Vikruti paradigm.
So if I have it right, the way that you just described it, the Prakruti is what you come into genetically. That's what you're set with. You have a constitution of these different elements in different levels. Correct. Vata, Pitta, Kapha. And we're all born with a set amount of each.
And then we have Vikruti, which is the variation, the difference, the delta between that as we live and eat and move in society. It changes.
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