Dieting/Fasting

[Jiva]

So what are peoples' views on dieting, particularly in relation to psychological occult practices?

I've participated in sports basically my whole life so dieting is something heavily ingrained in me. Transferring these from sports to meditation was a non-issue as I exercise most days of the week – I simply treated them as the same thing. Therefore I generally make sure to eat a meal with not much saturated fat or complex carbohydrates a few hours before. Naturally if spontaneity takes over I don't particularly worry though.

What is an issue are things like sugars and coffee; it's naturally hard to relax if these are pumping through the system. Coffee especially is a vice of mine. My job can be enjoyable (research and analysis), but often it can be painfully boring: tedious data entry or literally sitting doing nothing. A lot of the time I just resort to coffee breaks, although I've realised that since the proliferation of tablets, everyone can mistake seeing me sitting and reading a Kindle as me doing work so this might remedy the problem .

Outside my personal experience, I have no idea what effect nicotine addiction has on people but I assume it's somewhat similar to caffeine?

I've also never fasted, which I view as a major personal shortcoming as I'm aware people use fasting as a beneficial practice both physically and mentally. I'd be interested if anyone has personal experiences/tips in this area.

[Nefastos]

This is very interesting topic, especially because I'm personally not of a fasting type. My problem is usually more the overuse of mental control than the lack of it, so those kinds of exercises which add more self-discipline are often more like a step of regression than advancement for me.

So what are peoples' views on dieting, particularly in relation to psychological occult practices?

Personally I use more the slow way, in which some years or at least months are put in practice of training some or other principle, energy and/or quality of mind needed for the work. After that, only a little of fasting or not at all is needed to participate in magic that otherwise would need a lot of instrumental concentration.

Fasting builds up mental focus, and if that focus is already overstimulated, I have seen that it becomes hyperactivated and loses its intuitive qualities, the most important ones in magic. Control overrides flow, "the silent voice" is lost, and magic loses its feminine potency. Even in such cases, although, a female assistant has helped me to succeed, but it would have been much better had I not overstressed the part of focusing.

For other people the thing might be precisely the opposite, of course. We all have our strong points, which are at the same time our blind spots, because we tend to lean on them heavily. This is why I left Fosforos' instructions on fasting (p.179-180) so vague.

What is an issue are things like sugars and coffee; it's naturally hard to relax if these are pumping through the system. Coffee especially is a vice of mine.

Tell me about it... When I've been living my hardest years, one of the little things that have made me continue crawling on have been ritualized coffee breaks. (I don't mean I took them clad in cloak at the altar, but the same time every day made it a ceremony of sorts.) So I think it's great if one can have vices that keep us somehow attached to life. For it's "not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man". (Matthew 15:11)

But that's just considering the basic foundation. At the times the ritual fastings & diets can be very beneficial. It would be reasonable to think that they mostly belong to the periods & temperaments of Mars & Saturn.

[Insanus]

It is true that it's "not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man" but to overdo this by dwelling into the most disgusting spheres of emotion & thought and completely disregard physical self as a test, or "anti-fasting" in a sense...it's just doing it wrong. I used to do something like that before I joined SoA.
Too much control, especially with the Saturn-Mars combo stressing is not true control, but an addiction to power at least in my case it was. And I feel that after a strong period of destroying one's own self aggressively, fasting might well be the way to relax and improve those feminine potencies and "flow" as odd as it may sound.

I mean, I never cared too much about my own physical or psychological well-being, or anything that manifests on the physical plane, thinking that those things don't matter much as long as I can keep my focus on the right idea/direction under any conditions. This, in turn made my life miserable for quite a long time because of all the obvious reasons. Instead of the flame burning in me, I was burning in the flames, using resources that didn't really exist.
And obviously with satanist's temperament that's no reason to quit doing it wrong, but to seek even harder challenges which I had no chance succeeding in. The weird thing is, it DID improve my inner focus a lot, but also with huge outer costs. The stress levels turned unbearably intense and it seemed pretty much like there was no option except going downwards. I don't think I'm alone with these experiences.

From that standpoint, fasting 'normally' feels like a handicap, almost like a vacation, because it turns the attention to physical & personal level in a healthy and improving way. It's not about building more stress upon stress, but about learning to control the fire by setting limitations and accepting them as a tool in working.

It's a weird feeling when letting things be and "taking it easy" is the toughest challenge life can give.

[Jiva]

Well, I couldn't tell you whether I'm the fasting type yet or not, but I suspect short periods may well be more beneficial to me too, although I will of course experiment in time. When it comes to food I've found I have to be quite self-disciplined as if I don't have roughly set meal times I often completely forget to eat or drink and then wonder why I have headaches or why my eyesight is blurry. The feeling of hunger typically only makes itself known to me half-way through a meal.

In the context of physical fitness I've previously conducted various dietary experiments just for the sake of a challenge. For example, a few years ago I went two months eating strict amounts of nothing but Weetabix, muesli, porridge and mixed vegetables for carbohydrates and Quorn and unflavoured protein shakes for protein. While this was undertaken for a completely mundane reason, it did affect me in ways that seem obviously predictable in hindsight; although I didn't literally eat bread and water, it did occur to me that I was experimenting with monasticism.

Training a principle etc. for years would probably be overkill at the moment and impractical previously, although there are one or two primary issues I'm working on. At the moment, I'm thinking of focussing on something particular for a few months while dieting and then spending a few weeks somewhere completely isolated to fast, contemplate and meditate. In this sense I think fasting may actually be a loosening of control compared to my usual routine, similar to the description by Insanus above.

[Heith]

Inspired by my cousin, I fasted for 24 hours a while ago (water & tea allowed). In truth I think my fasting was much longer as the previous day I had eaten very little so the calorie intake was next to nothing. I had very positive results and feeling over this fasting, despite that towards the end I began to feel very cold and so spent two or so hours under the blanket.

As I lay there, I began to see into the astral. The most important and clear experience was a black serpent (perhaps a eastern indigo snake) which slithered up my body, sniffing with its black tongue. Our faces were close to one another, almost touching. I got very friendly feeling from the serpent and the experience was not frightening.

As the time became close that I was allowed to eat again, I noticed that I approached the idea of eating with a very good mindset. I took time to prepare my meal, considering what would be healthy to eat. I even set a table, lit a candle and spent some moments in prayer, thinking of the nature of eating and being thankful that I have food, that I do not suffer.

This is certainly a big thing for me because I've a little problematic relationship with food.

It may sound funny as to most who read this description, it undoubtedly means that I was hallucinating, but the fasting cleared my head of the astral energies of other people. There had just been a large practise within the fraternity that lasted for some days, so I felt it was really good to distinguish my own energies again.

Fasting is certainly a shamanic technique and I wish to do this again. Ideally I would like to do this once a week perhaps, but I've to do some reading as to what is recommended. Now I've been for a few days changing my eating patterns so that I only eat between noon and 8 PM. I hope this helps with metabolism, and my dentist should be happy too as I presume this is good for teeth as well cavity wise.

I'm open to ideas and suggestions, as I am very new to fasting!

[Kenazis]

Feeling cold is normal effect. I have been thinking this cold-effect would be good in those deadly and hellish heat days of summer. Also headaches and slight soreness of muscles and joints is normal when fasting longer times. Some reasons for these might be bloodsugar and natrium level changes in body. I don't recommend extremities in moving or staying still. If you are going to fast longer, the hunger comes and goes. Metabolism slows down, so when starting to eat again it's recommended to start with small portions, light and healthy food. Also I didn't need so much sleep when I fasted those 2-3 day periods. These are some things that I have learned. Mostly common sense I think.