My Top 5 Benefits Of Fasting
A few days ago I wrote a post on fasting for weight loss (it was a journal of my first-ever 48 hour fast) so I decided today that I should let you know that there a lot more benefits of fasting that you probably don’t know.
But you should, and NEED to know!
And although there are a lot more benefits of fasting that I’m not listing here, these are the top 5 reasons why I personally fast:
- Easy Calorie Reduction – If I fast twice a week, I can literally go off my diet and still lose weight. Although I don’t recommend you eat unhealthy just because you can, it’s an awesome feeling to be able to eat a bowl of ice cream, have a few beers, or go out for a good meal at a restaurant without feeling guilty. When I was back in the days of needing to eat “perfectly” I felt guilty every single time I’d eat anything that wasn’t what I was supposed to be eating.
- Human Growth Hormone – Human growth hormone is an incredibly powerful hormone in your body. It helps you build muscle (it’s essentially a natural steroid that your body makes), burn more fat, and some studies are even showing that during times of high output of human growth hormone, the cells in your body actually slow down the aging process.
- Higher Energy – One of the best benefits of fasting that I’ve noticed and personally love is that I’m always 100% full of energy. Even though I’m still young and already have a good amount of energy, I used to take afternoon naps probably at least 3-4 times per week. Since I started fasting, I literally haven’t taken one and have so much energy it’s ridiculous. I frequently work 60-80 hour weeks and have absolutely no problem with it (I’m getting married in September 2009 – and weddings are expensive!)
- Better Digestion – Another benefit of fasting is that your digestion will improve almost instantly. You see when you eat 6 meals per day, your body never really gets a chance to recoup. But when you fast and your body doesn’t have to worry about digesting food, it can do other important things. You know like…heal your body – something it never gets a chance to do properly when you’re always full of food!
- More Body Awareness – I’m very much into personal development so this is a benefit of fasting that you might not care about, but either way – it’s pretty cool. After a few fasts you’ll suddenly start to notice your body’s sensations more often and be able to control them much easier than you used to. To be honest it’s kind of weird how it happens. For example, do you hate the “hunger” sensation? I used to as well, but I’ve literally learned to embrace it. Instead of it being a negative feeling, I’ve turned it completely neutral and being hungry doesn’t bother me whatsoever these days. Essentially what I’m saying is that fasting gives you FREEDOM over food. It takes you out of the handcuffs and lets you control the intake of food instead of the other way around. It’s kind of hard to understand unless you actually go through the feeling yourself.
So that’s it!
Those are my top 5 benefits of fasting. There are definitely more, such as more vivid dreams (I love dreaming and mine are much more vivid since I started fasting) – but those would be my 5 favorites.
So what are you top 5 benefits of fasting for you?
I’d love to hear them!
Trying 2 Fix The Comments Section!
Hey,
Just a really quick note today.
I’m not sure if youv’e noticed but if you’ve tried to comment over the past few days, the captcha image is broken.
Don’t worry, it’s NOT your computer!
I’m not sure what happened but I’m in the middle of trying to get it fixed so you can start commenting again. Unfortunately, I’m a completely dunce when it comes to doing things like this, so any help would be appreciated very much!
Don’t worry though, I’m adding a few plugins that’s going to make commenting much more enjoyable for you, so check it out in the next few days (hopefully) 
Have a great week this week – I have a ton of great blog posts I thought of over the weekend that you’ll love. I might even start making some more videos and putting them on here too. I got one of those Flip camera’s and really need to start using it!
Why I Love Eating Disguisting Food
Last night I was eating some cottage cheese maybe an hour or so before I headed off for bed, and I realized something.
Eating disguisting food is actually a good thing!
Here’s why:
When you force yourself to eat foods you don’t particularly enjoy, 2 things happen.
First of all, you’re displaying tremendous amounts of self-discipline. Having self-discipline is not only great for helping you become fit and lean for the rest of your life, but it also carries over into many other areas of your life as well. Self-discipline is the mark of a successful person – do you have it?
Second, you also teach yourself that you don’t always need to eat foods that you love in order to get what you need. By starting off small and maybe just taking a few bites of something you don’t like but are good for you, you’ll become kind of “immune” to bad tasting foods. After awhile, the taste of the food really won’t matter and you’d be surprised at what foods you actually start to enjoy!
For example, I used to absolutely HATE cottage cheese. The first time I tried it, I thought it was the most disgusting thing I’d ever put in my mouth.
But then I started experimenting with it. First I tried it with some jam on top, then pepper, now I can eat it plain (although I usually put cracked pepper on it – I love pepper and put it on pretty much everything).
And yes, I know cottage cheese isn’t some super-food or anything like that – it’s just an example. One thing I hate to eat but eat anyway because I know they’re great for me is brussel sprouts. All I do is cut them up and saute them in a little olive oil and it livens up the taste a bit.
Is there a food you hate but you know is great for you? Instead of avoiding it, start taking small bites each and every day. After a few weeks, or even a few days, you’ll notice that the taste doesn’t bother you as much and that you might even start to enjoy it.
Try it and let me know how it works!
Journal Of My First 48 Hour Fast For Weight Loss
I’ve been fasting for weight loss (well, mostly for all the other fasting benefits, not really weight loss) for awhile now, however all I’ve done so far is 24 hour fasts which are actually really easy for me now.
So the other day I decided I wanted to try doing a 48 hour fast. Not that it has any extraordinary benefits over the 24 hour fasts for weight loss purposes, I just figured I’d try it because I like to push myself and see what I can do (you should too).
To be honest, I’d actually recommend doing 24 hour fasting for weight loss instead of 48 so you can help preserve your muscle much easier – this was simply an experiment I wanted to try out.
So I’m going to keep a journal of the entire 48 hours and let you know what emotions/feelings I’m going through for my entire 48 hour fast.
Enjoy!
Sunday, 6 p.m. – Just ate my last meal, plus an extra protein shake so my body had a little more protein. I think I’ll lose a little muscle during this fast, so I’ll do an extra hard workout on Tuesday when I’m finished with it. Plus, the muscle loss will be so minimal that I won’t even be able to notice, and it’ll come back pretty quick (muscle memory).
Sunday, 7 p.m. – I actually just got a hunger feeling, even though I was completely stuffed an hour ago. My digestive system is a little weird sometimes.
Monday, 8:30 a.m. – Just wrote you a new blog post – Why Your Weight Loss Goals Should Be Craaazzzzyyy (opens in a new window) – just got a tiny hunger sensation while drinking coffee, not bad at all though. I’ve actually come to embrace the hunger sensation (I know that sounds weird – I’ll write a blog post about it at some point in the future). I have a feeling I’m going to feel hungry whenever I post these updates, so I hope you appreciate this post because it’s going to make this 48 hour fast a lot harder for me!
Monday, 6p.m. – Just hit the 24 hour mark, still going strong. It actually felt like I didn’t even miss any meals. I met with my fiancee’s priest to do wedding things today and worked up until now, so I’m busy today which helped. Being busy while fasting is one of the best things you could possibly do to make it easy.
Monday, 10;30 p.m. – Just got kind of hungry because I’m thinking about food now, but nothing bad. It’s pretty cool that hunger pains literally don’t bother me anymore. It’s kind of a “neutral” sensation if you could understand what that feels like. So I’m up to 28.5 hours right now and still doing perfectly fine. Only got hungry a total of 3 times in 28 hours, and all 3 times were when I was writing about it here. So much to “you’ll starve if you don’t eat all day long” eh?
Tuesday, 1:30 p.m. – This is actually easier than I thought it would be, although now that I only have 4.5 hours left, I can feel myself wanting to eat. I’m not hungry, in fact a little while ago I actually felt like I was full, it’s just a mental thing telling me to eat. I just finished a cup of Oolong tea and have a little bit of an upset stomach. I think I might stick with peppermint tea if I do this again. Even though I haven’t eaten in 43.5 hours now, I’m still full of energy. No light-headedness, dizziness, or any of that stuff either.
Tuesday 4:30 p.m. – Man, talk about tempting! I’m putting together dinner for my family as well as finding 10 recipes – and I haven’t eaten now in 46.5 hours! I gotta say I’m pretty hungry now, but I can definitely control it. Doing this has been a great experience so far and I honestly recommend everybody reading this does it –not just for the health benefits, but to learn how to control your body and the feelings/sensations you have.
Tuesday 6:00 p.m. – I made it! To be honest it really wasn’t all that hard. I probably got hungry about 6 or so times (give or take 1-2). It’s actually 5:50 right now and I’m in the middle of getting dinner ready for 6, but close enough right? Below, I’ll give a 2 day summary of what I thought.
Ok so here’s a little summary of my entire experience:
First of all, it wasn’t nearly as hard as I thought it would be. I’m used to 24 hour fasts and have never gone about 26 or so before this – so I thought it would be 2x as hard. But it really wasn’t.
I experienced no dizziness or light-headedness. I also experienced just as high of energy levels as I normally have, which to be honest I didn’t expect. I actually thought my energy would have dwindled.
As far as doing it again, I probably wouldn’t unless I wasn’t going to be able to fast again for another week or 2. It wasn’t an inconvenience for me at all, in fact, I got a ton of work done during these past 2 days with a mind probably more clear than it usually is.
I honestly think this is a great thing to do. Not only do you get to challenge yourself which is a great thing to do on a variety of levels, but you simply learn to get more in tune with your own body which I think is the best fasting benefit.
Try it out and let me know how it goes for you!
Why Your Weight Loss Goals Should Be Getting Crraaazzyyyy
What kind of weight loss goals have you set for yourself?
First of all if you haven’t set any – are you insane? Seriously, setting up goals for yourself is going to make a dramatic impact on the amount of fat you lose as well as how fast you lose it. If you don’t already have some for yourself, I highly suggest making them.
But that’s not what this post is about.
What I’m going to talk about today is simply going craaazzzzyyy with your weight loss goals.
Well what if for example you made a fat loss goal to lose 5 pounds in the next month.
What if you DON’T hit that goal – then what happens? Anything? If not, you’re missing out on some extraordinary benefits.
When I mean you should go crazy with your goals, what I’m talking about is making yourself do something kind of crazy if you don’t hit the goals.
For example, say I wanted to lose 2 pounds this week. If I didn’t, I would tell my fiancee I’m going to do all the chores for an entire week – by myself.
Or maybe I would go into the middle of a WalMart parking lot in the middle of the busiest time of day and yell something embarrassing in front of all those people.
Or another thing I could do is force myself to give up my favorite food for an entire month, or even a week.
The more crazy you get with this, the better the results will be.
You see, when you set a goal like this and you force yourself to do something you really don’t want to do if you don’t hit it, it sets off kind of a trigger in your brain. Then the next time you see pizza all you’ll do is think about how you’re going to have to do that embarrassing thing if you eat the pizza.
Plus, it simply makes life a lot more fun!
I know this technique sounds kind of weird, but trust me – it’s a lot of fun and will actually help you stay on track much easier than simply having a regular weight loss goal and trying to accomplish it.
The one trick I should mention is that your “punishment” for not achieving that goal should be kind of equal to the amount of time you have to do it.
For example, don’t make yourself run a marathon if you only lose 1 pound in a week instead of 2.
Not accomplishing a weekly goal would have a small consequence. Not accomplishing a monthly would have a bigger consequence, and not accomplishing a yearly goal should make you have to do something really embarrassing (just make sure you get it on video and send it to me!).
So, what kind of crazy scheme can you come up with for yourself? Write a comment below and give other people some ideas that you’re going to use for yourself!
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Recent Comments:
- Johnine Bailey: You could mix it with water to make it less caloric. Or possibly substitute a cherry powder or herbal instead. There’s a Cherry Blossom herbal that is available, I’m not sure it would do the same, but maybe it would help.
- Darlene Siddons: great post and great 10 ways to attack those last few pounds….loosing weight is about attitude and feelings, when they are aligned right it is really easy…i use Vision Map Videos to keep my goal of correct body weight in a positive realm… darlene http://visionmapvideo.blogspot .com/
- Megan: great story, and so true! And i laughed a few times during this. keep up the good work!
- What Happens When You Stop Being “Healthy”: important if you’re doing workouts that are very intense and demanding on your body, such as High Intensity Interval Training or things like Tabata
- Weight Loss Excercise: You can also check out his post on weight loss goals here – http://hasslefreefatloss.com/b log/weight-loss-goals-getting- crazy/
- Johnine Bailey: You could mix it with water to make it less caloric. Or possibly substitute a cherry powder or herbal instead. There’s a Cherry Blossom herbal that is available, I’m not sure it would do the same, but maybe it would help.
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