Detox from Toxic Emotions

What is a Detox?

According to Google the definition of Detox is:

a process or period of time in which one abstains from or rids the body of toxic or unhealthy substances; detoxification.

In yoga and ayurveda we take it a bit further. It is not just about the body. It is also abstaining or ridding the mind, emotions and energetics of unhealthy and toxic emotions and thoughts.

Every single emotion, thought and experience will manifest in the body. Love, joy and happiness release oxytocin, the hormone which is related to bonding and trust. It is the hormone released during sex, hugging and childbirth.

But other emotions are lodged in the body too. Think of the fight or flight reaction of adrenalin,  adrenocorticotropic and corticotropin-releasing hormone – all known as stress-hormones. When you get angry you may clench your teeth, your abdomen or your pelvic area. Or perhaps you feel ashamed and your throat tightness up. How does your body respond to stress? That tension is not always released even when the situation has been resolved.

Undigested material = toxins = ama

Toxins can be translated to Ama in ayurvedic terms. Ama is basically all undigested material: food, beverages, emotions, sense impressions and feelings. With a good digestive fire, agni, both food and emotions will be digestive, nourish us and then anything not needed is released. But sometimes we don’t take time to digest. Then we create ama. Ama can manifest physically as sluggishness, bloating, mucus, skin issues. If left untreated may become more serious illnesses according to ayurvedic principles.

Emotional toxicity can be the thoughts we never resolved, the anger, heart ache, disappointments, which ever feelings which are still not digested. We may have been shamed or hurt. How did that feel in the body? Did you take time to digest those sensations? Were you too busy to allow your self to feel your feelings? To let what ever nurturing and learning you needed from them to be digested and the rest released?

When we practise yoga we move our body, we breathe and we start to allow our bodies to let go of some of these toxic emotions. Even if don’t even remember them. Yoga becomes a healing tool. And it becomes the meditation and stillness for our minds to detox too.

To learn more about both detox and rejuvenation please visit HERE where you get a one day detox schedule and recipe.

Enjoy time every day with the intention of letting go, release and breathe. Allow the body and the mind to detox and rejuvenate.