The Cauldron: A Pagan Forum

With my current eating disorder, it's somewhat unlikely that I will fast for very long or even at all, but if the benefits outweigh the risks I'm certainly willing to try it out.

These are my questions: Why exactly do people fast?  Is it for some sort of "detox"?  Is it purely for religious/spiritual reasons, or are there reasons beyond that?  At my age, height, and body weight (19 years, 5 feet even, and 94-98 pounds), what is the longest time I would be able to fast without getting to the point of it being unhealthy?  Are you only supposed to drink water during a fast, or are you able to drink things like homemade fruit smoothies and things like that?  Is it best to eat nothing at all, or to eat one small, balanced meal every day or every couple of days?  What are the positive and negative effects of fasting?

I know, it's a lot of questions.  But I would like to learn as much as I possibly can before considering it.  Thank you in advance for your help!

Ankh, Bah, Mert

These are my questions: Why exactly do people fast?  Is it for some sort of "detox"?  Is it purely for religious/spiritual reasons, or are there reasons beyond that?  

That depends. Some reasons for fasting include:
- exerting control over the body, either for not-so-great reasons (justifying disordered eating, for example) or to focus the mind on things not-of-the-body.

- avoiding specific foods (either long-term or temporarily) to create greater awareness (often done with unseasonable foods, or food in general right before a harvest festival. This is part of the reason in Catholicsm for the older practice of not eating from when you went to bed until you took communion.)

- freeing the time needed for cooking, cleaning, and eating for other tasks, temporarily.

- digestion takes the body time, energy, and focus. For some kinds of magical and ritual work, this has implications (see below.)

For Pagan purposes, as a group of religions, we're largely not into denying the body just for the sake of denying the body. (Which is to say: we're more likely to do "eat with intention and focus" than "don't eat." as a religious practice.)

However, fasting has other benefits. We might avoid specific kinds of foods, or non-seasonal foods, or abstain from the foods about to come into season right before a festival.

Catholicism historically includes both fasting from specific foods (meat on Friday in Lent - and historically, other holy days) and fasting at specific times (before communion, Good Friday.) Judaism has holy days which involve fasting for a day. Islam has fasting during certain hours, but in all of those cases, there's a clearly defined safety valve (and very clear instructions that if it's a threat to health, eat.)

For most people in good health (and without blood sugar issues) not eating from when they wake up until some point in the evening is not likely to be a huge problem. However, if you're doing substantial exertion, you know you respond poorly to missed meals, etc. then you adjust.

Extended fasting, however - more  than a day or so - is a *lot* more complicated, and it's generally not advised for people who already have a history of disordered eating without really good reason and meaningful support. (I've never come anywhere near an actual eating disorder: I still can't heavily restrict my food intake for more than a few days without getting into a really nasty mindset about food that lingers for weeks. That is not useful to my spiritual practice.)  

Before all three of my initiations, I was very thoughtful about what I ate the week before - generally, avoiding all junk food/highly processed food a week or two out, eating vegetarian the last few days, and fasting or nearly fasting (other than food in a ritual context) the day of. I do something similar for Samhain most years, as long as my work schedule allows. (I can't fast a full day and work and then do extended intense ritual.)

What that means is I have to plan my meals (and sometimes social plans) accordingly. If I fast, I drink water (which is a pretty common allowed thing across many religious traditions: there are reasons for that. It's mostly what I drink anyway.) And I have a plan for if I really need to eat during the fasting day, depending on what I'm doing.

(My default, when I could get such things easily, was supermarket sushi: relatively small meal compared to a normal one, good mix of protein and starch and veggies in the right combo, and didn't feel like a lot of food for me. Also something that's relatively easy to eat with clear intention.)

For me, I do it to help focus my mind, because fasting the day of particular kinds of intensive ritual makes a noticeable difference to my experience of that ritual. But you'll notice that I don't do it for every ritual - I've done a full day fast something like 8 times in 10 years. It's a tool - and sometimes a very useful one - but it's not the only tool, and I don't use it if my body really need something different.

(And in fact, I haven't done a full fasting day since the thyroid stuff hit, at least not for religious reasons, because my body responds differently to it now, and my focus goes completely out the window - not good for ritual work!)

I do know of people who've done longer-term fasting for Pagan spiritual reason, but usually at that point it's as much ordeal work as fasting-as-direct-tool, and that gets into a whole other set of questions (and is, in general, not something the majority of people will find useful. Ordeal work is like that: even when the general idea is useful, the mechanics of what actually works vary widely.)

These are my questions...

 
The only credible benefit to fasting is psychological/spiritual.  It is not cleansing, healing, detoxifying, etc (as any search of empirical/scientific sources will tell you).  If you really want to purify your body physically, try the Eat to Live diet or something like it, or just avoid processed foods.

That said, if you have an eating disorder, there probably isn't much point in pursuing spiritual dietary restriction.  It's very much akin to a drug addict using drugs "for spiritual reasons."  You're not going to be able to separate the body image/self esteem/chemical addiction of your eating disorder from the spiritual aspects of your fast.  It's absolutely not possible.  You cannot just "turn off" your eating disordered thoughts and cognitive distortions during a fast.

Given your history with eating disorders, I really don't recommend you attempt any fast until your relationship with food is less...adversarial (for wont of a better term).

 
Thankfully my eating disorder has gotten much better as of late.  (It's Binge Eating Disorder.)  There have been few binges and even fewer sessions of avoiding food altogether.  I wonder if maybe fasting would do me some good spiritually after I'm positive that I have completely recovered from the disorder.

I want to try fasting (likely no more than 2 or 3 days) because of the way it "helps to detach one's spirit from the physical body" and "focus only on the spiritual issues and not on the physical world."  (Quoting a friend of mine who fasts for Shamanic reasons.)  I'm curious to see if it would have a similar effect on me.  But as I said in my OP, my concern is the Binge Eating Disorder.  This is why I'm asking for advice and answers to my questions, so that I can make an educated and healthy decision.

I agree with her.  There's just too much baggage to make fasting a good option for you.  Even your attraction to the idea feels a bit like an attempt to justify/legitimize addictive behavior.  There are other less damaging ways to achieve that kind of clarity.

 
This is why I've decided to wait until I've regulated my eating habits before considering trying out fasting.  Thank you all for your advice and concern.  <3

I want to try fasting because of the way it "helps to detach one's spirit from the physical body" and "focus only on the spiritual issues and not on the physical world."  

 
It's always puzzled me how that works. It seems to me that it would be hard to detach from your body when its basic needs aren't met, and it's screaming at you to take care of them. Kind of like how it's hard to ignore the dog and read a book if he's barking and whining at you because he has to go outside and wants his dinner.

It's always puzzled me how that works. It seems to me that it would be hard to detach from your body when its basic needs aren't met, and it's screaming at you to take care of them. Kind of like how it's hard to ignore the dog and read a book if he's barking and whining at you because he has to go outside and wants his dinner.

As someone who uses various forms of fasting sporadically, I can testify that it becomes a lot easier to detach from your body when you're fasting. Especially during a three day non-solid food fast (where I rely solely on fruit shakes and yoghurt). The first day is killer and no fun at all, especially if I'm working. Then, no matter if I work or not, the second day the hunger fades away around noon. During this day I still take non-solid food regularly. The third day I don't eat. I make sure to drink a lot of water all days though! My body never gives me signs of hunger this third day but I do feel somewhat... 'floaty'. Meditation and ritual are highly enriched now and the lack of substance and nutrients in my body causes my brain to wander and shift easily. Because of this, even just sitting with my eyes closed makes me feel I can leave my body behind just like that.

Of course, I would NOT recommend anyone doing this as it's crap for the body and you need to make sure your body can take it. If you feel yourself getting too weak or floaty, EAT SOMETHING. It's a fine line here. Also, don't do this too much. A one day fast (full or non-solids) is quiet enough to make you aware of your body and allow your mind to become a little less attached to your body.

For religious purposes, awareness of what you consume leading up to important (ritual) events is enough. Cut back on meat, eat biological food and eat regularly and in small portions.

Now, I want to stress that I really do not recommend fasting as a tool for anyone who has strong issues with their body image or eating disorders. It is not worth it. For you there are other tools that are just as valuable. Daily meditations leading up to the event, daily sacrifices, not watching T.V. The possibilities are endless and every single one of them can get you the same results; an awareness of yourself and your place in the universe, a pureness as you enter ritual and the feeling of service to the Gods.