Fastito
My Reasoning
Plato — “I fast for greater mental and physical clarity”. This stuff has been around for ages. We’re just doing a full circle back to it.
Fasting is all the rage. You looking for some new info? You won’t find it here.
We’re still learning about it all as well. Researchers still don’t know the perfect fasting regiment, and we obviously don’t know the perfect diet.
I’ve done around 7 day fasts usually totaling around 32–36 hours. I’ve noticed that each day I’ve done this, I’ve felt somewhat good. I’m wondering if this is placebo because I’ve consumed quite a bit of info saying this is supposed to be good for you so do I just feel good because I’m supposed to? Not sure.
I get really hungry when I fast… duh. I’m a victim of bored eating. I also have a major sweet tooth. Denying myself food is kind of like winning a tiny mental victory. Perhaps this factors in to the increase in mood and focus. Also, I usually have consumed a solid amount of food the day before making things easier.
Another reason for the “feel good” is because you gotta distract yourself from your hunger. This distraction may cause productivity!
Food is so easily accessible these days. Readily available food is meant to be eaten right? I think so. I think it could be engrained in our psychology to eat food that is available. Hunter gatherers would’ve eaten when there’s food before it spoiled. If there was no food, it was time to go find some. Feast and fasting is probably the way we used to be instead of constant grazing like a vaca. So it almost seems like we were designed to fast.
Oh ya.. fasting is free. Love that.
So diets suck. Fasting sucks. Eating sugar is great then it sucks. It’s all annoying. I, like everybody else, want to feel good and look good without putting any effort in. There’s no easy way to tame addictions, cravings, and habits that have taken years to form. I also wonder what the next big diet related discovery will be.
A Little Bit of Science
The magic in fasting occurs because of autophagy. Autophagy is the body’s natural way of recycling. Cells get old and break down. The old stuff will linger until autophagy kicks in. When autophagy is triggered, damaged cells will be recycled into healthy cells because of cool science. One neat example of this is that people who have undergone extreme weight loss frequently have extra skin. If one induces autophagy, the extra skin will disappear. The body is too smart to keep that around. (Not sure the extent to which this work). One can induce autophagy through: fasting, working out, extreme cold, and extreme heat. Fun, eh?
When we’re fed our bodies feed off what we are ingesting. We burn the carbs, sugar, and calories as these are the most readily available sort of energy. When we’re in a fasted state our body switches energy sources. We start burning fat.
The brain seems to like fasting as well. The fasted state stimulates the production of a protein called BDNF. This protein plays a critical role in producing new brain cells, memory, learning, and is also linked to mood. Exercise is another way to trigger BDNF.
A reason for increased alertness and focus from fasting is due to norepinephrine release. This is classified as a stress hormone and is involved in the “fight or flight” response. This response is how humans are still alive today. In times of famine, our brains and bodies need to function better so that we can find food. If our brains and muscles went into “poor me” mode and shut down we’d all be dead.
Questions and further research.
I saw some differing opinions in regards to fasting and muscle retention. When does the body switch to eating its own muscle?
What is the sweet spot in terms of how often to fast and how long?
