When actor Sonali Bendre recently spoke about following an 18–20-hour intermittent fasting routine and eating roughly one-and-a-half meals a day, it naturally attracted attention. Celebrity wellness routines often do. They sound disciplined, simple and tempting to copy. Eat less often, fast longer, and stay healthy — that is the message many people take away. But the public conversation around intermittent fasting needs a little correction. Fasting may help some people, but it is not magic. For weight loss, calorie restriction remains central. That calorie restriction can be timed, as in intermittent fasting, or not timed, as in a conventional balanced diet with smaller portions. The eating clock can be useful, but the calorie deficit is what drives weight loss. Intermittent fasting is an umbrella term This includes time-restricted eating such as 14:10, 16:8 or 18:6 patterns, alternate-day fasting, and the popular 5:2 diet, where calorie intake is sharply reduced on two days of the week. These approaches differ in design, but the broad principle is similar: they reduce the opportunity to eat. For many people, …