Fasting Guide - A Layman's Guide to Fasting

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WHAT IS FASTING?

Fasting is the act of abstaining from food. In simple terms, not eating for a prolonged period of time (fasting window).

To fast all you must do is to not eat. This includes not drinking any juice or liquid which contains calories. Examples of drinks which contain calories are:

-coffee with sugar

-juices

-milk

The purpose of fasting:

Why fast? You may ask. You can read all about why fasting is beneficial in the extensive scientific literature that exists in the web and in books. You may have also heard about it from a family member or a friend. 

In essence fasting gives your body a break from digestion. It allows your body to breakdown things that are no longer working optimatly in your body. By allowing your body to break down stuff, you are aiding your body in a very natural process (called autophagy). Your body builds itself and it breaks down itself. It is constantly doing this because such is the nature of our body and life. To build and destroy. 

It is important for your body to do this so that it can get rid of stuff it no longer needs. Our ancestors would often go days without eating, and this became the evolutionary consistent way to eat and live throughout thousands of years. 

Enter modern day society. With the constant availability of food 24 hours 7 days a week we could pretty much eat ourselves to death. And that is what is basically happening. The obesity epidemic. Rampant disease related to obesity, metabolic syndrome, and diabetes.

Fasting is a way to go back to a more evolutionary consistent lifestyle. You are essentially emulating how our ancestors would live. If you ever get too hung up on fasting and how to do it, just pretend to be a caveman. You go out and hunt and if your lucky you eat, if not, you don't; thus you have no option but to fast. 

Definition of fasting

fast (v.)

"abstain from food," Old English fæstan "to fast" (as a religious duty), also "to make firm; establish, confirm, pledge," from Proto-Germanic *fastanan "to hold, guard," extended to the religious act "observe abstinence" (source also of Old Frisian festia, Old High German fasten, German fasten, Old Norse fasta "abstain from food"), from the same root as fast (adj.).

The original meaning in prehistoric Germanic was "hold firmly," and the sense evolved via "have firm control of oneself," to "hold oneself to observance" (compare Gothic fastan "to keep, observe," also "to fast"). Perhaps the Germanic sense shifted through use of the native words to translate Medieval Latin observare in its sense "to fast," or it might have been a loan-translation of a Greek expression brought to the Goths by Arian missionaries and spread from them to other Germanic peoples. The verb in the sense "to make fast" continued in Middle English, but was superseded by fasten. Related: Fasted; fasting.

How do I start fasting?

You can start right now. It doesn't matter if you've eaten or not, if you feel hungry or not, if you think you've not eating enough calories or not, if you think your muscles will break down or not. Don't worry about any of that and just start*. Because we've been conditioned throughout our lives that not eating is bad, and such thing would lead to X bad outcome, and not being able to grow muscle, etc. we are afraid to not eat. 

It is simply not the case and you can see for yourself. Once you've completed a fast you will know better than all that and know that it is ok to not eat for a couple of days, or several days, or even 4-5 days. Lions do it all the time, and they are still here. Our ancestors did it all the time. We didn't always have food around, so it was completely normal.

So all you have to do is take a leap of faith, and use logic. Imagine if we didn't eat, that we would die. The human race, or any biological organism for that matter, would not be here today. Because there was scarcity, and there isn't always food. 

We've evolved to be able to survive and without needing to eat, so go ahead and start your fast and give yourself a try. If you don't know how long to go for, it doesn't matter. The important and most difficult step for people, is to just start.

*Of course, it goes without saying that you must please consult your doctor first before attempting a fast. Any fasting you do without doing so is at your own risk so you must be aware of your health if you are planning to undertake a fast, specially if the fast is a prolonged period of time.

How long do I fast for (for beginners)?

Fasting can be done in increments. If you are new, you should take it slow. Because your body may not be so used to not eating, you need to be your own guide into this, because everyone is different. But here is a good way to go about it:

• Do not eat your breakfast for a week

• After a week, do not eat your lunch for a week

Once you can abstain breakfast and lunch, you are fasting for at least 16hrs (also called intermittent fasting)

At this point you are well on your way to intermediate which involves not eating for a whole day. Sound tough? It is not that hard, once you've done it once, you can see there was nothing much to it. 

Of course you may decide to jump right into it as many do and fast for a day or two at first. It's like a cold swimming pool. You can either dip your toes in and walk in slowly or you can just jump right in and get it over with. Both ways should work the same. But make sure you consult your doctor before you just jump right into it. If you feel like that's something you can handle, then you may just go ahead and do it.

How long do I fast for (for intermediate)?

Once you can abstain from eating for a whole day, you can get into how our ancestors would live. Which is the fun part. Because now your body will start to benefit even more from having a whole night to conduct its breaking down (autophagy) of stuff, so you will literally be optimizing your body and its systems by disposing of things it doesn't need.

After a whole day of fasting you may wish to eat, and that is fine. You can eat to your hearts content. Because you didn't eat the first day, the calories you eat from your second day will probably be more. But only eat until you are full. Don't worry about not eating "enough calories". Your body has reserves such as glycogen which is glucose essentially and it is used to power important things like your brain. And also fat, which acts as a buffer for periods were you cannot find food, and so it is a long term storage and important survival source of energy.

You can count on your body to autoregulate the fact you've not eaten for a day, to compensate the lack of calories from the previous day, with burning energy from it's energy stores. Glycogen and Fat. You may begin to lose weight which may be desirable for some. 

Let's say you ate 0 calories in the first day. And you were so hungry you ate 3000 the next. That's ok. That's an average of 1500/day. Let's say normally you eat 2500 per day. That would be 5000. You just cut 2000 calories by fasting for a day and eating a big meal or meals the next day. 

Because you can't eat as much in one sitting, and this is not a dare - just eat as much as you are hungry, remember we are trying to eat as naturally, and evolutionary consistent as we can - you will naturally lose weight. That is completely fine, because that excess weight you are carrying is probably not naturally consistent with what healthy weight you should actually be. 

This is because your body is super effective/efficient and smart. That it will always try to balance and autoregulate everything, it is always striving for the optimal.

You may say then, why do I feel so hungry the next day? It is normal because you are shocking your body into not eating, when you have been eating consistently for days. It may have to do with leptin levels normalizing or adjusting. Leptin is the hunger hormone. So don't worry too much because with fasting you are bringing your body to a new normal. And a lot of people and scientific fact argues that this new normal is better than eating everyday.

Eating every day is not bad either, but fasting is a tool we can use in modern day society to give our body a break. To let it do its thing once in a while.

Once you make it to day 2 of not eating, you may start feeling the symptoms of the dreaded keto flu, but it's not that bad really.

Dealing with hunger as a beginner

This can be daunting for a lot of people. And this may vary a lot for a lot of people. However, the basic gist of hunger is that hunger is just your body trying to get back to normal. However, if you feel like your normal hasn't been working out, and that is why you are attempting fasting, then you need to give your time to bring itself to a new normal.

How to deal with hunger? You can deal with hunger by eating just leafy vegetables (not starchy ones because they contain carbs) and protein, such as chicken, pork, beef, etc. Make sure your protein and condiments, such as salad dressing or meat dressings don't contain sugar, which are carbs. 

Carbs kick you out of ketosis, which is one the fundamental processes your body uses when you are fasting to give your body energy when there is no glucose. 

By avoiding carbs you are making this easier rather than harder. Because if you eat carbs, you are essentially taking your body out of ketosis. Ketosis is a process your body uses to give energy to your cells by converting fat into ketones, which can be used by your body as energy. 

Remember we are helping our body destroy stuff. This includes destroying/using fat. We want our body to go to its optimal weight, so that it does not have to be in a constant struggle for losing weight, or having excess amount of fat it doesn't need. 

In fact, with so much food today, our body hardly needs fat, because fat is a survival store of energy. How silly is that we are going around carrying tens of pounds of excess energy when we have all the food in the world we need. 

The keto flu

You may start feeling cramps, and some fatigue at the second day after you have fasted for a day or so. This is totally normal and to be expected. This is your body switching systems from glucose or sugar burning into ketone or fat burning mode.

This is normal and it will usually last a day or so until your body becomes used to it and starts producing ketones. Once it does this your body is in a fat burning mode and you should not feel as bad. The first time around is usually the worst. You may have mental fog as well and it could be difficult to concentrate. But here enter electrolytes to help with this, so read on.

However, don't give up because the best things in life are usually hard earned, and this is just a little hurdle you need to get over.

Electrolytes and how they help with the Keto Flu

Because you have not eaten, and because our water sources nowadays are so stripped of electrolytes (minerals such as sodium, potassium, magnesium, etc), your muscles and other systems can't get electrolytes to at least function at a normal level when there is no food.

In the past when we would drink out of springs or rivers we would get unfiltered water from the streams that would contain minerals to replenish our electrolytes and when we didn't eat at least our muscles would have electrolytes to keep firing properly, hence dismissed fatigue. Also, some of our ancestors would drink the blood of animals which would be rich in minerals, but of course they would already be used to fasting back then, so they would not depend so much on getting electrolytes from water, and lower sources, to feel better when they weren't eating.

Nowadays, we get our water filtered, or reverse osmosis, or it just simply is not as rich as it used to be. And we don't drink blood, at least not many of us. And we are not used to fasting, so trying to get to normal is obviously going to be harder than it was for our ancestors. 

That is why when you are starting to get into ketosis you may want to mix some electrolytes into water. These can be potassium, sodium at least which is are the two main electrolytes that will help you from feeling unnecessarily bad during the keto flu period.

How long do I fast for (for advanced)?

Once you feel comfortable with not eating for a day or two, and you have the confidence to go without food for that long without being worried or concerned of what may happen to you. This is when things can start to become challenging, more interesting, and seeing some real results. 

The period you are in a fast is usually called a window. Your fasting window can be anywhere between 1 eating period, to 3, 4, 5, 7 days, or more. Some people have fasted for 30 days. It takes discipline and a strong will. But that is evidence in and of itself that fasting is not as dangerous as some people will try to make it out to be. It is dangerous if you do it for too long and your body is not getting the nutrients it needs for a long period of time. This is why consulting your doctor is the wisest step before starting your fast. Specially one that is familiar with fasting.

However, on average, fasting is not dangerous at all. Imagine if it was. Humans would not be alive today. Not eating can actually be healthier than eating.... all the junk food, and highly processed food we eat nowadays is basically poison, so not eating can actually be healthier. Because we are not doing anything that is unnatural to our body. Fasting is the most natural thing, especially compared to eating highly processed foods that never existed before modern society. 

Once you get done with your fast you can reset your eating habits and start to eat healthy. That is another bonus. It's like rebooting your computer. You can start from a clean slate. All you need to do is fast and wipe out all the bad stuff off your system.* Of course, this is just conjecture, but it makes sense right? Once you get down to optimal, or lost weight, and feel good, don't go back to eating trash. We suggest you eat an animal, evolutionary consistent diet, like our ancestors did. What does that entail? Basically no processed foods, lot's of steak, chicken, pork, eggs. Vegetables, and fruits. And get some organs in you, desiccated organs are great, they contain many times more the nutrients of vegetables even. It's all about optimizing and getting rid of unnecessary stuff, and living optimally, healing and feeling the best your've ever felt.

So fast for longer. Fast for 2 days. That is your new goal. Can you do 2 days? How about 3 days? How about 4 days?

When you fast for longer than you are comfortable fasting, it is always advisable to fast when there are people around. You never know how your body may react. Mileage varies among people, but on average nothing goes wrong, really. That is again, why it is better to consult your doctor, just to be on the safe side. 

However, a lot of people undertake fasting as they believe to be generally in good health, and nothing happens. Then they challenge themselves to fast for more and more time. 

How do I extend my fasting windows at a safe pace?

You may be able to fast for 1 to 2 days. And now you are itching for more. You think you can handle a week. That this is so easy. Well, don't get your expectations up so high.

Fasting longer than 3 days can be tough. The hunger can get to a point where you are day dreaming of food. Specially if you live with other people and they are eating as normal. You may be tempted, you may want to just break the fast, or you may just be feeling weak. 

You may have trouble sleeping at night, or may not be able to focus.

On the other hand, you may be thriving, you have found new lost energy (ketones) which have cleared up your brain to the point it's like seeing with new eyes. You have lucidity and ability to think clearly, and you lack no energy.

It varies, but at the end of the day you want to feel like the latter. 

Usually of you feel like the former, it is a sign that you are not as healthy, or that you have to have more time to adjust to fasting and being in ketosis. That is ok, because it could just be temporary. The important thing is to recognize and see if those symptoms improve or not during the same amount of fasting. If they are, then you are adjusting and getting back to your ancestral roots. Your body is going back to normal, or how our ancestors would normally eat.

It is important to take it slow. If you are comfortable, then you can go faster. It is like driving. You drive at your own pace.

How much electrolytes should I take and when?

It is really up to you and your body and how it feels. If you are feeling the keto flu, it is a pretty good time to take some. Don't over do it and start small and give yourself an hour or two before you can determine whether the amount you took was enough or not. 

That concludes the guide. We hope that it was helpful as an introductory quick start 101 crash course into fasting and that it has given you a comprehensive overview of what fasting is all about. There are many more things to learn about fasting if you really want to delved into. We encourage you to supplement your knowledge with extensive reading on the subject and understand the various processes your body goes into when fasting.

Are you ready to start your fasting journey?