What a Yogi should Eat

The issue of diet comes up repeatedly. This is due to its effects on the mind and body. There is no doubt that what enters the mouth and is digested influences to mental and physical conditions. This makes it all the more important that a yogi should closely monitor diet.

What a young body can tolerate, the same body in its older years, may not stomach. Whatever should be done for the welfare of the form, and which is not palatable or enjoyable, should be done. Otherwise, the pleasure of taking foods which are enjoyed, or craved by the body, but which harm the body, will cause problems at a later date.

Suppose a body is destined to live for sixty years. A question arises as to how much of that time, will the body be healthy. When the body is not healthy, that interferes with all practices for the body. Ill-health affects the efficiency of yoga postures and breath infusion. Hence it is sensible to do what is necessary to keep the body in a wholesome condition.

Why is it that year after year, a human being may fail to come to terms with diet and with the times for taking that food on a daily basis?

Why does the abdomen become distended? Even in yogis, especially in elderly ones, we see that there is some compelling force, which causes the yogi to indulge meals in the wrong quantity, and at the wrong time. That results in a bloated condition of the abdominal tubing which begins at the throat and terminates at the anus.

What is the force which compels a human to be controlled by bad eating habits and by irregular scheduling of meals? Can the tongue know what it should reject and what it should accept?

Should a yogi eat flesh?

What about fish?

What are the reasons for using only a vegetarian or fruitarian diet?

If someone overeats a flesh-eating diet, but then he becomes a vegetarian and continues the overeating habit, is there something to criticize in that?

Does it really matter if someone overeats?