Yoga means discipline of mind and body, having noble thoughts, a
cleansing process. It includes pure food, water, air, sunshine and
exercise. These reduce diseases, even hereditary or chronic ones.

(Page 4 of 7)

IF YOU ARE EATING FOOD OR WATER containing chemicals or preservatives the results may not show then and there; maybe in the course of five or ten years the results will come. Also, each person’s digestive capacity is different. I am not giving a uniform system. I am simply saying that there are general rules applicable to all. But the practice of those things differs from person to person. Even if food is pure, everybody cannot eat the same things or the same quantity. You have to see what is your personal capacity. You don’t have to be dogmatic or manic about it but you have to be careful about these things.
       If you cannot digest raw or uncooked food you have to cook it to the extent that you can digest it. Let me give an example. Probably twenty-five million years back or so—I don’t know how the anthropologists would say—mankind had no fire or didn’t know about cooking with fire. That early man was very muscular, water-buffalo-like. He did not need clothes, he did not need shelter and he did not need fire for cooking. He must have eaten whatever was available just as animals eat; he was able to digest it and that was the best thing. Basically speaking, natural things that have been produced by God or nature are the best nourishment. Let’s say God produced one million living beings, from people to animals to birds, fish, insects, and so on. And He must have provided everything for each species, whatever was needed. At that time man was able to digest raw food, whatever it was, and drank the water in the river. We can assume that he lived very well. But the time did come when, out of the indulgences, out of earth consciousness, out of body identification, the power to digest went on lessening.

       In principle raw food is no doubt the most energetic. But when you lose your capacity to assimilate it or digest it, what happens? You go to second or third best methods of cooking certain foods that otherwise might have caused indigestion. Then doctors surmise that the things that were causing you trouble are wrong to eat. There are rare persons—not commonly seen—who could digest even poison, and even after they have taken poison they are the healthiest people I have ever seen. But we cannot prescribe poison for everyone! You see the point? Yogis have experimented with these things ages back. They have said you can even live without food. You can live on solar energy, if you know how to tap that. According to your level of consciousness or assimilation capacity, you have to see what suits you. The way you live, you create your necessities accordingly. Do not dogmatically follow the principle.
       God has already created all the resources we need, whether it is for man, animals, trees or flowers. Then if we pollute our resources, if we become impure, disturbed or create diseases or weaknesses, we have to have remedies. Otherwise remedies are not needed. If we create air pollution, we have to have machines to purify the air. These are remedies for the pollution and diseases we have created.
 



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