Now that you have come out (a little bit) of your fog from the change to daylight savings time, it’s time to recognize the seasonal changes that are taking place and adjust our diet and lifestyle to be in line with them. If you follow the rules of nature, then you will soon be walking around in love and drunk with the budding life of spring. It’s like something is beginning again.

Each season has its dominant characteristics, in terms of the strength of the sun, temperature, weather and what is naturally growing during that season. Spring is known in Ayurveda as a time of building. It’s a wet season in many regions, where the water mixes the local matter and this creates a fertile ground for growth.

Spring is the season of water and earth

Plants are beginning to bud, bloom and grow more during the moderate temperatures of spring. Vegetables that are harvested during the spring tend to be bitter, pungent, sour and astringent. These tastes can be very helpful in tempering the wetness from allergies that a lot of people experience during the season, which is referred to as kapha season, having the properties of water and earth. You’d be hard-pressed to find a super-sweet veggie or fruit growing, and that’s good because spring is the worst season to eat sweets in. Everything is already naturally wet and building, and the sweet taste creates more liquid in the body, so it’s better to eat sweets in the fall and early winter, when nature dries out more.

Spring begins to reveal destiny

Look at the plants to see what is growing, and look at your own life too. You likely have plans that are just starting to grow some legs. Seeds that you have already sowed are now beginning to sprout and grow. Continue watering and giving sun energy, and they will continue on their beautiful path of destiny.

Time to balance kapha dosha

Water and earth together are heavy, wet and cloudy, and this can make us feel slow, heavy and lethargic, so ideal spring foods are warming, lightening, drying, roughening, bitter and pungent. Here are some examples of foods that kapha body types can be friendly with during spring:

Grains:

• Millet = drying and warming

• Corn meal = rough and bitter

• Buckwheat = light and bitter

• Dry toast = dry and light

Vegetables:

• Peas = drying and airy

• Radish = pungent

• Spring onion = pungent

• Dandelion greens = bitter

Dessert:

• Corn bread = drying and roughening

Snack:

• Popcorn with black pepper = drying, lightening, warming and roughening

Time to keep pitta dosha in check

Those plants that are beginning to grow in spring tend to be spreading little particles around in the form of pollen, which can irritate bodies that have a propensity towards inflammation, generally the pitta body types. It can be an annoying season for those with allergies. However, if you keep pitta and kapha doshas in balanced, this will help keep those allergies in check in both spring and summer (where they can get worse for pitta body types). Pitta types shouldn’t try to use the warming techniques, like favoring pungent spices, to balance their doshas during the spring season. Rather, they can focus on bitter and drying.

Vata dosha is a rock star in spring

Those with vata body types tend to love the spring. They feel comfortable, strong and robust, and should enjoy the added stability that the water and earth elements, plus the increasing sunlight brings during the season. Therefore, adding in a lot of kapha and pitta balancing is not necessary for vatas during spring.

Get to know your doshas. Learn to balance them and your destiny is health.