Burn it Nutrition Podcast · Joseph Navarro Fitness, Nutrition, Ketogenic, Paleo, Keto, Diet Coach

Ep188: Faith, Fasting & Fitness: The Spiritual Blueprint to True Strength with James Benefico

·50 min·2 clips

Start with a 16-hour fast, then a 24-hour fast, and ask God for help along the way.

1. The Burn It Nutrition Podcast's Episode 188, "Faith, Fasting & Fitness," covers how fasting, prayer and early Christian practices connect to physical health. 2. Host Joseph Navarro, who says he has lost almost 80 pounds since his heaviest, interviews James Benefico, founder of Organic Muscles and co-host of The Jesus Way Podcast. 3. Benefico's thesis is that mind, emotions, spirituality and body are "intricately connected," and that fasting is a "huge pattern interrupt" that breaks autopilot habits and food-as-comfort. 4. Benefico says his mother's stage four cancer, a hospital meal of hamburger, soda and chips, and an argument with her doctor started his study of nutrition and spirituality, and his best friend's suicide pushed him to search for God. 5. He describes fasting three days, then seven and almost 14 days, plus daily cold plunges at Barton Springs in Austin, and says "a lot of the pain and fear and disappointment and anger just burned away." 6. Navarro adds the physiological side, naming autophagy and ketones as fuel for the brain, and Benefico compares it to "spiritual autophagy," citing a claim that digestion uses up to 85 percent of energy. 7. On The Jesus Way, Benefico says Jesus and John the Baptist were tied to the Essenes, citing the Didache, the Clementine Homilies and the apostle John's wish for "good health and prosper," and he reads "salvation" as related to the Greek for healing. 8. He calls gluttony "the most overlooked sin" in Christianity and says food addiction may be the "greatest weapon" of negative forces, while Navarro points to Jesus's 40-day fast and the temptation to turn stones into bread. 9. Benefico advises beginners to build momentum with five push-ups and five air squats, a 16-hour fast, then a 24-hour fast, and describes repentance as a nightly "self audit" of his day. 10. Suited to listeners interested in Christian faith, fasting and health habits.

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