Have you ever reached for your phone first thing in the morning… turned on background noise just to avoid silence… or filled every spare second with productivity so you don't have to slow down?
It's wild how even the smallest habits — those little "ropes" — can quietly tether our hearts and keep us from rising fully toward God.
This week on Nourished to Bloom, we continue our 40 Days to Food Freedom journey with a fresh Lenten question:
Instead of asking, "What am I giving up?" What if we ask, "What is really tethering my heart?"
Because Lent isn't a spiritual diet. It isn't a crash cleanse. It isn't about proving our discipline.
It's about holy detachment — loosening whatever keeps our hearts from soaring.
In this episode, we explore:
💫 The Bird and the Rope – Drawing from St. John of the Cross, we reflect on how even the tiniest attachment can keep us grounded spiritually.
🙏 Honoring Hunger as God's Design – Physical hunger isn't a weakness to suppress. It's part of how God created us. Fasting is chosen and ordered; chronic self-denial rooted in fear is not the same thing.
🌿 5 Deeper, Non-Food Ways to Fast:
🔇 Fast from noise — What surfaces when we allow silence? 📱 Fast from the phone — What happens when we put it down? 🗂️ Fast from productivity as identity — Who are we without the to-do list? 👀 Fast from comparison — Where has envy quietly shaped our peace? ✋ Fast from control narratives — Where are we gripping instead of trusting?
Food is often the visible surface. But sometimes it's not the rope — it's just where the rope shows up.
This episode invites us to examine the deeper attachments that keep us distracted, busy, anxious, or striving — and to create space for the Lord to gently reorder our loves.
Your Lenten Invitation
🌱 Honor your physical hunger appropriately — receive nourishment as gift, not guilt. 🌱 Choose ONE non-food fast this week. 🌱 Notice where resistance rises — that's often where attachment lives.
By Easter, we're not aiming for perfect discipline. We're seeking hearts that feel lighter, freer, and more centered in Christ.
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The Nourished to Bloom Podcast Show Notes: www.podcast.karatrochta.com/shownotes
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So last week we began our 40 Days to Food Freedom journey
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by asking a really different kind of Lenten question.
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Not what am I giving up, but what is tethering my heart?
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We relied on that powerful image from Saint John of the Cross, the bird
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tied by even the smallest string not being able to rise.
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So it doesn't really matter how thin the rope is or how thick it is,
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if it's tied, that bird also known as ourselves,
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cannot fly. We cannot rise to the Lord. And so this week I
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want to gently challenge something that I think many of us assume about Lent,
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that we need to fast or give up
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food, right? But what if the real fasting isn't focused on
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food at all? What if like your deeper attachments
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are to things like noise or distraction? Maybe it's
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comparison or productivity. Or the illusion of
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having control. Y'all, this is a season of holy
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detachment, a chance to loosen whatever keeps our hearts from
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rising fully toward God. So today we're going to talk about what
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honoring hunger looks like as part of God's design, as well as
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explore 5 non-food ways to fast that might reveal where
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your true attachments live. Let's dive in.
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Welcome to the Nourish to Bloom podcast. Where your faith meets
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your health. I'm your host, Kara Trocta, a registered dietitian and
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certified Catholic coach, and I'm here to help you cultivate a deeper connection
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with your body, your spirit, and the nourishment that sustains them
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both. In a world filled with noise and
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confusion about food, health, and body image, this podcast
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offers truth and healing from a Christ-centered perspective.
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Together, we'll untangle the deep roots of diet culture and discover
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what it means to truly care for ourselves through joyful
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nourishment of mind, body, and soul. We're here to dive into
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the transformative power of intuitive eating coupled with the rich teachings of our
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Christian faith. With every episode, I'll be cheering you on,
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offering insights, inspiration, and practical tools to help
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you heal your relationship with food and embrace the beauty
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of your body as a temple of the Holy Spirit. With
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confidence and courage that can only be found in Christ.
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Join me as we journey together towards a more holistic approach to wellness,
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one that honors the wisdom of your body as God's creation,
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the teachings of our faith, and the unique purpose you're called to
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fulfill. You were made to bloom,
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to come into full beauty and health in order to bear good fruit
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for the Lord with your life. So if you're ready to nourish your body,
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feed your soul, and bloom into the best version of yourself, then
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you're in the right place. And I'm so happy you're here.
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Welcome to Nourish to Bloom, where every day is a sacred
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invitation to thrive. Hey there, welcome back to the
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Nourish to Bloom podcast. So happy to be here with you this
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week and diving into week 2 of our 40 Days to
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Food Freedom Challenge. Um, we talked about the rope
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last week and it's an image that I keep coming back to. Uh,
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just— I think we can all visualize it, right? Whether it's a bird or some,
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some other sort of animal, we've maybe seen it in a movie or,
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um, you know, in a real life experience. Just this, this animal
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being like trapped and tied down. And if you think about the
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animal that's in this situation, it's often scared,
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it's, um, often kind of like fighting and resisting against
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those, those ropes or those tethers. And it just
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wants to be free. And then, you know, if you happen to be in the
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situation where like it does get free, it just, it just
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soars, right? It, it takes off as quickly as possible. And I think
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it's just such a powerful image for us because I think when
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we can look at these attachments and we look at the things that are tethering
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our hearts, that we're being, we're being tied
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down, right? And there, there is sort of that fear, but it's not
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um, it's fear that's provoked by things from the outside
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world, right? There's this, this deep desire and this
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longing to orient our hearts, to orient our minds and our lives towards
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God and towards love. But when we allow these things to tether
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us down, it starts to
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really invite fear in, right? And that's
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where we start, start to try to like struggle and resist and like
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fight against these things on our own. But the challenge is really
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to invite the Lord into, into that struggle,
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into whatever it is that's tethering your heart, and really let
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him loosen those attachments.
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And I think that's how fasting can, can really help, is that it gives
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us that space, right? And so again, we ask
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that question: what is tethering your heart this Lent?
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And not just what you're planning on giving up, right? Because
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sometimes I think we take kind of the easy path, the, the, the thing that,
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okay, maybe I know I can give this up, or I know that I it
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might be easy to go without this, but we don't really go deep. We
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don't really look at what has too much authority in your life.
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And so today the challenge is to just really gently and
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curi— curiously explore what if that rope really
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isn't food, like a particular food. I mean, maybe it is,
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but maybe there's something that's, that's deeper, right?
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Because we have to remember that Lent is not this self-improvement
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project. It's not a,
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um, a, a excuse to diet, right? It's not a test of how strong we
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can be, but it's really the church giving us fasting as
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this discipline of detachment.
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Detachment, not punishment. Detachment,
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not body distrust. Detachment, not self-hatred.
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It's just meaning that you're creating this space, and a
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space to notice what you're clinging to, a space to feel,
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you know, identify where are you dependent on God and
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then where are you self-reliant, and then space to just
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reorder and reorient your mind,
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your soul, your focus. And like I said,
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sometimes I think if we're honest, we choose food as our Lenten focus because
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it feels measurable, it feels maybe
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attainable. It feels maybe even comfortable, slightly
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easy. But when we do this, those deeper attachments
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that we have go untouched, and that's where we need that
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clarity. What if that thicker rope that's
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holding you down is the phone that you're reaching for first
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thing in the morning, or it's the constant noise,
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the, the car radio on, always listening to
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a podcast, TV on in the background that keeps you from silence?
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Or maybe it's that productivity,
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that need to be constantly producing something in order to make you
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feel worthy. Or maybe it's falling into that
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comparison trap that is constantly,
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quietly shaping how you see yourself.
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Or maybe it's the planning, the need for control that
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convinces you that everything depends on you.
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But y'all, the truth is, is that we don't actually have control.
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Now, we may have the illusion of it, and some of our habits are
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attempts to just really manage uncertainty.
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That's why we desire control, is because we don't like the uncertainty.
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And so then we create habits in, in an attempt to
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manage this uncertainty. And those things look like food rules,
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because if we have food rules, then we can maybe be a little more certain.
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Scrolling can do that. Overworking can do that.
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Constant distraction can do that because they create this
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sense of temporary stability. But
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Lent is inviting us into something deeper than management,
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because when we get caught up in this, you know,
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temporary stability, we are really just promoting that
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self-reliance. But instead Lent is an invitation
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to surrender, to lay it at
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the foot of the cross. And so if we kind of look at this, what
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this means about like honoring our physical hunger, um,
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in, in the light of how we were designed, you know, outside of the church's
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prescribed fasting days, right? And we know that the church's prescribed fasting
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days are, um, Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, and then abstaining
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from meat on, on Fridays, right? So that's where kind
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of fasting in the sense of, um,
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specific things around food look like. But we can
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also take fasting to mean something deeper, right?
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But if we look at our, our physical hunger and honoring our
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physical hunger, it's not a weakness. It's not, you
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know, um, giving in the way diet culture
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might make you think it is. And we can kind of look at Psalm 107,
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and it says that he satisfies the longing soul. And the hungry soul
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he fills with good things, right? And
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so when we take these things that we're, we're longing for,
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and if we look at this, you know, physical hunger— God created and
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designed our bodies to need physical nourishment.
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He's going to fill it with good things
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when we turn these, these,
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you know, physical hunger cues over to him and not focus
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on trying to delay our hunger, not focusing on trying
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to um, ignore our hunger because it's, it's a
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normal and natural thing, right? It's an acknowledgment
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of a human need, and it's God's way of
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helping us meet our physical human needs.
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I mean, if you think about it, you know, when, when Christ walked on this
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earth, he experienced physical hunger as well.
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You saw that, um, several times in scripture he fed
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thousands of people because he recognized that
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they had physical hunger as well as their spiritual hunger,
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right? So really trying to shift your
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perspective on what hunger might look like. But I really
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want to share with you, I think, 5 non-food
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ways to fast this Lent that I think expose some of the
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thicker ropes that are tethering our hearts.
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The first one is fasting from noise. Having that
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constant background noise— podcasts in the car, TV while
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cooking, music while cleaning, scrolling while waiting.
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Why do we do this? It's because
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silence can feel uncomfortable, right?
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When we have to sit in silence, we're afraid of what might come
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up. Of what we might have to face. But
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silence removes distraction,
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and distraction is really kind of that rope that
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is tethering you down. But it's a, it's a rope that feels
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safe and secure, right? Because if
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we kind of have this rope and we're distracted by it, it doesn't
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mean that we are facing that uncomfortable silence.
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But that's really when we fast from noise, that's the invitation. That's
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where the transformation of, of a Lenten fast can come
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forward. So the challenge is to maybe sit in some silence,
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and what surfaces for you when it's quiet?
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Number 2, fasting from your phone. Not eliminating it,
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um, they are good tools to have, but limiting it. Maybe that looks like
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no scrolling for the first, first 30 minutes of the morning, or maybe it's
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no scrolling before you go to bed. Maybe,
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um, you know, if you find anxiety rising when you set your phone down
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or when you like put space between it,
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don't, um, judge yourself, don't get harsh, but
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just realize that that's information, that's information of this
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attachment that we're talking about. Number 3:
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fasting from productivity as identity. I think this one hits
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hard for a lot of us. Um, if your sense of self-worth
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rises and falls with how much you accomplish, that is a
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rope. So maybe it looks like trying to leave one
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thing undone at the end of the day without
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having a freakout moment, without spiraling, without
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justifying it, without filling the gap. But what happens?
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What does it look like if you just leave one thing undone? Because
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if you are so tied up in who you are is
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what you do then again, that's showing that attachment, that
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self-reliance, that desire for control. That's the
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attachment that needs to be tethered. Number 4:
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fasting from comparison. Social media,
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body comparison, lifestyle comparison, spiritual comparison—
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we are surrounded by comparison traps all
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day long. And comparison ties your
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peace to someone else's life. It fills
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your head with lies that if I was more like this person, or if I
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did this thing, then I will, you know, insert blank— be
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happier, be healthier, um,
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be more liked, be more loved, you know, whatever, right?
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But this allows us to detach from accounts
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that stir envy to— and maybe that looks
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like needing to fast from a mirror if needed. If you're a person who walks
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by a mirror and every time you walk by a mirror you're checking yourself out,
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seeing if your hair is perfect, Maybe it's not
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looking in the mirror. And just notice
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when your mind starts to drift towards these comparisons, what are the
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lies that are popping up? And is that tether,
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that rope, the deeper vice of
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envy? Is that the attachment? And then 5,
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fasting from control narratives. Um, this one may be
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a little more subtle, but it's these mental scripts that if I just manage this
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perfectly then fill in the blank. If I plan enough,
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fill in the blank. If I track everything, fill in the blank,
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right? This shows our dependency on trying to have
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control, and we have to remember that we don't actually have control.
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We were really created and oriented to have
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dependence on God, and
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fasting really exposes when we resist that
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dependence or that truth that we need God.
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So now if we can circle back to bringing this back to food, if
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you fast from noise, you might discover that
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you are reaching to food to fill the silence.
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If you're fasting from your phone, you may notice how
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often you snack while scrolling. If you fast
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from productivity, you may see how you use food as a reward.
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If you fast from comparison, you may realize body
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image drives so many of your food choices.
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So it might not be food that's the actual rope, it just may be
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where that rope starts to show up. It may be a consequence or a
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byproduct of whatever is tethering you, of that deeper
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attachment. And so that's why this 40 Days to Food Freedom
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journey is really about a deeper
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transformation, finding those deeper attachments, understanding
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how, um, how food may be playing a part in this, how
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when we fast from food, we may discover some of these other
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attachments, or when we, um, fast from these deeper attachments,
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we may discover a disordered relationship from food, right? So
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the whole thing is about untethering those things that are, that are
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keeping our hearts pinned down. So your invitation for this
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week is first to really honor your physical hunger
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appropriately. When your body signals that it needs fuel,
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respond to it, nourishment, and
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see nourishment as a provision and a gift from God, and
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trust that God did not design your body to be your enemy.
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And then secondly, choose one non-food fast from the
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list that I gave to you today, not all five, but just one,
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and watch what surfaces. Where do you feel
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like this resistance rise? When you think about
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fasting from this particular thing? Where does the
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anxiety come up and bubble up? Or
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where do you feel really exposed or vulnerable?
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And those are all just clues of where
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you likely have an attachment living. And just
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remember, the goal of fasting is not
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emptiness. It's not about— trying to white-knuckle your way
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through anything. It's just this invitation to create
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space, to get curious, to build awareness,
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to really reorder and reorient.
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It's learning to loosen that rope so that your heart can rise.
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Because by Easter, we're not, you know, aiming for perfect discipline
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or to be this perfect person. We're just aiming for a
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deeper freedom through a deeper transformational
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change that can come about during our Lenten season.
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So I hope that you found some of these, you
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know, non-food ways of fasting, things that you can really explore in
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the coming weeks of Lent to understand where you have these deeper attachments,
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to understand where you are being tethered. Um, thanks so
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much for spending this time here with me today. I will See you
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right back here next week. Remember, beauty held is a seed, beauty shared is the
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flower. It is your time to bloom. Take care and God bless. Bye!