Cycling and stead state processes

A concept I wanted to discuss is a pattern I see in come up in biology and longevity, which is cyclicality and steady state processes. 

First which is cyclic processes, our bodies run on many of these. Such as 

• circadian
• digestive
• enzyme, NAD+/etc production
• ...

These and more show that our bodies depend on processes which need to cycle, they need to ping-pong back and forth between two or more states. The other type of process is steady state

• respiration
• circulation
• mitochondrial energy production
• ...

These processes need to always be running, if they don't then systems stop working. 

In the cyclic category, I've noticed patterns with modalities for longevity, including 

• stress/release (exercise, sauna, fasting, etc)
• catabolic/anabolic
• mental stress/release

To keep this relatively short let me address these three. 

Stress/release 

In many cases we see that the body responds best to low stress punctuated with high stress. For example, exercise. All coaches will tell you need to be resting in off days, and we know that excercise is good for primarily because of the stress it causes. Likewise sauna, - see FoundMyFitness/Dr Rhonda Patrick on youtube about this. Sauna (heat stress) creates hermetic compounds much like exercise or fasting. In foods, many of us eat lots of plants, and supplement with things like Resveratrol which are a stress response for burdock root (I believe that's the plant). These compounds are natural stress irritants that 'stress' out our bodies when we eat them. Sulfurathanes in cruciferous vegetables are one - they are natural pesticides that have benefits for us due to the stress effect. 

But, taking exercise as an example, doing too much is not good for you. Super athletes are not super healthy, and suffer from all sorts of ailments including decreased immune system response and too high inflammation. So the key here is cyclic activity, for longevity you want to be a relaxes person, and go through bouts of hard physical stress like exercise, sauna, fasting, or the like. 

Catabolic/anabolic

One is building up, the other is tearing down. With our cells we want to promote this life long. Even as adults, we want to encourage our old cells to get torn down and new ones regenerated. This can be done with drugs such as rapamycin, exercise (tearing muscle tissue etc) and modalities like fasting. But again here, it appears we want it to cycle. We want to keep cycling between these two states, which is accomplished well with living normally, then going through periodic water only fasting (I believe). One issue worth addressing with pharmaceutical I believe is how do you cycle it? I think that's an important component of taking a stress inducing drug worth thinking about. 

But this makes me suspect that doing a ketone diet is a bad idea. There's no cycling, ketones break down, they don't build up. Certainly we know the Atkins diet is a disaster, I think it's unfortunate keto diets are so popular. The concept here I believe is cycling - you want a diet steady state with complex carbohydrates which the body turns into glucose, alternated with periodic ketone stress. 

Mental stress/release

It appears that the best way to keep mentally sharp is to cycle it. Generally be laid back and stress free, but punctuate it with mental stress - such as by learning some new difficult skill and using it, like playing an instrument or learning a language. Aging studies show that living in the 'Land of the Lotus Eaters' in seniors is not good for your mental health, you need some periodic mental stressors to induce you to learn, grow and stay sharp. 

Long post - hopefully this makes sense, ask if any questions.