Fasting for Consciousness Work

[Seb G]

Little background on my food journey:

I've been intermittent fasting for over 4 years now eating only whole foods and it just been great in terms of lifestyle and health. I don't really subscribe to ANY diet- I don't care if there's a diet out there that makes you enlightened, immortal, etc. I think that's all salesy bullshit. Health and food has never been an issue for me; I've always eaten intuitively and known exactly what to eat to make myself feel better through self-observation and experience. In my view, deeply learning how food affects you personally is the only way to transcend the problem of diet.

Anyhow, this post is about fasting and how I've used it for consciousness work. Going long periods of time without food will reveal to you exactly: what habits, thought patterns, people, situations, bodily tensions, etc that drain your energy and lower your state of consciousness. Fasting can be really challenging sometimes, and during those challenging moments you can take notes or identify what exactly it is that is draining your energy. For example, if you are working and dealing with people, there is two process going on, useful and useless processes. A useful process can be focusing having clear communication and raising the emotions of your team. A useless process would be worrying how you look, worrying about an outcome, stressing out about time sensitive workload, etc. During fasting, the effects of these useless process are clear as day, and you will have extra motivation to eliminate them. Now that was just an example of daily human life. I've found that this same approach can be used for spiritual work. During fasting, it will be exceedingly painful to keep your body tensions,  shortness of breath, monkey mind, negative self-talk, beliefs about reality, etc. Clearly identifying energy drainers and falling into presence and releasing is the only way out of all of that as opposed to eating something to feed those things. (even so called superfoods!)

Pokes them holes! I yearn for you perspective!!

[Leo Gura]

Sounds good. I've been experimenting with fasting a bit. It looks promising, but challenging.

[Sahil Pandit]

@Seb G Sounds like you really got the hang of it. 

Awesome work. I've been doing tea fasting for quite some time. It provides a ton of energy for my workouts.

Lately i've been thinking more about fasting and eating whole foods to aid myself for when i need nutrients.

I was going to drink some raw carrot juice tonight but it's too late now or else i would be up for half the night. 

Powerful stuff! Thanks for sharing.

[herghly]

@Leo Gura Have you tried prolonged fasting 72 hours+??

[eskwire]

Very nice. How long are you fasting? 

I am currently doing OMAD, one meal a day, 23 hour fast every day. 

The longest extended fast I've done was 6 days. 

Fasting is helpful in a number of areas. To me, it's easier than fussing with food. 

Many people use food to tamp down uncomfortable feelings. It's a distraction from discomfort. 

Of course, it is key not to generate aversion to discomfort. To face it with awareness and equanimity. 

For those who use food dysfunctionally, it's like removing another abused substance from your life. 

You are sober in a sense and can grow from that place. 

 

[max duewel]

Currently doing a water fast, I am aiming at 5 days.

I did 5 days before and it was very challenging but you gain a lot from it.

For me I noticed 

                          way more time during the day, boredom which probably drives you to experiment and try out new stuff,

                         really seeing how habits and unconscious behavior drives your life (especially the ones that are built around eating)

                         less anxiety, more mindfulness, also after several days your body seems to heal itself, for example, muscle tension, back pain, and tissue          

                         damage disappeared for me. Meditation and Yoga are amazing while fasting !! 

There are also negatives:

                         can make you depressed especially at the start, inconstant energy sometimes very high sometimes veeerylow.

                         sleep can be a challenge. ou lose a lot of weight

 

[Leo Gura]

4 hours ago, herghly said:

@Leo Gura Have you tried prolonged fasting 72 hours+??

I have tried but it doesn't work well with my health conditions. It makes them worse.

I'm not sure how it works for healthy people.

[LfcCharlie4]

I'd recommend starting with 16/8 and 24-hour fasts before doing extended water fasts. 

Also please get medical supervision for your first extended fast. 

[Ry4n]

For me fasting just gives me hella anxiety for no reason, anyone relate? Maybe smaller fasts while doing a contemplation/meditation focused day are better than such long sessions? Assuming you don't want to lose too much weight? Idk 

[LfcCharlie4]

@Ry4n  Start small, and build up. Although the longest I've done is 24 hours, which I do once a week mainly for health reasons. 

Try combining a fast with some Wim Hof breathing, now that is an experience  

 

[Leo Gura]

3 hours ago, remember said:

any possibility that you would go more into the details so there could be an analysis of why it does not work?

No, I'm not going to get into my full medical history here.

Focus on how fasting works for you.

[Red-White-Light]

@Leo Gura I’ve done a 2 month dry fasting before. You can access higher states from it, however you don’t want to eat because you know you’ll lose nirvana states.  

[DrewNows]

9 hours ago, remember said:

any possibility that you would go more into the details so there could be an analysis of why it does not work?

could even just be the wrong kind of fasting - or that you still need some supplements while fasting. could be that you went too fast into the fasting and your body needs a time to adapt to it first - there could be multiple reasons why it gotten worse - in some cases there could be a worsening of symptoms first. its easy to dismiss something if it failed the first time.

Haha nice try, and I think you’re right: Health conditions are expected to get worse as weaknesses are exposed according to detoxification experts. During detox I’ve had old injuries return temporarily.

It’s very helpful to get an iridology reading and to use herbs to support the system and organs of elimination while fasting. Also not a good idea to dry fast without being properly hydrated on a cellular level. Fresh fruit and juices is the best way for this imo. 

Ive never done extended dry fasting but with a high alkaline diet of primarily fruit or at least very clean, I easily go an entire 24 hours without a dry mouth or even feeling thirsty or hungry 

6 hours ago, Red-White-Light said:

@Leo Gura I’ve done a 2 month dry fasting before. You can access higher states from it, however you don’t want to eat because you know you’ll lose nirvana states.  

This doesn’t make sense lol or you’re a practicing breatharian?

Deep breathing and meditation in nature can definitely help support a shift into pranic (living) energy intake and feeling highly connected with experience.

One must fall soo deeply in love with eating to sustain a life without. They say the counterintuitive way of attaining food freedom is taking your eating to a whole new level, fully conscious “professional eater will break the deep bonds reinforced throughout a life time. Without food, we are forced to face all demons, hidden away beliefs and lies we tell ourselves on the daily and take full responsibility for everything, mainly our feelings ?

 

[Seb G]

9 hours ago, Ry4n said:

For me fasting just gives me hella anxiety for no reason, anyone relate? Maybe smaller fasts while doing a contemplation/meditation focused day are better than such long sessions? Assuming you don't want to lose too much weight? Idk 

@Ry4n I can 100% relate. Advice given by @LfcCharlie4 is on point- pace yourself- if you feel anxiety and pain, don't fast more, eat whole foods and make sure to get enough nutrients and calories..

Anxiety is there for a reason, your are doing something unconsciously. Next time you fast and the anxiety starts coming up, instead of meditating, which I think, in your case, is being used to numb the pain temporarily (I could be wrong) practice DEEP and unfiltered self-observation. Think of your anxiety as a pool of stressful thought patterns and bodily tensions to start..

Ask these questions:

What SPECIFIC thoughts are making me feel anxious and tense?

Why am I holding these thoughts as valid and true?

What would happen if I let go of these thoughts? (Ego will make it feel as though you will die if you do, it will say something like: "of course you have to worry! if you don't then you'll die!"- that's a cartoonish example but its actually much sneakier than that)

After this: isolate the specific parts of your body that hold tensions because of this. Commonly those may be: shoulders, jaws, stomach, neck, etc. which all stifle your breathing and exacerbate your anxiety even more!

This will make you more mindful of your head space- and fasting will help identify those thoughts that drain your energy the most. I'm currently working on this pattern: "I am letting people down, I must do something to help  or else I'm a piece of shit" which seems like something positive at first, but I can assure you, what actually happens in reality is just me holding tensions in my shoulders and stomach, blocking air flow and ruining my posture not actually helping anyone.

The key is to make your energy draining processes crystal clear. Write them down and label them so that next time a pattern pops up, you'll be like "oh, there's that thought again."