Fasting: The Break

Go to a room in your house or apartment that you’re intimately familiar with. Wherever you spend the most time when you’re at home.

Once you’re there, sit wherever you’re most comfortable and set an alarm for two minutes.

Now close your eyes and sit still.

Once your alarm goes off, open your eyes and look around you.

Notice what’s hanging up on the walls. Take a good look at the furniture, the windows, the countertops.

Pause on one area in particular for a minute before moving on to the next.

Use every sense you have to experience that familiar space in new ways. Don't just glance. Really look. Listen. Smell. Touch.

Congratulations. You’ve just gotten a taste of what it’s like to break a 25-day water fast.

A whole new (old) world

Once we become so used to what’s around us in the spaces we frequent every day, we stop thinking about how those spaces are situated.

We don't think about the way the carpet feels on our bare feet. We don’t appreciate the subtle ways the light hits off the walls at night and creates shadows that dance across them.

We overlook our surroundings, tune out white noise, and don’t make time to breathe in the aromas that waft around our homes.

The same goes for food.

When you get so used to eating 3-4 square meals a day, food itself becomes just another routine.

You plan your meals in advance, which takes time and brainpower. Then you sit down to eat as fast as possible because you have deadlines to meet, emails to send, and responsibilities to juggle.

Or you just wing it and stop for fast food on weeknights because you don’t want to think about what your next meal is going to be.

You’d rather just stuff your face full of whatever gut-bombing mystery meat the food factory of your choosing shoves through your car window at the drive-thru.

But when you give up thinking about food entirely for three weeks, all your thought patterns change. You’re no longer organizing your days around when and what you’re going to eat.

You no longer have to stress about getting the right nutrients inside your body to fuel whatever kind of lifestyle you want to live.

Which means once you break your fast and start eating again, everything you put in your mouth is the best freakin’ food you’ve ever had in your life!

My breaking experience

The first “meal” I ate to break my fast was comprised of apple cider vinegar diluted in a glass of water, a cup of bone broth, two slices of watermelon, and a glass of cranberry/pomegranate juice.

Not necessarily a nine-course meal at a Michelin star restaurant.

But to me, it might as well have been.

Because to me, it was heavenly.

In all reality, was the watermelon I ate the freshest, juiciest piece of fruit in existence? No, probably not.

But it sure tasted like it was.

And that plain Jane bone broth? Yeah, it might as well have been an elixir from God. I wanted to warm up another cup and pour it down my gullet right afterwards.

Immediately after I’d broken my fast, I sat in my chair and let the sensations of the experience wash over me.

I started getting a little lightheaded and shaky. But not in a bad way. It was like I’d woken up from a long daytime nap and needed to get reoriented to what it felt like to be awake through the rest of the day.

I sat there, still feeling exhausted from the physical toll my body had taken after going so long without food.

And I felt my digestion system starting to wake back up and do its job for the first time in three weeks.

But as I sat there reflecting on my fast and finally breaking it, I felt like I’d done exactly what I’d meant to do, what I told myself I would do back in November as a way to begin the new year.

And that felt like I'd accomplished the mission I'd set out on.

In short, breaking my fast felt like peace. But not some woo-woo Zen peace. The kind you get when you experience a deep sense of satisfaction and self-pride.

Because when I was in the thick of my fast and feeling more physically exhausted than I'd ever felt before, I didn’t have any energy to think about what calamities were going on half a world away from me.

I’m not trying to sound too harsh here. But honestly, I didn’t really care what was going on in the rest of the world.

All I cared about at the end of my days was getting home, preparing for the next day ahead of me, and dropping into what was the most restorative sleep I’d ever had in my life.

At the time of this writing, I’ve been eating food again for over a week. I started with fruits, vegetables, juices, nuts, and seeds.

I slowly added meat, dairy, grains, and a small amount of sugar back into my diet.

My digestion has been smooth, my gut hasn’t felt overwhelmed, and my taste buds appreciate everything I put into my mouth.

But the main takeaway I've had throughout the breaking process is the pure joy I feel when I cook, when I eat, and when I sit at my table after having gorged myself on the food I’d prepared with my own two hands.

I lost about fifteen pounds over my three-and-a-half week fast and about an inch off my waistline. Since beginning to eat again a week and a half ago, I’ve gained about seven of those pounds back.

But far more importantly than any physical benefits I've experienced throughout this journey is the perspective I developed as a result of it.

Not just a personal challenge

In modern America, we are oversaturated, overstimulated, unfulfilled, and always in a hurry. We rush from place-to-place and errand-to-errand, checking all our to-do list items off one-by-one.

We make it to the end of our day and drop into our recliners, exhausted. Then flip on the nightly news to listen to a suit coat feed us information on all the things we should be worried about.

Political upheaval. Social unrest. Global crises. Inflation. War. Famine. Poverty. Disease.

The list goes on and on. We’re told the future is bleak day-after-day until it becomes the story we tell ourselves as we lay our heads on our pillows and try to snatch a few hours of rest in our otherwise anxiety-filled existence.

We’re tired. We’re bored. We’re scared. We’re anxious. We’re annoyed. We’re lonely.

And it’s killing us.

When we get so used to our routines - including the meals we eat on a regular basis - we overlook things like our own personal health and well-being.

But what could possibly be more important than you being healthy, happy, and functioning at your best?

Your health is your responsibility

Have you ever tried to concentrate on an important task at work when you’re so sleep-deprived you can’t see straight?

What’s it like playing with your kids when you have a massive headache?

Or how about being present for your spouse when you’re neck-deep in snot-infested tissues and have to spend thirty minutes in the bathroom every two hours?

Your mental, physical, spiritual, emotional, relational, financial, and professional health are all dependent on you taking care of yourself.

That means you eat healthy because you love your kids.

It means you exercise regularly because you want to show up for your coworkers and do the best work you can even on days you don’t feel like it.

It means you think long and hard about what chemicals you put in your body because they all have a direct effect on your metabolism and your ability to ward off diseases.

How would your world change if you shifted your focus from what is happening around you to what is going on inside you?

Better yet, what would change if you considered – and then acted on – everything that could change because of you rather than what will certainly stay the same because of forces outside of your control?

The bottom line

I didn’t choose to deprive myself of food on a whim or because I thought I needed to lose weight. Whims come and go, and weight is just a number.

I chose to do a 25-day water fast because I wanted to get a better sense of how far I could push myself and still function at a high level.

And in the end, my fast gave me just a taste of what I could put myself through.

And now I've come out the other side with a clearer head, a better idea of my purpose, and a greater sense of urgency to live up to my fullest potential as long as I’m walking this earth.

What I discovered along the way was a renewed eagerness to connect with the people closest to me, to lean into and invest in something bigger than myself, to do the work that matters to me (and not do the work that doesn’t), and to take care of the one mind, body, and soul I have in this life.

My fast has proven to me the truth in the phrase, “You are what you eat.”

So take it from a guy who truly wants what’s best for you: Eat well. Take care of yourself. Move your body. Enjoy every meal you can with the people you love.

And maybe try giving something up instead of constantly adding more to your plate. I bet you’ll feel a whole lot lighter if you do. And I’m not just talking about dropping that stubborn belly fat, either.

Reflection Questions

If you knew you would experience some form of positive life change after giving something up for an extended period of time, what would you subtract from your life? And for how long?

In what areas of your life do you feel most “comfortable” or “safe”? Are you crushing it at work? Do you have friends you hang out with regularly who accept you and care deeply about you? Does the picture of your home life look like how you want it to?

• Whatever that area of comfort is for you, take a moment to sit down and write out why you are thankful for it.

• If you think it would benefit you or someone else to do so, show what you wrote to one or two other people.

On the other side of any kind of personal challenge could be life-changing transformation. So what challenges could you face that might be transformative for you?

• Are you overbooked and overworked? What would it look like for you to cut something out to regain a few minutes of your precious time?

• Are you overweight and constantly feeling tired? Could you find thirty minutes a day, three times a week to go on a walk outside or stretch?

• Are you burdened by debt and crippled financially? What are some ways you could save up and pay off that credit card in the next six months?

Wrap up and next steps

You can’t sit around and wait for things to change. Eventually you’ll find yourself lying on your deathbed after having watched from the sidelines as your life passed you by.

It is of the utmost importance for you to figure out the first step you need to take to start making progress towards the life you want.

Message me at tim@tboltcreative.com if you would like to start a conversation about your first steps towards a new sense of purpose and direction.

You can also take my FREE Find Your Direction Questionnaire and accompanying email series, which will walk you through several steps you can take to get started creating your own life of adventure and purpose.

Here’s to a new beginning for you and the people you care about most in 2025 and beyond!

My sincerest well wishes for you and yours,

Tim