Here are some books, articles and videos that influenced me:

1) Science of Fasting (56 mins, 2016, Documentary, on YouTube) — Amazon (free with Prime). I'd recommend this documentary to everybody, not only those interested in water fasting. Towards the end, they explain why 1-day or 2-day fasts are being introduced as a preparatory step for chemotherapy in US hospitals. Overall, this documentary presents an overview of water fasting and the (limited) science behind it. It does not go into details of what happens day by day, or week by week, or what symptoms arise, and so on.

2) Fasting - Safe and Effective Use of an Ancient Powerful Healing Therapy (DVD, 55 mins, 2011) by Dr Michael Klaper. I watched this DVD way back in 2012, the year I first learnt of Whole-Food Plant-Based Diet. From this DVD, I remembered that if we're healthy (disease free), then we can do a 7-day water-only fast comfortably by ourselves; anything longer should be supervised by a qualified doctor. Of course, if we are on any medication, even the first day should be supervised.

Why Do You Recommend Water Fasting? (YouTube, 25 mins) by Dr Klaper covers some of the main points in the DVD above. Very helpful!

3) How and When to be your Own Doctor by Dr Isabelle Moser & Steve Solomon (1997, 192 pages). The authors have made it freely available online. A printed copy is available at Amazon. Chapter 3 of this book has a fairly detailed description of water fasting. That's the chapter I read. Of particular interest to me was a section called The Stages of Fasting which outlines what happens to our body, day after day, week after week. In the third week of the fast, when I experienced inflammation and swelling around my right big toe, I was drawn to another section: Retracing.

4) Articles and videos by Michael Klaper and Alan Goldhamer: Both are from TrueNorth Health Center, Santa Rosa, CA. This center has conducted guided fasts for decades. Dozens of YouTube videos in the form of interviews and lectures are available. For example, see this interview with Michael Klaper. A general overview of water fasting is presented here: Benefits of Fasting by Alan Goldhamer. Why Do You Recommend Water Fasting? (YouTube, 25 mins) by Dr Klaper covers many key points in Q&A format.

5) Benefits of Fasting (1977) by Paul Martin traces the history of fasting in various cultures. This article helped me realize that fasting has been practiced worldwide for ages.

6) Misc articles: The articles below are light reading, not as detailed as the book by Moser & Solomon linked above.

Good article with guidelines by Tanglewood Wellness Center in Costa Rica; they regularly conduct guided water fasts. This article convinced me that it was okay not to exercise during the fast for muscle conservation, and that I should focus on rest.

Warnings When Doing A Water Fast is a non-technical overview of what to expect during a water fast.

What Medical Doctors Say About Fasting has lots of references.

7) Misc Books: I haven't read any of these but they have good reviews on Amazon and get mentioned in fasting articles.

The Fasting Cure (1911, 34 pages) by Upton Sinclair. This 100-year old book is freely available here and here, for example.

Books by Herbert Shelton: The Science and Fine Art of Fasting (1963, 476 pages) and Fasting Can Save Your Life (1978, 188 pages). Herbert Shelton is mentioned often in the book by Moser and Solomon.

Fasting and Eating for Health (1998, 255 pages) by Joel Fuhrman. Even though I haven't read this book, the fact that Joel Fuhrman wrote a book on fasting convinced me that there's something of value here. Joel Fuhrman is one of the top 6-7 doctors who are vocal advocates of Whole-Food Plant-Based Diet. He has penned down NYTimes bestselling books. I like his talks. In his 20s, Joel Fuhrman was a world-class figure skater. To cure himself of a debilitating heel injury, he did a 46-day water fast with Herbert Shelton and fully recovered.

[Update in March 2019] A few weeks after I had finished my fast, a friend pointed me to Interview with Fuhrman where Fuhrman explains that his 46-day fast nearly killed him! My personal understanding of what probably happened is as follows. Fuhrman went down from 150 lbs to 88 lbs, a loss of 62 lbs. When he started, Fuhrman was a world-class figure skater (training for the Olympics), so I imagine that he had a lot of muscle and not a lot of extra fat on his body. Water fasting articles explain that within a small number of days, our body goes into 'fat-burning mode'. After some days, when little fat remains, our body starts consuming muscle (and maybe bone?). Not the literature on water fasting is scant but as far as I can tell, water fasting guidelines don't encourage us to continue fasting beyond this point. So for somebody as fit as Fuhrman and weighing only 150 lbs, a 46-day fast seems too long! I imagine that his fasting supervisor (Herbert Shelton) had some good reasons but I haven't found them in any article or video yet.

This article: The Five Stages of Fasting - Dr Nikolayev [Russian Case Studies] mentions this book Postul Negru in Romanian by Thierry de Lestrade. The Romanian book describes the water fasting research done by Dr Nikolayev (who is mentioned in "Science of Fasting" documentary).

Note: I didn't find Reddit and Quora discussions helpful. I even posted a question on a FaceBook group on Water Fasting; the answers I got didn't seem to be in harmony with the guidelines mentioned in the books and videos above. I realized that over the years, people have disovered myriad variations of a pure 'water-only' fast by introducing liquids like {teas, broths, honey}, enemas, colon cleansing, salt water flushing, coffee or other substances. Many of these are to be consumed in response to symptoms that arise. From the articles that I was attracted to, I gathered that a water-only fast should really be 'water-only'. At the same time, the variations do have their uses, depending upon the person and their circumstances. For myself, I decided to embark on a pure 'water-only fast'.

TrueNorth Health Center in Santa Rosa, California is led by Dr Alan Goldhamer and Dr Michael Klaper. This center has been conducting medically supervised fasts for decades. Both doctors are friends with John McDougall who runs the Dr McDougall's Health and Medical Center in Santa Rosa, California. John McDougall is one of the top 6-7 doctors who advocate the Whole-Food Plant-Based Diet.

Tanglewood Wellness Center in Costa Rica conducts guided fasts.

The "Science of Fasting" documentary mentions two institutes that conduct guided fasts: Goryachinsk Sanitorium in Russia (see this link as well), and the Buchinger Clinic in Germany.

Dr Gracie's Wellness Clinic in OH, USA conducts multi-day water fasts.

The protocols followed in the above clinics are different. I am not familiar with details but here are some examples. The Russian clinic encourages exercise and movement. I'm not 100% sure but I think they ask you to consume nothing more than plain water. The German clinic employs the Buchinger Method which includes teas, broths and juices. In contrast, Herbert Shelton (who is quoted often by Moser and Solomon in their book) used to emphasize fasts with plain water alone, without teas, without enemas, without salt water flushes and so on.

The presence of multiple fasting clinics worldwide run by certified doctors strengthened my belief that there was something valuable in water fasting, if done carefully.

The Stages of Fasting (a section in Chapter 3 in the book by Moser and Solomon) emphasizes that two stages are critical and should be taken seriously: preparation and re-feeding.

Preparation is tricky. I remember Michael Klaper's remark in some video, 'If you've been eating meat or white bread in the days leading to the fast, you'll get stones in your intestines within a few days of water fasting' (!) Some article mentioned that during a water fast, our body starts expelling toxins from various body parts. So if we're very toxic inside, the organs that filter out these toxins (the kidneys, for example), can get overwhelmed. So a highly toxic individual should not even attempt a water-only fast; it's plain dangerous.

So the question for me was, 'How do I know that I am not so toxic that my internal organs will get overwhelmed?' :) Is there a test for toxicity? Maybe...

At the end of the day, we all make judgment calls and take risks. My judgment call to move ahead was based on two things:

1. I've followed a Whole-Food Plant-Based Diet (advocated by doctors like Ornish, Esselstyn, Greger, McDougall, Barnard, Fuhrman) since 2012. So my food for the last 7 years has been meat-free and dairy-free. I try to eat simple food but haven't managed to be consistent. I avoid obviously oily food and I avoid processed food.

   In the 6-8 weeks leading to my fast, my food habits had been quite reasonable. I had been overeating but the actual food that I was eating was okay.

2. I have some prior practice with fasting. Since 2012, I had done juice fasts for 10, 15, 17 and 21 days, respectively. And I had done a 3-day water-only fast (2013) and a 6-day water-only fast (2017). Here are some links to my personal experiences: 10-Day Juice Fast (2012), 3-day Water Fast (2013), 6-Day Water Fast (2017). I didn't write about the other juice fasts except that I went to Half Dome (16 miles round-trip, 4800 ft hike) on Day 20 of a juice fast (2016).

   How do these fasts compare with each other? I would say that my first ever 10-day juice fast was like a 'moderate 5-mile hike', all other fasts (including the 21-day juice fast and the 6-day water-only fast) were like a 'stroll in a park' but the 26-day water-only fast was like a 'difficult 12-mile, cross-country hike which needed some route finding skills as well'.

On the whole, my decision to go ahead with an extended water-only fast was based on intuition. My instinct told me that I would be just fine. Also, I had about 30 days in mind but I didn't set the number of days in stone; I told myself that I'll break my fast whenever symptoms arise that indicate that I ought to break it.

This section contains descriptions of my struggles and challenges during the 26-day water-only fast. Such struggles are an integral part of every water fasting experience. If you're likely to feel uncomfortable reading about bodily pains and misery, you may skip this section.

Water only: Throughout my fast, I just drank tap water. Michael Klaper from TrueNorth Health Center in Santa Rosa mentions that they do not trust tap water; they recommend water treated by reverse osmosis or distilled water. You could search for 'water distiller' on Amazon to buy one. I kept drinking tap water because it tasted right to me. And I've heard that the water quality near my home is good.

One day, I did think of buying plastic bottles with distilled water. However, the idea of throwing away so much plastic into trash for a simple water fast didn't appeal to me.

Other than water, I took some salt (1/2 tbsp) on 6-7 different days. This was my only deviation from a 'pure water-only fast'. Was occasional salt intake required or helpful? Don't know.

Showers: I took daily showers for the first 20 days or so. Then it became once in two days.

Brushing Teeth: I regularly brushed my teeth every night. Around Day 20 or so, this became once every other day. At some point of time, around Day 15, I stopped using toothpaste; it had started tasting yucky.

Entertainment: Internet and YouTube videos. I saw a couple of NetFlix movies in the first two weeks, then completely stopped. During the last ten days, I consciously decided to watch comedy videos, a light-hearted Hindi movie from 1970s and listen to some of my favorite songs: classical and semi-classical Hindi movie songs from 1950s - 1970s.

I had read that during water fasts, we become emotionally more and more sensitive. So I consciously stayed away from emotional videos and negative videos.

Dreams of Food: Starting the fourth or the fifth day, my dreams had food in them! This lasted about 5-6 days. Such dreams resurfaced in the fourth week. In some dream, I was with my brother in a house with cooking going on in a verandah. In another dream, I was cooking with some friends. In another, I was probably in a restaurant :) During waking hours, I didn't have any food cravings but during night time, my subconscious was remembering food!

Sleep: My sleep cycle was pretty lousy. I wish I had fixed it during the fast. I used to sleep between midnight and 2am. I used to wake up at around 8am. And I used to wake up once in between for a restroom break.

Meditation: Ideally, an extended water-only fast should be done in an environment with prayer and meditation. I didn't do it this way. My mind was busy with office work for the first 2-3 weeks, and I watched YouTube videos for entertainment.

Silence: During the last 7 days of fasting and the first 3 days of re-feeding, I actually didn't talk to anybody except a couple of sentences with a cashier at Whole Foods. No talking via phone calls or Google Hangouts or WhatsApp either. I did respond to some emails and WhatsApp messages. This was not a conscious decision; it just happened. I have some prior experience with silence — at the 10-day Vipassana retreats, we keep silent for the first 9 days. And I was generally a quiet kid in childhood, so silence comes naturally to me. In fact, I can sense that talking actually requires energy. It would be nice if I could talk only when something meaningful has to be discussed, and talk using hand gestures and facial expressions otherwise :) That may sound weird but that would be the most comfortable state of being for me.

Office Work: For the first two weeks, I felt just fine. Even though I was feeling tired, I was able to go to office and be as productive as before. However, by the beginning of the third week, my productivity started dropping; it became challenging to pick up new pieces of work and get them done. For the fourth week, I took vacation. And I needed two more days of vacation in week 5 to fully recover.

Physical Activity Levels: As the fast progressed, my tiredness kept increasing. At work, I am a software engineer. For the first two weeks, I could do software engineering related work just fine. I could conduct and attend meetings as well. By the third week, I was losing the ability to sit in a chair for long durations of time and write new pieces of software; code reviews and email replies were okay. By the end of the third week and throughout the fourth week, sitting on a chair was out of question; just getting out of bed was becoming a chore. I had to tell myself mentally, 'Okay, I am going to get up and I am going to the restroom', and about 2 minutes later, I would actually get up.

Physical Balance and Mental Alertness: I never wobbled or felt dizzy or nauseous. My movements became progressively sluggish but I always steady. Nothing ever slipped out of my hands. Michael Klaper mentions in his videos that if his patients start experiencing such symptoms, it's time to break the fast.

Mentally, I was always alert. I never forgot to pick up something or forget to do something. The changes I experienced were physical: sluggishness, tiredness, fatigue. I just wanted to be in bed and rest.

Bowel Movements: On days 1, 2, 6, 9 and 13. On other days, I had no bowel movement. When I broke my fast with juice, bowel movements restarted (and I felt relieved).

Stomach Churn and Acidity: I didn't really feel hungry for the first several days. About one week into the fast, I started experiencing stomach churn and a fair amount of acidity. This lasted almost a week. I remembered this book I had read in 2007: Your Body's Many Cries for Water which said that we should drink water if we experience acidity. Well, the water fasting articles say the same thing: keep drinking water :)

Stomach acidity lasted the whole of second week for me; it subsided in the third week but resurfaced in a milder form in the fourth week. As per The Stages of Fasting, I was experiencing the third stage called 'acidosis'. Among the various symptoms mentioned in the article, I luckily experienced only one: fatigue.

Gas and Discomfort: The last 8 to 10 days of my fast were marked by gas and discomfort. I felt gassy all the time. My last bowel movement was on Day 13. So I imagined that my body was attempting to expel what was in my stomach but it couldn't do so via the usual route through the intestines. So whatever was in my stomach was simply putrefying. It wasn't a good feeling. It was during these days that I browsed through online articles and learnt about different techniques that people attempted to handle such a situation: with a salt-water flush (drink a fair bit of salt water; it induces bowel movement) or with an enema or even by self-induced vomiting after drinking salt water (a Yogic practice called Kunjal Kriya is exactly that). None of these options appealed to me. I learnt that Herbert Shelton would not have advised any of these interventions. His philosophy was to let the body be; it will do what it has to do to take care of itself. And I was not so uncomfortable that desperate measures were called for; I could wait this out.

Itchiness: For several days in weeks three and four, I had itchiness in my lower back, my legs and arms. Fasting articles explain that we expel toxins from our skin too. The itchiness was tolerable; it was not severe. In the grand scheme of things, this was a mild discomfort, something I could easily ignore.

Tongue Color: I didn't pay any attention to my tongue. Perchance, I noticed on Day 21 that it was white! Online articles explained that this was normal. My tongue returned to its original color only by the fourth day of re-feeding.

Toe Inflammation: On Day 20, I developed some pain in my right big toe. It increased on Day 21; my big toe was visibly swollen. I'd experienced such inflammation and swelling before; my primary care physician had thought it was gout (!) but a specialist later had emphatically ruled out gout; she characterized it as 'hyperuricimia' — basically, if my uric levels increase, then they start crystallizing and cause such pain. I connected some dots and realized that my body is telling me that it's actually dehydrated; my urine color was a clear indicator; I had not been drinking enough water. What a mistake! At this juncture, I had to make a judgment call: should I seek help from a Western medical doctor or should I simply continue my water fast regimen? I was in no mood to meet a medical doctor; I imagined that they might place me on some intravenous saline drip or feed me something else via blood for rapid assimilation, then give me some chemicals to make my toe swelling subside; this would lay waste my entire water fasting effort so far.

It was at this point that I stumbled upon the documentary "Science of Fasting". Somebody in an online forum had mentioned that this documentary contains a remark about gout and rhematoid arthritis: that when such pains arise, they subside in a mere 48 hours. I watched the documentary. And yes, they do mention that patients with gout or rheumatoid arthritis (RA) replay their symptoms but they subside within 24 to 36 hours. Wow! I knew I didn't have gout or RA; I don't know much about these diseases but I believed these would be tougher to tackle than simple hyperuricimia. So I placed my faith in water fasting literature and waited. And within 36 hours, the pain actually went away. But a new pain arose somewhere all over my right ankle. For this pain, my intuition told me that I probably have been placing my weight on my foot in a wrong way for years (the usual culprits: overpronation, collapsed arch, etc) and that my body was attempting to correct itself somehow. This pain also subsided in about 2 days.

Unable to Walk: From Day 21 - 26, I had serious difficulties in walking due to the right big toe inflammation and the ankle pain that developed. Both subsided very quickly, within 2 days of arising, but 2 days is a long time when the body is tired and our perception of time has slowed down. Plus I was experiencing gassiness. And day by day, I was getting progressively tired. During these days, I had to make judgment calls for handling each symptom I was facing. And I wanted to keep taking showers, at least once every two days.

Positivity: Days 21-26 were emotionally challenging. I had unshakeable faith in the protocol that I was following. I kept calm. Many times, I reminded myself, 'I am fine; I will be fine.'

Breaking the Fast: On Days 25 and 26, I could intuit that I could actually continue fasting for many more days.. maybe 35 to 40. I also understood that I wasn't done yet; my body was still in the middle of detoxification. However, I was growing weaker and facing walking difficulties. With the help of a support person or under medical supervision, I could have continued. Also, I wanted to return to work; I had already taken leave for a week and that had delayed my project by about 10 days. Keeping all these factors in mind, I decided to break the fast after 26 days.

Getting Help: In order to break my fast, I actually needed some fresh fruits and vegetables. I had not anticipated that I would encounter walking difficulties when I break my fast.

I have a good friend who half-knew what I was doing. I pinged him and learnt that he was in New York and would return early morning on Saturday. He also sounded busy and I didn't wish to impose upon him. I then wondered, 'Whom should I ask for help at this point of time?'

Fasting articles mention that as water fasts progress, we become emotionally sensitive and start picking up energies of people that we interact with. Keeping this in mind, I wanted help from somebody who was calm, joyful and understanding. Somebody who would simply get me some fruits and vegetables without asking me any questions, without even talking to me, then just let me be.

I actually have dozens of acquaintances but I was worried that if I were to invite them into my life at this juncture (Day 26), they would have no clue what was going on and would grow anxious. They might tell three other friends. Collectively, I expected them to start giving me advice and start making decisions for me, for example, that I should immediately be hospitalized and be in touch with a medical doctor. They may even insist on seeing me in person and drop by my place to influence me. I did not have sufficient physical or emotional energy to tackle such people and explain to them what I knew and what I was doing.

Luckily, a name crossed my mind… a friend I had met 2-3 months ago. He has also done the same meditation retreats as me, he follows exactly the same food habits as me and he's a joyful fellow! I pinged him on WhatsApp. Without asking me any questions, he said 'Yes, I can get fruits and vegetables for you.. but only by evening.' He was volunteering for a children's meditation course until afternoon. I felt relieved.

… but I didn't want to wait until Saturday evening … I wanted to break my fast on Saturday morning itself.

Grocery Shopping: On Saturday morning, I drove to Whole Foods and Trader Joe's to buy groceries. In hindsight, this was a huge mistake. I should not have done this. I wore a pair of shoes without any cushioning and without any arch support.. this triggered inflammation in my heel. This inflammation was not fasting related; it is an overuse injury that triggers due to improper footwear or overuse, something that has bothered me for the last 18 months.

During grocery shopping, I noticed some muscle cramps in my calves. I knew these would go away soon after I intake some salts via juices, fruits or veggies.

The Stages of Fasting (a section in Chapter 3 in the book by Moser and Solomon) emphasizes that re-feeding is a critical phase in a water-only fast and should be handled with care. For a 26-day fast, Moser and Solomon recommend consuming juices for 3-4 days, then slowly introducing fruits and veggies. I decided to do the same. But what juice should I drink? Through some videos and articles, I learnt that watermelon and celery juice is given at TrueNorth Health Center in Santa Rosa for breaking a fast.

Day 1: I prepared watermelon and celery juice on Saturday noon. I carefully removed all watermelon seeds before juicing it. It took me 25 minutes to consume about 3/4 of a cup. I had my second cup about 3 hours later, sipping slowly, gulp by gulp. In the evening, I had a third cup. This time, I added some carrot.

On the evening of Day 1 of re-feeding, I had bowel movements. I was relieved. The same night, I could sense that my stomach was churning. My intuition told me that if I continue having juices for the next 2-3 days, I'm going to have the same digestive reactions for the next 2-3 days: some juice will get absorbed but I'll keep having loose motions. I felt that the right thing to do would be to start eating boiled veggies and actual fruit from Day 2 onwards. This way, my digestive system would be back on track quickly.

Day 2: I prepared a soup with sweet potato, celery, kale, onion and ginger. At noon, I could consume only one small bowl and I felt full. I consumed another bowl at around 2:30pm. I also ate a banana and a peeled apple. In the evening, I prepared another soup. This time, I introduced radish, some turmeric and some black pepper. I overate and quickly felt uneasy. I also felt that radish was not right for me at this point of time; it probably over-stimulates my stomach.

Day 3: I introduced brown rice and spices into my foods. In the morning, I prepared a porridge of boiled brown rice + finely diced apple + banana + 2 walnuts. In the afternoon, I made another soup with sweet potato, celery, kale, chard, turnip, onion, ginger, some black pepper and some turmeric powder. In the evening, I prepared a similar soup again.

On Day 3, I also got regular bowel movements. By evening, I felt agility in my body. I felt that I was back to 'almost normal'.

Day 4: I introduced beans: split moong beans. And I introduced more spices and seeds. By the end of Day 4, my meals had all of these components: grains, beans, veggies, fruits, nuts and seeds. I felt that the re-feeding phase of my fast was also over.

From Days 2 to 4, I allowed my intuition to guide my food choices. For example, I was drawn to potatoes and bananas, and I really wanted onion and ginger in the soup. I should have done the same for Day 1 as well by allowing my intuition to choose the fruits and vegetables for juicing; I had followed the TrueNorth Center protocol instead.

Instinct and Curiosity: A big reason why I did such a long fast was instinct and curiosity. I first heard of water fasting in 2012. I heard doctors saying that such fasts are nothing short of miracles in terms of their healing power! So I was curious: how is it done and how does it help? Over the years, I gravitated towards longer and longer water-only fasts (3-day in 2013, 6-day in 2017). In 2019, my curiosity finally got satisfied.

When I broke the fast, I knew that I was not done; I had broken it midway. So maybe I'll try it again in a few years from now, with help from a few support persons.

Support Person and Medical Supervision: The first three weeks were relatively easy for me. The fourth week was challenging. A support person would have been very helpful. Other than Achilles tendonitis and a bone spur in my right heel, I don't have chronic problems like diabetes or auto-immune. So I felt confident that I could do it by myself. Even though it worked out fine for me, my decision was risky because medical supervision is recommended beyond 7 days.

Positivity & Calmness: The last 7 days of the fast required a fair bit of positivity and calmnness. I would go to the extent of saying that somebody should attempt an extended water-only fast only if they are infused with positivity inside which they can sustain day after day. Otherwise, there is the possibility of hurting yourself.

Positivity can be generated from within or may be derived from the environment — for example, a support person with a calm and understanding disposition would be wonderful.

Spending Time in Bed: In a long long time, I haven't been so sick that I needed to lie in bed for successive days. The water fasting experience helped me get some insights into the minds of those who are sick, how they must feel and what kind of mental techniques they would need to keep themselves going. I also got some insight into how somebody with very low energy feels and what kind of support they would need in their condition.

Comparison with Other Experiences: Actually, I don't have too many life experiences that required a combination of physical and mental stamina. The only experience that comes to mind is the first time I climbed Mt Whitney — it's the tallest peak in continental USA, about 14,500 ft high. Beyond 12,000 ft, I was affected by thin air. A headache had kicked in (our brain swells during such climbs). The higher I climbed, the slower I became. The last 0.75 miles took one hour of laborious walking. I had to employ mental tricks to keep trudging along, step by step, without being off balance. The second time I climbed Mt Whitney (via the High Sierra Trail), I had similar symptoms but I was mentally prepared — I knew what was going on, so it was easy :)

The challenges in an extended water fast were different and far more difficult than climbing Mt Whitney. A Whitney climb is only a few hours long; an extended water fast continues for many days. More importantly, at Whitney, it was about drawing energy from within, using that energy to keep myself focused, staying sharp and controlling my gait, step by step. In contrast, an extended water fast was not about generating energy and controlling anything (I had little idea what was really going on inside my body); it was more about conserving energy, allowing my body to take care of itself and keeping myself calm and positive — a lot of 'non-doing' — just resting and letting things be, with a firm faith that 'I am doing fine; I will be fine'.

Detoxing: Did I detox? Don't know. Maybe. I haven't done any tests to quantify what happened. I can say that I breathe much better and my skin feels smoother to touch. And that I have a fair amount of calmness right now. At the very least, my taste buds have been reset. So I can now follow excellent food habits for several months.

The spectrum below comes to my mind:

A) Intermittent Fasting (IF) or Time Restricted Feeding (TRF): In TRF, we limit our calorie intake to about 8 hours every day (for example, 8am, then 12noon, then 4pm) and we don't eat anything for about 16 hours (for example, from 4pm in the afternoon to 8am the next day). Luckily, a survey paper was published in 2018 that summarizes research in IF and TRF: Flipping the Metabolic Switch: Understanding and Applying Health Benefits of Fasting, published in Obesity, 26(2):254—268 in April 2018. Dr Greger is also preparing a video series to summarize research related to IF, TRF and so on (watch this video for 1 min) — hopefully, these videos will be published before 2020.

B) Extended Water-Only Fasting: the theme of this article.

C) No-Food, No-Water Fast: Aha! That's the kind of fast Buddha did for 6 days under a tree, as he was in deep meditation in a state of mind which I cannot even fathom right now.

Here is another example but contemporary: The Mountain Monks of Mt Hiei are probably the highest-caliber endurance athletes of the modern world whose feats are relatively unknown. We have some insight into their practices via a documentary from early 2000s and some articles like this one — search for the term "doiri" in this article to see what I'm referring to. You are bound to be blown away and wonder, 'why?' :)

Big Picture: As we go from A → B → C, the benefits keep growing exponentially: the mind keeps getting stronger and stronger. In other words, the mind keeps becoming 'calmer and calmer'. At the same time, these protocols become harder and harde. In other words, the protocols become 'more and more dangerous if undertaken without adequate knowledge and preparation; we also need some grace and divine blessings'. Also, knowledge about these protocols keeps getting scanter and scanter; fewer and fewer people in the world know how to do them. Finally, the kind of body and mind needed to successfully negotiate these protocols keeps getting more and more refined. As mentioned earlier, the mind keeps getting stronger and stronger (in other words, 'calmer and calmer'). My personal strategy is to keep making forward progress but in careful, measured steps, through a combination of education, self awareness, intuition and guidance.

A good next step for me would be to adopt TRF (Time Restricted Feeding) into my life.