Fasting

Do you do this as a spiritual practice and if so, how do you manage when you have no option but to go to work?

I have never fasted whilst working but find that I really have no other option and I seem to be being pushed towards this more and more.

If you have any pointers or experience which you feel appropriate to offer, I would welcome your comments.

I don't propose a total fast because I simply couldn't manage that and work too. Fruit and water may be the way though.

My mother uses fasting as a vital part of her connection, as well as intercession. She takes her lunch & breaks as usual, but spends the time alone doing whatever her spirit leads for the specific situation or issue. She does drink plenty of water & continues to take her vitamin supplements.

I would agree that natural fruit or celery should be acceptable to help with energy levels.

I have not fasted for more than 24 hours, but I found that having a beaded bracelet or a smooth gemstone shape helped me to re-focus when I got pulled away mentally. The sight and the touch play a large role in reminding me that this is a special time and purpose.

Also, I like to make up my own versions of the Five-Finger Prayer where each finger (or even small section of the fingers) represents a meditation point.

When I was sick with Diverticulitus I was denied food and water for 4 days, and it did not bring me any closer to God, or anything spiritual. After that I got only chicken broth for 3 days, and then jello after that. I didn't and still don't feel that fasting has anything to do with just how spiritual you are.

However, if you want to cleanse the body of toxins there are foods especially for that. And if you are daring, you could try colonics. Now that is wonderful and it gives you a feeling of purity.

And I think it is really healthy to skip a few meals here and there to calm the intestines down. Ya'll don't realize how much work they have!!!

I feel the connection I have with God, or the Spirit resides in my mind, not in my body. I can get to that place even when I am hauling wood into the house for the wood stove.

I can't fast as I am an insulin-injection dependent diabetic. However, before this happened to me I have sometimes felt the need to fast for a weekend. Never longer as in those days my family needed more looking after than now, and my work was a full working day/week instead of part time. I do think that for those called to it fasting has a role to play in spiritual practice.

I did spent some time in a convent (as a postulant) some 30 years ago and fasting was part of our routine. However, it was *very* carefully supervised. The elderly, the sick and the frail were not allowed to fast but had to take vegetable broth and fruit. The physically hale were allowed to fast but not for longer than a single 24/48 hour period at a time without some over-riding reason. The amount of physical work to be done was considered when any sister requested permission to fast. The one thing that was important was that a fasting sister take plenty of fluids - well, water actually. It is easy to forget that a great deal of our bodily fluid requirements come from the food we eat.

It is a way of "forgetting" the body and focussing entirely on the internal life. Now however I wonder a little as to whether this is a good thing to do - the body's needs and pleasures are important and we should be as open to physical joy as to spiritual joy.

However - we are all called to different methods of spiritual practice and if one is called upon to fast then, provided you are healthy and take care in the matter of fluids I don't think there would/could be a problem. Since you are to be working at the same time, then something like a clear soup would not go against the spirit of the fast as it is merely a hot, flavoured liquid. Certainly fruit and/or raw vegetables (if liked) would be a good thing to take once or twice a day.

If I were physically permitted then in certain circumstances I would consider this but know that it is not something that I could or should do now.

ETA - It is hard to believe that once I was a postulant nun! Now I am not a Christian and have not been for a great many years .........

For me fasting does wonders spiritually- the problem (that's - to me ) is the fast related headache - it can become really bad, its even known (and lately treated) as 'Yom Kippur Headache'/ 'First of Ramadan Headache.'
Where i live fasting is common (different of what i practice though) - most of Montenegro's population is Christian Orthodox and that means, at least theoretically, fasting every Wednesday and Friday plus forty-days long Great Fasts before the main Holy Days and so on - basically more than half of the year is spent fasting. I think customs might vary between various CO Churches, but mostly fasting in this tradition excludes all foods of animal origin and basically is vegan way of eating.

I have decided upon a limited intake fast with just a small quantity of fruit/veg per day. Because I am working, can't dedicate all my time to inner contemplation, want this to be more than 48 hours and because I have physical work to do so to avoid giving less than my best at work, I have opted to take a very limited amount of nutrition.

(basically the equivalent of 3 apples a day) for no more than 7 days.

I started this morning and so far I feel very much more clear headed but I know that the first day is never the worst!

Milfoil said:

I have decided upon a limited intake fast with just a small quantity of fruit/veg per day. Because I am working, can't dedicate all my time to inner contemplation, want this to be more than 48 hours and because I have physical work to do so to avoid giving less than my best at work, I have opted to take a very limited amount of nutrition.

(basically the equivalent of 3 apples a day) for no more than 7 days.

I started this morning and so far I feel very much more clear headed but I know that the first day is never the worst!

Click to expand...

Good luck, Milfoil! Hope it brings you all the benefits you desire!

Good luck from me too. I hope you get what you are expecting.

I don't know what to expect, I guess I have no expectations or desires about this other than to experience what it is. Its just something I feel that I have to do.

Initially, I have found a clarity of mind which I think is what is missed when we are ill. Enforced starvation whether through illness or circumstance is not a conscious decision and we are rarely thinking clearly when our bodies are so unbalanced.

I am also, in these early stages, becoming more open to or more highly attuned to sensation, impression and messages. One insight which came to me last night was that when fasting, the object isn't so much to fight the feelings of hunger or weakness, but to experience them, feel what it is to know them, not fear them but understand them and allow the body to do what it does but also discover how, through letting go, how strong I can be.

Compassion for those who do not have enough to eat has also come through.

The cleansing aspect is also starting to show. Things in my life and psyche which really do need to give way or be left behind are coming up. Dreams of big insects which grow to monster proportions, going down steep hills, being carried up steep hills, finding a squater in an upstairs room of a big house and throwing him out . . . all sorts of stuff which suggest change and cleansing.

I know, there is WAY more than this but it has only been 24 hrs so far.

I'm sure you've read that breaking a fast should be slow and careful, too.