Fasting Journal : Fasting Center International

[Eric Egnet chose this article from among online health professionals, for publication in HEALTHSEEK NEWSLETTER, his online publication for those seeking to improve their health. HEALTHSEEK has been ranked in the Top Five Percent of all Web sites by Point Communications; chosen by InfoSeek as an InfoSeek Cool Site; given the Excellence in Commerce Award by NetMall, and chosen among the Top 100 Web Sites On the Planet by Planet Earth, Inc.]

THE GENIUS BEHIND PERIODIC, SCIENTIFIC JUICE-FASTING

By Dennis Paulson/Fasting Center International, Inc.

The reason countless millions of intelligent Cybernauts in nations West and East today seek proved-over-millennia, alternative approaches to better health is stated well by one of America's best-known medical doctors, Deepak Chopra, M.D.: "None of our Western medical interventions get to the root cause of disease." Many now refer to the growing, alternative Western focus on body-mind health as healing's new frontier, yet perhaps its very premier modality--scienfitic juice-fasting--has been used by most of our greatest thinkers since time immemorial, including all three Fathers of Western Medicine.
At Fasting Center International, the Web's premier site for regaining one's optimum health (www.fasting.com), avant-garde M.D.s, D.O.s, psychiatrists, and Ph.D.s in every field--doing our Programs every year in increasing numbers--are helping us to lead this necessary paradigm shift, so that Western Medicine can finally grow out of what Doctor Chopra aptly terms "it's outdated, Newtonian model of reality, wherein nature, and by extension, the human body, functions as an intricate, impersonal machine" (as opposed, obviously, to the inseparable body-mind-spirit complex which scientific fasting addresses quite naturally, millennium after millennium, as most of our species' most celebrated thinkers and spiritual teachers discovered, historically).
As HEALTHSEEKER NEWSLETTER is helping us sharpen the cutting edge of this new, globally-emerging, wholistic-health paradigm, its readers may be interested to learn that as we 2lst-Century cybernauts all view the deteriorating quality of existence, from our exploding population and environmental degradation, to global warming and rents in our planet's protective ozone layer, the two most important requisites for one's optimum health and enhanced longevity may now be these--periodic, scientific fasting, along with systematic undereating whenever possible, of a more intelligent, plant-based diet (preferably organic), going directly to the SOURCE of nutrients, rather than running them through the toxic, second-hand sort systems of dead animals.
The average adult American, for instance, now carries 5-to-10 lbs. of toxic chemicals in her or his precious body. Additionally, 100 million Americans are today unnecessarily overweight, primarily because of unskillful nutritional habits. (Plus, at least that many more now think they are too heavy, as indicated by a recent GLAMOUR MAGAZINE survey in which 82% of women at desirable weight believed themselves to be fat, as did 45% of under-weight women. . .due, in no small measure, to the sad acculturation by our media at all levels, especially in our 'women's' magazines.)
As the oldest, fastest, safest (biochemically), least expensive and most effective method of removing unwanted weight and also toxins, scientific juice-fasting helps you stay slim, healthy and vital, while breaking addictions. Further, it will increase physical well-being, mental clarity, and sexual virility. However, its greatest benefit of all results from its capacity to detoxify, rejuvenate and regenerate the physical body, thus allowing the mind to function more efficiently, as well. In Plato's words: "I fast for greater physical and mental efficiency."
By providing all digestive, assimilative and eliminative organs a much-needed rest, periodic fasting also restores and normalizes glandular, metabolic and nervous-system functions; speeds elimination of morbid accumulations, toxic wastes and of dead cells; accelerates new cell and tissue generation, and enhances cell-oxygenation. Perhaps more importantly, it introduces a heightened clarity of consciousness and enhanced spirituality which we all-too-often forget we possess.
In other words, prolonged fasting miraculously puts us each in touch with our Higher Power, or Highest Mind, which is why the Buddha, Moses, Elijah, Hippocrates, Galen, Paracelsus, Christ, Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, St. Francis and Mahatma Gandhi practiced and recommended it, as did all the equally-great and noble women, historically, whose fasts and equivalent accomplishments went unrecognized and unrecorded by the patriarchal societies they all suffered in.
Low-calorie and other fad 'diets' fail disastrously, because they literally starve your body--still dependent upon nutrients from the 'outside,' as some solids continue to be ingested--of much-needed nutrients, causing even greater biochemical imbalance. Thus, when one can no longer stand to continue 'diets,' because of how heavily her or his body is craving what's still being denied, she or he usually over-compensates in an attempt to rebalance oneself, nutritionally, often gaining more weight than was lost, and thus further lowering self-esteem. After researching 26,000 popular U.S. 'diets,' the WASHINGTON POST concluded that "diets have failed Americans 99.5% of the time over the past 70 years."
During scientific juice-fasting, on the other hand, your body autolyzes, or self-digests, its own stored substance, resynthesizing nutrients and eliminating toxins. Additionally, fruit and vegetable juices, FCI's alkalinizing vegetable broth, and herbal teas add vitamins, minerals, trace elements and enzymes to the body, in addition to aiding detoxification.
Having done prolonged juice-fasts and supervised others on them for 35 years, worldwide, FCI recommends a complete detoxification Program, followed by annual 'Spring cleanings' of one or two weeks. Our ancestors 'fasted' many times without ever planning it, often living on next-to-nothing before the harvest arrived, or during periodic famines. Today, many of the most long-lived cultures on Earth still live with this health-promoting 'uncertainity,' without the availability of exotic fruits and vegetables from distant areas, or our superb, time-saving juicers.
Following scientific fasting, food digestion and nutrient utilization are both improved considerably, while organ sluggishness and further water-retention are precluded. Thus, besides allowing one to permanently remove unnecessary pounds from her or his body, juice-fasting greatly enhances the capacity of your body-mind-spirit complex to deal with stress, and thus prevent dis-ease.
U.S. comedian Dick Gregory purposefully put the lie to the two greatest falsehoods about fasting--particularly prevalent among U.S. symptomatically-trained physicians, all of whom have absolutely no medical school training in scientific fasting--by l) skillfully fasting nearly 200 lbs. from his obese frame and keeping it off for over 30 years now, and 2) running from Los Angeles to Chicago--averaging nearly two marathons a day for 40 straight days--while juice-fasting.
Emphasizing this point, the two young men who won a recent, annually-run U.S. cross-country bicycle RACE ACROSS AMERICA took no solids whatsoever. . .3200 miles, in barely over eight days! Obviously, the three renowned Fathers of our Western Medicine (Hippocrates, Galen and Paracelsus) knew well what they were doing in fasting and prescribing it for others. As Philippus Paracelsus said nearly 500 years ago: "Fasting is the greatest remedy--the physician within!"
Fasting is contraindicated for all pregnant and lactating mothers, for children not yet fully grown (still forming bone and teeth), and for all those suffering serious conditions requiring monitoring by a physician(s), including diabetes. Also, those who have not yet discovered the superiority of juice-fasting over water-fasting may wish to consider these remarks from Swedish Nobelist Dr. Ragnar Berg, long our world's foremost authority on nutrition and biochemistry before his passing:
"During fasting, the body burns up and excretes huge amounts of accumulated wastes. We can help this cleansing process by drinking alkaline juices, instead of water, while fasting. I've supervised many fasts, and made extensive tests of fasting patients, and I'm convinced that drinking alkaline-forming fruit and vegetable juices, instead of water, will increase the healing effect. Elimination of uric acid and other inorganic acids will be accelerated, and sugars in juices will strengthen the heart. Juice-fasting is, therefore, the very best form of fasting."
A note of caution for those seriously interested in possibly doing a supervised fast, either for weight-loss or detoxification (or both). Europe, unlike the U.S., has myriad, residential fasting centers and clinics in nearly every country (the best being the Buchinger Klinic in Bad Pyrmont, Germany, where my friend and colleague, Andreas Buchinger, M.D., is Director). But in America, because Symptomatic Medicine has for so long abandoned the wisdom of 'prevention,' patients by the millions are instead choosing alternative healing modalities. In M.D.s' attempt to lure these infidels back, clinics, hospitals and universities from coast to coast, for several decades now, have offered various types of weight-control and so-called 'fasting' programs.
But as U.S. symptomatic practitioners know as much about scientific fasting as they do about nutrition, it's understandable why a front-page NEWSWEEK expose on the U.S. 'diet' industry found that over half of all those who began these exhorbitantly expensive, physician-sponsored programs ($2500-$3300 for OptiFast, MediFast, et. al.) never did complete them. And of those who did, the vast majority wound up precisely like Oprah Winfrey when she tried OptiFast --quickly regaining it all. Sadly, about all they have accomplished in their greed for obscene profits, is to taint the reputation, earned over millennia, of true fasting (as is easily seen by the large amount of misinformation about even true fasting on our Internet today). This same greed later led allopaths to push health-damaging diet-pill combinations on naively trusting Americans, causing many open-heart surgeries and even deaths.
Such protein-sparing modified 'fasts'--not fasts at all, as they include powdered solids in shakes 5-to-6 times daily--prevent the advanced stage of autolysis (self-digestion) from occurring, as the appestat mechanism in the brain continues to signal appetite (accounting for their extraordinarily high rate of failure, as opposed to Fasting Center International's 98.5% Program-completion rate--because true fasting shuts down the brain's appestat mechanism 3-to-4 days in, precluding hunger from arising, thereafter).
As Joel Fuhrman, M.D., warns in his 1995 scientific book, FASTING AND EATING FOR HEALTH, p. 215: "Please don't make the mistake of grouping any unusual practice that is 'something like' fasting. . .to the real thing. For instance, protein-sparing modified fasts are more than dangerous." P. 191: "Liquid-protein diets, or protein-modified fasts, have caused the death of more than 60 people. (U.S. Centers for Disease Control, "Liquid-Protein Diets," U.S. Public Health Service, 1979 publication number EPI-78-11-2; Shelton, H.M., "Fasting Can Save Your Life," Tampa, FL: The American Natural Hygiene Society, 1993, p. 21.) Certainly, Americans will soon realize that you can't purchase health in a can or bottle. Don't be conned into a quick way to get something for nothing. You can't poison your body with toxic drugs and expect not to reap the consequences, down the road. Likewise, you can't poison your body with an unhealthy high-fat or high-protein diet, and expect not to pay the price with the eventual deterioration of your health."
As FCI's Chairman and CEO, because we supervise the most skillful juice-fasts on Earth, FCI has developed--over three decades--the largest nonresidential fasting clientele in the world. I recommend all intelligent Cybernauts stay away from any self-styled practitioner who does not have several decades of both theoretical and also experiential knowledge under his or her belt. Again, fasting's never been taught in any of Ameria's 127 accredited medical schools.
As so many, many suffering beings have learned the hard way, a fool and her or his money are soon separated. In the same vein, every reputable fasting book on Earth warns that one should never do a prolonged fast without having skilled, veteran, professional supervision. Quite simply, without such experiential knowledge and distilled wisdom, you simply have no way of knowing how to deal with all which can arise. . . physiologically, psychologically and spiritually. In other words, you can be harming your extraordinarily complex and delicate body-mind complex without even knowing it.
All clients of Fasting Center International, Inc., worldwide, receive veteran, start-to-finish, professional supervision throughout their Programs, along with the intelligent follow-on missing from most 'diet' programs, worldwide (still another reason they fail 99.5% of the time)--our LIFETIME OPTIMUM-HEALTH PLAN, including the latest nutritional biochemistry, along with the oldest wisdom from the healthiest, most long-lived cultures on Earth (what they're doing we're not). Thus, it's no accident that FCI has long been blessed as the global, nonresidential leader in its field.
Post-fast, among our global clientele, some always decide to make necessary changes immediately, never looking backward. Others, however, adopt a more gradual approach, perhaps backsliding before finally getting serious. But all take back a greater degree of control over their precious body-mind-spirit complexes, becoming stronger, healthier, happier, and more conscious human beings, after their magnificent detoxification.
Should you or any of your loved ones or friends wish to more intelligently explore scientific, prolonged fasting's possibilities, please use the following contact information, and thank you so much for caring enough about yourself to have read this far.
--Dennis Paulson, Founder, Chairman and CEO, Fasting Center International, Inc.

Please come back soon for new additions to FCI's online, archived FASTING JOURNAL!

Any questions, email or phone FCI. Email: FastMaster@fasting.com; phone: 818-590-2536 (know that the best time to catch Founder/Director Dennis Paulson, himself, with the least interruption, is between 10-4, California time). For the Fasting Center International home page, click here: www.fasting.com