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Vice Blog

LONDON - A DIET TO DIE FOR

Here’s a diet that’s radically different from those regular regimens that people go on. Instead of cutting out meat or abstaining from dairy, you don’t eat anything at all. Zilch. It’s a new age lifestyle advocated by a bunch of people called Breatharians. Led by an Australian housewife turned guru called Jasmuheen (pictured), they claim they don't need to eat food because they get all their nourishment solely from sunlight, air and love. The Breatharian diet has been dogged by controversy however, with leading members caught red-handed stuffing their faces with sneaky burgers, while others have starved to death. I decided to consult a British Breatharian and ask her how I could learn to eat nothing.

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Vice: How did you first hear about the Breatharians?
Margaret: I first read about it in Autobiography of a Yogi, which is about this Indian lady called Giri who didn’t eat for 56 years. Before she became a Breatharian she was gluttonous. But she got really fed up with her mother-in-law always complaining about her eating all the time. In the end she ran away crying. Then she met an old guru who took her into a cave for three weeks and taught her yoga which helped her to never eat again. All her family testified that she never needed to eat. They once even took her away and locked her up for two months at the local palace to prove that she didn’t need to eat.

And this was something you wanted to do?
I sort of forgot about it until I saw Jasmuheen’s advert in the back of a magazine. She talked about being on your own, meditating and fasting for 21 days. That really appealed to me and I wanted to do it.

Why?
Well, my reasons were practical really. I have no colon. I had a major operation a few years ago, so food doesn’t get digested.

How did you start doing it?
I saw a Daily Mail advert for a caravan site, a timber lodge in the North Yorkshire Dales. I thought,  "This is ideal!" So I went to the camp and I didn't eat anything at all for the three weeks. I allowed myself orange squash for the last two weeks.

Weren’t you afraid of dying?
Whatever has been done in the past can be done again. We’re limitless. We can do anything. We’re all taught to die of disease or old age, but I don’t believe that now. We should be able to de-materialise. Invisibility and levitation -- we can do this.

D'ya think? I was thinking about trying the Breatharian diet myself.
If you tried it you could die. You need to have spiritual awareness. You need to go within to sweep condemnations and judgements away.

Do you hate food?
No. I like cooking for my husband. I make him a lovely plateful, but to me it’s just stuff, you know?

RONALD REGAN