Sapnali is a long-term practitioner of the Franz Bardon System and a student of SURA Academy run by Ray Del Sole, She also works as a professional psychic consultant and an avid supporter within the Franz Bardon community.
Conscious Eating
Conscious eating is an important spiritual practice which is unfortunately quite often neglected by spiritual aspirants. In this article I would like to put light on some important aspects of conscious eating.
The First Step, Conscious Chewing
If you are a beginner or just starting out with conscious eating, the first thing I would recommend would be to train yourself in chewing food consciously. Whenever you are eating food, try to maintain a conscious focus on how you chew the food. Try to feel the physical sensations associated with the food being chewed by your teeth – notice the amount of pressure exerted by your jaws to chew the food, how the food gets mixed with saliva, and also notice how the food moves through the esophagus when you engulf the food.
Try to experience the taste of the food in the deepest way possible while filling yourself with gratitude for the good food that you get to eat. Doing so will enhance your sense of taste and will have further grounding effects and increase your meditative power. The more you practice this training, the more you will be able to see or track the movement of the food you are eating – you will become more conscious of the process.
This exercise trains your concentration ability as well as moderates your speed of eating. Certainly eating slowly is wise. It teaches you to stay active throughout the process, in other words to stay aware of the food when you eat it.
Also, after a certain period of time, you become more conscious about your body, you will develop a consciousness awareness of your body and able to naturally focus on eat and drink healthy which is very good for your health. This exercise will be considered to be complete once it becomes your habit and comes to you naturally.
The Second Step, Become One with Your Food
Once you have completed the first step, you would find yourself more focused, active and aware while eating food. Once you have made conscious chewing a natural part of your eating process, you can move on to the next step.
I begin the process with a small prayer. Many religions and traditions suggest offering a small prayer to God to showing gratitude for the food before eating.As I begin to eat my meal, I become aware of the space around me. I then imagine myself in the vast universe and see my body (the Microcosm) as a reflection of the universe (the Macrocosm). In this state, I see the food as a form of energy. I imprint this energy with any positive trait or wish I want to manifest by feeling the universe around me and hovering my hands above the food in the blessing/energy-channelling position with full conviction. As we know, the intentions, wishes, affirmations or positive traits we put into the food can have strong effects on the material plane.
Let’s say my aim is to bring a sense of freedom in my life. I charge the food with the quality of freedom. I see the energy of the food turning into sky blue and begin eating the food with my hands. (Eating with hands has both Vedic and scientific reasons. According to the Vedic wisdom, our five fingers represent the five elements and each finger aids in transformation of the food before it reaches to the digestive system. This transformation also heightens the five senses that invites the fire element to bring forth the digestive juices. It is certainly something optional and depends on the kind of food you are eating.) I continue the process with eating the food while at the same time maintaining my intentions to absorb the energies of the imprinted food.
I see my microcosm filled with a sky blue energy and imagine that my physical body is also getting charged with this energy. My skin, organs, tissues, cells, body fluid, veins, blood are getting completely charged with this energy and I embrace the energy within my body on all planes with gratitude.
If you wish, you can simply give a colour to the energy of the food according to your intentions, or just imagine it turning into bright white dazzling energy. It is also okay if you have difficulty imagining colours, the intention itself is sufficient and you will get better with training.
For example, when I imprint the energy of the food with love, it turns into a pinkish energy, when I charge it with success – it turns into bright yellow energies, for peace/faith it turns into white energies and so on.
The impregnation of food can be used for the development of virtues, powers, and abilities
Blessing the food
It is possible to transform the energy of the food by connecting to it and praying to a deity of your choice, or directly to God to bless the food. This method can also be used to impregnate the food with specific virtues or powers you wish to develop within yourself.
Simply get connected to any God/Deity and then hover your hands over the food and the bless the food with the virtues that you desire. This method will refine the energy in the food and increase its frequency, and can have various practical uses.
Healing through the exercise
Charge the food with healing energies and direct the energies from the food to the organ/part of your body that needs healing.
For instance, let’s say that my kidneys are completely exhausted due to some emotional, physical and financial stresses. In this case I would charge the food with vital energies by infusing my concentration, imagination into the food and with a feeling of complete trust in the process. I would then eat the food slowly and direct this charged healing energy of the food to the concerned region in my body, which would be the kidneys in this case.
Points to remember
It is important to remember that when you eat in such a way, the act of eating is transformed into something sacred. Therefore it is always good to have a feeling of respect and gratitude before beginning to eat the food.
- Clear your mind while performing the exercise. Let no second thoughts or doubts arise in your mind during this process (this is in particular if you haven’t mastered the thought control exercise yet).
- Charge your food with complete conviction.
- Eat your charged food completely.
- Make sure not to talk during eating. I am thankful that in my family we eat food together but we never talk during that time. It is a very strict rule in our home thanks to my mother. It also goes without saying that you cannot be watching TV or reading a book while doing the practice.
- I prefer to eat food with my hand instead of using spoon or fork – another important rule in my home and culture that I am thankful about. Obviously, I use a spoon and fork as usual in public during gatherings, social occasions etc.
Benefits
- Better digestion, good health and vitality.
- You will improve your connection with your body, feel strongly connected to your body. You will start to feel comfortable in your skin.
- You will become more aware of the needs of your body and your energy system.
- It will provide grounding effects on your physical body.
- You will have a greater control over your body better than ever before. On mastering this exercise, you will be able to heal any part of your body with this exercise.
The fruits of practice
A first result of eating food consciously that everyone practicing it would be able to notice in a short period of time is improved digestion. Just being aware of eating leads to better digestion. Digestive processes are aided when we are more involved in the process of eating food, and the food is assimilated in a better way. Conscious eating then also leads to an improvement in health, increasing our general levels of vitality.
Imagine that you have been practicing this exercise diligently for the past twenty years, making efforts to improve in the practice and getting better year by year. You now take a piece of apple and take a few minutes to charge it with the energy of happiness. As the first bite moves through your teeth and you feel the saliva flowing through your mouth, you feel your soul to be a little sun radiating with joy. You find that your whole being is filled with great happiness. You feel content with yourself. It may seem amazing that the simple act of passing your intentions to the food and eating it consciously leads to such results. However, it should be remembered that persistent training is always rewarded with results.
In this article I have tried to highlight some ways to enhance this practice, but it is only regular practice that will yield true results. It is my blessing to you, dear reader, that you may practice this exercise over the period of your life and master it.
