Beer Fast

[_honorentheos]

Article that may be of interest related to fasting and Lent -

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/02/25/my-take-what-i-learned-from-my-46-day-beer-only-fast/?hpt=hp_c1

From the article - "At the beginning of my fast, I felt hunger for the first two days. My body then switched gears, replaced hunger with focus, and I found myself operating in a tunnel of clarity unlike anything I’d ever experienced."

This was, as he says in the article, while consuming nothing but water and 4 beers a day.

[_moksha]

Achieving clarity with beer but no Fritos? Bah! This was proved to be impossible by future President George W. Bush over thirty years ago at Yale University. He also tried beer only and not once did he achieve clarity.

[_honorentheos]

Achieving clarity with beer but no Fritos? Bah! This was proved to be impossible by future President George W. Bush over thirty years ago at Yale University. He also tried beer only and not once did he achieve clarity.

I think the weed was getting in the way.

Serious point, though - I've never participated in Lent. The closest I could say I've come was the monthly fast common to LDS. Or, perhaps, giving up a lot of things while serving on a mission. Or while in the military when somethings simply weren't available.

The first time I got my mp3 player out after stowing it for overseas shipping (it was unavailable for about a month for various reasons) was like rediscovering music. First song I played - Sinatra's Luck Be a Lady - was pure heaven.

I can't say I intentionally deprive myself in that way anymore. Not to say I think I'm gluttonous, it's that I don't withhold from eating, drinking, listening to music, or any number of things that give me pleasure with the aim of discovering something transcendent in the process. There is a difference I think between this and not eating the pie after a meal for health reasons.

His article has made me rethink why this is that I haven't done so. And how, as an agnostic/atheist, might I make this a valuable practice if reframed in some way that works with my current view of the world. It's finding that way of reframing it that has me stuck right now. If you have thoughts since your rebirth at 10,000 posts (a significant number in the Tao of course) I'd be interested in you sharing them.

[_moksha]

My first thought is that I appreciate everything you have ever written. The second is that I experience altered states of consciousness all the time without doing anything unusual - just waiting for these states of consciousness to bring me enlightenment.

What are your thoughts regarding prayer and meditation? These practices always leave me feeling calmer and most all the time happier as well.

As to writing so many posts, I wonder what happened to one of my Buddhist tenets of wisdom, moderation in all things?

[_zeezrom]

Honor,

You're right. That song is heaven.

Zee.

[_honorentheos]

Moksha,

I couldn't imagine a Mormon board without the humor you bring, and the insights they often share as well.

What are your thoughts regarding prayer and meditation? These practices always leave me feeling calmer and most all the time happier as well.

Prayer is something I haven't engaged in for a very long time. By that, I mean praying in a way that is a true conversation. I don't think I could actually pray anymore as I do not feel any kinship to the hypothetical other party in the conversation. I occasionally find myself conversing with God as a form of habit, not in any meaningful way but more as the silent target of any mental rhetorical question I might have. Or perhaps it's for the same reasons the Irishman from Braveheart did so...;)

Meditation, in particular zazen, is also something I've stopped practicing for a while. That's kind of sad, now that I think about it. It certainly wasn't due to an active decision. It's a good point you bring up.

[_honorentheos]

Honor,

You're right. That song is heaven.

Zee.

I appreciate your taste, Zee.

It's interesting to be able to listen to a song as if for the first time, yet with the anticipation of knowing it all too well. I felt a real physical thrill when the bass line kicked in.

Perhaps withholding is valuable as a way of touching the transcendent, regardless of one's beliefs, because it allows our experience - our developed self - to flow together with something outside ourselves as if for the first time? I suspect there is something physiologically, in particular with fasting, that is reducible to scientific explanation. But this doesn't make it less powerful. I think that's interesting.