07/03/2025
In February, my incredible wife, Dr. Mel DeBoer, ND of Rooted In The Wild, shared with me that she intended to embrace a fasting practice over the Lent season. She does a wonderful job explaining the medicine and ritual of fasting on her recent post - and I personally have found fasting practices to be cleansing and sharpening - both physically, but also mentally and spiritually.
So - inspired by Mel as I often am - I decided to embrace this 40-day journey as well. We raise our own meat chickens on our homestead, and we are often making bone broth. It’s already so incredibly healthy, but we add things like reishi mushrooms to the brew to make it even more nourishing. Over these next 6 weeks, our goal is to fast about 20 hours, and enjoy a 4-hour window for eating, typically for dinner. However, during the fasting hours, warm home-made and home-strained chicken broth (and coffee!) is welcome.
Being a couple of days into it, I am already becoming aware of so many things. Intentionality comes to mind. I am realizing how often I think about food - not because I’m hungry, but because I’m bored. Further than that, it seems to be a way of unconscious distraction so I avoid experiencing or feeling discomfort.
As a CrossFitter… this practice is also challenging. I have to consider the eating window and the workout timing in a way that fuels me for exercise. Again, intentionality. We are also taking supplements, collagen and amino acids to support our nutrition and exercise during this time.
My questions for you to ponder are:
When you open the refrigerator or reach for a snack - are you truly hungry? What feelings or emotions might you be trying to avoid? How can you bring reverence, appreciation and connection into meal times? What other ways might you be creating distraction (phones, substances…) in order to not feel - or to not confront an emotion?
While difficult at first - even on this current fasting journey - asking those questions above, confronting hunger, and confronting feelings I have avoided brings significant healing and perspective. It also brings immense gratitude for simple things. I’ll share more as the weeks progress!
