Dr. Deepak Chopra is one of the leaders in the field of mind, body and spirit healing and continues to transform our understanding of the meaning of health.

Dr. Deepak Chopra and Ayurvedic Medicine

Dr. Deepak Chopra is one of the leaders in the field of mind, body and spirit healing and continues to transform our understanding of the meaning of health.

As the former Chief of Staff at Boston Regional Medical Center, Deepak Chopra built a successful endocrinology practice in Boston in the 1980's.

His teaching affiliations included Tufts University and Boston University Schools of Medicine.

In 1992, he served on the National Institute of Health's Ad Hoc Panel on Alternative Medicine.

Annually he is a lecturer at the Update in Internal Medicine event sponsored by Harvard Medical School, Department of Continuing Education and the Department of Medicine.

Through his creation of The Chopra Center For Well Being in La Jolla, California, he established a formal vehicle for the expansion of his approach using the integration of the best of western medicine with Indian ayurvedic medicine traditions.

His mission is the "bridging the technological miracles of the west with the wisdom of the east."

Dr. Deepak Chopra realized in his medical practice that there was potential in western medicine for the establishment of a new life-giving paradigm, one which encompassed the fundamental principle that perfect health is more than just the absence of disease.

He envisions a medical system based upon the premise that health is a lively state of balance and integration of body, mind and spirit.

The doctor is revolutionizing common wisdom about the crucial connection between body, mind, and spirit and he continues to chart new pathways to unleash the potential for optimum health.

He is the author numerous books, audio, video and CD-ROM titles, that have been published on every continent and in dozens of languages.

Many of Chopra's themes and beliefs are stated in his first book, Creating Health: How to Wake Up the Body's Intelligence in 1986.

He launched himself as a staunch advocate of the interconnection between mind and body, advocating meditation and self-awareness as primary factors in both illness and healing.

He deepened these themes in Quantum Healing: Exploring the Frontiers of Mind/Body Medicine (1989), where he examined the mysterious phenomenon of spontaneous healing of cancer.

Here he introduced quantum physics as a means of understanding the mind-body connection, arguing — as he would in many other books — that consciousness is the basic foundation of nature and the universe.

In Perfect Health: The Complete Mind/Body Guide, Revised and Updated Edition (1991) Chopra authored the first widely read book on Ayurveda, the traditional system of Indian medicine.

Besides outlining the Ayurvedic concept of body types (Prakriti), Chopra emphasizes that the roots of Indian healing lie in changing the holistic balance of mind and body.

Subsequent books have turned toward larger spiritual questions. In How to Know God (2000) and The Book of Secrets: Unlocking the Hidden Dimensions of Your Life (2004) an argument is made for an all-pervasive intelligence that unites every living thing rather than the traditional Western concept of God as a person, "a venerable white male sitting on a throne in the sky."

Chopra sees God as a projection of human awareness who becomes more expansive and universal as individual consciousness expands.

In his book Life After Death: The Burden of Proof (2006) he extends personal consciousness beyond the "artificial boundary that separates the living from the departed."

Assessing the seven varieties of the afterlife espoused in world religions, Chopra offers the startling proposal that a person's awareness in the present shapes existence after death; that is, the afterlife is created uniquely for each of us by our present level of consciousness.

In 2005 Chopra became a staunch advocate for disarmament and international peace in Peace Is the Way: Bringing War and Violence to an End where he argues that a "critical mass" of people who band together in their spiritual worldview can defeat the age-old "addiction to war" that continues to create mass suffering.

In the same regard he became president of a broad-based organization, Alliance of a New Humanity, that seeks to form "peace cells" around the world and to foster such related goals as environmental healing and sustainable economies in developing nations.

Deepak Chopra's main tenets include mind-body medicine , Ayurvedic healing , meditation , Quantum Healing , understanding the connection between diet and health , and recognizing one's dosha .

Above all, he is concerned with the importance of self-knowledge. He is a champion of what many label "New Age" healing and health.His philosophy is apparent in this quote from Utne Reader in response to a question asking what exciting prospects for the future obsess him:

"I'm obsessed with the infinite possiblities that are contained within the human potential, that the human being is literally a field of pure potentiality.

I am fascinated by the fact that almost everything we see around us, from fax machines to jet planes, is literally a manifestation of human consciousness. And yet, with all thisamazing potential, most humans are not happy.

Therefore, I am obsessed with the idea of helping to unfold the full range of human potential and self-knowledge.

I want to make it available to as many people as possible and I want a day to come when the study of self-knowledge becomes an integral part of the educational system...then perhaps we will see a world of peace, harmony, laughter, and love."

Mind-Body Medicine maintains that for every experience in the mind, there is a corresponding change in the physiology and biochemistry in the body. The essential foundation of mind-body medicine is that health is not merely the absence of disease. Rather, it is the "dynamic integration of our environment, body, mind, and spirit."

Chopra believes in reducing stress through meditation techniques, improving vitality through balanced nutrition, and developing flexibility, energy and endurance through yoga and exercise. These, he offers, are a few of the approaches of mind-body medicine.

Herbal medicine, massage , sound, movement, and aromatherapy are other tools of mind-body medicine that Chopra believes can advance mental and physical well being.

Chopra has also emphasized the importance of a proper diet in order to maintain total health.

Again, the Ayurvedic approach to nutrition is a consciousness- based approach, so that more important than any approach is "awareness of one's interaction with food as part of conscious universe."

This awareness exists on many levels: the awareness one has when putting the food into one's mouth, the awareness of the cook who has prepared the food, even the awareness of the farmer who has grown the product, all these influence the life energy or prana of the food.

When one eats pre-packaged or canned foods, Chopra believes, it does not provide the eater with the utmost feeling of energy because it is missing the life force/life energy, which is an expression of consciousness in Ayurveda.

Another important aspect of Ayurvedic nutrition is the emphasis on taste as an indicator. Knowledge about nutrition is obtained through taste and the effects of food in terms of awareness: whether particular foods make you feel heavy or light, congested or energized, hot or cold.

Chopra also maintains the importance of fasting and enemas as a vehicle for detoxification and purification.

Finally, although Chopra only serves vegetarian dishes at his seminars and his Center for Well Being, Ayurveda is not necessarily strictly vegetarian. For Chopra, however, there is a spiritual reason for being vegetarian

As a prolific author, Chopra has been able to reach millions of people, teaching them about Ayurveda and spiritual health. In his best selling book, Ageless Body, Timeless Mind: The Quantum Alternative to Growing Old, Chopra invites his reader to imagine a time when disease and aging and the deterioration of the environment are no longer inevitable. In order for this to become a reality, the reader is asked to follow Chopra's Ten Keys to Happiness . Briefly, these include:

(1) Listen to your body's wisdom.
(2) Live in the present, for it is the only moment you have.
(3) Take time to be silent, to meditate.
(4) Relinquish your need for external approval.
(5) When you find yourself reacting with anger or opposition to any person or circumstance, realize that you are only struggling with yourself.
(6) Know that the world "out there" reflects your reality "in here."
(7) Shed the burden of judgement.
(8) Don't contaminate your body with toxins, either food, drink, or toxic emotions.
(9) Replace fear-motivated behavior with love-motivated behavior.
(10) Understand that the physical world is just a mirror of a deeper intelligence. (14)

In Journey into Healing: Awakening the Wisdom Within You , Deepak Chopra offers some inspiring thoughts which he believes will help the reader find peace within oneself, with the objective, once again, that what one thinks and feels can influence one's health. These thoughts include:

(1) When the mind is peaceful, inner energies wake up and work miracles for us.
(2) The use of love is to heal.
(3) Happiness radiates like the fragrance from a flower and draws all good things toward you.
(4) Healthy people live in the present.
(5) An intimate relationship allows you to be yourself.
(6) Accept what comes to you totally and completely.
(7) When life is full, it is only love, and when awareness isfull, it brings only love.
(8) Your mind gives you control.
(9) Health is not just the absence of disease, it is an inner joyfullness.
(10) Enchantment is our natural state.
(11) Attend to your own inner health and well being.
(12) Allow your love to nourish yourself as well as others.