What I Learned From Doing A 3-Day Fast

So I just got off of doing a 72-Hour, 3-Day Fast.

I did Coffee, Water, a tbsp of Salt for Electrolytes, and some vitamins.

Something you can easily replicate.

On Monday, Bedros the founder and boss of my company, sent out a Monday morning Email inviting some to join in a fast for 3 days.

Not having food yet for the day, I shortly obliged.

The vitamins of choice, came from 1 Wellness Shot from Trulean, and 1 Greens Product in the morning. 1 Greens Pack mid day, and 1 more at night.

Off I went..
I spoke with a friend Cliff, who has done 5-7 day fasts in recent past, and claims it to be one of the best things he discovered for multiple reasons.

He recommended me a book and an interview, to watch by Author Dave Asprey, who wrote the book Fast This Way, and his big selling point was “What if I told you you could fast without ever being hungry?”

Obviously I was intrigued and did just a small amount of research and implemented what was said, didn’t have time to plan I was already in it haha.

One of those tips was taking Activated Charcoal, which just acts as a mop to all of the toxins we release and have floating around our body, which is typically the culprit of the anticipated headaches and stomach pains.

A couple of key things from the interview that I took going into it, mindset wise -

• Don’t go into a fast with the framework of “lacking” food, it’s like going on a diet and only thinking the thought “damn I can’t have pizza.. I can’t have pizza.. pizza pizza pizza..” What do you think is the first thing that’ll break you from that consistency? Instead, go in and indulge into the fast, you’re doing this to experience the fast, not deprive yourself of food.

• Your body, especially that first night of sleep, will think you’re going to die (lol seriously), but don’t worry, you absolutely won’t.

• All our life, we’ve provided for ourselves some level of food, so it’ll be deeper than choice to opt to go without it.

• Theres 3 stages to what we perceive as “hunger”.
  1. Craving’s 2. Hunger 3. Starvation

  We’ve likely never went into actual hunger, what we typically experience is moderate to strong cravings. Hunger happens after several days, and Starvation happens around 30 days. Our body’s are pretty resilient.

A couple key moments and thoughts during the fast -

• Like I said the first night of sleep, was harder than the actual sleep haha.
  Probably the best sleep I’ve gotten in years I might add, I’ve heard of those “don’t eat 4 hours before sleep” hacks but this was new to me. We’ve all had the late night hankerings that makes you toss and turn, I knew my mind would go places with cravings, but honestly it showed up like slight to moderate anxiety. Every though I had, every dream I slipped into would make a turn for the worst haha, it was pretty bad. But when I was able to convince myself “I committed to this” and convince my body “you’re okay, you’re safe.” I feel asleep fine and again, probably the best sleep in a while.

• Fight the urge to feel sorry for yourself.
  It’s easy to just say your low energy, and be slightly an asshole, and complain about not eating. But according to that interview, that is your biological response. Your body’s literally calling you a sick for not feeding it, and it shows up in your mood. But, while I heard the whispers and conversations, I tried to keep my head above it and repeat, again how I am committed to no food, therefore there’s no need to complain about it.

• Time your cravings. A good trick I got from Cliff, was that every time he got a craving he slapped his stop watch and timed it. According to his data, they typically last around 5 minutes. I’d be swiping, or driving past a good burrito spot, who doesn’t love a good burrito, and have the though “Damn that sounds good, I’m so-“ and I’d cut myself off, and remind myself that words have utility, and would say “I’m having a craving..” and what do you know, a couple minutes later, a couple miles away, a couple posts on social later and craving gone.

Retrospectively, here’s what I can say from the results -

• Delayed Gratification is one of the greatest muscles you can develop. Delaying the gratification of literally the most essential, consistent thing in our everyday lives, is without a doubt one of the bigger reflections one can have. Controlling your mind and urge that we are so justifiably reactive to shows you how much you are capable of control over your mind.

• Fasting is an experience, not torture. If you were to ask me what I thought fasting would be about, I’d say its tough, its grueling, and although you have these biological reactions to fasting that make your mind and body fight against each other in little moments, the all around experience is one filled with benefits to look forward to rather than harsh hurdles to meet.

• You can start literally anytime. It is one of the things that takes very little to start. Haha almost counter-intuitively, yes minimal research is needed, and it does help to look into the timeline of benefits, like this one.

• You’re communication with your body, will only get clearer. I thought I knew my body and what it needed, but I didn’t realize, and what most will realize, is just how chronically inflamed we walk around, the foods, ingredients and chemicals we just sort of blindly ingest and carry the detriments. I don’t know about you but I would notice then ignore little things after eating certain foods, like fried foods would bring up phlegm, or I’d just tell myself that “after lunch I’m just tired” not piecing together that its probably the volume or combination of foods I was eating. Oils, Sugars, Artificial sugars, highly processed foods, inflammation and allergic type reactions, you sort of become your own bodies expert, in what you want to and don’t want to in your body. Likely, the way we are supposed to live anyways.

I hope this served as some level of clarity of what you can expect out of a prolonged fast. It was an incredible experience for me and I’d expect no less of one if you decide to give one a try. It doesn’t hurt to try a 24 or 48 hour fast, it simply feels great to ride the wave once you’ve crossed the line into feeling great and in control.