3 reasons why we shouldn’t eat food
When most of us hear the word fasting, we immediately think of Jesus or Gandhi. We mistakenly associate fasting solely in a spiritual context. However, fasting is a great way to break addictions (other than food), the only way to truly cleanse our bodies and it is a great way to lose weight.
I partake in a 3-day fast once or twice a year. I would like to do this more often, but fasting takes a lot of energy, will power and time to complete.
I am writing this post to introduce my readers to the background and benefits of fasting as I will again refuse to eat food and drink anything other than water in the next few days.
I will be keeping a a detailed log of my experience here for all of you to see.
Ryan, why are you going to fast?
I fast for 3 reasons.
One, a water only fast is the ultimate way to cleanse the human body.
Digesting food requires massive amounts of energy from our bodies to complete. When we remove this energy intensive process, all of the energy that we would have spent removing nutrients and disposing of food, we will now use to heal our bodies.
Because food is not available for energy production in our bodies, we must obtain energy from somewhere to stay alive. When this starvation mode is engaged, our bodies use fat and muscle for energy. When this occurs, our bodies (again in their infinite wisdom) seek out cells that are damaged for energy. Leaving cells that are strong to carry out our bodily processes.
Second, abstinence from food results in increased mental clarity.
I enjoy meditating on a regular basis. When I am in a fasted state, my mind is free and clear and my meditations are very fulfilling.
Jesus Christ and Gandhi fasted regularly. Jesus fasted prove that he could overcome temptation from the devil. He also fasted many times to reassure and strengthen his faith in his God.
Gandhi fasted for many reasons. He once fasted for 27 days in protest of Indian civil rights in India (before India was its own country, it was ruled by the British). He also fasted regularly to gain mental clarity and direction from his God.
These two men are arguably the most profound humanitarians in human history. If they fasted for mental clarity and spiritual renewal, then there is something to be said about the power fasting.
Lastly, I fast because I love the taste of food.
I am positive that many people out there often eat without actually tasting their food (like me).
After abstaining from food for an extended period of time, the taste of food is out of this world.
In the book Fasting and Eating for Health, Dr. Joel Furhman brings forth evidence that argues when the body is in a fasted state, taste buds that are sensitive to sugar and salt actually regenerate and become more sensitive to those tastes.
As I mentioned earlier fasting is a great way to lose weight.
I am not promoting chronic withdrawal from eating food. That is what doctors call anorexia.
If you want to start a new lifestyle change, fasting before hand is a great way to get a fresh start.
If you fast solely to lose weight, then you will be sadly disappointed. Without a drastic change in your daily diet, the weight that you lost while fasting will be gained back in the days following a fast.
Other Benefits of Fasting
As I mentioned before, Joel Fuhrman wrote a book titled Fasting and Eating for Health. Within his book, Dr. Fuhrman recounts his personal experience with fasting. Joel was an world class figure skater. At the age of 20 he experienced a terrible injury to his leg. After a year of surgeries from the world's best surgeons, he was still unable to walk without pain. Fed up with drugs and surgeries, he sought the help of a doctor who specialized in fasting. After fasting for 46 days his leg was healed. One year later he placed 3rd in the World Professional Figure Skating Championships.
This is an example of the bodies amazing ability to heal itself. As long as we provide the opportunity for this to happen, the body will heal almost any disease or injury on its own. Dr. Fuhrman uses fasting as a treatment to cure arthritis, asthma, heart disease, high blood pressure and diabetes.
Personally, when ever I am sick or obtain a physical injury I fast. I give my body the opportunity to use all of its energy to heal itself.
Our bodies are genetically created to fast. Evolution has endowed us with the ability to survive extended periods of time without food. Living in the natural world for the last 1.94 million years has forced us to adapt to times of food abundance and times of food scarcity.
We are made to exist with periods of no food. However, in our modern system of cheap and abundant food, this bodily system rarely, if ever, is utilized.
I understand that this mode of healing comes as a shock to many of you. In a world where are televisions are flooded with advertisements for drug companies that "cure" every common ailment known to man, it is no surprise.
In truth, drugs to not "cure" any disease, no matter how small. Drugs only mask the symptoms. We tend to view the human body as that of a machine. Like a car, we believe that if we add something the machine, we will make it run better.
For example, if a cars gas lines freeze, we add a product to the gas that prevents it from freezing. However we are not solving the problem (living in a cold climate), we are only masking the consequences of living in a cold climate. As for the human body, if we come down with a terrible cough, we take NyGuil or some other drug to "make my cough go away". In reality drugs do no such thing. Does the cough come back? Yes. So it did not "cure" anything. We over look the fact that we are coughing for a reason. Somewhere in our bodies something has gone wrong and a cough is simply the bodies way of cleaning itself.
I will be fasting for 3 days. I'm not sure when I am going to start this, but it will be soon. I will fast for 3 days because fasting for a longer period of time should include a doctor.
Eating food is more powerful than most of us have ever realized. Embrace it.
- Ryan
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January 4th, 2010 - 00:04
I am now embracing the fasting technique cause I feel like a pile of poop. And whats the first thing Riv makes after I decide I am going to. Popcorn. Unreal. I’ll let ya know how it goes
January 4th, 2010 - 10:14
Patty,
A word of advice. Drink lots of water. If you feel really hungry, glass of water will help suppress that hunger.
Withdrawing from food consumption is very difficult even when we have no food around to eat. But in our culture food is every where. Funny how we are now at a point in history when not eating is more difficult than eating.
Personally, while fasting, I get a huge ego boost when I’m around delicious food and refuse to eat it. Fasting is a great way to test a persons will power and self motivation. Remember last week when I sat at the diner table and refused to eat lasagna and garlic bread? (I had a sore throat, so I fasted to allow my body to heal itself).
I felt like a bad ass.
Thanks for commenting Pat
- Ryan
January 4th, 2010 - 10:58
Banks, come on, your statement that medicine only masks symptoms is not remotely true; many medications do actually cure diseases. Over the counter pain medication like nyquil doesn’t heal anything. However prescribed medications that are anti-bacterial in nature do very much to rid your body of infectious diseases. Fasting may be helpful, but i think ignoring medications in loo of fasting would be doing the same thing in essence that the family who refused lifesaving treatment for their daughter and instead prayed for her to get better. She ended up dying
January 4th, 2010 - 20:09
really, 46 days fasting, that dude is crazy and a bit hypoglycemic too. I do agree about the ego that goes along with refusal of your favorite meal. is this blog a part of your education? Keep writing, it makes me smile!
January 4th, 2010 - 23:37
I survived….barely….. Even if it doesn’t work I had an orange and some soup and it tasted 10x better than it normally does.
January 5th, 2010 - 09:07
Houli
“Your statement that medicine only masks symptoms is not remotely true” and “Over the counter pain medication like Nyquil doesn’t heal anything.”
A little contradicting but I’m going to assume that your first statement is aimed at major life threatening diseases and your second statement is focused on minor illnesses?
First I want to apologize for giving the impression that all medicine is bad. It isn’t. Bacterial infections, viruses and cancer are all illnesses that can be combated and “cured” with medicine. However, believing that these medications simply go into our bodies and attack a disease is very far from the truth. These drugs aide our bodily systems ability to ward off a disease.
My argument is mostly aimed at over-the-counter drugs. Which, it seems, you agree with me that they do not cure any ailment, but rather mask the symptoms associated with a minor illness. Fasting is actually a natural bodily process. When we are sick, we are not hungry. Ever wonder why? It is our body telling us that it does not want to waste the energy digesting food. Rather it wants to use that energy to heal itself.
Even though some life changing illnesses require medication to aide in the healing process, many are only masking the symptoms. Here are a couple of examples: Diabetes. Diabetes medication simply lowers the the glucose levels in the blood. Again, it gives patients a false vale of hope that they are “getting better”. This is so far from the truth that I want to puke. These medications do not “heal”, they do not address the root cause of the problem that the body cannot process glucose in the blood. For example, I recently spoke with a person who learned that s/he has “pre-diabetes.” This person clearly eats like shit and does not exercise. This person’s doctors gave him/her diabetes medication. And can you believe that his blood sugar levels went down! Well no shit they went down, they are taking blood sugar lowering medications. Forget about altering your diet or actually exerting some physical movement or giving your body the ability to heal itself and attack the root cause of why his or her blood sugar levels are high. I am getting off topic a little, my bad.
Dr. Joel Fuhrman uses fasting techniques in his practice to bring diabetic patients off medication and regulate their bodies ability to process blood sugar.
Arthritis is another disease. Medication is again given to mask the pain and discomfort of joint failure. Does the medication actually cure arthritis? No. It only makes it less painful to live with.
Focusing on the outward symptoms of a disease has led us to be reliant on medications. Modern medicine does not focus on curing the cause of a disease, but rather on masking the symptoms. Giving us a false illusion that we are being “cured”.
Our body has all of the process and systems necessary to heal itself if we give it the chance to. Yes their are exceptions and I understand that this concept is completely foreign to many of us here in America. But do not degrade an idea because it is not the “normal” thing to do.
The girl whos parents refused medication for their daughter is a sad story. However, each individual has the right to choose what method of healing will be the best for themselves and there family. The fact that modern society and the mass media portrayed her parents as monsters is a travesty.
Thanks for commenting Houli. Your comments are always contradicting mine; you make me think and I love it!
- Ryan
January 5th, 2010 - 09:11
Kathy,
Yes 46 days. He had physician supervision, so if any level of nutrient got to low I’m sure he would have stopped it earlier. He is crazy, but his leg is also healed.
This blog is my own idea and creation. I enjoy writing and I really like to hear other peoples opinions issues as well, so I figured why not?
Thanks for reading and commenting Kathy!
- Ryan
January 5th, 2010 - 09:13
Patty,
Good to hear you made it through alive! Let us know if you feel any better.
Thanks for giving it a shot!
Ryan
January 5th, 2010 - 12:54
I actually feel a lot better. Im glad I did it.
January 13th, 2010 - 10:17
I love food so u guys are fags. I dont respect what your doing with your body life is too short to worry this much about things!
January 13th, 2010 - 14:21
Todd,
The fact that you love food does not make anybody who abstains from it a fag. Grow up.
“Life is to short too worry this much about things”
I refuse to use conventional medicine to “heal” my body. This is my way of combating an illness and cleansing my body. Sorry if it doesn’t fit into your scope of reality.
Thanks for reading,
-Ryan
January 14th, 2010 - 21:11
I think I may give this fasting thing another try at some point! Thanks for the great insight on this. Also, reading all the comments.. I agree with both you and Houli on the debate of drugs vs food (fasting). I think that drugs are beneficial, yet harmful. Masking certain symptoms at the time for comfort, sense of ease, and more time, yes, but ultimately curing, rarely. It takes bodily changes for better health to occur. But there are a few things that food and fasting alone can not control, so thankfully we do have various medications. But I still feel as well that treating the body right is the way to go. Just an opinion
Also I find the quote “Life is to short to worry this much about things” funny. I mean when I read that my first thought was this… Yes, life is short, by putting crap in your body and not treating it correctly it will make life shorter. But by being health concious rather that be through fasting, healthy eating, whatever, life can be made longer, and maybe would involve less worry?! So
just a little food for thought I guess … haha.
January 14th, 2010 - 21:40
QE
Thanks again for the great comments!
I recommend every person in the industrialized world try a 3 day fast at least once in their life. We are so grateful to have cheap and affordable food in this country that we often take that for granted.
Well said about the life is to short statement. I never even thought of that! Great point
Thanks again for reading and commenting. You add a lot of valuable insight! I appreciate it
=Ryan
January 15th, 2010 - 00:59
I’m going to see if I can do one within the next month is the goal! Also I may sound terrible in saying this… but I dont know how grateful I am for the cheap affordable food we have.. Yeah its cheap, but thats because most of it is crap… haha. If McDonalds/Burger King, SunnyD/kooliad/gatorade, and oreos/doritos were more expensive I bet we would see a difference in the way people ate.. especially when it comes to the fast food part. But, I am grateful that we have affordable food, just wishing our food consumption in the US was dispursed differently. But all of this is a whoooole different discussion combined, involving many different ideas.
January 15th, 2010 - 11:38
QE
You are most definitely correct. The reason those kinds of foods are so cheap is because the US government subsidizes them. Just think if they subsidized organic whole foods? Our obesity epidemic would go away and our need for health care would drop. It is like our government wants us to be fat and unhealthy.
Again, your comments are much appreciated
-Ryan
February 17th, 2010 - 16:03
Fasting is great, but I’m betting a good deal of the benefits come from ketosis and a complete lack of carbohydrate consumption.
I imagine fasting is also 10x easier once keto adapted – I imagine you are?
February 18th, 2010 - 12:11
Anthony,
“I’m betting a good deal of the benefits come from ketosis and a complete lack of carbohydrate consumption.”
I could not agree more. Actually the benefits of fasting greatly increase once ketosis sets in. This forces our bodies to use our fat stores as energy and discard any toxins or other harmful chemicals that are stored there.
For all of those who do not know what ketosis is, here is a bryantheryan definition for ya. When carbohydrates are present in the body, we use them as energy in the form of glucose. Ketosis is a “switch” from using carbs as an energy source to using fatty acids for energy when carbohydrates are not present.
I follow Dr. Jim Carlson’s blog (here) and he brought to my attention that the amount of energy found in carbs is much less than that in fatty acids. He claims that the “second wind” phenomenon that many athletes experience is simply our body switching from using carbs (glucose) as energy to fatty acids.
And yes Anthony, cutting my carb intake has made fasting much easier. At least in the first day, when our bodies are still used to receiving at least some food. Although after the first day, hunger disappears. Also, being keto adapted makes “mini” fasting much easier. This happens without any conscious effort, which is awesome.
Thanks for the great comments
-Ryan