Goals of Ayurveda

Goals and Objectives of Ayurveda at a Glance

A Few Herbs - Herbs are important in Ayurveda

As known to many, the foundation of the Indian culture is the Vedas (oldest compositions of hymns/prayers); one of the famous Vedic hymns/prayers says:

“Lead me from darkness into light

Lead me from untruth into truth

Lead me from mortality into immortality”

This is where Ayurveda steps in; the wisdom of great Indian sages became the ‘Science of Life’ and got organized into three-fold knowledge – Physical body (relates to Tana), Yoga (relates to spirit) and Tantra (relates to the mind).

In Ayurveda, health means harmony and a sincere and true seeker of harmony always tries to balance his or her health. Then, if Ayurveda is the ‘Science of Life’ and if it has eight schools of medicine to cure various diseases, then what are the basic objectives of Ayurveda? This article deals with the objectives briefly to give you some idea what Ayurveda is all about.

The four-fold objectives of Ayurveda, without which living is meaningless to us, are:

1. ‘Dharma’ – it means that we must fulfil our duties that have been assigned to us by our social status or position.

2. ‘Artha’ – it means that we need to accumulate possessions while fulfilling our duties.

3. ‘Kama’ – it means that we should neither suppress nor overindulge in our desires and urges. A balance is required to be maintained in this regard.

4. ‘Moksha’ – it means that we must try to realize that there is more to life than our possessions, our duties, our desires. We must be able to answer the self-question ‘Who am I’ in a clear-cut manner.

These four objectives may sound easy to follow but in real-life practice, these are quite difficult to achieve as we need to strictly go by:

1. A daily routine (Dincharya)

2. A seasonal routine (Rutucharya)

3. An ethical routine (Sadvritta)

For the above three to fall in place, we must:

1. observe proper diet (Ahara).

2. observe proper sleep (Nidra).

3. avoid overindulgence in sex (Brahmacharya).

If properly noticed, you will see that every human aims at either living an indulgent life or a spiritual (ascetic) life. In either of the case, we need a sound body (Tana) and a sound mind (Mana).

Keeping these in mind, no doubt Ayurveda is also known as ‘the art of longevity’ or ‘the knowledge of living’.

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