With a traditional fast you usually consume no food and hardly anything other than water for an extended period of time. How long you fast is really up to you, but it isn’t uncommon to fast for 30 days.
While there are some definite benefits to this, it also isn’t something that’s easily done. Sure you’ll do fine for the first day, but as your stomach starts to grumble and you’re getting tired and cold (because your metabolism start to slow to a crawl) things get a little harder.
Alternating Periods of Eating and Fasting
And if weight loss is one of your goals, a slow metabolism is the last thing you want. The solution is something called intermittent fasting. The idea is simple. Instead of fasting strictly for days and week on end, you alternate periods of feast and fasting. Think of it as interval training for your metabolism. It’s one of the most effective and quickest ways to burn body fat.
You can do intermittent fasting several different ways, but what seems to work best for most people is to skip food for a large part of the day and limit your eating to a few short hours. For example, you could sleep, then run on just coffee, tea and water through lunch and have a meal in the early afternoon, followed by a light snack a few hours later. From there you can easily make it until bedtime and sleep through a large part of your fast.
Keeps the Metabolism Fires Burning
This is a very effective way to do intermittent fasting. Since you are eating a fair amount of food each day, your metabolism keeps burning strong while also forcing your body to burn fat during the longer stretches of time when you’re not taking food in. It is pretty easy to do and stick with since you know you can eat what you want in a few short hours. Almost anyone can stick to this until the next “feast”.
Try To Go Low Carb
If your main fasting goal is to lose weight, try sticking to a low carb diet as much as possible when you eat your meals. Skip the candy, the sugar and the bread and instead feed your body with plenty of healthy fats, protein and veggies. This will keep your body in fat burning mode even while you’re eating. As an added benefit, without the sugar and carbs in your system, you won’t suffer the headaches that are a common and unpleasant side effect of fasting.
