Interview with lecturer Jutta Krebs
As an experienced Ayurvedic therapist and certified natural cosmetician, you have been teaching Ayurvedic cosmetic and beauty treatments at the European Academy of Ayurveda for many years. What is special for you about the Ayurvedic beauty teachings?
I see beauty and being beautiful as a natural potential inherent in us. According to one's own constitution, beauty manifests itself in its own special way. For the discovery and awakening of our own individual beauty, we direct our attention to feeling and thereby experience the special communication with ourselves, nourish each other through care and receive tender touches in wonderful massages. Beauty is the symbiosis of self-confidence in the body and charisma. It expresses itself in affirmative joy of life and contentment, through bubbling life energy.
Here, the Ayurvedic beauty teachings clearly set themselves apart from the objectified, depersonalized image of beauty prevalent in the media. The fixation on images, as they are given by beauty magazines and the cosmetics industry, in which beauty is the result of a number of ideal attributes, is not compatible with the Ayurvedic principles.
How does Ayurvedic cosmetics differ from conventional cosmetics?
A constitutionally determined skin condition results from a variety of underlying characteristics in the personality. In addition, living conditions and eating habits are reflected in the skin. Thus, Ayurvedic cosmetics is not primarily about the application of a range of products to maintain and restore a healthy skin appearance. Since inner well-being is the first and decisive step towards holistically understood beauty, the Ayurvedic facial massage (Mukhabyanga) makes up the heart of the treatment.
Mukhabyanga is "love therapy" as it connects the head/face to the heart. One focus is on "heart opening" as Ojas has its seat in the heart; this is where the "radiance" arises. In preparation for this, the scalp and face are massaged and tensions in the neck and shoulder area are released. The heart opens, deep touching unfolds through the strokes in the décolleté and chest area. The massage process is based on many Marmas (vital points), which have a regulating effect on accumulated tension through their own touch, contribute to pleasant relaxation and have a direct effect on smoothing the skin, a natural face lifting.
High-quality natural oils are available as nourishing and lubricating agents. Cleansing is not done by pressing comedones and pustules; excellent herbal powders, selected according to the intention and stimulating the skin metabolism, are used for this purpose. These powders are mixed with the appropriate medium immediately before the treatment and applied as a mask. Vitalizing and nourishing masks can also be prepared with a few ingredients. Everything that is supplied to the skin from the outside can also be nourishment and nutritional supplements for the inside.
Your seminars and trainings for Ayurveda cosmetics are especially for women. Why are you doing this?
Being a woman... being female... what are the qualities of your true feminine side... what value do they have in your life? These are questions that can only be answered in a protected circle of women. In an atmosphere of intimacy and warmth of heart, which unfolds especially through the wonderful touching massages, which happen in loving care, the experience of enjoying oneself and the access to one's own emotional world is nourished. In this way this course can become a journey of self-awareness. One's own worth becomes conscious, hidden potentials may come to the surface. Women nourish each other in an optimal way, as traditions in different cultures show.
One of your special fields is Ayurvedic skin and hair care. Which products are used for this? Are there also simple recipes for home use?
As mentioned above, we use single substances in the form of Ayurvedic herbs, as well as traditional Ayurvedic foods like ghee, but also familiar ones like milk, cream, honey, almond flour. Herbal waters are prepared by the students themselves and can be used as face and compress waters or hair conditioners depending on the plant and specific effects. The recipes and applications implemented in the course are easy to make and therefore ideal for use at home. The selected high-quality medicinal Ayurvedic oils, which are produced in a complex procedure according to traditional recipes, could be described as "finished products". These are available from the Ayurveda specialist trade and the Academy.
Can you explain the Ayurvedic anti-aging concept with its treatments and recipes?
An Ayurvedic-based anti-aging concept is based on the holistic understanding of the individuality of each person. Through the three Doshas (Vata, Pitta, Kapha) we find access to our unique personality. It is essential that a treatment concept not only includes the physical aspects such as the skin, but also the way of life, which manifests itself in behaviour, attitudes, diet, etc. The skin does not only feel sensory stimuli. It also expresses what we feel. Skin problems are therefore not really problems of the skin, rather they are signals of certain imbalances in the depths that creams and lotions cannot reach. Ayurveda also does not stop when the symptoms of imbalance have disappeared. In finding who we are deep down, where our needs are and how to develop our potentials, via individual wellbeing rituals, balanced diet and the optimal Rasayanas. The goal is wholeness, that is, perfect harmony unfolding from within. When we live on this basis, our face and skin look vital and flawless from within, we radiate youthfulness, joy, happiness and contentment. Anti-aging originates on the inside and finds an individual expression on the outside.
