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An excerpt from The Warrior Diet book I'd like to address the issue of overeating. This is a controversial topic, so please bear with me. Briefly, when people practice overeating after undereating, their body changes to a more thermogenic and highly metabolized state. The brain receives a signal that it should elevate metabolism in order to burn the extra energy coming from food. On the whole, when one overeats after a controlled fast, nutrients are assimilated at a greater rate, there is an acceleration of the anabolic process of repairing tissues and building muscles, depleted glycogen reserves and intramuscular triglycerides (special high octane fat fuel in the muscle) are replenished, there's an increased secretion of dophamine, thyroid hormones, and an elevation of sex hormones. If overeating is practiced regularly, your body's metabolism will remember this, and while adapting to these daily big meals, it would most likely become metabolically faster and more efficient than before. Many people have lost the capacity to enjoy the subtle taste of whole food; if you're one of them, you should know that it's fairly simple to retrain your taste buds. As noted, after the Undereating Phase, your taste buds are very fresh and sensitive, so that's the best time to train yourself to acquire subtle tastes. Exploring the Advantages of Overeating 1. Metabolic Acceleration Per Meal Scientific studies indicate that there's a correlation between our metabolism and how many calories are consumed per day. However, as far as I know, no studies have been conducted on the correlation between our metabolism and the amount of calories consumed per meal. I truly believe that the amount of calories consumed per meal is the bottom line. Recent studies by Dr. Mark Mattson, Professor, Department of Neuroscience, Johns Hopkins University, and colleagues at the National Institute on Aging (2003) have shown that mice who followed intermittent fasting (one day fasting followed by overeating twice the amount of daily calories the next day) were surprisingly provided with substantial benefits including increased life span, reversal of diabetes, and increased resilience to age related brain damage. Researchers speculated that the cycle of fasting-overeating affects the brain similar to the way physical exercise affects muscles. 2. Adaptation to Big Meals (Metabolic Acceleration) Let me give you an example of how adaptation works. People can walk for two hours every day without noticing any improvement in muscle, strength or speed, but if they sprint for only five minutes a day, they will most likely notice improvement in both strength and speed . So, it's not necessarily the length of time spent exercising, it's the intensity of the exercise. Coming back to the subject of diet, the question remains: Is it the intensity of the meal that will dictate your body's metabolism? My answer is yes. That's the way I experience it. 3. Overeating: A Primal Instinct The Warrior Diet is the only diet that explores the advantages of overeating. Let me say something to all those who overeat and then feel guilty. You feel guilty because you didn't know that a deep, primal instinct drove you to overeat. An instinct that we have most likely inherited from our late Paleolithic ancestors who were night eaters, cycling between periods of famine and feast (undereating and overeating). Many people binge late at night when exhausted from a rigid, obsessive, daily self-control. That's usually the time when inhibitions are broken down and the alleged "demons" come out. But these are not demons. If you know how to use this instinct in the right way, it can work for you instead of against you.
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