Wednesday 19 September 2012

Fasting - What's stopping you?

Fasting seems to be getting a lot of press at the minute, some good and some bad. As the debate continues you may be hesitant to get started not knowing whether you should, or if its really worth it.

Here are some things to consider:

You already fast
Every night when you go to sleep, you stop eating (at least most of us do :)) and spend several hours without taking in food or water. Considering that you spend roughly a third of your life asleep, I would argue that your body is designed to handle long periods without eating / drinking.

When you are sick you stop wanting to eat
Depending on what is wrong with you, this isn't always the case, but it happens often enough to be of interest to a pragmatic faster. I believe this is your body wanting to preserve its energy to use in fighting off the ailment, rather than spend it on digestion of food. If at the time your body is most vulnerable it's quite happy to stop eating then this also seems significant to me.

Hunter Gatherers
If you consider a hunter gatherer community (ie they have no real food stores and have to find food each time they want to eat) then two ideas present themselves. The first is that there will be peaks and troughs in their food consumption. The second is that they exercise predominantly when in a fasting state. Must hunter gatherers are slim and capable of extended endurance especially when compared to those of us in the 'modern' world, whose exercise is very limited, and food is essentially an unlimited resource.

If you don't like it or don't get on with it - eat!
Fasting is one of those things that can be started and stopped at virtually any time, don't let the fear of a long fast put you off. Build up gradually, if you are not ready to start with skipping meals, push your meal time back gradually - give yourself time (and permission) to go at your own rate. If you commit to a fast and its too much (for whatever reason) just eat.


It may be that fasting is not for you, perhaps just now or ever, but how will you know if you don't try it?

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