Dear friends and inquisitive subscribers,

This story encompasses spiritual and physical health, yoga and nutrition, and is based on whispers of the stars.

I reflect a little on the ways in which days of fasting, sadhana, and tapas relate to moon days and the planetary rulers of the weekdays. I also discuss the differences between moon day counting in Western and Eastern traditions, focusing on the most important days (excluding moon quarters) when fasting is most auspicious.

• Sadhana is a regular or everyday spiritual practice (like meditation, prayer, or yoga) harmoniously integrated into your schedule and routine, while tapas implies rigid inner discipline, which is intended to burn out bad habits and purify the mind.

We have all felt how busy and overloaded the days around the full moon can be: many of us experience overexciting and overwhelming activity, blazing-high passions, and occasional insomnia; increased blood loss during injuries and surgeries; maniacs crawling onto the streets and like spiders onto the World Wide Web. All in all, by the Full Moon, desires and passions reach their maximum. However, if we consider the Full Moon in a Buddhist way, we will discover a completely different perspective! It is very meaningful that the day of Buddha’s birth, enlightenment, and passing into Parinirvana (Parinibbana) coincides with the full moon, for it makes us understand that he had reached the maximum in overcoming and detachment from his strongest desires, when they usually reach their acme. Probably, this process had started the night Prince Siddhartha secretly slipped out of his palace, leaving his royal privileges, acquired family riches, his wife, a new born son, and 500 concubines. Here, the depth of the Teacher’s readiness and degree of renunciation is revealed to us, for it is easy to renounce something that one has not tried, or something that one had never had and does not have. According to tradition, all meat, fish, and liquor shops are closed on the Full moon day, together with slaughterhouses. As I noticed, the full moon in this part of the world is believed to be favourable and spiritually bright, as seen in the cleansing rituals – almost everyone flocks to temples, where they recite mantras and meditate under the monk therā guidance.

Τhe second critical day happens just before the New Moon, when the moon is not visible. This is the 29th, “satanic” or “dangerous” day, which doesn’t work well for new beginnings, but which suits yogic practices of purifying and tapas, including the mauna practice of silence. It is also connected with the taming of pride and ego, since the “I” and “mine” are the roots of all suffering. 

Here I should also mention the lunar days and different systems of approaching them: Eastern and Western. It may well be that your “questionable” lunar birthday on the Western half is actually a good one on the Eastern, and vice versa, since in the Western system, lunar days are usually counted from the rising of the moon, while in the Eastern system, by the presence of an exact aspect – that is, by the distance between the Sun and the Moon (they only coincide in the beginning of the first lunar day, the very moment of the new moon). In my opinion, the latter is justified, because when you see a tense aspect of the Sun-Moon in the chart, it means that the lunar day itself is “not a gift”. Although, a good connection between the Sun and the Moon will likely bestow an adequate lunar day. In the Western system, one may not correspond to the other, since lunar days are counted from the moon’s rising in a specific place, so an exact aspect can occur before or after a “critical” lunar day, when an exact configuration is activated. Those who got used to looking into the lunar calendar may have noticed themselves that the tense lunar day set for a given date, had begun in the second half of the day prior or, vice versa, was delayed until “tomorrow”.

Besides the classical “problematic” moon days, Ekadashi – eleventh lunar day granted to us by the Vedic tradition – is of particular interest. It occurs fortnightly on the waxing and waning moons (in the Shukla and Krishna Paksha, respectively). Unrecommended foods – other than the typical tamasic meat, fish and alcohol, garlic and onion – include all grains and legumes, as well as flour and bean products (except for pseudo-cereals such as buckwheat and quinoa). Because it is said in the Puranas that the seeds of all vices, capable of producing particularly unfavourable karmic shoots, find refuge in grain and legumes on this day. If we look at the aspect of the eleventh moon day in the Western tradition, it is the day of unblemished warriors and war against evil. It relates to the harmonious aspect between the Moon and the Sun that facilitates the ascend for the devotee, synchronizing consciousness and the unconscious. Nevertheless, many believers keep a dry fast, even sidestepping water.

Most of us have heard that, in Ayurveda, food divides into three categories: tamasic, rajasic and sattvic. Tamasic foods are all foods of animal origin, alcohol, garlic and onions, and canned, over-processed, or just plain stale foods. They strengthen our ignorance, delusion, inertia, laziness, including spiritual idleness and mental heaviness. Rajasic foods agitate our desires, passions, the nervous system as a whole, and include all too much foods – too salty, too sour, too hot, too pungent, over-fried or over-stimulating (caffeine drinks). Sattvic food harmonizes the mind while arousing compassion, humility, and the propensity for spiritual development. This is why consuming sattvic food increases our sattva, maintaining a calm, clean, and transparent state of mind.

• Mushrooms are considered to be a near-tamasic food, because they grow in dark and moist geographies, often far from domains of the sun, and their mycelium itself is located underground.

• Milk and all the dairy products are originally sattvic, for it is in them that the “light substances” which facilitate spiritual awakening are contained. No doubt, long ago, almost everyone had their own magic cow, and not just some 7-Eleven supermarket nearby – this is obvious from many ancient folk tales.

The meaning of such of fasting, sadhana, and tapas is to not just starve the physical body, but to clean the mind, nurture our sattva. In other words, it’s to help oneself remain in goodness-mode, and solve karmic problems – not all at once; gradually. Through the body, we are capable of knocking on koshas – the subtlest shells of our essence. Yoga believes that it is much more difficult to control the mind when thoughts jump around one after another. This is why many yogic traditions recommend starting with the simpler things, such as the physical body.

Small but effective practices

If you immediately “harness” and strain yourself to perform something overwhelming, it will be difficult, because if you do not complete the task, you may lose the motivation and interest. It is better to make small steps towards achievable goals.

For example, the Yoga Sutras emphasize the importance of a 6-8 hour break from food and drink, which allows the digestive system to rest, cleanse, and reboot. Therefore, there is no need to fast all day long; it is enough just to take a break or, for example, fast after sunset.

If you drink coffee regularly, a good practice may be a “Decaf day”, when you don’t drink coffee, hot chocolate, or tea and abstain from chocolate, instead opting for herbal drinks or fresh water. This practice helps not only to cleanse, but to observe attachment to certain pretty habits.

Those with a weak or afflicted Mars (which you can identify by a propensity towards fits of aggression, hysteria, internal irritability, increased nervous excitability, disagreeableness , resentfulness, and outbreaks of untimely activity, as well as problems with men, especially in women’s life) are recommended to schedule their sadhana or tapas on Tuesdays.

Those who are going through a difficult period in everything, who have problems with bones, teeth, lateness, tardiness, time management, concentration and goal-setting, as well as those who have permanently difficult relationships with their parents, should choose Saturdays (days of Shani, Saturn).

Our world is dualistic, like a yo-yo. Often, we need to deny ourselves something in order to gain something else, and we have to push off something in order to reach new heights. The more sincerely we approach sadhana or tapas, the more obvious the effect will be. However, any practice should be performed with joy and from a pure heart. Thus, it will become not a burden but a reward, and perhaps your sacred duty.  

• Sadhak (or sadhaka) is a person who regularly performs spiritual practice (sadhana) for self-realization, inner purification and comprehension of the highest truth.

• Kosha (Sanskrit: कोश, kośa) – literally "sheath," "box," "covering." The Pancha Kosha (five sheaths) represent five concentric layers or veils enclosing the inner core of pure consciousness (Atman or Purusha). Together, these five koshas sustain human existence, from the physical body to the deep soul (distinct from aura: the aura is usually viewed as a luminous energy field radiating around the body).