If you are thinking about fasting to lose weight, keep reading because you may be surprised at what you are about to learn. Some people can fast and have no problems with it while others may be adversely affected.
Even if you lose weight while fasting you could eventually run into problems such as under nutrition and you run the risk of overdoing it. For example you may love what you are doing and see the new skinny you but are you threading the needle between healthy you and anorexic you? Ask yourself why are you fasting? There are examples of people fasting for religious reasons political reasons, health reasons but why are you fasting to lose weight? Why are you losing weight at all? The main reason why you should lose weight is for better health.
If you are fasting because you don’t approve of your image than you are starting off on the wrong foot. How do you know if what your image looks like is right? What are you gauging your image against? There are so many images in the media that attacks the natural you and could possibly distort your own perspective as to what you should or should not look like. All the faked, Photoshopped and air brushed crap out there is hard to compete with yes? When you see images in the media and you start thinking you need to look like that stop right there. Back track a bit and let yourself know that God created you as you. If you don’t approve of your image is it because of the false imagery the world created for you to fit in? Don’t worry about what you look like and don’t let what you look like affect what you feel like.
You want to feel energized, happy and healthy. Losing weight is the end result of pursuing how you want to feel. Feeling good is accomplished through diet and exercise. Losing weight is just the beneficial by product of living a healthy life style. Fasting to lose weight is just a tool you use to shed some pounds but only if your fasting is done right.
The Right Way To Fast
- Don’t over do it. If you fast too often you run the risk of losing muscle mass. Muscle mass is pure gold because your muscle will burn your fat. You need muscle mass to work, produce energy by burning fat. The less muscle mass you have the less fat burning capability you have. When fasting you are not replenishing your body with what it needs to stay strong and healthy. When fasting too often your body could end up using your muscles for the nutrients it needs for vital functions which could make your muscles atrophy.
- One 24 hour fast per week should be plenty for anybody trying to lose weight. You can do longer fasts than this but if you do a longer fast for 2 or more days then you should not do another fast until your body recuperates from the fast. You don’t need to fast every week either. Fast at your own comfort level.
- The best time to work out when fasting is toward the end. Your body will tend to burn more fat during the end of your fast. For example if you start your 24 hour fast after dinner at 7pm the best time to workout would be the next day late afternoon about 3pm. The most convenient way to do this for most of us working a regular schedules is:
- Start your fast Saturday night after dinner.
- Fast Through Sunday
- Work out Sunday afternoon
- Have a nice breakfast Monday to get you strong for work.
- If you have massive hunger cravings during your fast don’t fret. Try these tricks to help you get past the hunger pangs.
- Take this appetite suppressing drink. Take the juice from two lemons and two limes. Mix with honey. Drink it down to kill your hunger pangs.
- Another thing you could do is heat up some broth. Vegetable, beef, chicken whatever you like and drink it like hot tea. Miso soup is like a broth too. You can make a quick Miso broth by combining hot water and Miso. There are different kinds of Miso You can get. I like white Miso.
- Another way to fast and keep hunger down is to drink a smoothie. If you click HERE you’ll see we have a few fabulous smoothie recipes you can use. If you haven’t read the article yet you will be pleasantly surprised and well informed to get you started at smoothie preparedness.
- Another trick to curb hunger and not break your fast too bad is to eat some plain oatmeal. No dairy no sugar just plain oatmeal. Use rolled oats, oat bran or instant oats. Yes this is cheating but not too bad.
- Breaking your fast… Breakfast. Some hold to the idea that one of the best foods to breakfast is watermelon. It has electrolytes and is not to heavy on the digestive track. The idea is not to shock your digestive track out of dormancy. Instead slowly ease back into a regular eating schedule. As always use your own judgement and go by what your gut is telling you. Literally.