Balancing Multiple Doshas

If you score as a combination Dosha you have a bit more reading to do than a single-Dosha person, but after that life is easier for you. You'll have a much larger list of foods to accent.

When you're a combination Dosha, which Dosha takes precedence depends not only on your unique physicality but also on your lifestyle and the weather. Balance whichever Dosha is being imbalanced. If you have no ailments or signs of imbalance, enjoy whatever balances either and even aggravates either so long as you don't overdo.

Vata-Pitta

This combination is quite easy to balance because the two Doshas balance each other in interesting ways. The fire humour of Pitta is no longer so strong, so that hot summer days are more manageable, and winters not so freezing to the cold, dry Vata aspect. Their skin is most likely combination skin, so they should use gentle astringents like Witch Hazel on their face, and a good gentle soap like Miracle II or Dr. Bronner's Castille Soap, Peppermint or Lavender.

Their lifestyle habits and diet should change with the seasons. In the winter, they should follow Vata guidelines. In the summer, follow Pitta guidelines.

Bitter, astringent, hot and pungent foods aren't as aggravating, especially if eaten in the proper season. Dry foods like popcorn or puffed grains or baked potatoes should still be limited and liberally oiled/buttered, and the diet should overall be more vegetarian and less rich.

Vata-Pitta people must work on being grounded, solid, calm and joyful. They have a tendancy towards becoming very irritable, even angry, when tired or imbalanced or when they feel their safety, pride and boundaries have been violated. They can be easily distracted. Sometimes they are great multi-taskers, other times they just putter.

Pitta-Kapha

Pitta-Kapha people do the best with a raw, vegetarian diet provided they get enough skin food. They can easily judge the success of their diet management by their weight, level of energy and skin. They get to enjoy all the bitter leafy greens and astringent fruits they could ever want. They also get to enjoy more sweet foods like honey. But they should reduce oils and very rich foods, eat small regular meals and fast at least one day out of ten. It is important for the Pitta-Kapha person to work on issues of jealousy and possessiveness, both of things and people. Acquiring expensive objects will not make them as happy as they think.

Kapha-Vata

Mixing Kapha and Vata is easy because Kapha Dosha moistens the dry qualities of Vata and alleviates many of the Vata complaints. Because the Kapha qualities are lightened by Vata, they can afford to have more rich foods than pure Kapha people. They are still very susceptible to cold, however, so foods should be warmed and rarely raw unless it is summer.

The Kapha-Vata eater should be sensible 5 days out of the week and have at least one crazy, fun, fattening, dairy-rich meal on the other two days, especially in the winter. As long as they do not exceed their caloric needs they can eat a wide variety of foods prepared in many ways, but they should drink plenty of Cleansing Drinks, especially on their high-protein days. They should study up on Pungent Therapy, Tongue Diagnosis (well, this goes for everyone really) and adjust accordingly.

It is important for the Kapha/Vata person to learn about the basic laws of physics, especially how nature abhors a vacuum; giving means receiving, being miserly means being poor. They must learn to let go, detach from emotions, and work on self-esteem.