Benefits of fasting everyone needs to know

Fasting is never an easy thing to do, at least not when the food we like is in the house. Its true that we have fasted once a time in our life, but the question is, Is it a good thing to ‘starve’ yourself each day, or a few days of the week? Well, several evidence indicates that timed periods of fasting are a good thing. it is important to know hat fasting is quite different from starvation.
What is fasting? According to Wikipedia, fasting is the willing abstinence or reduction from some or all food, drink, or both, for a period of time.
It doesn’t mean skipping a meal or not eating for 24 hours. Or not eating for three days even. The belief that meal skipping or short-term fasting causes “starvation mode” is so completely ridiculous and absurd that it makes me want to jump out the window. The beauty of fasting is that there isn’t one “right” way to do it. In fact, there are several types that are popular. And while most health practitioners are afraid to recommend eating less due to the stigma involved, it still doesn’t alleviate the incredible benefits of fasting when used sensibly.

What are the benefits of fasting

Increases Body’s Resistance to Stress 

A lot of us suffer from stress at one point or the other. Some way more than others. What causes this stress? There are a lot of different reasons that stress can be linked to.
With fasting, you will be improving your body’s resistance to stress. Stress is partially caused by free radicals in the body (unstable molecules that carry reactive electrons). Long story short, the free radicals react with other molecules in your body and change the dynamics of certain cells, leading your body to have more stress.
Fasting causes your cells to start functioning by getting energy from other sources than it would if you had a normal food supply in your body. When this happens, your body goes into a survival mode and gets rid of the bad cells and starts to replace them with healthier ones. Over a long-term period, less free radicals will be formed and your cells will be able to fight off the free radicals that do form in your body.
This will keep a chemical balance in your cells and your body, thus causing less stress.

Fasting Helps in Weight Loss 

Fasting can be a safe way to lose weight as many studies have shown that intermittent fasting – fasting that is controlled within a set number of hours – allows the body to burn through fat cells more effectively than just regular dieting.
Intermittent fasting allows the body to use fat as it’s primary source of energy instead of sugar. Many athletes now use fasting as means to hitting low body fat percentages for competitions.

Fasting can normalize ghrelin levels 

What is ghrelin? It is actually also known as the hunger hormone, because it is responsible for telling your body that it is hungry. Dieting and really restrictive eating can actually increase ghrelin production, which will leave you feeling hungrier. But when you fast, though you might struggle in the first few days, you’re actually normalizing ghrelin levels.
Eventually, you won’t feel hungry just because it’s your usual meal time. Instead, your body will become more adept in discerning when it actually needs food.

Improves Brain Function 

Sometimes when you eat, your body uses the food and goes into a bit of an overdrive, depending on what you have consumed. Over-activity of the brain can be a bad thing because there is too much firing off. There isn’t one thing that your brain can really focus on to properly function.
Fasting may cause your body to go into survival mode, as mentioned earlier, forcing your brain to have more focus on certain tasks at hand.
The changes that happen in your brain during fasting are the same that happen when you are exercising. In laymen terms, brain power can increase significantly for a certain time period.

Fasting clears the skin and prevents acne Fasting can help to clear the skin. 

With the body temporarily freed from digestion, it is able to focus its regenerative energies on other systems.

Fasting Improves Your Immune System 

Intermittent fasting improves the immune system because it reduces free radical damage, regulates inflammatory conditions in the body and starves off cancer cell formation.
In nature, when animals get sick they stop eating and instead focus on resting. This is a primal instinct to reduce stress on their internal system so their body can fight off infection. We humans are the only species who look for food when we are ill, even when we do not need it.

Fasting can lower triglyceride levels. 

When you consume too much bad cholesterol, your triglyceride levels may shoot up, increasing your risk of heart disease. Intermittent fasting actually lowers those bad cholesterol levels, decreasing triglycerides in the process. Another interesting thing to note is that fasting doesn’t affect the levels of good cholesterol in the body.

Fasting Speeds Up The Metabolism 

Intermittent fasting gives your digestive system a rest, and this can energize your metabolism to burn through calories more efficiently. If your digestion is poor, this can effect your ability to metabolize food and burn fat. Intermittent fasts can regulate your digestion and promote healthy bowel function, thus improving your metabolic function.