There are gradations of fasting measures ranging from rigorous to
relatively casual. Water fasting is the most rapid and effective
one. Other methods have been created by grasping the underlying
truth of fasting, namely whenever the digestive effort can be
reduced, by whatever degree, whenever the formation of the toxins of
misdigestion can be reduced or prevented, to that extent the body
can divert energy to the healing process. Thus comes about assorted
famous and sometimes notorious monodiet semi-fasts like the grape
cure where the faster eats only grapes for a month or so, or the
lemon cure, where the juice of one or more lemons is added to water
and nothing else is consumed for weeks on end. Here I should also
mention the "lemon juice/cayenne pepper/maple syrup cure," the
various green drink cures using spirulina, chlorella, barley green
or wheat grass, and the famous Bieler broths--vegetable soups made of
overcooked green beans or zucchini.
I do not believe that monodiets work because of some magical
property of a particular food used. They work because they are
semi-fasts and may be extremely useful, especially for those
individuals who can not or will not tolerate a water fast.
The best foods for monodiet fasting are the easiest ones digest:
juices of raw fruits and nonstarchy vegetables with all solids
strained out. Strained mineral broths made of long-simmered
non-starchy vegetables (the best of them made of leafy green
vegetables) fall in the same category. So if you are highly partial
to the flavor of grapes or lemons or cayenne and (highly diluted)
maple syrup, a long fast on one of these would do you a world of
good, just not quite as much good as the same amount of time spent
on water alone. If you select something more "solid" for a long
monodiet fast, like pureed zucchini, it is essential that you not
overeat. Dr. Bieler gave his fasting patients only one pint of
zucchini soup three or four times a day. The way to evaluate how
much to eat is by how much weight you are losing. When fasting, you
must lose weight! And the faster the better.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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