What do ecovillages – and more specifically, the Gaia Ashram Ecovillage – have to do with fasting?

Good question. I was surprised (and happy!) this came up during my time at Gaia.

In the last article you learned about the people at Gaia and some of the social dynamics of ecoliving.

In this article you’ll learn about ecoliving and fasting.

It’s been a while…so now I don’t remember exactly how the topic of fasting came about at Gaia. I’m not sure if I mentioned it or someone else did initially. Regardless, I shared that I offer fasting programs and found out that there was some interest in fasting among the group.

Marie said that she wanted to try fasting to clean up her body (with a so-called “cleanse” or “detox”)…which I thought was great. Some others were curious so I ended up giving a talk to the group about fasting.

I shared some of my insights around fasting – the problems it solves, the benefits, different types of fasting, etc – with a short talk and discussion. And then over the next week, there were three people already committing to fasting!

I didn’t realize it would be so interesting and popular but perhaps they were sold on the many benefits of fasting. Or perhaps they are simply more open to fasting since they are guests at an ashram ecovillage. I guess it kinda makes sense because fasting is seen as somewhat of a spiritual experience for many people.

I think Laura ended up going multiple days fasting while a few other people experimented with intermittent fasting by skipping meals every now and again. It was really cool to see people so open to trying it out.

Keto Reboot to kick a cold / sinus infection.

I ended up doing my own fast after coming down with a cold and sinus infection. It was more annoying than anything because of the constant sinus drainage. I happened to have a Keto OS reboot kit with me so I decided to take the supplements and fast during one weekend.

I can’t say that the fast was enjoyable. In fact, I never did get a big energy boost like when I’ve done the keto reboots in the past. Instead, I was tired and lethargic (and hungry!).

It wasn’t immediate but it seemed to do the trick because my cold and sinus issues went away not too long after completing the fast.

More Health Talk

Another evening I was scheduled to give another health talk. This time I planned on reviewing what we learned about fasting the week before and move on to a new topic: meditation.

We only had four of us for the health talk about meditation in which we discussed different forms of meditation and some cool biohacks to improve meditation and change your brain state.

That’s all you get for now. In the next article you’ll learn about permaculture at Gaia.