I have heard fasting has been used throughout the ages to facilitate religious experience, but I know very little of it.

What's your opinion/experience with fasting and meditation?

I'm curious also. Early Christian  monks fasted ridiculously.  And they lived remarkably  old. But does it help reach jhana? Ora stage of poi

Until around 3-4 years ago, I would do yearly solitary retreats where i observed 8 monastic precepts, including not eating solid food after noon, hence fasting until the following morning. 

3-4 years ago as I was doing this in a retreat I developed pretty unpleasant symptoms. Long story short I developed some form of reactive hypoglycemia and am no longer able to skip a meal without those symptoms recurring. Obviously my personal bias is to see not much point in fasting. It did make me observe the craving for food and let go of it while on retreat, so it can help work on that. I'm just wondering if it's actually healthy.  But I'm open and curious to hear others' experience. Monks do follow the fasting rule above and seem to be doing ok with it. Maybe it's just a few like me that cannot do it.

Easy answer, try it and report back.
Many questions are available this way. Why not learn from doing instead of speculation?
Good luck,
​​​​​​​~D

@dreamwalker Forewarned is forearmed.

As much as I love direct empiri, fasting poses both risk and difficulty, especially if doing prolonged fasts. Most I have managed is 60 hours.
I also struggle to discern if it's done for moral reasons, or to enhance mental state.
Add in variance between individuals, and I would consider due diligence wise.
All that said, I likely will end up trying a 10-day fast with electrolyte water during retreat.

@runner1 I think consensus is cyclic fasting is good for extending lifespan. Whether it increases or decreases vitality and healthspan, I'm not sure about.

@benvipassana Man that sounds rough.
That's the weird thing about fasting, it seems some get miracle effects from it, others get run into the ground by it.
Thanks for sharing that

60 hours fasting, good, doing meditation? 
retreat following the retreat rules. Including your own. 60 hours should go to one incremental step up.
Good luck mixing them and watch out for a&p bs screwing up your rules.
​​​​​​​~D

Fasting raises dopamine and various forms of cortisol and adrenaline- whether or not that will be good for your practice is something only you can determine from trial and error.

I am unable to fast because it makes me too "high," encouraging me to go in the direction of hypomania. 

We know from various studies that meditation raises dopamine around 65% higher than baseline- add that to fasting and you might get into the territory of hallucinations, which is of course why a lot of shamanic traditions combine fasting with the other practices to induce that sort of experience.

I would be wary of it if you have a tendency towards mania but I wonder if it would be more helpful for a depressed/sluggish/kapha type person. 

It is very helpful. I use it to get results from doing about 2 - 3 hours kasina a day that I would normally get from about 6 hours.&nbsp;<br /><br />If I did a 10 day fast, all day awareness + 3 hours of meditation a day I would definitely get similiar results as a 10 day retreat would give me.<br /><br />Be careful if you have already very little body mass. I have read stories about people who were already very skinny and it often did damage.<br /><br />If your BMI (and/or bodyfat) is reasonable you should be OK.