World Health Day: What Buddha can teach us about fasting, weight loss and better health

As someone who had constantly struggled with losing weight, food remained a constant battle until I came across a little book called Buddha’s Diet: The Ancient Art of Losing Weight Without Losing Your Mind’. Written by Zen follower Dan Zigmond along with Tara Cottrell, it doesn’t focus on ‘what’ to eat but ‘when’. Timing is the key here.

And why it’s called the Buddha’s diet is interesting. Buddha set a rule for his followers to only eat from dawn till noon and nothing after that. Was the founder of Buddhism also the first propagator of intermittent fasting? It’s possible!

Research has shown that intermittent fasting has benefits, such as helping you lose weight, improving blood pressure and resting heart rate, along with helping with tissue health and physical performance. It also helps with thinking and memory, studies have shown.

While Buddha lived at a different time, and the modern lifestyle makes it difficult, if not impossible, to stop eating post-noon unless you are anti-ageing propagator Bryan Johnson, Zigmond’s suggestions are more practical.

What is Buddha’s diet?

In this book, the authors suggest you start eating in a 13-hour window, say from 8 am till 9 pm, and the idea is to gradually reduce it to 9 hours, which means having breakfast at 9 am and dinner by 6 pm. The good news: You can eat whatever you feel like, as long as you’re eating in this 9-hour window. The focus is more on the ‘when’ than on the ‘what’.

Having said that, the authors make some useful recommendations, such as protein keeps one full longer than carbs, it’s better to stay away from sugar and processed foods, and eating whole grains is better than refined ones.

Also, the simple act of mindfulness can be extremely helpful.

Mindful eating

Practicing mindfulness is a crucial tenet of Buddhism, and it appears, that the same can also bring benefits when it comes to food, health, and well-being.

Just pay attention to what you are eating and why, and its impact on your body. For example, in moments of stress, some tend to eat more and generally gravitate towards unhealthy food choices. Just taking a step back, and paying attention to the ‘what’ and ‘why’—it will help you save some extra calories and also inculcate healthier food habits.

Cottrell and Zigmond’s Buddha’s Diet also allows you to “cheat” (on your diet) once a week when one can eat beyond the 9-hour window. It helps in resetting, making the ‘diet’ not feel like a burden.

I’ve tried the Buddha’s diet, and it helps. For more, reading Cottrell and Zigmond’s Buddha’s Diet can help. 

Health