The doctors offered no hope for my chronic bronchitis.
They stroked their beards and told me I would find it increasingly hard to breathe – I would end my life pulling an oxygen tank. In the final stages, I would lie in bed until I suffocated.
I thought, “Stuff that for a lark, there’s got to be a better way.”
I prayed for help, and then on a whim I opened a forty-year-old book by Paavo Airola, a natural-health advocate, who suggested that chronic bronchitis could be controlled with “repeated short fasts of seven to nine days.”
Though week didn’t seem short to me, I decided to give it a try. After studying the instructions, I fasted for thirty days.
Having undertaken many short fasts, I was aware that there would be times when my energy would sag as my body rid itself of toxins.
It was worse this time – I felt lethargic, mired and mildly depressed. Worse, Swami Kriyananda would shortly visit our Ananda community. While he was here, I didn’t want to feel as if my veins were stuffed with mud; yet I was determined not to break the fast. On the day before his arrival, I felt awful.
When Swamiji arrived, everything changed. During his visit I didn’t catch a glimpse of him, but I felt mentally bright and filled with energy.
I knew it was because I had begun the fast by telling God that I wasn’t undertaking the cleans to be “slim, healthy, and young” as the book promised. I gave the fast to God. I only wanted to have more energy to serve, to love Him, and to live simply.
Swamiji often stayed in our community, on his way to distant parts of the globe. Always, we felt a sense of subtle blessing at those times, even if we never saw him.
I learned to control the chronic bronchitis by adjusting my diet: primarily by giving up citrus and dairy at the first sign of a cold, and avoiding peanuts, vinegar, and other foods that made the coughing worse. Now, thirty years later at age 82, I haven’t had bronchitis in years.