Explains how to determine one's body type, recommends programs of diet, stress reduction, exercise, and therapy, and explains how to restore the body's essential balance with nature. Reprint. 50,000 first printing A decade ago, Deepak Chopra, M.D., wrote "Perfect Health, the first practical guide to harnessing the healing power of the mind, which became a national bestseller. The book described how breakthroughs in physics and medicine were underscoring the validity of a 5,000-year-old medical system from ancient India known as Ayurveda ("the knowledge of life span" in Sanskrit). "Perfect Health went on to describe how to apply the ancient wisdom of Ayurveda to everyday life. In celebration of this classic work we have created this new edition, revised and updated to include the latest medical research. Although we experience our bodies as solid, they are in fact more like fires that are constantly being consumed and renewed. We grow new stomach linings every five days, for instance. Our skin is new every five weeks. Each year, fully 98 percent of the total number of atoms in our bodies is replaced. Ayurveda gives us the tools to intervene at this quantum level, where we are being created anew each day. Ayurveda tells us that freedom from sickness depends on contacting our own awareness, bringing it into balance, and then extending that balance to the body. "Perfect Health provides a complete step-by-step program of mind body medicine tailored to individual needs. A quiz identifies the reader's mind body type: thin, restless Vata; enterprising, efficient Pitta; tranquil, steady Kapha; or any combination of these three. This body type becomes the basis for a specific Ayurvedic program of diet, stress reduction, neuromuscular integration, exercise, and daily routines. The result is a total plan, tailor-made for each individual, to reestablish the body's essential balance with nature; tostrengthen the mind body connection; and to use the power of quantum healing to transcend the ordinary limitations of disease and aging--in short, for achieving "Perfect Health. Acknowledgments ix Part I: A Place Called Perfect Health Introduction 3(4) Invitation to a Higher Reality 7(24) Discovering Your Body Type 31(32) Ayurveda Mind Body Type Test 38(8) Characteristics of the Body Types 46(11) Vata 47(3) Pitta 50(3) Kapha 53(4) Understanding a Two-Dosha Type 57(4) Understanding a Three-Dosha Type 61(2) The Three Doshas---Makers of Reality 63(24) The Subdoshas 77(10) A Blueprint from Nature 87(22) How the Doshas Get Unbalanced 98(11) Restoring the Balance 109(28) The Balanced Life---General Points 121(16) Part II: The Quantum Mechanical Human Body Quantum Medicine for a Quantum Body 137(14) Opening the Channels of Healing 151(46) Panchakarma 152(5) Meditation 157(10) Healing Sounds 167(11) Marma Therapy 178(9) Aromatherapy 187(4) Music Therapy 191(6) Freedom from Addictions 197(16) Aging Is a Mistake 213(22) Rasayanas---Herbs for Longevity 221(4) Quiz: How Well Am I Aging? 225(10) Part III: Living in Tune with Nature The Impulse to Evolve 235(8) Daily Routine---Riding Nature's Waves 243(14) Diet---Eating for Perfect Balance 257(60) Body-Type Diets 259(24) Vata-Pacifying Diet 262(8) Pitta-Pacifying Diet 270(6) Kapha-Pacifying Diet 276(7) The Six Tastes 283(10) Agni---The Digestive Fire 293(13) A Blissful Diet 306(11) Exercise---The Muth of ``No Pain, No Gain'' 317(46) Body-Type Exercise 320(5) Three-Dosha Exercises 325(38) Sun Salute 326(13) Yoga Positions 339(19) Balanced Breathing (Pranayama) 358(5) Seasonal Routine---Balancing the Whole Year 363(6) Epilogue: Flowers in a Quantum Field 369(8) Appendix A: Sources for Ayurveda 377(4) Appendix B: Glossary 381(2) Bibliography 383(2) Index 385