Also, if you avoid sugar for a week before fasting that helps a lot, or rather, I should say that it helps me. Eating sugar messes up my ability to know if I am really hungry or if it is just too many Candida bacteria in my system messing with my brain chemistry.

Anyway, if you like, try avoiding sugar leading up to avoiding fasting.

I would say that avoiding sugar as much as possible in general is a positive. Avoiding unnecessary insulin spikes is a positive.

> The idea that your body needs constant food intake is a modern myth.

Modern food intake also trains the digestive tract (most notably stomach) to never be empty, and we end up confusing signals of hunger with an empty stomach.

I heard that Japanese (or was it China? Korea?) people have this rule of thumb of eating only up to ~80% of stomach volume; no idea if it’s factually true but having this rule of thumb of not filling myself to the brim as we seem to culturally do currently seems to be extremely positive I’m my experience.

Letting go the social baggage of “bon vivant” and “oh my god I’m so full this was soooo good” seems to be just as hard as not smoking when many around are smoking.

“one should eat to live, and not live to eat” says Molière, but even being acutely aware of that, I struggle to fight the deeply ingrained social pressure, as even most foodies/fasters I know seem to subscribe to this “all you can eat” way of life (although with healthy food)

Goddamit when I was feeling great, all sporty and fit (athletic even, dare I say) everyone was saying I was too thin, and now that I feel like shit having some 10+kg excessive weight to shed, everyone around says there’s no need to, and worry a lot when I don’t take a second or third serving.

>I heard that Japanese (or was it China? Korea?) people have this rule of thumb of eating only up to ~80% of stomach volume; no idea if it’s factually true but having this rule of thumb of not filling myself to the brim as we seem to culturally do currently seems to be extremely positive I’m my experience.

The traditional Buddhist notion is that one should eat to the point where one more mouthfull would fully satisfy oneself.

In the West we've turned food into a source of pleasure. We no longer see it as a source of nourishment, and the foundation of our health, but as an entitlement to tongue orgasms.

Fasting helps to change our relationship with food. It's about proactive control and not succoming to the minor inconvenience of feeling a bit hungry.

I do. But as Soylent would demonstrate some people aren't interested in food as a source of pleasure.

I have been on IF for almost three years and started recently on 36 hours once every three weeks. If you can do 24, 36 is not too much of a problem. My last 12 hours of the 36 hours is sleeping, so I don't think about food or feel hungry when I am sleeping. Also, I ended up doing it for 38-40 even though my intention was to do it for 36 hours because of my sleep.