Testing a new software on Linux, called FocusWriter. It’s a full screen word processor that eliminates all menus and icons on your desktop, and the text you type shows up over on your preferred theme background. Mine, perhaps not surprisingly, is called “Bitter Skies,” a dark themed background picturing a high altitude lightning strike. Very fitting, since I’ve been reflecting more and more on how our whole economic system is sick. Politics, economy, agriculture. All of them terminally ill. But that doesn’t mean that I have to buy into any of it.
I am three months in on a year-long experiment with intermittent fasting. The first phase of the experiment was intermittent fasting (eating nothing on MWF, eating lunch and dinner on T-Th-Sat-Sun), and going vegan with no exercise completely ad hoc (infrequent, lifting once or twice a week, cardio occasionally). I lost 23.2 lbs in 43 days. I then took a break for a month, eating a more consistent schedule (1-2 meals a day). To my surprise, I hadn’t gained any weight back despite dropping most dietary restrictions. I simply found that I wasn’t as hungry, and often forgot to eat for a whole day.
This week I started the second phase of the experiment, with an initial goal of an additional 20 lbs weight loss. My ultimate goal is 60 lbs of weight loss, spread over three phases. For the second phase, I am keeping the same intermittent fasting schedule (MWF no eating) while limiting myself to lunch and dinner on Tuesdays / Thursdays, and a single meal on Saturday and Sunday. Added to this is a structured exercise regimen and a modified dietary approach based on lessons learned in phase 1 (described in more detail below).
Our agricultural system that produces so much food while providing so little real sustenance. This comes into sharp relief when you fast. Fasting completely overhauls your relationship with food. It amplifies the effects of the food you eat. Any positive or negative mental, health, or metabolic effects of a given food are multiplied, particularly if it is the first food that you eat after a bout of fasting.
For instance, I have completely lost my taste for beer, which I used to drink at a rate of almost three a day. There are only a few cases where I can enjoy a whole beer. One is after a long day of physical labor outside, in which case a very light beer is refreshing. The other is a draft beer on special occasions. However, in each of these cases, I have noted that after the fact I have regretted drinking each time. The initial rush gives way to an amplification of snap negative behavior, particularly when dealing with the kids. I have thus concluded that any ingestion of alcohol is ultimately unproductive and not worth the metabolic costs.
Another unexpected result from initial experimentation was a marked reduction in the urge to eat sugars. Now and then, I crave something sweet, but I find that having an apple or a cinnamon toast rice cake is enough to quell the urge. Before intermittent fasting, I would be ravenous for dessert, particularly after dinner. I still have a pang now and again, and admittedly have relapsed and had a single episode of eating cake and ice cream at people’s birthdays. But with these events came a realization that wasn’t there. I had a noticeable reaction that the sweets have no sustenance. No filling value, no medicinal value, just pure energy that is wasted.
Another marked discovery from my dietary experimentation is the marked inflammatory effects of gluten. The ingestion of this vile substance creates across the board inflammation in my body. And it’s in almost everything that I usually eat. And have been eating for my whole life. Horrible. Truly horrible. How much damage have I done to my system over the years from ingesting this garbage? Lots. Well, it ends now.
Regarding veganism, I tried it for about three months and realize that it is an incomplete solution to dietary and moral issues. While it is definitely the lowest carbon dietary alternative, the protein sources you get, particularly nuts, are not necessarily carbon conscious. Almonds in particular. Coconut milk I have found as a desirable and sustainable alternative to cow’s milk. Almond milk is similar, but almonds use a massive amount of resources, particularly water, that I can’t support. Peanuts are another source that I over-relied on during the vegan experiment. However, these may have slight allergenic consequences when consumed at a high rate. Also, I noticed that the over-consumption of nut products acts as a severe depressant. For protein sources, I have incorporated fish products into my diet, since they contain no carbohydrates and healthy sources of fat. Initial results are promising, but I will continue to monitor since I am too early in the process to pass final judgment. All told, it seems that the dietary composition question tends as all things do to a moderate, mixed approach. I will continue exploration of my theory in this regard, which is currently the elimination of as many allergenic foods as possible, with serious limitation but no stringent prohibition on the consumption of animal products.
Also highlighted by recent experimentation is an addiction to coffee, which was eventually cured by intermittent fasting. I used to drink multiple cups of coffee each day, to the point that it took an inordinate amount of caffeine to produce any real response. I was drinking iced coffee at dinner. Initially, coffee was a crutch to help me through the fasts. A kind of treat that I could have while fasting. Once I adjusted to the fast, however, I found that coffee had worn out that use and was making me feel worse. When you fast, your body dehydrates with dropping insulin levels, and coffee is a diuretic, so I found its effects ultimately counterproductive. Tea, on the other hand, hydrates. In addition, herbal teas can be selected for medicinal effects. My current favorite is a turmeric / cinnamon blend. I still have an iced coffee each day, but unless I finish it in the morning I find it hard to finish and opt for tea instead.
All told, intermittent fasting has highlighted the medicinal value of the food you eat, whether those effects be detrimental or beneficial. It amplifies the sensitivity of your body and your mind to these effects, making them obvious. Before, these effects were buried in the noise of your body’s reaction to a cacophony of reactions. With fasting, you can isolate the effects of a given food and make adjustments to your diet accordingly. It is a long, drawn-out, and often humbling process. But I think it works in the long run. It can go a long way to cure food addictions and bad habits, simply by bringing your reaction to a certain food or habit into focus.
Regarding exercise and intermittent fasting, I made a few discoveries over the past four months. Specifically, these discoveries relate to the effects of different types of exercise before and after the fat-burn switchover point, when the body switches from burning glucose to processing fat as it’s primary energy source. I noticed that while fasting, if I performed cardio exercise prior to the fat-burn switchover point (24-36 hours for fresh fast after full feeding, 20 hours during intermittent fasting) resulted in much more extreme desires to eat and a higher fast failure rate. This effect did not occur if cardio was performed after the fat-burn switchover point. In fact, after the switchover point, cardio exercise did not result in an increased desire to eat. Strength training prior to the switchover point, however, does not result in significant increase in hunger. After the switchover point, ultimate strength and endurance seem to decrease slightly early in the intermittent fasting program, but these effects wane as the body adjusts to the new energy source. In effect, your muscles take a while to “learn” how to perform while harvesting fat energy. These discoveries have led to an adjustment in my program. I now only do cardio after I have cleared the switchover point “wall.” Theoretically this should be optimal, since cardio exercise burns the most calories, and if it is performed after the switchover then it will burn only fat. Within the switchover window, I do strength training. During this time, your muscles still have access to dietary protein, and building lean muscle helps to continue burning fat through the fast.
Having learned this, I would recommend to long-distance runners: Try fasting for two days, then running. You will already be past the wall and accessing a much higher reserve of energy that is pent up in your fat cells. The ultimate “bonk” training. Then again, I wouldn’t recommend running at all. After losing more weight in eight weeks of intermittent fasting than I did training for the last half-marathon, I suddenly have an urge to scream at every runner “YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG!” They are wasting their time burning glucose, only to store it back up at their next meal. Talk about a Sisyphean effort. It is a futile business. It only took me 25 years and a worn down knee to learn this, but hey....better late than never.
Of course any discussion of fasting would be incomplete without discussing mental effects. In the end, fasting is merely an exercise of mind over body, overriding the survivalist tendencies of your body with pure willpower. It is a simple process, but by no means easy. Simple in that all it is in not eating for an extended period. Difficult in the body’s determined will to keep the status quo, even if that three meal a day status quo is an evolutionary outlier. Exercising this type of willpower does take a great bit of effort, and it is much worse at the beginning. But after a while your body adjusts to its new reality, to the point where you wonder how in the hell you ever ate three meals a day when a meal every other day seems more than sufficient. Fasting also opens up time that would otherwise be spent getting and eating food to use for more intellectual pursuits, like reading, writing, exercise, meditation, language learning, what have you. Keeping busy actually helps immensely during the early stages of fasting, because your mind can focus on something other than the constant, unnecessary demand for food from your tummy.
Exercising mind over matter unlocks other effects as well. Noticeably I have been more creative than ever, writing more in my journals, drawing more graffiti concepts. In general, I’m trying to do a single creative thing every day. Today’s is this entry. Yesterday was a graffiti motif “ENJOY LIFE.” Last week was a journal entry on advice to Ryan and Elinor one day, graffiti the next, programming a desktop schedule app in PYTHON the next.
Creativity on one hand, a healthy dose of societal criticism on the other. When you realize what a literal crock of shit you have been fed your whole life, everything comes into question. How deep is the rot? Well, it’s all the way to the core of course. Everything. Every aspect of our culture is subverted. Off kilter. Dead ass wrong. “Everything you know is wrong.”
Which I guess brings me to the point: Life is an experiment. My favorite mug has an infinity sign and says “Experiment. Fail. Learn. Repeat.” I think too often we forget the “Learn” part. When picking up Ryan and Elinor the other day, I overheard another kid tell his father “Scientists know everything.” Incorrect. A true scientist will admit that he knows nothing, but he has theories supported by data. A true scientist would also consider all data, even the data that doesn’t fit into his current theories. In large part science has become it’s own worst enemy by purporting to adhere to these principles, while completely failing to acknowledge or consider data counter to current scientific understanding. It’s only human to think that you are right and everyone else is wrong. But when this is morphed into scientific hubris, it discredits the whole enterprise.
I guess what I’m saying is be a true scientist. Perform your own experiments and learn from them. This is your life. Your time. Experiment. Fail. Learn. Repeat.
Wow. It seems that an ancillary discovery is that, on initial inspection, FocusWriter works. I wonder if they have this on Windows.....
No comments:
Post a Comment