This morning I was listening to a podcast during my walk. I listen to podcasts every day while walking, because learning inspires me, and sets me up for a positive day. The benefits of walking outside in the morning are huge! Here are just a couple:
- Reduces anxiety and depression, and makes you happier.
- Lowers your risk for disease including diabetes and strokes.
- Improves your sleep.
- Makes you more creative.
- Triggers an anti-aging process and repairs old DNA.
My favorite podcast topics, as you may guess already, are health, wellness, and faith. So, along with anything from Ancient Faith Radio, I have several people I follow.
On this particular morning, I was listening to one of my favorite podcasters in the health and wellness space. He allowed himself to be interviewed for his own podcast. His goal was to let his listeners know more about him, his background, and his philosophy. I’ve been listening to this man constantly for over year now, respect him immensely, and have always wondered about his faith.
Here are just a couple of the things he said that put a skip in my step. (As a side note…isn’t it interesting how, when we hear others articulate the same beliefs we have, we can feel a burst of joy? I am not alone! Yay!)
“Weight-loss isn’t a formula. It isn’t a math equation. We now know that a calorie isn’t a calorie isn’t a calorie, and that weight loss is not about calories and burning them. It’s 80% food and 20% exercise.”
“It’s about Getting Healthy to Lose Fat….Not Losing Fat to Get Healthy” (Wow! Yes! Tweet it out, ya’ll…as another one of my favorite podcasters would say.)
“You have to be able to change your paradigms, you have to be able to change your subconscious mind. Your subconscious mind is what’s driving you. Our thoughts create our feelings, our feelings create our actions, and our actions create our reactions.” Of course this brought to mind one of my favorite books, Our Thoughts Determine Our Lives by Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnica. (Which I admittedly quote continually in my programs and with my clients.)
But then his interviewer asked him one final question, “…what do you think the glue is that holds this world together?”
And he didn’t know how to answer.
This man who had a tough life while growing up, pulled himself up out of situations that others may have languished in, and has benefited so many people worldwide with his selfless love and support…building schools, etc, did not know how to answer.
This is when my yes…yes…yes…elevated feelings of simpatico, became no…no…no…Lord have mercy!
This is when it came out that the school he went to when he was a child was a Catholic school, and it “repulsed him from biblical teachings”. Through tears I thought…This man has wisdom, yet he doesn’t know where that wisdom came from. His success has been great, but he doesn’t know who gave him that success. He has influenced so many peoples lives for the better, but he doesn’t know what makes the world go around or how it’s held together.
But there is hope, as there is for all of us. He has started reading scripture again, and said that he has not become religious, but he has begun to understand what the stories in the Bible mean. The heart of the message for him is love, and that love conquers evil.
All the wisdom in the world is nothing if you do not know the creator of it. I don’t believe that he would bring up his school experience after his long silence if a belief in God wasn’t in his subconscious. My prayer is that he’s on his way. How many people do we know in this same boat?
Wisdom without faith can be hollow
Health without faith can be pointless
Love without faith can be selfish
Faith without God is meaningless
