Did you know that flies can become obese? I heard Dr Satchin Panda, author of The Circadian Code: Lose Weight, Supercharge Your Energy and Sleep Well Every Night, speak at a conference in 2019 and I found this information fascinating. Dr Panda is a research scientist who explores the importance of our internal clocks. In his lab, he found that feeding flies around the clock causes them to gain more weight than their counterparts whose access to food was limited to a few hours a day – even though both groups consumed the same amount of food, the timing made a difference. This is one of the underpinning arguments for time-restricted eating or intermittent fasting, and it relates to our circadian rhythms. These are the natural cycles that our body aligns to, and Dr Panda and his colleagues have extensively researched the purpose and function of these rhythms. Their research has established that ALL the organs in our body have their own preferred cycles of activity and repair. By optimising the time we eat, sleep, exercise and work, we can tap into these natural rhythms and improve our health and performance in several areas. By focusing on the when rather than the what of a healthy lifestyle, we can start to Iive in sync with our circadian rhythm, and see benefits not just in weight management but also in the function of our immune system, digestive function, hormone balance, alertness and cognitive health.

This book encourages you to track your daily habits for a week to get a baseline and then offers an explanation of why its important to optimise all of these areas, and how to make changes to start living more in line with your body’s clocks. Its a great resource for anyone wanting to improve their health by simply organising daily activities into a more consistent routine.

Do you eat/sleep/exercise/work at roughly the same time every day or do you have a more spontaneous approach to life?