Unlocking Your Stored Energy!

As always, I aim to help you optimize your performance with low-cost and time-efficient strategies. This week, I will take this concept to the next level by improving your performance while saving you time and money.

Let’s step back and start by understanding that your liver plays a critical role in regulating blood sugar levels and energy storage in the body. One way it does this is by storing glucose as glycogen. Glycogen is a readily available energy source that can be quickly mobilized.

However, it is crucial to note that the liver has a limited capacity to store glycogen. Once its glycogen stores are filled, any excess glucose in the bloodstream is directly converted into body fat. For this reason, it’s not as simple as more glycogen is more energy. In our modern world, people often keep adding glycogen to the extent that it can’t be used and must be stored as body fat. The system overflows as it can’t keep up.

The disadvantages of having excess body fat are numerous and worth discussing in a later edition. For now, let’s focus on how to maximize your energy!

The answer is to be found in the opposite of overflowing the system. If you don’t eat for an extended period, your body depletes glycogen stores. When your glycogen stores are low, your liver produces ketones from fatty acids. This process is known as ketosis.

Accessing ketosis

As mentioned above, this is rarely experienced in modern-day lifestyles, where overconsumption is the norm. Intermittent fasting is the best way to access this beneficial state of ketosis.

As the words intermittent fasting describe, you practice an eating pattern where you fast for at least 16 hours and eat the remaining 8. You can go more extreme, but this is a great way to start.

I recommend skipping breakfast and having your first meal at lunchtime, around 12 noon. After dinner, you can start your fast at 8 p.m. Feel free to have coffee or matcha in the morning; in the evening, you can have chamomile tea. Like water, these don’t break a fast and even aid in waking up and going to sleep.

Benefits

When your body is not using energy to digest food, it can use it to boost your performance. This supercharges your performance while saving you time and money on cooking, cleaning up, and groceries…

While the benefits of fasting are too numerous to discuss here, I want to list some of my favorites below.

1. Weight Loss & Metabolic Health: Numerous studies, including a systematic review and meta-analysis published in Obesity Reviews in 2019, have demonstrated that intermittent fasting can lead to significant weight loss and improve metabolic health parameters such as insulin sensitivity. [Source: Harris et al., 2019] 

2. Cellular Repair & Autophagy: Research published in Nature Communications in 2017 highlighted the role of fasting in promoting autophagy and cellular repair processes. The study showed that fasting-induced autophagy in multiple tissues leads to cellular rejuvenation and improved health span. [Source: Longo & Mattson, 2017]

3. Enhanced Brain Function: Studies, such as one published in Molecular Psychiatry in 2017, have demonstrated that fasting increases the production of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), a protein crucial for neuron growth, synaptic plasticity, and cognitive function. Additionally, fasting-induced ketosis has been associated with cognitive enhancement and neuroprotection. [Source: Marosi & Mattson, 2017]

4. Heart Health: Research published in JAMA Internal Medicine in 2017 found that intermittent fasting led to significant reductions in risk factors for cardiovascular disease, including blood pressure, cholesterol levels, and markers of inflammation. [Source: Gabel et al., 2017]

5. Growth Hormone: Intermittent fasting boosts growth hormone levels, aiding in fat loss and muscle preservation. Studies published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation have shown that fasting triggers spikes in growth hormone secretion, promoting fat breakdown and preserving muscle mass. This combination also increases longevity. 

Please understand your body needs some time to adjust, so increase your fast by about 1 hour a week until you reach the recommended minimum of 16 hours. You will notice everything starts to taste better, making it easier to eat healthy foods as your baseline has been reset.

I hope you try this week’s actionable strategy to supercharge your performance.

Philippe