In Ayurveda, fresh breath, healthy teeth, and healthy gums are naturally part of morning self-care. Because Ayurveda doesn't just start with diet, yoga, or meditation. Daily oral hygiene is also part of Dinacharya, the Ayurvedic daily routine.
Cleaning your tongue, oil pulling, brushing your teeth, and then drinking a glass of water from a copper cup: A soothing morning ritual made from a few simple steps that can be wonderfully integrated into our modern everyday life.
What does Dinacharya mean?
Dinacharya in Ayurveda refers to a regular daily routine. The term is composed of the Sanskrit words for "day" and "conduct" or "way of life."
Behind it lies the idea of performing certain nurturing and health-conscious actions as regularly as possible each day, thereby giving the body and mind a reliable rhythm.
Many of these traditional recommendations relate to the morning. These include, for example, cleaning the mouth and tongue, body care, exercise, yoga, or meditation.
You don't have to change your entire daily schedule for this. Small rituals in particular can be easily integrated into everyday life – and can over time become habits you no longer have to think about in the morning.
1. Clean your tongue
After waking up, Ayurvedic oral care begins with cleaning the tongue.
During the night, a visible coating often forms on the tongue. With a tongue scraper, it can be quickly and thoroughly removed in the morning.
Place the tongue scraper as far back on your tongue as possible and pull it forward with light pressure. Repeat this several times and rinse the scraper under running water in between.
Too much pressure is not necessary. Tongue cleaning should feel pleasant and can be done within a few moments.
2. Oil pulling with an Ayurvedic mouth oil
After tongue cleaning comes oil pulling, a traditional form of Ayurvedic oral care. In Ayurveda, the term Gandusha is known for this: oil is taken into the mouth and held there for some time. In the widely practiced oil pulling today, it is also moved through the mouth and between the teeth.
Traditionally, sesame oil plays an important role. A special Ayurvedic herbal recipe for oral care is Arimedadi Thailam. This oil is based on sesame oil and contains a variety of traditionally used herbs and spices such as turmeric, liquorice, amla, vetiver, cinnamon, cardamom, and clove.
Take the amount of mouth oil recommended by the manufacturer into your mouth and slowly move it through your mouth and between your teeth. Especially at the beginning, a few minutes are completely sufficient. Please observe the application instructions for the respective mouth oil.
Then spit the oil into a cloth or some paper towel and dispose of it in regular household waste. This prevents the used oil from entering the drain.
Afterward, you can rinse your mouth with warm water – and continue with brushing your teeth.
3. Brushing teeth with Ayurvedic toothpaste
After oil pulling, brushing your teeth follows.
An Ayurvedic toothpaste beautifully complements the morning routine. Traditional recipes often incorporate plants, herbs, and spices that have long been used in Ayurveda for oral care.
Brush your teeth thoroughly as usual. This combines daily modern dental care with elements of traditional Ayurvedic Dinacharya.
4. Drink water from a copper cup
Now your oral hygiene is complete – and your water is already waiting for you.
If you want to integrate drinking from a copper vessel into your morning routine, you can fill your copper cup with still water the evening before and let it sit overnight.
This way you don't need to prepare anything in the morning: The filled copper cup is already ready and becomes the last step of your small Ayurvedic morning ritual.
Your Ayurvedic oral care in the morning
The order is very simple:
Clean tongue → Oil pulling → Brush teeth → Drink water from copper cup
Four steps that after a short time can be effortlessly combined.
And that is precisely the beautiful idea of Ayurvedic Dinacharya: It is not about filling the morning with ever new tasks. It is about regularly practicing a few beneficial habits.
Do you know about the 66-day rule?
If you want to start a new morning routine, a little patience helps.
Perhaps you have already heard of the 66-day rule. It goes back to a study on habit formation, which found that it took about 66 days on average for a regularly repeated action to become increasingly automatic.
The 66 days are not a magical deadline – some habits establish themselves faster, others take significantly longer. The beautiful message behind it is rather: Repetition turns a conscious decision into a habit over time.
Therefore, try to consistently maintain your Ayurvedic morning routine for 66 days.
After a few weeks, you may not even have to think about what comes next. The individual steps simply become part of your morning.
Ayurveda doesn't have to be complicated
A tongue scraper, a good Ayurvedic oil pulling oil, an Ayurvedic toothpaste, and a copper cup – initially, you don't need anything more for this small morning routine.
Individual products become rituals. And recurring rituals can become habits.
Perhaps a few minutes of meditation, pranayama, or yoga will follow. Perhaps your normal everyday life will simply begin.
But you have already consciously used the first minutes of the day for yourself and your care.
