Hi Healthi Friends!
Happy March First! This period between winter and spring can be a difficult time to navigate. If you’re like us, maybe you’ve nixxed your New Year’s Resolutions by now, but you’re ever aware of the looming “spring break bod” that teases us more and more each day. Which by the way, should not taunt us in the way that we all let it! Nevertheless, maybe you’re craving progress or change. Based on this notion, and some requests from our Healthi Community who participate in Lent, we thought it might be helpful to talk through the idea of fasting! Everyone seems to have different opinions and assumptions about fasting. Through this quick write up,we hope that you’ll have enough information to form your own opinion and association.
Fasting has been around for centuries… literally! Maybe you just recently heard about it through the trendy topic of “intermittent fasting”? Turns out it’s not trendy at all! Quite timeless actually. It’s been used as a form of sacrifice, meditation, mindfulness, discipline and dieting for almost all of civilization.
In some religions, it’s used as a tool to dedicate your mind, prayers, and temptations to your spiritual health. For example: this week will begin the season of Lent. A time that some of the Christian church uses to reposture and rededicate time and spiritual effort to prayer and dependency on God. A lot of times, this manifests as a food or drink fast. Maybe giving up caffeine in order to reshift the mind and body out of the mercy of a drink and into something different. Lent ends on Easter Sunday, and Christians typically revisit whether or not they want to indulge again into the thing that they’ve given up, or carry on without. Very much not a dieting type of fasting, but can be somewhat similar.
Intermittent fasting is probably a more familiar version of the practice. It’s a simple construct: periodically you fast, and periodically you eat normally. The simplest form is a daily intermittent fast: you choose a set amount of time during the day (usually about 8 hours) where you do not eat or drink anything besides water. A common timeframe for this is 1 pm to 9 pm. There are other types of intermittent fasting that some like to participate in. Maybe it’s a whole day that they fast, but then they eat normally the days before and after. Or maybe it’s a version in between those two.
So now the million dollar question… is it for me?
In one sense.. Sure!! Fasting can be for everyone! In another sense… no!! Don’t worry about doing it. Much like all things in life, it’s all about the why. If you’re fasting because you want a “get thin quick” scheme… PLEASE don’t do it. We never want to give our beloved Healthi community real polarized health advice, but this is different. We strongly discourage that weight loss/ fasting mentality. It is by no means, a “fast” way to lose weight (regardless of the punny wording). If you’re interested in becoming a more mindful eater and want a more mindful daily routine… we say go for it! Again… it’s all about the why.
We hope that this perspective is helpful to you. In most of our social efforts, we try to empower you with resourceful information so you can make your best educated health decisions. Whether you participate in Lent, intermittent fasting, or you’ve never heard of either; we hope this info found you well. Add your fasting info into the health checks on the Healthi App, and share it on the community for extra accountability!
