Intermittent Fasting and Ayurveda: “If You Can’t Manage 16 to 8, There’s Something Called the 3-1 Rule”

world: Intermittent fasting is in fashion. Does this make sense from an Ayurvedic perspective?

Ulrich Bohover: Intermittent fasting is an invention of Ayurveda. It stimulates what is called autophagy – the disposal of waste products in the body’s cells. Japanese scientist Yoshinori Ohsumi deciphered the biochemical processes of autophagy and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2016. The term autophagy comes from Greek and means something like self-consumption. In cells, misfolded proteins are broken down and converted into amino acids. From this, new proteins are built again. The body, as it were, consumes itself, and this is a sustainable recycling method. There is always some basic level of autophagy in our cells. Intermittent fasting, for example according to the 16-8 rule, stimulates autophagy. This method can be derived from a basic ayurvedic statement: food should never be eaten before the previous meal has been digested.

world: But intermittent fasting is only effective if you completely avoid eating any snack during the 16-hour fasting phase?