June 12: #4 Only consume water

Phil: I had to opt out of this one for the day, as I had a few appointments with some medical folks in the AM that I needed to make sure I wasn’t malnourished for. I’m only human. I do vow to do this on another day this month and double up on the challenges. Let this be a reminder that the whole point of this thing is to change your thinking, within reason. Sorry folks.

Bruce: I knew I could easily do this challenge because I'd once fasted drinking only water for 12 days. Although I lost 13 pounds and stopped just shy of 2 weeks because I genuinely thought for the only time in my life that I would die, I still had the discipline to do it. 11 years later, the challenge is illuminating if only as a reminder. It occurred to me throughout the day how much of my conscious day is occupied (and often gratified) by thinking about food or planning my meal or making improvisational decisions around eating. I kept having to remind myself that food was just not an activity I was participating in today. I've had a headache all day, which may be due to the lack of caffeine. I found myself pretty fatigued and often sore. Sometimes I wanted to nap just to skip ahead through conscious time that I wasn't permitted to eat. I was a fair bit grumpier than usual as well, perhaps on account of the aforementioned symptoms. It's interesting to see how many people are baffled when you tell them you're just not eating for a day, as if it is a real significant amount of time to be disallowed to eat. I'm typing this at 11:30 pm vigilantly watching the clock with a thunderous stomach and cramps that are climbing their way up into the back of my mouth. A mouth that has tasted almost perpetually like the faint copper taste of blood, like I was sucking on pennies. I carried around a quart mason jar today and drank probably two gallons of water but couldn't seem to satiate my thirst. I'm debating whether or not to eat before I go to sleep, I've been tortured all day by a Greek salad that awaits me in my fridge cackling it's delectable gyro meat laugh and smelling somehow simultaneously enticing and like a locker room. Locker room salad fragrance or not, I'm ravenous. This was a good lesson in discipline and a reminder of the privilege that it is to regularly and spontaneously just reward any impulses and cravings I have.

Tomorrow's challenge: #30 Detour day. Change your routes all day, everywhere you go, make at least one different stop to a place you’ve never been