Essentially, the body is a play of five elements — water, earth, air, fire and space. It is very common in India to refer to the body as a puppet made of five elements. How these five elements behave within you will determine just about everything. Bhuta shuddhi (“Bhuta” means elements, shuddhi means “to cleanse”) is a basic sadhana in yoga to become free from the taint of the elements and become available to a dimension beyond the physical.
You can do some simple things to do bhuta shuddhi in a very natural way. This is not the ultimate type of bhuta shuddhi, but some cleansing of the five elements will happen.
Water: Among the five elements, our biggest concern is water. It has tremendous memory and is 72 per cent of the body. You can put some neem or tulsi leaves in it, which will make the water very vibrant and energetic. Another thing is to store water in a copper vessel so that the water acquires a quality from the copper which is beneficial.
Earth: Earth is 12 per cent. How food goes into you and how you approach it is important. The food you eat is life as other forms are giving up their life to sustain us. If we can eat with enormous gratitude for all the living things which give up their life to sustain our lives, food will behave in a very different way within us.
Air: Air makes up six per cent. In that, only one per cent or less is your breath. The rest is happening in so many other ways. It is not just the air that you breathe that affects you, it is the way you keep the air within you. You must take care of that one per cent too, but if you are living in a city, what kind of air you breathe may not be in your hands.
So go for a walk in the park or along the lake. If you have children, it is important that you take them out at least once a month. Instead of taking them to the cinema, take them to the river, teach them how to swim or climb a mountain, even a big rock will do.
Fire: Get some sun on your body every day because sunlight is still pure as fortunately nobody can contaminate it! You can also take care of what kind of fire burns within you — Is it the fire of greed, of hatred, of anger, of love or the fire of compassion? If you take care of that, you needn’t worry about your physical and mental well-being.
Akash: Akash is an intermediary situation between the creation and the source of creation. If we keep the other four elements well, akash will take care of itself.
Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev, a visionary, author, poet and speaker, can be contacted at www.ishafoundation.org
