The Lifetime Plan

A cycle has ended. What next?

The simple answer is: another cycle. But that is not the whole answer. Because losing weight is not the goal of this plan. It is only a side effect. The goal is something else — learning to read again the signals the body gives. That goal has no end.

Three stages

The third stage is the real goal. The first two are only the way there. Two full cycles a year is a great cleansing for the body. Rather like cleaning the house twice a year.

There is a difference between these three stages: the first two have an end, the third does not. Correction is finished one day; stabilising is finished too. Only maintenance goes on for a lifetime. That is why the rules of the third stage have to be simple — nobody keeps anything complicated going for thirty years.

Seven habits that hold for a lifetime

Rather than memorising the twenty-seven methods in this book, carrying these seven through your whole life is the greater victory.

• No solid food after the sun has set. After eight at night the digestive enzymes are no longer secreted.
• The day's big meal at midday. The same food, the same amount — change the hour and you change the result.
• Sleep before ten at night. After midnight, deep sleep never comes.
• At least a twenty-minute walk a day, in the morning sun if you can.
• One hungry day a week — rest for the organs of digestion. Our forebears called it the Saturday fast.
• One full day of rest a month — the new moon.
• No screens while eating. Attention on the food alone.

This is what Gandhi said: a well-ordered life is worth more than complicated postures and exercises.

The four seasons of a life

What changes in each season

When the season changes, the method does not change; the intensity does. In your twenties the body will bear anything, so two full cycles a year is possible. At the end of the thirties and through the forties the consequences begin to show; then one cycle a month. After fifty the dry fast should become a water fast, and if need be the water fast a honey fast. Over sixty-five, no hard fasting at all. The seven habits, and one light day a week, are enough.

There is a simple arithmetic in this. In youth the body has great powers of recovery, but no urgency. In age there is urgency, but less power to recover. So the right thing is to take the method learned in youth and apply it gently in age; not to begin something severe for the first time when you are old.

What to do when you slip

You will slip. That is expected. A wedding, a feast, travel, illness, a heavy week at work, grief — life does not consult the plan before it happens.

Only one rule matters: a single day missed counts for nothing. But the thought "I have missed a day, so this month is finished" — that is the real danger. What kills eating plans is not the slip; it is the thought that follows the slip.

• If you slip for a day — carry on the next day from the same point in the plan. Do not try to make up what you lost; no double fasting.
• If you slip for a week — stop that cycle right there. The next full moon will come in thirty days. Begin afresh.
• If you slip for a whole month — begin again with WWYP alone. Water, walking, yoga, prayer. That is the doorway back.
• If you slip for several months — read the first chapter again. Remind yourself why you began.

What to measure

Weight is only one marker; it is not the story. It rises and falls day by day — most of that is water. Record these at the end of every cycle.

How often should you measure? Weight daily, in the morning, at the same hour, on the same scale. Waist once a month. Blood tests once every six months — A1C, cholesterol, thyroid, vitamin D. Sleep and mood in one line a day. Measuring more often than this turns the measuring itself into a worry.

Do not look at a single number; look at the trend. One day's weight is almost meaningless — water, salt, waste and sleep will each move it by a kilo or two. The seven-day average is what tells the truth. If A1C falls half a point in six months, that is a great victory; two kilos lost in a week is no victory at all — it is mostly water.

Finally: there is a language that was lost when you ate as a small child watching the moon — the language of hunger. Two sentences: "I am hungry" and "I have had enough". The one goal of this lifetime plan is to recover that language. Recover it, and the rest happens by itself.