Hello, welcome.Heavy things lightly today.Dr. Pete Petitsas.Dr. Pete gets deep into how fasting may unlock the answer to most of the diseases that infiltrate our modern bodies.It's everything. And we've been ignoring it for 500 years.Okay.
That's an exaggeration, but a long time.And he says there's something special in it.He says it's a little like Adam and Eve were fasting, but then they ate the apple a little before men, a little after midnight. They should have waited.
It's an interesting conversation.Today on Heavy Things Lightly.That's Greg Gilbertson playing music in, by the way.We're doing a cool fundraiser event, Joe Pug.Vesper Stamp, we're all going to get together.Vesper Stamp, we're going to get together.
We're going to play music, a concert actually, and then we're going to have a podcast with the musicians right on stage in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin.
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All right, Dr. Pete, what's happening, man?It's good to, this is, guys, this is something I've been trying to figure out, how to do this and when to do this, because we contact, I went to Georgia before we, I think, right, I traveled.
You reached out or I reached out and then I traveled, correct?We've been waiting to do this.
Yeah, I reached out and you were getting ready to go to Georgia, I mean, the country of Georgia.And I didn't want to get in between that destination and your mission.
It sounds like a beautiful place, and I've seen some shorts, actually, of you describing the hospitality and the meaning and kindness of those people.It just sounds like a beautiful place physically and culturally.
It's a good... You know, we tend to exaggerate when we love. but then they're not really exaggerations.
It's sort of like, you know, I, I talk well about my wife cause I love her, but she got warts like everything else, but that place has warts, but it's, it's, it's going to tie into this talk today.
So you've written this, you've written about the Mount Athos diet.You're tell them, tell people who you are.I I'm learning.
No, that's fine.So I'm Dr. Pete Petitsas.Please just call me Pete.I'm an ER doc.I went to medical school.I went to residency.I'm board certified in emergency medicine.
I think we have phenomenal techniques and tools to take people out of their most desperate moments and make them well, give them another chance, give them a second life.I have so many stories I could share with that.
But my point bringing that up is that my workday is so raw and so sober. And there's no coincidence that from that environment of rawness, I get to see true human nature.When all the masks are off, people are talking from a real place.
And I think that's really powerful because you meet people in the grocery store, you meet people at a cocktail party, you put on your smile, you put on your makeup. This is people being ripped out of their moments of their day, unexpected.
And at the same time, I get to see the calculus, the absolute outcome of that equation of their lifestyle.And that sometimes manifests in heart attacks, stroke, suicide, overdoses, all sorts of things.And from that basis,
I can kind of start thinking about how to put things in terms that might actually help people in real ways, not euphoric ways, not infomercial ways, but how can we really help people?
And being an Orthodox Christian, that's another way I'll introduce myself.I'm a Greek Orthodox Christian. Raised in the faith, my father was an eye surgeon and also a priest, and I'm one of five boys.
But, you know, I was raised in this faith, and I started to realize, actually, the version I got of it was quite unique in the sense that, like, my dad tried to have us do stuff right, you know, as best he I started fasting when I was seven.
And as we all know, as Orthodox Christians, that means we're basically vegans or pescetarians for half or more of the year.And that makes you think a lot about who you are and where you're coming from and why the hell you're doing all that stuff.
And as I bridged medicine with spirituality, because these things are very much intertwined.I mean, there's a reason that Jesus Christ was God himself, but like also the ultimate physician.And again, that's pretty powerful.
I don't know how like carpentry gets thrown in there.I'm still waiting for like the carpenter that can solve all of our problems.But I will say.
I think carpenters have, I think they write books like you write books, but it's just about, it's about building, you know.
I guess, I guess Bonavent Pajot is the ultimate wood carver, you know, carpenter.
So that's a good point.Yeah.
No coincidence.And, and, oh my gosh, I, you know, it's, there is a connection there between, between those, those, um, those areas of art and areas of vocation and spirituality.
But anyway, between the medicine background and the orthodox background and trying to reflect on something so inconvenient as fasting, I mean, let's get it straight.
There's nothing more annoying than having to change your diet on a daily basis, weekly basis.And it causes you to start to think about why you're doing it.
Let's jump in there for a second. Let's do kind of the pop culture thing.You're saying something like, in your research, in your writing, in your book, you're saying something like there is a diet that exists.
Diet's a cheesy word, but we understand it in the West.There's something like a diet, a way of knowing food that is ancient.It's built into the orthodox spiritual life.And that it's like,
Salvific for the body, it like saves us from a lot of diseases, but how?What is it about fasting?Tell me about fasting.
One way I could kind of introduce it is, why is it that we're encouraged to be prepared to have communion every day?And of course, communion in the Orthodox Church is associated with you know, salvation.
And so if you kind of reverse engineer this, where like, in order to have communion, you have to be spiritually prepared.You must have fasted, you know, the evening before to get there.And then this could be repeated every day.
And then there's this claim that it's the healing of both soul and body.And you're kind of like, well, what is that body thing all about?You know, like, how does that really manifest in my cells, in my organ systems, in my health?And the reality is,
is that if you take that call to be prepared seriously, and you repeat that over and over again over your lifetime, there is a host of metabolic physiological processes that God, I'll say, has engineered into the fabric.
of our earth and our human experience that will literally allow us to heal disease and to live a long life will literally heal our body.
And what I've done is I've, I've tried to figure out through through science and medicine, what those processes are, and they are, they are real.
Can I interrupt you for a second?So, so There's something unique about you.So is it that you're applying a science?Because you went to science school.Let's call it that I joke about this stuff.
You went to science, you learned an enlightenment type of discipline called called being an MD, right?
So You say you're seeing with both eyes in like 4D because you're seeing the science, but you're also seeing the spiritual inclination of the orthodox way as like healing, right?Is that what's special?
Because when I was reading your stuff, it feels like that's what you're doing.You have a whole new set of eyes.Am I getting that right?
Well, you know, it's kind of like when Christ in the New Testament calls us to fast and pray.And what I'll say is that you can't reduce these things into components and then get away with it over your life.
Like, you can try to gain the system, but you'll never win the game.And what I mean by that is, you know, there's a story actually about this rugby team that crashed their plane in the Andes Mountains like decades ago.
Oh yeah, there's a movie about that.
Yeah, there is.And there's this incredible ethical dilemma, and everyone gets introduced to this question. Would you have been the person to eat your comrades once they died, and to be a cannibal, or would you have not?Just a leg.
Just a leg for me.Just a leg.
Or would you have not?And I know these situations.And the issue is this.In that moment, you could have said, hey, I need to survive.All things trump that.This is about life or death.There's no playbook here.But there was a playbook.
And the playbook is that we're not supposed to eat other humans.It's a really extreme example.
But in that moment, when you're in the Titanic, when you're in the airplane, when you're faced with starving hunger and you're freezing cold and there's no hope, What the hell do you do?
And what I'll say is that as this whole ethical dilemma is being brought up over and over again in schools across the world, universities across the world, the reality is, is that the only reason anyone was saved from that freaking airplane crash was because someone said, no, I'm not going to eat this individual.
And so as a result of following my principles, what did he do?He walked. like eight or nine days to get help.And he saved the entire remaining people.
What I'm trying to say is, if people had taken the first principle from the beginning and just said, you know what?
We don't do that.Everyone would have walked to get help. far less people would have died.
And so what I'm saying is, is that, you know, you, in the moment as an animal creature, you would have just eaten everything, you know, whatever it had taken, you would have felt justified.
But as a human being blessed by God, meeting the image of God, you take the higher road and God gives you the antidote.And so I'll take that same story to say that if we apply that same mentality for our lives and our lifestyle,
we have to stop a self exiling ourself from cure.And I think fasting is the antidote to what seems to be 80% of all disease, which is entirely preventable.
Tell me how fasting present prevents some of these diseases.
First of all, which diseases do you see as a doc?And then which ones?Tell me how the fasting impacts these diseases.
Yeah, so, you know, well, first I'll just say that the Athos diet itself, which I created, so to speak, is really just best practices of Orthodox fasting found throughout the world, but generally found concentrated in the communities of Athos.
where they are generally eating over a very confined period of the day as they prepare for various services and communion, as I mentioned earlier.They are eating plant-based protein and they're not doing CrossFit.
They're just like walking around and staying active.I mean, it's those three prongs.
And when you start to figure out what does it mean to fast with Jesus Christ until the ninth hour or to fast until communion, what they're actually doing is intermittent fasting. And this has been going on for over a thousand years.
In fact, Father Peter, your older brother mentioned two individuals in particular.
Wait, wait.Younger.Let's go younger.
Oh yeah, younger.Yeah, yeah, yeah.I don't want to change the record.
I gotta have something on this guy.
No, your younger brother.Sorry.Yes.So he, he essentially, he essentially highlights these two figures that actually one of them was from the 300s talking about the proper way of fasting, he recommended just one meal a day.
But when you start breaking down what that ends up meaning is you are eating all of your calories over a confined period of the day as you prepare for communion, as you prepare for the feast, as you fast with Christ.That's intermittent fasting.
If I just take any mammalian species in the world and have them do that, they live 30 to 40 percent longer.
Now, what rational human being, including everyone in 2024 who's so consumeristic, so instant gratification, so, hey, technology's our friend to give us everything when we want it, as soon as we want it, how would we arrive at that conclusion other than through the wisdom of the church?
And this is where I think this ancient wisdom practice is held.And so as Roman Catholics completely forget the art of fasting and as Orthodox Christians resist it,
Or they feel like, oh, this is just something that we do in preparation to remind us of the spiritual undertaking.And it is that.But it also, if we take it seriously, has these second, third order effects.
And one of those effects is, by God, allowing a person to live 30 to 40% longer.
In fact, if you follow the historic timeline over time, I mean, the monks of Athens were outliving Byzantines and many others throughout the centuries before there were hospitals, antibiotics, diseases, fraud, or immune disease.
And so, as I say, the whole book basically, and much of my podcasts and my YouTube films are basically trying to show that scientific process and validating it, that there's actually something there.So, I can dive into the topic.
Here's a question.You've got to help me with this because I kept seeing it and now you're saying these words that make me think this question again.So, There is this idea that that fasting you're describing on Athos, or in the lives of just
just, I don't know, attentive Orthodox Christians, the life of fasting and then communion.It ends with a high thing.Like, I don't know, generally, it's ending with the consumption, the intaking of God.
And so, I wonder in your mind, if I make intermittent fasting And with the high thing called my own bodily health.In other words, I do it only for my own bodily health.Do you think that degrades the ability for the fasting to be of use?
You know, sort of like, like yoga is a thing, but it's then it's stripped and it's placed into like, you know, a strip mall and like Wichita, Kansas, and then they're doing yoga kind of like, do you think it can still exist outside of the mystery of communion?
I'll say this.I think that these are two barrels of the same gun.I think there are two parts of the same process and they shouldn't be decoupled.
I mean it's almost like saying the opposite extreme where like can you just be some esoteric Taoist who lives in a cave and just feels the presence of God, but doesn't manifest those virtues in their life.
And so I'll say that I think these things have to be united.Just like, why didn't Christ just stay as the ultimate God, the Father in another dimension?Why did he come onto earth? That was a necessary process to save us all.
And so it was only once he took on flesh that we manifest the principles of virtue and God into something physical that we were able to truly interact and connect.
And so somehow I would make the same connection that, first of all, fasting is not easy, and you need that prayer and support of the church to succeed.
Um, you know, there's a reason why a lot of churches like, you know, the Catholics, I think you only have to fast an hour before communion, you know, so most Catholics fast an hour before communion, you know, but in the Orthodox Church, you're supposed to wait, wait till the midnight before maybe even longer.
And with that support system, again, we can't reduce it.With that support system, we are allowed to get people to get to that
13 hours without food, 14 hours without food, 15 hours, maybe then feasting after communion with your fellow parishioners, and having that community and that social support, and then getting to the next day where it's repeated.
And so all of this, in my mind, allows a person to succeed in the physical undertaking that is very difficult to do.I mean, there's a reason why diets are called fads, because it's not a lifestyle and there's no support.
It's like I think Americans, this is a great point.
Americans spend 60 billion a year on on diets and food related stuff that's bigger than the entire economy of hungry.No pun intended.And, and so kind of funny.
I'm just telling me that's in your book.
Please tell me that exact.Now I forget.
But that means to recall your editor.That's got to get in there.That's Yeah, that was great.
No, but the point though, is that we think that like, oh, we can detach these things from one another and we can still succeed.And now I'm just gonna do the Athos diet without any of the orthodox stuff with that.
Yeah, this is a temptation.
But you know what?I don't want you to just do this diet for a week.I want you to do it for the rest of your life.Like literally every day for the rest of your life.
Now, I will say the Athos diet as I presented is a 48 day cleanse, which mimics Lent, go figure. But then I tell people to just do that every time we are called to fast through the Orthodox calendar.
Wednesday, Fridays, all the various fasts throughout the summer and August.Do it right.
Is 48 about the length of the Great Fast, right?
Yeah, that's right.That's right.It's that's exactly that.That's the kickstart.But then once you get through that, you realize, oh, my gosh, like, I'm supposed to do this in Friday.Anyway, I'm supposed to do this in the summer.Why not?
I just do it right.And so what I'm telling people is, if you're going to do the fasting, Let's do it right.And here is something that is scientific based, right?God's the ultimate engineer, He's the ultimate mathematician.
I'm trying to find out His calculus and His math, how He's doing it and saying, hey guys, within the parameters of the church, here's best practices so we can get some actual health benefit.
That's the tell me if I got this science.I don't know the science interests me.Like good science is good.When it's it's scientism.It's bad.So here's here's the thing.So you know, I'm still trying to work out and I'm like 100 or whatever years old.
So but here's the thing.I still know that when I work out, Something's being broken down so something can be built up.Is fasting working on that same kind of template as a scientific event?
Like, are you, is your body being sort of asked to be stronger so that then when it's your, you're going through your day as a faster than your body becomes more resilient?Is that what's happening?
Um, you could describe it that way.I'll also make the analogy.It's just like anything in life.I mean, most of human experience is challenge.You know what?
I mean, it's so bizarre to me that the Olympic the Olympics are organized in a way so that this individual who at least four years, if not for like 25 years has been working his ass off every day, now gets this shiny medal for 15 minutes.
And somehow that was all worth it. You know, like that's pretty irrational, you know, and at the same time, it absolutely is worth it.
And what I'll say is with fasting, yes, there is this component of breaking down, but there's also this amazing return on investment.
And so, you know, as I just kind of hint here and there of the science, I talked about intermittent fasting, but what's the mechanism?
So when you when you only eat all of your calories over a confined period of time, and as far as I can tell, that magic window where you're not eating is 16 hours, I tell people to only eat between four and eight hours.
So you can have you can have food, a calorie between four and eight hours of your day.But that means that between 16 and 20 hours a day, you're not eating. When you do that, there's a host of physiological processes that turn on.Why did God do that?
I'm not sure.Maybe to make it seem like it was worthwhile for communion.
But the point is that when you get to about 12 hours and then approach 16 hours, you have converted from sugar fuel to fat consumption across your body's storage, and you start releasing ketones. And ketones are very powerful.
Ketones are very brain friendly.Ketones affect GABA receptors that actually lower the sensation of anxiety.And it's interesting that a quarter of women in America are on benzodiazepines and anxiety medications because their anxiety is so high.
Well, maybe they should stop eating 15 hours a day, 11 times in 15 hours.That's the average time an American eats.Over a 15 hour period, 11 different eating events.
it literally is making you more anxious wait wait doc hold on go back is that real is that true what you just said yeah yeah 11 eating events in 15 hours 11 eating events in 15 hours with that's like typical for an american
Very typical and and it shows right.I mean it shows we have a huge obesity problem in America.I think it's between 70 and 80 percent of people are overweight.Forty plus percent are morbidly obese.
Seventy percent of all young men can't even qualify for a draft in the army even if we needed it at this point.
Wait, really?So I'm not, I'm not afraid of foreign actors.You've already described, you've described the enemy.Yeah, right, right.
No, but it's interesting that as a society, and our society is bankrupt, right?Like we, we are America with $35 trillion in debt.I mean, if this was a household, And dad was actually using his salary to pay off the interest of his loans.
He's probably has a drug problem.He probably is spitting on horses.He's probably doing something.
Yeah, all of this in my mind is is just a microcosm example of like, our national problem, which is which starts with every human being and family and household and then scales up.
to be 35 trillion in debt, with 70% obese, or 70% overweight and 40% obese.
So do you think the debt and the obesity, I've always had this thought, I want to do a podcast on this, the debt and the obesity are actually the same problem, right?
It is.It is a consumer problem.It is a hedonistic problem.And just like anything, and I always try to say this, because as an Orthodox Christian, I always feel like there's this
weird belief that the uglier you are, the fatter you are, the more failed you are, the more closer to God you are.And in my mind, those things do not have to occur.Now, they're not our priority. We're not about vanity.
We're not about being so frugal that we can't take care of our families.But we need to understand that I do believe that God calls us to transform our spirits and our bodies.And that can manifest as beauty and productivity and wealth.
and balance of our finances.And these things are good.The problem is, is the extremes of those emphasis.And if you start looking at, you just had a wonderful podcast just the other day about the difference between knowledge and wisdom.
And, you know, that is so powerful because what we've done in America is we've elevated technology and we've elevated data and wisdom to such an extent that we've lost the aim and the purpose of that tool and that technology and that data.
I remember actually at the turn of the century, there was a cool business case I studied.McDonald's decided they were going to spend several billion dollars on being able to see what temperature all of their oil fryers are among many other metrics.
They wanted to be able to see what everything everyone was doing everywhere in the world from one spot.They spent like a billion plus dollars on it.It was a complete failure. It was a complete failure.They completed the project, and it was useless.
It was useless.And they got so drunk with the Kool-Aid of data and knowledge, and they completed the project, because unfortunately they had the money to do it, but it didn't get them anywhere closer to what they thought. things would be.
This is what a great phrase.Unfortunately, they had the money to do it.Yeah.Wow.And so there's that meta fix, the meta fix of technology that sort of comes from this giant umbrella from some like outer space technology wizard to fix everything.
When in reality, you're saying something like, It's really just self-discipline in a habitual way, leading towards some high thing, the highest thing being communion.
The aim has to be spiritual.And that's why you can't have the fasting without the spiritual goal.
And at the same time, I don't think you can succeed anyway over a lifetime without the church supporting you through community, through spirituality, through all the sacraments of the church. confession, etc.
And so, all I'm trying to say is that when you take a society that doesn't value discipline and delay gratification, and limiting when they act on their impulses, etc., you take that at scale, you put that over 100 years, and you get the United States of America, and it's
35 trillion in debt.It's barely able to cover its interest payments on that debt.People are sick.
And when I'm in the ER, I mean, I'm telling you, and I don't think it's just because I work in an ER, but like, I am truly worried about the cultural mindset of every person that comes into the ER, the health problems, the disparities that are so real.
This is not just about like, Am I being more efficient and optimized with my lifestyle?This is truly manifesting in life versus death.If I could tell one story, it just happened last week.
Please do.Because, come right back to it, because I have this I want to just say to you.I feel like there's something about you that's missionary and there's something empathetic that is trustworthy.Here's what I mean.
I think you've got a good idea and a good book, and you're an Orthodox Christian, and I like it, but I'm Orthodox.But I feel like you're sad about something.
Yeah, let me tell you this story.
Something sad.You're seeing something sad in this industry.
It's true.It's true.You are picking up on something real.And it's from that motivation, I think, that we need to turn on the tools that God's given us to literally It's so funny, when I was a child, I had this moment.
I mean, I didn't hear God's voice, but I had a quiet conversation with Him.And I had this inherent belief.I think I picked up on this when I was like nine.I said, God, fill my life with challenges, but don't give me any tragedies.
And I really believe there's something to that.There is something about filling your life with challenges, difficulties, struggles, that will allow you to avoid tragedy.
Or maybe when the tragedy comes, you don't even see it as a tragedy because you've already accepted the struggles.You know what I'm saying?It's just another struggle.
That's a good point to say.But as I reflect on the statistics that 80% of all disease like Parkinson's, dementia, stroke, cardiovascular disease, suicide, hypertension, diabetes, all of these things are entirely preventable.
Like the vast majority of cases, I'm talking like 51%, I'm talking like 90 plus percent. And so anyway, you have to put in the work.You have to put in the work.
And as someone once said, you can work hard being well, or you can work hard being ill and dealing with the consequences of that illness.There's just no way of getting around it. Um, but I'll tell you about why, why I think tell me the story.
I interrupted you last week.I'm in the ER and there's this guy who comes in after a bike ride.
He's 60 years old.You know, he doesn't look too, too overweight, maybe a little extra poundage, but nothing crazy.He's having terrible chest pains, radiating to his shoulders, jaw.He looks diaphoretic, sweating, et cetera.
We get an EKG within like two minutes.He's got an obvious heart attack. We rush him to the cath lab.This is a small rural hospital in central Pennsylvania.We get him to the cath lab.Perfect. Amazingly, this does not happen.
15 minutes later, another person shows up.This is an even younger lady who's spent her life smoking, hypertension, among other things, whatever.And she's feeling really unwell.
Her first EKG does not show a heart attack, but the story just seems very worrisome.So I tell the nurses, hey, in 10 minutes, repeat the EKG, get labs.I'm really worried about this person.And it can't possibly be another heart attack.
I am paged several minutes later because the same guy who went to the cath lab is now in the cath lab with ventricular fibrillation.So his heart is doing a dance, a rhythm, pumping in such a weird way that it isn't actually working.
And there are no other docs in the hospital except me.So I'm running up to the cath lab because the cardiologist hadn't arrived yet.And I'm going up there to put pads on this guy's chest to shock him into a normal rhythm.
So the point is, is I'm going upstairs to do that.And in fact, as I go into the room, we shock and we get him back.He is alive again.I mean, technically he did die.This did happen to that individual upstairs two more times.Okay.
Now I'm running back down to the ER because I'm really worried that this lady's having a problem.Lo and behold, the second EKG shows a heart attack.Now she goes into ventricular fibrillation.The heart's not pumping.Right there.
Right there.I had to shock her. And we get her back, and there was all this drama and delay because, you know, we're a small hospital.We have two caths to do now instead of just one.This is like the perfect storm.It doesn't happen.
And we finally get them up to the cath lab.Two and a half hours later in this small hospital, instead of going to a critical care unit, they actually have to come back down to the ER because we don't have a critical care unit.
We're just a small little hospital. So these two individuals are talking, they're pleasant.I go over to the first gentleman and start talking about, hey, I want you to know you just died like three times upstairs, but we got you back.
I need to get you to a- Just a regular old Tuesday in the emergency room.
Yeah, yeah, right.I need to get you to a critical care unit and we need to get you there as fast as possible.And the guy, Instead of waking up and being like, thank you so much, doctor.Whatever needs to be taken care of next, I'm up for.
Whatever you think is best, thank you so much.Instead, it was like, do you think you could transfer me to a hospital that my friend can get to back in out-of-state somewhere?That would be really helpful and convenient to me.
I'm thinking to myself, dude, you just died three times, and you have convenient preferences that you're trying to share with me right now? Now, as if that was just one point on a potential line, I go over to the next person, same exact story.
I guess in the old days, people used to wake up from death and they were like Scrooge, who realized, oh my God, I'm getting as a school boy, buy the biggest turkeys, save everyone in the community, I have this realization.
Or maybe they saw God, or maybe they saw the lights.But instead in 2024, Both of these people died twice and their first request is, can you conveniently send me to a different hospital?And I just... To me, it was such an insight into human nature.
My analogy, you're on the Titanic, the Titanic is sinking, you're in the water, you're dying, you're freezing, and maybe eventually a lifeboat comes over and the person in the water's like, you know what?I don't wanna go on that boat.
I prefer the beverage service on the future boat that's coming.Just keep me in the water a little longer.It's crazy.It's crazy.But I see those- What do you think?Yeah.
So as a medical, as a doctor, what do you think, what creates that default to inconvenience?Because also as a spiritual man in the Orthodox faith, you're trying to figure stuff out.So where do you think this is coming from?
How did it happen this way?
to turn out and end like this.Yeah, the blessing of civilization is that we've gotten rid of a lot of inconvenience through technology.People are educated.We compartmentalize suffering to a hospital.People don't see people die.
They barely go to the funerals.You know, it's too tough for the little one.We don't want Johnny to see grandma dead.But I will tell you, if you want to see
what it means to be a man, go find any 10 year old Amish boy who's just been run over by a truck, a horse, a combine who has multiple bones broken his body who's bleeding literally internally.
And I go over to that little boy and I say, can I get you some pain medication?He's like, I'm fine.And then, you know, which is a different society, right?
The Amish are special, but then, but wait, you are in that you're near that community, right?You live in Pennsylvania.
That's right.They're one of the, I think it's the second largest population of Amish people in the countries in Pennsylvania, or maybe it's the first.
So keep going.So there's something about expectations.Keep going.I want to hear this.
Well, there's, I think, I think we're all just addicted to convenience and technology and we've gotten really soft. And we just can't imagine that you can go without 20 hours of food in a day.
We can't imagine that, you know, this effort might take this much work to be seen through because the laundry machine and the washing machine take care of that.The car takes us there.We're so overwhelmed with
and have an addiction to convenience and consumerism and now.
And I think the key antidote to all of this, to this transformation, because we don't want to go back to the days where you're losing your child at birth or your wife giving labor or pneumonia at 50.We don't want to go back to those days.
But the way that we combat it, it's kind of like, hey, if you're driving all day, you still need to go exercise. If you're, if you're able to potentially all day, you still need to fast.
So you still have that inherent sense of discipline, delay gratification, and you know, your limits.I mean, it's so funny.People like, Oh my God, Pete, you know, you're not eating today.What's going on?Oh, so I'm not eating window.
Oh, you don't eat like 16 to 20 hours a day.What's that all about?Hey, by the way, the average American has 60 extra pounds of fat.They can easily last a hundred days without food.And some do. Some do.So like, it's not about 20 hours.
It's about 100 days.And we've so underestimated our potential, that we're like, anxious out of our mind.And again, I see the anxiety thing all the time.Hey, this is chest pain.We go through all the lab workup.It's not chest pain.
Well, anxieties.Let me go this direction for a second.So what do you hope happens with your book?I mean, I think you hope I don't know Joe blow from from wherever from Idaho picks it up.I think because even if it's the beginning of something
It ends with a spiritual something.Is that how you see your book?Is the beginning of something for people all over the world?
First of all, I want 300 million Orthodox Christians to take fasting seriously so we outlive our enemies.I say this as a joke, kind of, but I want us to tap into this technology that God gave us.
And so that we are there productive, highly functional, there to give us the wisdom to our great grandchildren, and to make the world a better place so that we don't have 80% Well, let's put it this way.
If I can get rid of 80 percent of disease, we don't need 80 percent of the people in the ER.And in fact, you know, per GDP, health care is the largest expense in our GDP.I mean, some people see it as like, you know, that that's that's a good thing.
I mean, you might say it's actually a terrible thing that we spend so much.And by the way, we spend more than any other country and our health outcomes are worse. but you just can't out- Thank you for that.
Thank you for that.We should repeat that a lot.Our health is worse and we spend more money on it.
That's right.That's right.And it's a problem.And, you know, again, there's so many examples I could bring up where that irony really shouts out loud.
But, you know, I'm just saying is that if we can at least start with the Orthodox Church that's saying, hey, I'm supposed to do this fasting thing anyway, like I might as well just do it right. Well, now I'm getting you to live 30, 40% longer.
I'm getting rid of your hypertension.I'm keeping you from getting Parkinson's, diabetes, stroke, cardiovascular disease, the list just goes on.
And the mechanism actually, it's interesting, when you start fasting in this way, and you're not eating for 16 to 20 hours a day, growth hormone goes up, by like 200%, why is that an important hormone?
And again, let me know if this starts getting too much in terms of the science.But for instance, Andre the Giant in the 1980s, he had a pituitary hormone in his brain that made him make growth hormone all the time.What happened to the guy?
He was a giant.He was seven feet tall.He was incredibly strong.
This made me the happiest person ever that we're gonna do some Andre the Giant right now.That is awesome.Remember that guy from my childhood?Wait, so what happened?He just kept growing and then what happened?
He kept growing, his bones kept getting bigger, stronger, muscles kept getting larger, bigger.He was a freak of nature.And now again, too much of growth hormone like he had was pathological, it ended up killing him.But you know, it's a good hormone.
Actually, some people supplement with that unnaturally, exogenously, as we would say, into their life.It keeps them young, it keeps their skin better, their health better, lean mass more.You get a pulse of this every time you fast.
Okay, so sign me up.When I when I eat in this particular fashion, growth hormone goes up.Well, it's like an anti aging hormone.Next, next autophagy kicks in, they discovered this process just like six or seven years ago.
And this is literally a cell repairing process that gets rid of bad furniture, let's call it, in the cell.And it gets rid of things like cancer.And it turns on things called sirtuins.There's seven of them.They call them the Magnificent Seven.
When people have sirtuin activity, they're literally getting rid of cancers.And actually, by the way, when you're eating ketones, there's one physician, quite famous,
research, I should say, I think for Boston College anyway, but he, he was mentioning that ketones can't even be utilized by cancer cells.So if you want to kill cancer, just rob it of its fuel, rob it of its fuel, just use ketones.
Well, you know what, I'm going to do that every day.I'm going to kill the cancer while it's just a little, little miniature cancer.And I'm going to do this every day to give my body a clean out.Okay, I'm getting rid of a lot of cancers now.
certainly at a healthy weight, we have to understand that 12 different cancers are associated with obesity, 12 of them.You know, when people say, hey, I mean, beauty and health is very interesting thing, right?
We want a lean person, we want an attractive person as a wife, as a husband, whatever.But there is a real, that's a proxy.Beauty is a proxy for health.
And so if I can say, hey, you're a healthy weight, it also might be a proxy for some spiritual things, too, because ultimately, you know, it's a sin of gluttony when you're morbidly obese, four, five, six, seven, 800 pounds.
And actually, you have appendicitis, I think, but I can't get into the cat scanner because you're so huge that the only thing big enough is a cat scanner at a zoo in Maryland.Like, it's it's really
What I'm trying to say is that what I see... Oh man, I got sad again.
What I see in the ER is the ultimate outcome of this denial.And when I say denial, I mean self-denial.I mean just denial of reality.And you have to have humility to accept that.And it's not a good time.
Can I tell you a story?Can I tell you a story?Please.It's about fasting, but not food, but maybe.When I was first married and then People might get a little like, I can't believe he's talking about his life like this, but I don't care.
I'm going to do it. I was married and then I was learning just about orthodoxy.I was young in orthodoxy.In my first parish, the priest didn't really emphasize fasting in its fullest sense, including marital fast.Here we go.
So you know about the marital fast.So you fast also from sexual relations, even with your own wife.And so I was like, my spiritual father was like, yeah, that's what we do.And I went, that's great.What? Wait a minute.
And then my wife was pregnant and having a baby.So obviously, you know, in those periods of life, you're not. as a young, I was a young man, you know, happy and love my wife.I didn't really do a lot of the, the romance during that period.
And then she had time right after the baby, a wonderful baby was born.That was Georgia, I think.And then, and then there was a six week, six week to eight week, you know, you don't, you don't, don't mess around then.
Cause your wife's just had a baby, right?You know about this.Don't, you can, I want to make you a little uncomfortable.So here we go.And then go for it. You're a doctor, you're not gonna be uncomfortable.
But trust me, right now, somebody's out there going, I can't believe he's talking about his sex life.Whatever, calm down.It's about life.So here's what happened next.During that six weeks, I saw something coming, which was the great fast.
And so I talked to my spiritual father and I said, Father, so there's this thing that we've learned about, my wife's really into it, it's called marital fasting, but That doesn't like apply like to me right now, right?
Because of, you know, all eight months, nine months, then six weeks.And now you're going to tell me another 48 days.Come on, father.Like, seriously, like, uh, really want to, you know, I'm feeling it feeling good.Let's do some carnal stuff.
And he's like, so what are you asking me?And I was like, father, I'm just asking.Uh, I think the words are kind of, I'm a young ortho economy of like, you know, give me a thumbs up. I'm not gonna give you, what are you asking me?
You wanna have sex with your wife?I was like, yeah.He's like, well, go ahead and have sex with your wife.The fast includes marital relations.So here's the deal.If you wanna do what the church, the healers of body and mind and spirit do, then do this.
And I was like, ah, yeah, yeah.Because I'm like, I operate out of guilt a lot.I went to my wife.She said, yeah, we're gonna do that, of course.So another, another, whatever, eight weeks. And guess what happened?
Guess what happened, Dr. Pete?
I fully understood Pascha, Easter, resurrection, because I lived it both as a thing, as an act, I lived it as a liturgical event, but also as an act of participation.
I participated in the fast at the highest level, for me anyway, as a kind of a carnal guy.
And when I entered all that the feast was, people know what I'm saying, then I actually was rewarded with a deeper, more profound understanding of the resurrection of the body.And it was amazing and I never forgot it.
And so that was like my second Pascha.And when that happened, I think what happened is I realized that there is something else to all this conversation about health that I hadn't ever thought about.
I thought, you know, I thought sick pill pill fixes sick.I happy, you know, and I realized, no, it's a participatory event.This thing called health and spiritual awareness and enlightenment and deification and illumination.
You know, that's the story is not about food there, but you get it right.Get what I'm saying?
I do.I do.And, you know, there's You know, I haven't done the research to figure out what happens when you go without marital relations for that long, you know, testosterone and other things.
It's a type of fasting, though.
It's carnal.It is a type of fasting, and there is.And, you know, it's an opportunity to focus on different things.It's a moment to make good use of time that would have been spent doing something else. It's a different emphasis.
I get what you're, I'm picking up what you're putting down.I'll say this just about the timeline of Lent, which I find no coincidence.
You know, there are studies out there with people with cardiovascular disease, true disease in their coronary arteries, in their heart, where they're able to oftentimes reduce and really start to decrease some of those risk factors in as little as 30 days with certain interventions through diet.
I bring this up to say this, I have worked the ER so many times on holidays where people face terrible tragedies on the holiday.
I mean, if you can imagine being there at Pascha and like instead of being there for come receive you the light at midnight, you're in the hospital instead dealing with stroke or heart attack or some sugar issue.
And what's so fascinating to me, it's like, We think that we're just kind of like happy-go-lucky preparing the bunny eggs for Easter, and we're going to do these little practices to make it seem better and good, and we're going to be excited.
But actually, you might actually be doing the fast might allow you to physically be at Pascha this year. for a grandma, for grandpa, for your uncles, for your aunts.
Like you literally, like God, again, God says, hey, I don't want you to suffer on Pascha.Here's a practice to ensure that you and your family and your community can celebrate it without confusion.
And so again, I just, I find that the, our own self exile, we're our own worst enemies. And if we take Lent seriously, you know, and I bring it up as an ER doc because I see these outcomes all the time in the ER. on the holidays.
But if if we had a society culturally that prepared for the holidays, well, maybe we could celebrate them without this confusion of tragedy.
And so, you know, that's that 30, 48 day period is no coincidence is a reason why we fast for that long, because it takes that long to reverse these different risk factors and or at least mitigate them.
And, you know, we don't want to be burying mom on Pascha. You know, we don't want to be in the hospital when we should have been at vigil the night before.We're actually at the hospital instead.
And so, you know, I'm not sure if the mechanism for marital relations at this point maybe deserves another book.
Well, no, but it helped me to be illuminated.It helped me.It took me from a bodily understanding of Posca.I was actually in an agnostic place, which is, I'm just going to think about all that Posca is and Easter is.
I'm going to think about it, to actually participating in a way where the thing I liked the most was deferred, like you said.And there was something about that that allowed for illumination. which I think fasting with food also does.
And of course, it does the physical parts of cleaning stuff out, right?Do I have that right?
Yeah, I mean, it all is in the same vein of progress, and they resonate with each other.There's a synergy there.And
Yeah, it's a pattern.It's a pattern of health.Yeah, it is.And the pattern of health is, is up and down, right?The pattern of health is you have to, you have to both die and be resurrected, you have to do both.
And I just find speaking of dying, resurrecting, I mean, why did God say when he was on the cross, God, my God, why is that forsaken me?
And I feel like that phrase actually resonates with so much of human experience, which is like, I am really losing hope.I don't know why this is happening to me.But then God has to die in order to resurrect, to go into Hades, to prepare heaven.
And I feel like it's the same thing.It's like, God, my God, why do I have to fast?Why do I have this challenge?Why do I have this problem?But you need to go through that to break through and resurrect into a better future world.
And, you know, I think it's allegorical.I think it's literal.I think it's figurative.It's all of that.And I think it's a very powerful moment in spiritual history.But we need to take that seriously.
And so when we're complaining about the things we're asked to do, and again, I don't say this It's funny, right?Because you could take this thing I just said in a cult and justify all sorts of terrible things.
But that's why you have to be a part of the body of the church that has quality metrics.And as you talk about Christianities, I mean, I can't really say that that phrase I just saw or said applies to 30,000 different groups of Christians.I can't.
But what I can say is that in the Orthodox Church, over 2,000 years of improvement, checking things, applying stuff,
um you know right the movement of the holy spirit yeah it's valid yeah so what can we do is your book what We'll link stuff to your work and to your writing, and we'll link it all up, and people can find out more about what you do here.
That's part of why I want to have you on.But I also really want to thank you, man, because I think something happened where the practical-minded person could also see
the impracticality of the spiritual life being bound and united with the simplicity of the practical life.I think there's both things happening in this conversation.It was nice.Do you want to add anything?
I actually just made a response piece to that point you brought up about how Adam and Eve, for the sake of knowledge, ate the fruit.So brilliant.So brilliant. It's pretty scary.It really is such a core fall.
And anyway, there's so much more we could talk about, John.But like I said, I just feel like there's no coincidence that when God had to sort of say, hey, can human beings handle it?
going to put this thing called a food in front of them like it's going to be a fasting practice.
When they failed that all manner of sin resulted the world was changed.But like he didn't he didn't say don't murder is the first the first test.Don't say a certain word don't have sex.It was it was don't eat but that represented
all future potential problems.And I, again, I just go back to this idea that if we could just get fasting right, it's almost like we're going back into Eden and we're able to get ourselves in the right place.I'll just say this.
There was a documentary that came out from National Geographic about whether or not the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem was indeed the tomb of Christ.And what's so funny to me is that the documentary itself
It called together this funny irony that the sepulcher was starting to fall apart and they had to renovate it and reinforce it.But it was an opportunity for the scientists to go in and prove the fact. that Christ was there.
Now, as God says, you know, there's nothing worse than like asking God to be a circus actor and being like, oh, you know, move, you know, burn this tree or do this thing.
But it is funny though, that in 2000 years of Christian history, you know, the faithful didn't need proof.They just needed oral tradition and understanding that this was indeed where Christ was and they venerated as such.But now we're in 2024.
And with the scientific lens, we had to go in there and validate.Now, They did validate it and it was true.But I guess my point is connecting that story to fasting.
It's like, God gave us this tool in this antidote to suffering and this truth about who we are and we can transform ourselves physically, spiritually, mentally through it.
And I, in 2024, because we lack so much faith, I lack so much faith, I have to go through it and prove it to myself that fasting really is indeed molecularly, physiologically, metabolically useful.
And all the while, it's always been useful, just like all the while Christ's tomb was always there.But in some ways, though, it is kind of like God's giving us some compassion there, too.He's kind of saying, hey, it's 2024.
Things have never been more secular.Things have never been more confusing.If we need to go in there to the tomb finally and validate what has already been known, people, just go do it.
And then like, here's Dr. Petitius, you know, you don't want to fast, it's a pain in your ass, you know, you, you're so upset about it.It's such annoyance.
Well, you know what, here's a book on all the on the things that prove that it's actually one of the greatest return on investments you could ever do.
Like, if I could get a drug that could get you the results of what fasting does, I would be a trillionaire.
And, and so, you know, it's just, it's just so interesting to me that we self exile ourselves in our own lives from God's, um, uh, sympathy and tool and, and therapy.
And, uh, you know, as the old saying is, you know, physician, heal thyself, or do you want to be healed?And, um, when it comes to evidently 80% of all disease, we have to ask ourselves, you know, we need to be responsible and take accountability.
And that doesn't mean we don't need to have sympathy or empathy for people in front of us.It's just that.
You know, of course, let's not forget our our beginnings and some of the tools that we've been given and and I'll talk all sorts of different examples about how fasting makes a big difference in a lot of different Diseases out there that I mentioned many of them.
But yeah, well, you know, this is just touching the surface, but um, well, let's keep Why don't you come back come back in a while?Thank you.John.
I appreciate what we'll talk again.This was fascinating.I
Thanks, John.Thanks for your work, and I appreciate your time, too.It really, really means a lot.
Can you get back, can you ever come to South Carolina to our restaurant?Would you?
I've heard about this feasting that goes on, and again, no coincidence there.
I mean, the idea that you're communicating through food, and John, we didn't even talk about this, but the enteric nervous system, it's the second biggest nervous system in your body.
It's very complicated, and there's no reason, there's no coincidence that communion is a food. You know, it literally interacts with us on on a on a basis, like our center isn't just our brain, it really is our gut and communities of food.
And you're talking about this feasting and bringing people together in the harmony of what comes out of that synergy.And that's there's.
OK, Dr. Pete, then this is the deal. Yeah, my editor, Andrew says no one will listen past an hour and he yells at me and I want to keep talking, but we can't talk.So then we already have our second podcast, because that's actually amazing.
And it's really essential to our work.And there's something in there that I need to know how to articulate.Will you teach me in another podcast in a little while about this nervous system.That's really nice practical knowledge for the table.
I want to talk to people about that.Okay, that's our next thing.I'm I'm not joking.Okay.That's great.
Guys.Dr. P Petitus.And then you are related to I had your uncle on once.Yes, Timothy.Cool.
Yeah, Uncle Tim.Just brilliant, man.He's the Aristotle.Yep.
Yeah, he's the Aristotle.You're the, you're the down in the, you're, you're down in the dirt physician working with people, man.I love it.This is beautiful.So, so I'll see you soon.We'll do this.
And I really do want to have that conversation and, um, God bless.And I hope we, uh, we find each other either down here or if I'm up in Pennsylvania, I'll look you up.Okay.That's, that's real thing.
Thank you, John.You got a friend of PA.Yep.
Okay, good.Have a great, have a great day guys. Like if you go, that doesn't sound true to me.What?Fasting doesn't sound like it would be helpful to you.Okay, you are holding on.You are holding on to some modernism and some scientism.
You're holding on to something.Consumerism, the promise that you can do whatever you want and still be healthy.
Like, if you still think that's true, like, if you're hanging out in that spot, don't worry, they'll have a pill for me once I destroy my body.Guys, that guy, Dr. Pete, is helping us wake up.
If you're all the way in and you want to do something crazy and spend two and a half years of your life or two years of your life overseas working, we just got two guys to sign up.It's amazing.A guy named Coltrane.Three, actually.A guy named Joseph.
A guy named Tyler. They're heading into the field, but we have two more slots to fill in Mozambique right now.You should talk to me and Adrian.Check out our website.First things www.first-things.org right there.You know what you'll find out.
How to contact Adrian or Daniel and get hired.Well, maybe.You gotta have some skills.Here's the number one skill.Perseverance, language, ability.The ability to speak a language.That would be helpful.What if you can't do that?
How about an ability to sit quietly and learn about your neighbors and then apply really cool skills to help them build their most beautiful projects?Who loves ya?Peace out.
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