>>Tom:
>>Strictly speaking, you don't need to eat fruits. One can live on sprouts
>>alone, or on a mono-diet, or on a diet of sprouts and vegetables alone.
Pat:
>Hello, Tom:
>I find that a shocker, in light of my training and subsequent lively
>interest in nutrition. Is a doubting Thomas permitted on the list? :) How
>do you feel about Roy Wolford's "Undernutrition without Malnutrition"? (he's
Tom:
Thanks for your comments. I have not yet read the book you mentioned. What I
was referring to in my post was mono-diets, which are often technically
deficient in nutrients, yet the people on them often thrive. In another
followup post, I discussed two people on a diet of sprouts alone, who seemed
to be quite healthy. Let me briefly summarize the information on the two
mono-eaters I have read about. (Those on mono-diets are quite rare.)
The first was named Vimalananda, and he is the subject of the two "Aghora"
books (both fascinating books, by the way), by Robert Svoboda. I didn't
have time to look it up in the book, so let me give you the info from memory.
Vimalananda was on a mono-diet of milk when he was young, for 2-3 years or
so (that's raw cow's milk). Then he switched to a mono-diet of soaked
chickpeas for around a year, which was followed by 2 years on raw, green
chili (hot!!) peppers. He not only survived, but thrived on this. (I don't
understand why the peppers didn't burn him up - I wouldn't last one meal on
a mono-diet of hot peppers).
Another person who followed a mono-diet when he was young, is Swami
Satchidananda, one of the best known yogis in the US. For over two years,
he lived first on a mono-diet of soaked mung beans, then he switched to
raw, soaked chickpeas.
The examples of mono-eaters thriving on a diet of 100% high protein foods,
suggests that the fear of raw protein foods, expressed by some raw-fooders,
does not have a firm basis.
Given time, I can find the specific citations for the above, though I think
the above is pretty accurate.
Anyway, the point of the above is that some people seem to be able to ignore
nutritional requirements and get away with it. Others apparently cannot; I have
learned that I personally cannot ignore things like B-12. I don't recommend
mono-diets - too limiting, too boring for most people.
P.S. The "Aghora" books mention what is sometimes called "breatharianism" in
the West - overcoming the need for food. The spiritual path of Vimalananda
is the *only* tradition in the world where overcoming the need for food is
a standard, albeit uncommon, practice. Sometime in the future (may be weeks
or months), I will write something that summarizes the info on that topic,
from the "Aghora" books. (Vimalananda's guru ate only one leaf per day; that
was his total food intake.)
I hope readers find the above interesting (it certainly is unusual). I hope
discussion of rare and unusual raw-food practices does not turn off some
readers.
Tom Billings
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