Imagine you have a water tank that leaks. Each day it leaks out 500ml of water and you pour in 700ml. After 365 years, your water tank would have gained 73 litres!
Control the input
We spend our best hours at work. We spend the other waking hours split between family, friends, entertainment and others. A Singaporean may sometimes struggle to find time to exercise. But you can control the input, just like with the water tank.
The conventional wisdom of “3 square meals” is better used as a guideline. Early humans subsisted on fruits and nuts, and a successful hunt occasionally brings them a “decent” meal. Feeling underfed was common. These days we have the opposite: overfed and physically underworked. Unlike penguins and seals living in snow and arctic waters, we humans are not meant to grow overly chubby.
Health benefits of meal skipping
You can skip a few meals each week and still be perfectly healthy. Healthier even. Here are a few benefits at a glance: better heart health, disposal of damaged cells and proteins in the body, faster metabolism, enhances the body’s use for fat (turning fat into energy) and better blood sugar management. And weight loss, obviously, which may be your goal.
A normal weight human can go roughly 3 weeks without food. That is of course a bit extreme. While talking about extreme, there was once a Angus Barbieri who fasted 382 days – a full year and 17 days! – under close medical supervision. He consumed only coffee, tea, water, sparkling water, vitamins and yeast extract. He slimmed down to 82kg from 214kg. A study 7 years after his fast found him healthy and without any long-term ill-effects from the drastic fasting.
Only the underweight will suffer any sort of ill effects from meal skipping.
Primary school mathematics for weight loss
Weight control is simple mathematics. Calorie in larger than out, you gain weight. Calorie out larger than in, you lose weight. When you feel you are unable to control the output (exercise), keep in mind the input was always up to you.
