Reducing the adverse effects of extreme weather conditions with meteorology and meteorotherapy
Andrei Gămulea, AMN-Romania
The human being is a complex entity that is indissolubly linked to the natural environment. The signalling of qualitative changes in this relationship is achieved through meteosensitivity. The regulatory action that can result from the wise use of meteosensitivity can limit the potentially disruptive impact of environmental conditions on health and at the same time can constructively exploit certain conditions that favour qualitative balance. Such an adaptive and balancing use of meteosensitivity is achieved in Ayurveda through weather therapy (vatavaranya-kriya).
Meteosensitivity can generate intense and acute signals especially in human beings experiencing poor health and a disordered lifestyle.
For human beings with a balanced and harmonious lifestyle, meteosensitivity provides the necessary clues for immediate adaptation to possible adverse weather influences.
Meteorotherapy offers the human being some practical guidelines through which it can constructively enhance the signalling potential of meteosensitivity. Restful and regular sleep, frequent consumption of fresh fruit and ensuring that the body receives adequate amounts of water and fluids are the simplest measures for maintaining optimal functioning of the meteosensitive. Movement in the open air together with the systematic practice of the body postures (asana) and meditation (dhyana) of the ancient system of Yoga facilitates the mastery and enhancement of the meteosensitive.
Weather therapy teaches the being that nature's help is invaluable. Through weather therapy, the human being can benefit from a much better physical, mental and immune adaptation to the environmental conditions he or she faces.
Weather therapy improves natural defence mechanisms and teaches the human being how to adapt to changing weather conditions.
At the heart of weather therapy is the essential idea that every human being is suited to live in a particular climate.
Some humans are adapted to living in colder climates, while others are better suited to warmer places.
Meteorotherapy states that in fact the constitutional typologies (dosha-prakriti), which are known in Ayurveda, highlight adaptive patterns to climatic factors. In the context of the specialised science of meteorotherapy, constitutional typologies can be considered as different 'climatic types' that differentiate the responsiveness of human beings to natural environmental factors.
The predominance of the fundamental vital factors (dosha) in the being determines the manifestation of certain psycho-somatic characteristics, eating habits, but above all a set of biological and psychological reactivities to climatic factors in the external natural environment.
The ideal climate that every human being needs is precisely that which can ensure that the quality balance of its internal environment is maintained in relation to the influences generated by the natural external environment.
Meteorotherapy states that every human being can achieve maximum well-being and regenerate constantly or periodically when he can stay as long as possible in the climatic environment that is most suited to his constitutional type (dosha-prakriti).
A particular practical way of exploiting this general principle is to recommend breathing as often as possible the characteristic air of that environment which is most deeply balanced in terms of quality with the constitutional specificity of the being in question.
Meteorotherapy states that it is not only the external temperature or the hours of daylight that influence the vital state of the human being, but also the different levels of ionisation of the air and the chemical composition of the air corresponding to different climatic situations. Meteosensitivity makes us feel very comfortable when we are in a place in nature with which we feel very compatible. In such climate-integrating situations some people make the profoundly significant statement that "breathe well".
This is one of the reasons why the practice of weather therapy has been suggestively referred to as "a healthy air diet".
American professor Ergon McPhalsey has intuited a significant part of the benefits of weather therapy and has developed a strategy of so-called "healthy air feeding".
Weather therapy can give modern man a new perspective on the healthy relationship he can have with the natural environment.