Fasting is a completely natural healing therapy that has been used for thousands of years to aid, treat, and even cure many common maladies. It creates the same healing effects today.
And while modern medicine so often attempts to alleviate outer symptoms of a health condition, fasting affects healing from the inside out, getting to the actual source of the condition, helping to burn inferior cells and build new healthier cells and tissues.
Dr Azadeh, our health adviser, a senior lecturer at University of The Gambia and a senior consultant Physician will this week focus on the benefits, advantages for human body and also disadvantages for those suffering from long standing diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, epilepsy and heart disease.
Fasting is a wonderful antidote for our usual over-indulgences. There’s nothing wrong with enjoying our food, but excess food on a continuous basis does create a burden for the body.
Fasting for natural healing
Our bodies are capable of instigating their own perfect healing if we allow them the opportunity. Fasting is such an opportunity.
What can fasting do for you?
heal a host of minor (and sometimes major) health disorders
help you lose weight and keep it off
cleanse your body of metabolic wastes and toxins
improve your skin tone and health, making you look younger
stimulate new cell growth, making you feel younger
strengthen your immune system and natural defenses
improve glandular health and hormonal balance
increase mental clarity
enhance your moods, enjoy a more positive outlook
give you more energy and enthusiasm
enhance your spiritual connection
The benefits of fasting
Affecting our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual aspects.
Can the benefits of fasting really be so broad? Yes, they can, and they are. We are so much more than a physical body and fasting affects every part of our being.
Fasting will:
rest the digestive system
allow for cleansing and detoxification of the body
create a break in eating patterns, while shining a spotlight on them
promote greater mental clarity
cleanse and heal “stuck” emotional patterns
lead to a feeling of physical lightness, increasing energy level
promote an inner stillness, enhancing spiritual connection
These benefits of fasting are not limited to just traditional fasts like water or juice, but can be attained through cleansing diets as well, although the effects will be less pronounced, as they occur over a longer time frame. But they will be there.
Physical effects of fasting
Fasting has been called the “miracle cure” because the list of physical conditions improved by fasting is long and varied. Cited most often are allergies, arthritis, digestive disorders of all kinds, skin conditions, cardiovascular disease, and asthma. Because fasting initiates the body’s own healing mechanisms, any ailment may show improvement.
Spiritual benefits of fasting
And let’s not forget the powerful effects of fasting on our spiritual connection. Another one of the benefits of fasting is that it promotes we take our attention inward that we listen, become quiet.
Without the continual addition of heavy foods into the system (and after any major deter symptoms have passed), the body takes on a lighter, less dense, feeling. This helps to create a subtle separation from ordinary physical reality and all its worldly things, and instead you begin to sense the presence and power of things beyond this world.
Meditation or prayer becomes clearer, higher states easier to attain, messages or guidance from higher realms clearer. Knowing you are loved and supported every minute of your day and of your life is something you begin to intuitively feel. Recognition that there truly is a higher plan or purpose will become more real as it is intuitively experienced rather than just intellectually understood.
WHAT ARE CHRONICAL DISEASES
Chronic disease simply means persistent or recurring disease, usually affecting a person for three months or longer. A chronic disease is generally one that is hereditary or one that is the result of factors such as poor diet and living conditions, using tobacco or other harmful substances, or a sedentary lifestyle. Such a disease is not typically contracted from another person by contagion, because most chronic illnesses are not caused by infection. The term chronic disease commonly applies to conditions that can be treated but not necessarily cured.
There are different types of chronic disease from A to Z. From Alzheimer’s, arthritis and asthma to “zoonoses,” chronic diseases are many and varied. Zoonoses are diseases that are passed to humans by animals. A chronic disease often requires extensive care by a healthcare provider with the cooperation of the patient in learning and practicing methods of rehabilitation. While providers offer different courses of treatment to lessen the effects of symptoms caused by chronic disease, most chronic illnesses cannot be cured completely. Frequently the result is a lifetime of discomfort, doctor’s visits, medical tests, medications, therapies and sometimes surgeries.
Losing weight
Losing weight is, for many of us, one of the greatest benefits of fasting. Due to differences in metabolism and/or body chemistry (or mental patterns), exact results will vary from person to person.
Using fasting to lose weight can create many opportunities to gain insights into your patterns with food and for making changes to your habits and lifestyle much easier to accomplish
Begin to experience the benefits of fasting
You can start with simple, short-term fasting. Even short fasts will help you enjoy the many benefits of fasting, allowing the body, digestive tract and organs a chance to rest and repair and heal, and you to begin the process of rebuilding your inner connection to your physical body, as well as your inner spirit.
The benefits of fasting reach into all areas of our lives. And whether you want to fast for increased health, or increased mental clarity, you will get them both--only maybe not all in the first day. Fasting is an ongoing practice that grows and deepens over time, delivering more and more meaningful benefits.
Mental and emotional benefits of fasting
Because fasting improves mental clarity and focus, it can become a tool in your life to give you greater freedom, flexibility, and energy to get done the things and projects that are important to you.
Emotionally, you will feel calmer, clearer and happier. Fastest often report that depression lifts, goals begin to feel more obtainable as obstacles are put into proper focus. Doctors have reported patients experiencing improved concentration, less anxiety, sleeping better and waking more refreshed.
Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between our emotional and mental aspects, where one begins and the other ends. Am I sad because I had this thought? Or did I have the thought because I've been feeling sad? Fasting has a way of clarifying those issues.
Your awareness can focus in more accurately and determine the source of some unpleasantness that then snowballed into a mess. Once the source is identified, it’s easy to see how overblown everything else was that came after. In other words, you see things from a clearer, more appropriate perspective
For further information e mail azadehhassan@yahoo.co.uk or text DR AZADEH on 7774469/3774469