When you eat, your organism assimilates the useful elements and eliminates those that are foreign or harmful. But your organism may not always be healthy enough to recognize and sort out the two, either because you have given it too much food, or because there are too many impurities in what you eat. When this happens, wastes accumulate in the tissues of the various organs, and in particular in the intestines.

Even when it is pure, food leaves some waste in our bodies, and this is why it is good to fast from time to time so as to give our organism the chance to undertake the necessary cleansing process. Fasting is a method taught by nature itself: I am sure you all have observed how, when an animal feels ill, its instinct tells it to fast. It goes off and hides in a quiet spot, looks for some kind of grass or herb that will act as a purge, and waits until it is cured.

Fasting is a very healthy habit, and if circumstances permit, it would do you good to fast for twenty-four hours once a week. During those twenty-four hours, try to devote yourself more particularly to spiritual work: tune in to entities of light, choose some inspiring music or reading, purify your thoughts and your emotions.

Those of you who want to fast will have to change your point of view. Instead of being alarmed if you feel unwell, you must just persevere until you feel better. If you break your fast at the first signs of discomfort, you will be making exactly the same mistake as those who start taking pills as soon as they feel a temperature coming on. Of course, they feel better immediately, but they do not realize that by getting rid of their fever in this way they are opening themselves to the risk of serious illness in the future.

Let your organism react freely in its own way. When it is clogged by waste it tries to get rid of that waste by producing a fever to dissolve it, and your temperature rises. You must put up with that temperature: it shows that your organism is cleansing itself.
To be continued…

Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

Read more in…
Izvor Book 204, The Yoga of Nutrition
Chapter 7. Fasting
Complete Works, Volume 16, Hrani Yoga