Harness your inner cannibal for health.

INSIGHT

Detoxing is often associated with adding “detoxifying” foods, when actually we just need to stress ourselves through starvation.

The detox-retox pendulum — this is what I called the fad (and my personal bouts) of going on strict detox retreats and coming back to “regular life” only to fall back into my binges of wine and gelato. Though I understood that “detoxing” was already a naturally-occuring function of my cells all the time as my metabolism went from regenerative (anabolic) states to breaking down (catabolic) ones, I somehow assigned the idea of “detoxing” to the idea of a time frame (like being on retreat), a week of juicing, or even a specific food type (i.e. cruciferous vegetables) that had been touted to have “detoxifying properties.”. It wasn’t really until intermittent fasting became a ‘thing’ and even later when the science of autophagy came out (winning the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 2016) did it start sinking in that the only true way to detox is to cannibalize yourself.

Because that’s what autophagy is: inducing enough stress so that the body, in it’s intelligent conservation of energy consumption, begins to move from digesting food particles to digesting pathogens to eventually digesting itself (old cells and even spaces that serve no functional purpose but still linger inside tissues and organs). As mentioned, this is always an active process but becomes particularly valuable in response to stress or nutrient deprivation — eliminating the damaged cells that can trigger inflammation and contribute to a plethora of diseases.

Cells begins to clear out through this mass recycling, regulating our mitochondria (powerhouse cells) and providing other cells the much needed energy and molecular building blocks to encourage repair, grow, stabilize our DNA and prevent damage to healthy cells. That’s why you often experience extra alertness after practiced cycles of fasting (key word: practiced…it’s no party train the first time around, especially if have a lot of clearing to do).

As a potential therapy for fighting cancer, neurodegenerative and cardiovascular diseases, this area of medicine is ripe for more investigation. In the meantime, incorporating (slowly) fasting techniques can be an excellent way to sensitize your body to all the extra weight it’s carrying. (By the way, it’s a myth that you would die in 3 days without water — dry fasting is apparently 1-3 times as effective as a water fast. But proceed with proper training!).

INSPIRATION

Author, speaker, writer and fitness enthusiast Siim Land has created a meal + workout + fasting regimen that combines periods of fasting with cyclical keto food plans that can increase the positive effects of autophagy while avoiding the negative side effects. He’s got a great YouTube channel that explains the science along with his personal experience with this lifestyle — designing the program from principles and trial-and-error -- not only theory.

Siim Land is a best-selling author, anthropologist, entrepreneur, high-performance coach and a biohacker who writes about optimizing health and human performance. This book incorporates daily lifestyle and dietary practices that help to cross the chasm between longevity and high performance.

INNOVATION

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