"For no 'you' is present when mind is 'fasting.' In a fasting mind no I-concept arises. And there is no inferential entity to assume that it is unfree." - Wei Wu Wei
Meditation is fasting of the mind, starving the thought-beast, and at its purest should not be confused with concentration or contemplation techniques. They have their place, but they still feed the beast, even if only a single morsel such as a mantra. I used to fast my body periodically on weekends, Friday night until Monday morning, for the usual reasons: clearing toxins, losing a few pounds, justifying ice cream gluttony, etc., and I also understood it to be vaguely propitious for spiritual "progress." Mebbe so, mebbe not so. Asceticism is for ascetics and I am not inclined to be one. Not until I came upon the self-inquiry of Ramana Maharshi did I begin to benefit from genuine fasting, the kind that roots out toxins and addictive tendencies of mind. Resting in "I am" creates a kind of self-conflagration that burns these things up the moment they come into view. It does not suppress or obfuscate anything, just eviscerates thoughts into sparks and ash as they arise in consciousness and then drift away from the heat. Fasting adds nothing and consumes and clears everything. Eventually even the fuel of "I am" burns itself out and the ember of "inferential entity" dies into pure freedom, unbound and never bound. Clarity.
Meditation is fasting of the mind, starving the thought-beast, and at its purest should not be confused with concentration or contemplation techniques. They have their place, but they still feed the beast, even if only a single morsel such as a mantra. I used to fast my body periodically on weekends, Friday night until Monday morning, for the usual reasons: clearing toxins, losing a few pounds, justifying ice cream gluttony, etc., and I also understood it to be vaguely propitious for spiritual "progress." Mebbe so, mebbe not so. Asceticism is for ascetics and I am not inclined to be one. Not until I came upon the self-inquiry of Ramana Maharshi did I begin to benefit from genuine fasting, the kind that roots out toxins and addictive tendencies of mind. Resting in "I am" creates a kind of self-conflagration that burns these things up the moment they come into view. It does not suppress or obfuscate anything, just eviscerates thoughts into sparks and ash as they arise in consciousness and then drift away from the heat. Fasting adds nothing and consumes and clears everything. Eventually even the fuel of "I am" burns itself out and the ember of "inferential entity" dies into pure freedom, unbound and never bound. Clarity.
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