Vata Pitta Dosha
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The Three Dosha & Our Prakruti or Ayurvedic Constitution
Today we are going to discuss the dual-dosha of Vata Pitta Dosha. When you see an Ayurvedic professional for an Ayurvedic Consultation, they will help you discover your prakruti or your specific makeup of the three dosha of Vata, Pitta and Kapha. There are 10 different Prakruti combinations or dosha types. Roughly 75% of people are dual-doshic, 20% are mono-doshic, and 5% are tri-doshic. So most people are going to be dual-doshic. Chances are you are as well. This often causes confusion because there are two different sets of recommendations for each dosha, so how do you reconcile these often conflicting treatment protocols.
Vata Pitta Dosha
When someone is told by an Ayurvedic professional that they are a Vata Pitta dosha, they are telling you that you have an equal or almost equal predominance of Vata and of Pitta dosha. Each one of us has all three dosha in our bodies, it is just our unique combination that differentiates us. In fact, every person is completely different and no treatment protocol would ever be the same for any two people.
Oftentimes when we are a dual-doshic person, we will have a primary dosha and a secondary dosha. It is important to take notice of how it is written; is it vata/pitta or pitta/vata. If it is written as vata/pitta or vata pitta, then your primary dosha is vata and your secondary dosha is pitta and vis versa with pitta/vata or pitta vata, your primary dosha is pitta and your secondary dosha is vata.
When we have a primary and a close secondary dosha, the treatment protocols will generally focus on the primary dosha while not recommending anything that would be too harsh or aggravating for the secondary dosha. A person’s vikruti or their current imbalances will also impact the Ayurvedic guidelines a person should follow. It is always best to schedule an Ayurvedic Consultation with an Ayurvedic professional before beginning any Ayurvedic treatments. This way you have the most holistic and comprehensive approach.
There are others that feel that dual-doshic types are complicated to treat since any efforts to balance one dosha could aggravate another. Because of this some people feel that it is best to try and raise the third dosha or the one that is too low, so a vata/pitta or a pitta/vata individual should try to increase kapha or the water element.
Vata Pitta Dosha Characteristics
Vata Pitta people share characteristics of both dosha. For example, the body type of a vata person is thin and bony while a pitta person is muscular and athletic. A vata pitta person will usually be thin and muscular. A vata person usually has kinky or curly hair while a pitta person usually has straight hair. Therefore a vata pitta person will usually have wavy hair, and will usually have thin hair since both vata and pitta is associated with thin hair. Vata and pitta also share the quality of lightness, so both a vata person and a pitta person and thusly a vata pitta person can benefit from stability, groundedness, support and consistency. Vata and pitta are both pacified by the sweet taste, so sweet tasting foods are beneficial for a vata pitta person.
Vata pitta people can have issues with vyana vayu or poor circulation. Vata loves heat, but the pitta side will limit the amount of heat a vata pitta person can handle. Vata and pitta people both struggle with addiction. Vata is associated with pain so vata predominance in prakruti or vikruti can lead to addiction to pain medication. Pitta loves heat and intensity so may turn to drugs to amplify and intensify experiences. Because of this, a vata pitta person must be careful with drug-use and addictive substances.
Oftentimes a vata pitta person will alternate between vata and pitta mental characteristics so their manas prakruti or mind constitutional type and manas vikruti or imbalances in the mind will change from vata to pitta and vis versa. When a vata person is stressed, they often respond with emotions of worry, fear and anxiousness while a pitta person will respond with anger, judgment and agitation. A vata pitta person will experience both of these sets of emotions. There can also be internal struggle between the opposing sides of vata and pitta, particularly the dominance and confidence of pitta with the insecurity and nervousness of vata.
Conversely though a balanced vata pitta person will combine the positive qualities of both vata and pitta. For example, a vata person is creative, artistic and imaginative, combine that with pitta’s determination, ambition, and drive, you will have a successful and fulfilled vata pitta person. A vata pitta person will also be energetic, a vata quality and will be focused, a pitta quality.
Vata digestion is called vishama agni or irregular digestion while pitta digestion is called tikshna agni or sharp digestion. Because of this a vata pitta person will usually have sama agni or regular agni. However, vishama agni or irregular agni could dominate and with pitta predilection for eating large quantities, this can cause indigestion. We will discuss in a later post about the vata pitta dosha diet, but stay tuned for next weeks post where we talk about the dual-doshic type of pitta kapha.
