The Best Benefits of Intermittent Fasting

What are the benefits of intermittent fasting, you might ask?

Dieting can be difficult and unenjoyable for many people. Some diets force you to avoid sugar while others keep you from enjoying carbs and so on. Intermittent fasting, on the other hand, is a completely different kind of diet.

Instead of focusing on what you should or shouldn’t eat, intermittent fasting focuses more on the frequency of your eating habits. But what is intermittent fasting exactly? Keep reading and learn more.

The Details

Intermittent fasting is all about spacing out your meals and dictating when you should eat or fast throughout the day. The reason why many people in America are overweight is due to snacking. While snacks themselves tend not to be very high in calories, if you snack all day, these calories will eventually add up and contribute to weight gain.

But if you restrict the frequency of your meals, you will find that losing weight will become a much easier task. Because this diet is all about eating and fasting frequency, you won’t have to put too much thought into the types of food you consume.

There are several different types of intermittent fasting and some are more intense than others. A common form involves a 16-hour fast. This means that you don’t eat anything for 16 hours. When you do eat, you typically should eat a large meal to fuel you throughout the entire day.

You wouldn’t do this every day but instead twice a week. There are also 24-hour fasts where you go one entire day without eating. Again, you would do this about twice a week. In some cases, fasting may involve eating very small amounts such as 500 calories worth of food.

The point of fasting is to reduce your overall calorie intake. By eating less throughout the week, you won’t have the opportunity to maintain your weight or gain weight.

Benefits of Intermittent Fasting

There are also many benefits of intermittent fasting. Fasting allows your digestive system to take a rest. Instead of exhausting energy by digesting and propelling food through your body, your digestive system can instead relax. Damaged cells also have time to repair themselves more efficiently.

Some people believe that intermittent fasting may contribute to longevity, but more scientific studies are needed to see how true these claims are. Whatever the case, intermittent fasting is a unique method of dieting that you can try whenever you feel like it.