Proper Food Including exercise

Meaning: The line of Rigved 4/40/5 says us that – our diet should be such as to contribute to the constant growth of our intelligence, longevity and strength.

Message: Life is not possible without food. Every man must pay more attention to his diet. It will be health-giving in proportion to its cleanliness, and simplicity. It has been clearly said in Geeta that simple or ‘saatvik’ foods are those which increase longevity, intelligence, strength, health, happiness and love, which are viscous and juicy, which remain stable and by nature are pleasing to the mind. We should always take ‘saatvik’ and balanced food. Instead of gorging ourselves we should eat frugally. Gautam Buddha also advises that, “ A person who takes one meal a day is a mahatma (great soul), one who eats twice with restraint is intelligent and one who eats more than that is unfortunate, a great fool and is like an animal”. That is why there is a saying that one who eats once a day is a yogi, twice a day is a bhogi, (i.e. a man of the material world) and three times a day is a rogi (i.e. a diseased person). Control over the tongue is extremely necessary. One should decide one’s diet by careful attention to what is proper and improper, what should be eaten and what should not be eaten. That increases ‘saatvikata’ (moral simplicity), forbearance and spirituality, and all other sense-organs remain under control.

One very great and easy means of diet-control is ‘asvaad vrat’ i.e. a vow to eat only boiled food without salt, sugar ands condiments. It implies that we should not become slaves of taste. It does not mean that we do not eat all the food worth eating in this world and lose the natural power (of taste) of our tongue. The meaning of this vow is that we do not neglect adopting the foods that are necessary for the nutrition, health and protection of the body, and always keep the tongue under control. For cultivating that habit we should eat boiled food without salt and sugar and also eat fruits.

By taking ‘saatvik’ and limited food, there is no loss in any way neither bodily, economic nor societal; on the contrary there is benefit only. Whereas the simplicity in food habits is necessary, regularity is very important from the viewpoint of health. Going to bed, getting up in the morning, taking bath and similar daily routine must be punctually done. Disorganization in daily routine spoils the health. Some people are very lazy and do not maintain any schedule of daily routine. They are haphazard; they have no fixed time for eating and do not keep any fixed time for bathing, sleeping, toilet etc. Everything in their lives is topsy-turvy. The body’s energy bears this misconduct for some time and in the flush of youth, nothing is visible. But by the time the body is middle-aged i.e. 35-40 years, the body becomes a house of disease and in some cases hardly has the age of youth started, when old age takes over.

Only by proper food and daily routine including exercise does the life become interesting which in turn contributes to our longevity by increasing intelligence, and bodily and spiritual strength.

You have no control over what the other guy does. You only have control over what you do

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