If you’ve been involved in or following any type of health and wellness community these days, it’s likely you’ve been hearing the words “intermittent fasting”.  Perhaps you’ve tried it, or perhaps you veer away from it for various reasons such as, fear of hangry-ness, low blood sugar, or simply to not miss out on the joy of eating.  Taking long breaks in between meals isn’t typically something we look forward to doing in our consumer culture.  So why would we start?

Autophagy, that’s why!
In this podcast episode Cate Stillman breaks down the What, Where, When, Why, and How of intermittent fasting and autophagy.  It’s not only to lose weight, it’s also to be in autophagy.  In autophagy, we deeply digest so much more than food!  And as we digest more fully and at the cellular level, we feel more space to experience our best life.  Listen in to learn the ayurvedic approach to intermittent fasting and the best way to enter autophagy for your specific body type.

What you’ll get out of tuning in:

• What time to close the kitchen.
• How to let your body feel empty.
• How to fast for your body type.
• What is autophagy?
• How to get into autophagy.
• How to digest ama and emotions through autophagy.

Links/CTA:

• Cate references Dr. Mindy’s research on why it is important to have days where we don’t go into deeper autophagy.
• Cate mentions a quote about research done on Urine Therapy

Highlights:

• Cate shares appropriate intermittent fasting for all body types.
• Understanding the two center channels – physical food carrying channel (maha vaha srota) vs. subtle energy carrying channel (sushumna).
• Cate explains the health benefits on a cellular level and why we want to get into autophagy.

Timestamps:

• [2:53 – 7:10]: Breakdown of the body types
• [7:10 – 14:12 ]:  Understanding the 2 main channels  
• [14:16 – 16:02 ]:  Fasting for wind people/vatas/catabolic ectomorphs
• [16:12 – 18:18]:  Fasting for fire people/pittas/metabolic mesomorphs
• [19:03 – 20:02]:  Fasting for earth people/kaphas/anabolic endomorphs
• [20:10 – 24:34]:  What is happening on the cellular level during autophagy
• [24:52 – 27:44]:  Description of ama and how to digest it through autophagy
• [27:55 – 37:44]:  The different types of digestion
• [38:59 – 43:53]:  Processing emotions through digestion

Quotes:

• “Unity love’s duality.”
• “With the subtle digestion that happens with autophagy, when we allow digestion to rest, and the cells to digest what’s in them, is a subtler level of consciousness.”
• “When we are empty in the food carrying channel, we can be very full in the 
• “Ama equals stuff that is getting in the way.”
• “You can’t get into self-maintenance mode without fasting”
• “Remember, all body types are capable of sama agni.”
• “Don’t fight the operating speed.  Cooperate with the operating speed.”  
• “You might hit a deeper level and what happens is that these addictive cravings come up.  Why? Because you don’t want to digest whatever is arising.”