A CONCEPTUAL APPROACH TO BEAUTY CARE IN AYURVEDA: A REVIEW

Abstract

The literary meaning of Saundarya is Beauty. Many authors and poets have described Saundarya in their own ways. In the present era, the meaning of Saundarya is beautiful features, some think of beauty as beautiful personality, deep blue eyes, dark eyes, long black hair, fair skin and so on. But Saundarya in Ayurveda is one of the aspects of healthy person. Saundarya comes naturally to a person who is healthy according to Ayurveda, as it is defined as one of the outcomes of Sukhayu (longevity). Beauty consciousness and the knowledge of application of herbs, minerals and animals products are as old phenomena as the human existence. Beauty of person gives a profound experience of pleasure and satisfaction. Ayurveda unites the concept of beauty with the involvement of mental and spiritual well being of human body. Ayurveda determines beauty by the assessment of some factors like prakriti (Body constitution), samhanana (compactness of body), twak (skin completion), sara (structural predominance), pramana (measurement) and dirghayu lakshana (symptoms of long life). So the present article aims to derive the possible ways of Saundarya prasadana (enhancement of beauty) through the principles of swasthya prapti as told in Ayurveda.