Fasting and Your Health
I don't know when it started, but for a long time I've gone through periods where I would fast, aka not eat. This most recent job has perhaps heightened the practice. I find that 3 days out of 5 I work my entire 8 hour shift (which is actually 8-11 on average), without taking a dinner break for a meal.
I can sometimes go 2 or 3 days where I don't take a significant meal, though to my detriment I do come home and relax over 3-4 beers before bed.
Then at the end of those periods I can feel a creeping need to feast, and will often times spend the morning having a meal after meal, usually protein heavy ones of meat, mushrooms and cheese, but sometimes what ever is in the cabinet and freezer that catches my eye.
One of my resolutions for the Fall and Winter is to take some control on my diet. Amplified by a recent health exam where the doctor frowned at my prominent over weight belly, lol.
As we progress into the Collapse, food is going to be an issue. Either getting food from stores, or having food from gardens, we as Green Wizards will need to learn to moderate and plan our nutrition for ourselves and our families.
The age where we can always go to the cabinet and find a snack are ending. Perhaps fasting will again become a tool on keeping us health.
http://observer.com/2017/10/complete-guide-to-science-of-fasting/
Sophie Gale
Tue, 10/24/2017 - 23:17
Permalink
Religious fasting
It strikes me that the Catholic calendar of fast days and feast days has survived over hundreds of years, because it is very practical. I can see an intentional community adapting and adopting a similar ritual calendar.
Kay Robison
Mon, 10/23/2017 - 17:34
Permalink
I do a 5:2 fast
I do a 5:2 fast and have found it helpful with weight loss. I consume about 500 calories in two meals, 12 hours apart on my fast days which are not consecutive. Mondays and Fridays are my fast days and if I think I will need to change the day for social reasons.
It was not hard in the beginning, but since I don't have quite the same reserve (20lb worth) that I used to have, it is a little bit harder now to stick with the diet on the fast day, but only a little bit. If I stay busy, I don't think about being hungry and my success rate is better. On non fast days I eat as normal. I don't have a sweet tooth, so I don't get a surplus of sugar in my diet and I don't drink very much beer, although I like it.
The book that inspired my effort is The Fast Diet by Dr. Michael Mosley and Mimi Spencer. Their emphasis is not on weight loss per say, but how your body will actually do some repair work when food is limited if it doesn't go on to long.
This past summer when it was just to hot to eat, I stopped the fast as I just wasn't eating enough. Now that it has cooled off, I find it easier to eat and so I started my fast practice again.
Hope this is helpful.