By Dr Partap Chauhan
When we talk about family we think about our parents,
siblings and spouses. A family, however, is not just a group of people connected
by consanguinity, affinity or co-residence alone. There must have to be a
healthy coordination and an undercurrent of genuine love and affection among and
between every member of the family.
The Modern Family
The modern age with its fast-paced life has taken its toll on the family life of
people in general. After the day’s hard work people are left with almost no time
to even talk to other members of the family. This has created a sort of
artificial barrier between each other. The net result is utter non-cooperation
and incongruence—the son does not know where his father is going the next
morning or the mother is not aware of her daughter’s greatest day in school the
next day. There are also examples of a ‘family’ of four living together as neighbours in separate rooms, with individual television sets, bathrooms and
wardrobes!
The large families of yore comprising parents, children and grand-parents have
been degenerated to form smaller ‘nuclear’ families, or worse still,
single-parent families. The slow decline of love, cohesion and understanding
among people has given rise to these queer situations. In a single-parent family
comprising son and mother, e.g., the mother has to arrange for all familial
needs that include cooking, house-keeping, baby-sitting, emotional support and
financial support such as paying up for grocery bills, laundry bills, home
rents, transport overheads, medical expenses and future savings. This keeps the
mother exceedingly busy and takes away from her the most important aspect of
living—health and happiness.
Similar is the case with other small families. They keep on accumulating means
for enjoying each and every luxury of the world but fail to attain the perpetual
joy derived from a healthy body, mind and soul ensconced in a happy family. A
large, mutually connected family, on the other hand, encourages healthy division
of labour for sustenance and mutual benefit.
There are numerous examples of thugs, convicts, rapists, conmen and robbers who
had chosen the path of violence and ignominy just because they did not get a
healthy family that shared a cordial relationship among its members in their
formative years. Just as charity begins at home, contempt too starts from home.
The family into which a child is born acts as the first and the most important
teacher for the highly impressionable mind of the child.
Therefore, it is highly important that we give to ourselves a healthy family
that binds every member harmoniously through a cord of mutual understanding,
love and cooperation and leads an individual towards the path of eternal health
and spirituality.
An Ayurvedic Perspective
Fortunately, ancient texts from the 5000-year old Indian system of medicine,
Ayurveda have a solution to build up a happy family. Ayurveda sees family as an
extension of the different aspects of a human being at micro-levels.
Understanding the functions of the various constituent parts of a human being
will help us to easily comprehend the ideal functions of every member of the
family. Let us explore.
 According to Ayurveda, a person’s behaviour and overall outlook is a
manifestation of his or her being at all five levels—bodily, mental, sensual,
emotional and spiritual. Different aspects of life co-exist inside the human
being and work together harmoniously to run the various life processes. The
human being is the conglomeration of Sharira (body), Gyanendriya
(the five senses—eyes, nose, tongue, ears and skin), Karmendriya (the
five working senses—the vocal cords, hands, feet, genitals and anus), Buddhi
(intelligence), Atma (soul) and Ahamkara (ego). The five sensory
faculties of Gyanendriya help humans to see, smell, taste, hear and feel.
The five motor faculties of Karmendriya help us to speak, grasp, move,
procreate and eliminate.
When each of these individual elements cooperates between each other in harmony,
the human is considered healthy at all five levels—bodily, mental, sensual,
emotional and spiritual. An anomaly creeping in any single element sends the
entire system in disharmony. Here, I would like to cite an example.
We often find ourselves devouring our favourite dish even when we had just
finished our main course meal and we are not feeling hungry. This is a classic
example of feeding our senses at the cost of taxing our body. Let me now explain
it at a fundamental level.
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