INTRODUCTION:
David Hernandez is the founder of Body By Purpose, creator of the Elite Champion Fitness Academy and host of the podcast, Listen, You’re Not Defeated.
He is passionate, inspiring, and
motivated. He believes that each of us was designed to live a life of purpose.
He believes in one core component in everything he teaches… providing VALUE. So that men and women can learn the principles needed to achieve a healthy, fit and fulfilling life.
His life’s mission is to empower OVER 1
MILLION people to live a better life, healthy, fit and free! After losing his
childhood best friend to obesity at the age of 21, David promised himself that
no one he loved or cared about was ever going to die of obesity if he could
help it.
INCLUDED IN THIS EPISODE (But not limited to):
· Super Sickening Health Advice
· Male Self Esteem Issues
· Obesity Concerns
· Emotional Eating
· Our Relationship With Food
· Fitness Industry Tea
· Lagging Indication Of Lab Tests
· The Benefits Of Weight Loss
· The Stress Of Weight On Internal Organs
· The Mental Effect On Exercise
CONNECT WITH DAVID:
Website: http://www.DavidHernandez.co
Website: http://www.EmotionalEatingSupport.com
YouTube: https://bit.ly/3k6mW3t
Facebook: www.facebook.com/davekhernandez
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/davekhernandez
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/davekhernandez
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/davekhernandez/
DIETICIAN RECOMMENDED INFO:
https://www.niddk.nih.gov/health-information/weight-management/adult-overweight-obesity/health-risks
https://www.cdc.gov/healthyweight/effects/index.html
CONNECT WITH DE’VANNON:
Website: https://www.SexDrugsAndJesus.com
Website: https://www.DownUnderApparel.com
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sexdrugsandjesus
YouTube: https://bit.ly/3daTqCM
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SexDrugsAndJesus/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sexdrugsandjesuspodcast/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TabooTopix
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/devannon
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.es/SexDrugsAndJesus/_saved/
Email: DeVannon@SDJPodcast.com
DE’VANNON’S RECOMMENDATIONS:
· Pray Away Documentary (NETFLIX)
o https://www.netflix.com/title/81040370
o TRAILER: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tk_CqGVfxEs
· OverviewBible (Jeffrey Kranz)
o https://www.youtube.com/c/OverviewBible
· Hillsong: A Megachurch Exposed (Documentary)
· Leaving Hillsong Podcast With Tanya Levin
o https://leavinghillsong.podbean.com
· Upwork: https://www.upwork.com
· FreeUp: https://freeup.net
VETERAN’S SERVICE ORGANIZATIONS
· Disabled American Veterans (DAV): https://www.dav.org
· American Legion: https://www.legion.org
· What The World Needs Now (Dionne Warwick): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfHAs9cdTqg
INTERESTED IN PODCASTING OR BEING A GUEST?:
· PodMatch is awesome! This application streamlines the process of finding guests for your show and also helps you find shows to be a guest on. The PodMatch Community is a part of this and that is where you can ask questions and get help from an entire network of people so that you save both money and time on your podcasting journey.
https://podmatch.com/signup/devannon
TRANSCRIPT:
David Hernandez
[00:00:00]
You’re listening to the sex drugs and Jesus podcast, where we discuss whatever the fuck we want to! And yes, we can put sex and drugs and Jesus all in the same bed and still be all right at the end of the day. My name is De’Vannon and I’ll be interviewing guests from every corner of this world as we dig into topics that are too risqué for the morning show, as we strive to help you understand what’s really going on in your life.
There is nothing off the table and we’ve got a lot to talk about. So let’s dive right into this episode.
De’Vannon: Good morning everybody, and welcome to the Sex Drugs in Jesus podcast. So glad to have you with me today. David Hernandez is the founder of Body by Purpose, creator of the Elite Champion Fitness Academy and host of the podcast. Listen, you’re not defeated. Join David and I today as we get deep and heavy about obesity, our relationship with food, mental health, self-esteem, and so much more.
David [00:01:00] lost a friend to obesity and had a near death experience himself,
and so this episode is quite emotional.
Please listen and share. Hello everyone and welcome back to the Sex Drugs in Jesus podcast. I love having all of you. I love having sex with all of you. I love doing drugs with all of you, and I love talking about Jesus with all of you. David, how are you?
David: I’m doing fantastic. My man’s doing, doing a, a great morning here and excited to be here with you.
Thanks for having me.
De’Vannon: Hells fuck yeah. So y’all, David Hernandez is in Florida. He’s the founder of Body By Purpose. He’s gonna tell you what that is in just a moment. He’s the creator of the Elite Champion Fitness Academy. He’s gonna tell you what that is in just a moment. He’s a certified personal trainer, a certified nutrition specialist, the member of the International Sports and Science [00:02:00]Association.
He’s gonna tell me what that is in a moment, cause I’m most curious about it. He’s the host of. Of of the podcast called Listen, you’re Not Defeated, and he’s gonna give us some tea about that too. So I’ll walk you, I’ll walk you through everything that you gotta tell us. So first, what is Body by Purpose?
David: Yeah. Awesome. And look, I believe our body was designed with the specific purpose, and each one of our purposes are unique. And if our body isn’t aligned to our purpose, to our desire, to our lifestyle, to the things that we desire to achieve and do in life, well, we may fall short of that because our body is the instrument that takes us there.
right? It’s what makes us travel to that destination in life. And so I believe that when we align our body to that purpose, we can truly become unstoppable and ultimately able to achieve whatever we desire to achieve. So that was critical with me. I was, I was kind of thinking about what name do I wanna [00:03:00] give?
Because I believe that health is bigger than us, right? And if we can include purpose in all that we do, well, then we can make our body achieve that as well.
De’Vannon: So is this like a nonprofit? Is it, you know, like your fitness organization? What is it?
David: Yeah, it’s my company where I run all of my fitness through.
But primarily it’s also A, a kind of like a, like a motto that I, that I want people to adopt in their own life, so to speak, because it’s a message, right? And I think that when we put a message or a meaning to everything that we do, then we can enhance the value of what we’re doing. And I believe that our body is a critical tool.
It’s an instrument that oftentimes we ignore. We’re now starting to talk a lot about, a lot about the mind, and we talk a lot about our emotions and we talk a lot about many things, and the body’s also talked about, [00:04:00] however, I believe the body is not presented in the correct. I believed oftentimes when we look at the media, when we look at how we should look, there’s a specific stigma.
There’s a specific style. Right now we’re getting back into the really, really skinny look, and oftentimes if the look or the body, again, isn’t specifically aligned to your purpose, then it doesn’t matter what body you have, it’s gonna ultimately keep us from achieving our ultimate desires in.
De’Vannon: Okay. All right, cool.
So what is the Elite Champion Fitness Academy?
David: That’s the academy that I put together where I utilize to train all my students. So instead of me telling you what to do, I believe in educating you to take control of your own health. So it’s a platform that I have. All of the years that I’ve been in fitness, 15 plus [00:05:00] years, all of the education that I’ve acquired, I’ve condensed it to a very specific core component system, so to speak.
And in that academy, I put all of the principles that I believe are necessary for one to achieve the ultimate health that they desire in one place. And so that’s basically my coaching platform that I put together, and it’s what I utilize with all of my students.
De’Vannon: Fabulous. Now, what is the International Sports and Science Association?
David: That’s where I got my certification from. It’s a certification education company or a certification company where you can get your nutrition certification, your personal trainer, asso certification and all things related to health basically.
De’Vannon: All right. Now they had me atk. I was like, okay,
So the podcast, listen, you’re not defeated. What is its premise?
David: The premise is really to tell [00:06:00] people that doesn’t matter what situation that you’re in, you’re really not defeated. And oftentimes as humans, we have one area or a few areas where we might feel defeated in, and that might be nutrition, that might be in health.
I can’t release weight. That might be in mindset. I don’t know how to take control of certain negative thoughts to get me there. So it’s a lifestyle show where we basically cover many areas to ultimately help you live a not defeated life.
De’Vannon: Now, when I was researching that on your website it’s the verbiage kind of makes it seem like it’s geared toward women.
Is that still the case or has it expanded to include.
David: It’s expanded to include everyone, and it’s really now to the place of, well, what is your ultimate desire, right? In life, which initially when we started it, it was geared very specifically towards only health. But I realize that in that [00:07:00] health is covering all areas, right?
It’s not just a physical health, it’s also a mental health. It’s also emotional health. It’s also spiritual health. And health is bigger than us because it does impact everything that we do. So through our development and kind of going episode to episode, we’ve now been able to diversified and expand it to anyone that wants to basically just live a freedom lifestyle or a lifestyle of freedom.
for proper English,
De’Vannon: oh, fuck, proper English . One thing, one thing I despise about this country. Is that we don’t have like an actual language of our own. That’s right. You know, we speak English well, that came from fucking England and fuck the king off with his head. Yeah. . You know, may I think that, I think that Mad Queen might’ve had a few Few.
Hmm. A few, few, few good points there. [00:08:00] I don’t know. I just it would be, I just love it that every other, basically every other country has its own fucking language. Yeah. You know, Australia at least has a goddamn accent, you know, and at least they have an accent, you know, over there in the uk, but pretty much every other country, you know, they have and in that their own language and that language really unites them, you know?
Yeah. And everything like that. It’s like, it’s like, it’s like when you’re on a job, but you learn to speak that occupation’s language and it bonds you. Mm-hmm. , you know,
David: I feel like, I mean, it’s an essence, right? I believe it’s, it’s an essence that makes up a country and it makes up an identity type. And look, I, I think holding onto that, that conversation there, I think it’s the same thing for all language in terms of who we are as people, right?
Because when we look at language, it, it’s the, it’s an essence that, that identifies something or someone, a country. [00:09:00] And I believe that in America, oftentimes we don’t have our own unique language, meaning we strive to sometimes be like somebody else, to copy somebody else, right? To, to, to, to live the life that somebody else has.
And we sometimes forget about, well, what is our core essence that we can adopt to live our own life and set our own standard, so to speak, in what we want in our life? So I just thought
De’Vannon: I’d throw that in. Feel free to throw in anything you want, man. So I love, I love how how deep of a thinker you are. And the reason why I really wanted to have you on my show is that that passion, you, you talk like a preacher, like you have like one of the good preachers, y’all, not one of the rapy ones or one of the molesters , not one of the grif ones.
Good one. So you have like that certain fire and intensity and passion and I could tell that you’re living, like you’re calling [00:10:00] and you even fused that into health and fitness and so Right. Thought it would be a unique take. I could have gotten anybody on here to talk about health and fitness, but I, I was, I was needing that, you know, I was looking for that, that.
And so, which you have that spark. And so I’m curious when I Oh, you’re welcome. And so when I was read, you know, researching you and everything I saw where you in the beginning of your fitness journey, you would go to the gym and you, you start up like the big muscley guys or whatever like that and mm-hmm.
and I read where you were able to extract insight and wisdom and tips that you said that you felt like the personal trainers and things like that either didn’t know or they weren’t sharing. So I would like you to share with us some sweet ass
David: secret. Yeah. Look, it really, what I’ve learned through I guess, looking at many bodybuilders life is that they’ve got [00:11:00] two to three things very clear for the.
They’ve given meaning to everything that they’re doing in the gym. Like it has a certain value and it has a certain standard of meaning for them. It’s what drives them. It’s what gets them up. It’s what keeps them on diets for months and years on end. It’s what keeps them committed to a specific outcome.
So much so that even if they don’t get it, they live satisfied because they know that the process and the journey has gotten them close to it or to achieving it. Right? And when I look at health, I look at, well, I started asking questions and saying, well, why is it that people don’t stick to the journey?
Why is it that people fall off? Why is it that they have, they’re able to commit to other things, but yet they fall off? When we’re talking about health, and I really come back to this piece, they’ve either not given health the value. That is necessary for them [00:12:00] to continue, or they’ve put other things at greater value that are overvalued or have greater value than they’ve put on health.
And then the second component is really looking at, well, they haven’t given value or they don’t find value in themselves. They don’t feel that they might be worth it. They feel that they might not be worthy enough. They might feel that they’re not deserving of having the health or the life that they desire.
So that was a big one. And I said, okay, so if this bodybuilder is living in this way and he’s given this meaning to them, that’s keeping them stuck, well, why can’t we incorporate that to just any average person? To help them in their own health and fitness journey. Right? So that was one. The second, the second thing that I learned, the second sort of secret, right, which is really not a secret, but is their commitment to process, meaning their determination and dedication to the [00:13:00] sport, right?
Or to their body or to their life. Because we look at, well, what does it take to get a body so greatly proportioned, so immaculate, right? So precise in a sense that it comes down to a science they’re determined to achieve, that they’re dedicated to that process. And oftentimes when we’re looking at an average person, right, or, or, or a, a person that is on their own journey, sometimes that might be lacking the dedication, the determination, and it help, it doesn’t allow them to get to their ultimate goal and destination.
Right. And then thirdly, a lot of it was learning how they actually work out some of the methodologies in terms of how they’re sculpting the bodies, how they’re actually doing certain movement patterns and taking that muscle to failure and making the muscle grow through increasing the blood flow in that body part, right?
And [00:14:00] ultimately reducing down to as little body fat as possible. So it, it brought a lot of insight that I was able to incorporate and look at, okay, if I’m not training a bodybuilder, how can I still incorporate some of these principles or some of these things that they do to a average person that is looking to maybe release 20 pounds, 30 pounds, 10 pounds, 50 pounds, a hundred pounds?
Right. And it was some, some of the core essences that I believe have really impacted many people in their, in their own journey.
De’Vannon: You know what I’m curious about? I don’t really think like a male. I identify more with feminine energy, so I think more like a woman on mills dating. Okay. Right. And so I’m curious cuz all of this, everything that you said is like, so like meaningful and deep in terms of physique and stuff like that.
So from talking to other guys and within yourself, like what are some of the things that motivate men to go, [00:15:00] you know, to work out, to get, you know, really, really defined bodies? We’re gonna talk about like the obesity and everything. Yeah. You know, in just a second. weight loss goals can be different, you know?
Absolutely. Going from 300 pounds to one 90 is like a huge deal, but you may not be like chiseled and well defined, but you are in super great shape, especially relative to what you were mm-hmm. . And I know that once you get like a six pack and eight pack, a nine pack or whatever, every guy I know who has that, the, if he gets out of the gym for like a month, that damn thing goes away.
Mm-hmm. . And so so whenever, so they don’t go more than like a week out of the gym and whenever they travel, they take their asses over the Gold Gym, fitness or whatever, like, like religion. So when I look at a man like that, I think, okay, he’s hot. This is like a sexual thing. Mm-hmm. . But the, but from hearing you describe this, and from the way I have [00:16:00] observed other guys, I don’t know that it’s like a sexual thing.
And so I don’t, so how, how do men look at, how do y’all look at your own
David: body? A lot of it is driven by ego in a sense that because we as men are achievers, right, strivers, we want to be in that place of, of chasing after things, achieving the provider at the home or whatever that might be for you.
It really is driven oftentimes by. How can I be the best version of myself or how can I be better than him? Or how can I be better than myself to become better? Or oftentimes it’s, I used to be this type of person that kept me in a low self-esteem state that wasn’t who I wanted to be, for example. I can really identify to that.
Growing up, I was super. [00:17:00] I was given a nickname, skinny. My dad used to call me that he didn’t know. He thought it was a good thing for him, but for me, it would affect my self-esteem. It would affect the way I would view myself because I did not like the way I looked. I was excessively for my standard skinny.
I would be made fun of because I wasn’t able to possibly perform, be good at sports because I was a specific physique type, right? And I always found myself having to prove myself, proving myself that I was able to play football, proving myself that I could become the best athlete, proving myself that I was much more than what my body said.
And so that took me into, okay, so how can I change that? I started reading magazines. I started looking at these bodybuilders and these physiques and saying, oh my gosh, who is this? Can I possibly achieve that? Then I look at their back stories, and many of these bodybuilders were the same way. They were skinny.
They were very thin, they were bullied, they were made fun of. [00:18:00] And then that drove them to change that. So oftentimes it, it really comes down to each person’s unique story, but I believe deep down inside there is something of that nature that is driving them, either growing up excessively skinny, low self-esteem, maybe being bullied, or it can ultimately come down to an ego-based drive that’s just like, I wanna be the best.
How can I achieve that wall? Let me be intimidating. Let me have these muscles because it’s gonna give me a certain look or a certain presence, right? Wherever I go, that when I walk into a room, I can change or capture the environment based on how I look.
Okay. No, I can’t speak for every male. Right? But that’s what oftentimes I’ve, I, I believe is, is the reasons.
De’Vannon: I mean I think you might speak for quite a [00:19:00] lot of them, especially men who, who are more on the masculine side, you know, and you know, cause even like the gay world mm-hmm. , you know, your tops and everything.
You know, you, you have your tops, your bottom tops are like, the dudes bottoms are like the girls, you know, for lack of better. Right. References. Even them, they get like this thing about being too thin. Mm-hmm. , you know, for me, I’ve always been able to keep a weight on, so I’ve always been like, okay, how can I get this shit off
Yeah. But I, but I didn’t wanna be muscley or nothing like that. I wanted it like a nice, you know, curvy like, you know, womanly physique and stuff like that. And I, I guess it’s just, and I guess it’s just because I don’t think like a guy like it, it was, it, it has been absolutely perplexing to me in my existence.
Why somebody who’s not overweight. Who’s like super skinny has a problem with that. Yeah. You know, [00:20:00] I, you know, hearing you explain it helps me to digest that better, because all my life I’m like, okay, how can I get down to, to being, you know, skinny mm-hmm. , you know, and and then the skinny guys are like, I’m not enough.
You know, I want to be more. And, and I’m all like, boy, don’t you know, you fine as hell. What do you want? Like, what more do you want? So, and then perspective. Perspective, right? And then the relationships. That I’ve had, you know, the, the, the, the dude, he’s all like, he thinks he’s too thin. I’m all like, okay, whatever you need to do.
I’m not judging your body, but they have it in their head. So much likes saying like, I can’t, I just can’t be thin. I need to like, have muscle or whatever. And so I don’t know if that’s like the xy chromosome primal. If I need to defend myself, I need to be bigger than the other person too. Maybe some of that’s getting worked in there.
I believe
David: so. Yeah. And, and oftentimes it can become a coping mechanism [00:21:00] to something like when we’re talking about life experiences, right? We’re talking about emotional triggers, emotional pain, trauma, right? Something in experience that causes some type of impact to us emotionally or psychologically will produce a stimulant to search for a coping mechanism.
And as humans, we all need them to survive to allow us to release whatever emotional impact we’ve received by X situation or X circumstance, right? And oftentimes, if it’s body dysmorphia, right, which we can kind of label that as as well. I see myself skinny. I see myself skinny, but dude, you’re not right.
In our head, we create that dysmorphia type where we may never be satisfied or we just see ourselves at something else. And oftentimes when we’re chasing after this and we fall into this coping action physique wise, [00:22:00] it can become a trap because again, we’re never satisfied. I remember on my body building journey, it didn’t matter how big I was.
I wanted to be bigger. It didn’t matter how good I looked, I wanted to look better. It didn’t matter how many compliments I received of, dude, you have a great physique. No, no, no, but this, but that, right? We have a tendency of finding the flaws of not being satisfied, and that ultimately is caused in my belief by finding a coping action in the wrong things or releasing our set circumstances that we’re feeling emotionally satisfying them or trying to satisfy them with the wrong things.
if that makes sense. Oh, it
De’Vannon: makes perfect sense. And that’s a huge reason why I do all the work that I do to try to, to get people to understand themselves. Because so often we don’t. And we think we do. Yeah. Yeah. So you hear me say all the time, people, why do you think, what do you think? Why do you feel [00:23:00] what you feel?
Where do you get that belief and value system from? I love that. Is it valid? I love that. Yeah. I, I went the opposite direction. No matter how thin I got back in the day. It wasn’t thin enough. I lost so much weight that I couldn’t fit the men’s jeans in the store that I would go to. So I had to start wearing wow jeans as I was down like a 26th waistline.
And I was like, I need to be thinner, you know? And so so I guess that’s like how the girls, that’s how we do. And thin enough, the boys, you’re not big enough. Oh my God, help us to just figure this shit out, , .
David: But look, if we are doing things for the wrong reasons, that can quickly spiral to that. So that’s why every time I’m doing a consultation, right, and I’m talking to a potential client, it’s why do you wanna release weight?
Why do you wanna build muscle? Because if the reason why you’re doing it is an incorrect reason, right? Just to give it a, a name, to give it a [00:24:00] category. If it’s placed for the wrong reasons or it’s placed on the wrong things, that is when things can quickly become destructive. Mm-hmm. . It’s why sometimes I even ask myself, right?
And now, now we’re get, I’m getting hypocritical because this is me and this is how I tend to look at things based on my understanding and knowledge. I become hypercritical about certain things, and it’s okay, I wanna have this whole pizza. Why do I wanna have this whole pizza? I wanna have this cake. Why do I wanna have this cake?
Right. And it might be, I don’t sit there and ask myself this question. It happens here now because of the practice that I’ve had. But if we can get into a place to, to, like you said, ask ourselves questions. Why is it that I want this? Why is it that I wanna do that? Why do then we can stop and really think, is this really necessary?
Is this what I want? Which is why [00:25:00] one of the questions that I teach my students to ask them is, is this choice that I’m, I’m about to do in line with who I wanna be in line with, who I wanna become? Mm-hmm. in line with the life that I desire. If we can practice, like you said, to ask ourselves these questions, I believe that we can really get good at taking control of our impulses, of our reactions, of our emotions, right.
That sometimes drive us or lead us to making choices that later we can regret. . Mm-hmm.
De’Vannon: you preaching now. Amen. And amen. . So, so you mentioned consultation. So tell, tell us about exactly the, so what, what kind of, so you have clients, are they seeing you in person? Is it virtual? Clearly they’re coming because they want to change their physique.
So kind of walk us through what that looks like and if people would reach out to you through your website. Like how does a, what exactly are you offering here?
David: Yeah. Before, [00:26:00] before Covid, a lot of it was in person and it was very exclusive, right? It was like only a certain type of people. Only certain, certain instances would I take them.
And after Covid I realized, look, I, I, I could be impacting more, right? And really the reason why I do everything that I do, it was to be able to help people avoid. Going through what my best friend went through, and we can touch on that story story a little later, but it was to support and to help people.
And when this epidemic happened, it was a great opportunity for me to then make that expansion. So now everything is virtual. Everything is now online based, right through the academy, and we’ve got several different types of formats. We have a one-on-one type coaching, and then we have a group type model.
And it’s to accommodate people at different levels based on their commitment and also based on their finances. But it’s really [00:27:00] just, we make it unique and personal to you because we’re that type, right? As humans, we’re all unique. We’re all different types of people, so no program should ever be the same for.
Because we’re different, right? We have different desires. We have different lifestyles. And that’s really the big key, because I believe if whatever you’re doing today doesn’t align to your lifestyle, meaning who you are as a person, the type of career you have, the type of of schedule you have, the type of time that you have, the commitment that you have, if it doesn’t align to that, at some point or another, you will quit or you will fail, you’ll give up, right?
Because it just becomes unstable. It’s not sustainable. So my approach in every consultation is really getting down to the root and to the desires of each person’s life. Why do you wanna do it? What is your motivation? What is the driving force, right? What are the desires? What do you wanna achieve? And then from there, it’s really getting to the person’s commitment level, [00:28:00] right?
So how much time are you willing to invest? What is your life like, right? How can we make this align or come together with your life? Because. If you’re, if you’re chasing health in a f in a program mindset, meaning I have an exercise program, I have a, a nutrition program, that means it’s not necessarily a part of your life.
You’re just following a specific program. And at some point, if you don’t like that program anymore, you are gonna stop doing it. But if I can now introduce health to become a part of your life, now I marry it. I bring it together with your life. It’s gonna be a lot easier for you to sustain, and you’re more likely to hold onto it.
Why? Because now it becomes a part of you, a part of your essence, a part of your d n a, a part of your makeup as a human and as your life. [00:29:00] So that’s a very critical component for me. When we’re doing consultations and we’re, we’re working closely with any student because I wanna ensure that. You keep it lifelong.
So
De’Vannon: then give me an example of the sort of help you would offer. Is it meal plans? Is it workout plans? Is it helping someone see like, like, like, like what, like what, what would it actually
David: be? Yeah. Again, it’s customized for everyone’s need, right? So it would include all those things. If let’s say, no, I only need help with the exercise part.
Okay, we’ll tailor it to that. No, I need help with a lot of things, right? I need help with my nutrition, my, my exercise. And then I’m also battling some type of unhealthy relationship somewhere. That might be with sugar, that might be with, with alcohol, right? That might be with another controlled substance type form.
There’s all types of. [00:30:00] Of needs, so to speak, and we tailor it to what you are needing from mindset, the psychological side, because a lot of what we do stems from there. A lot of the choices that we’re making stem from there. And my object or or my process is I wanna help you identify why you’re doing what you’re doing.
If we can get to the core root of what is driving you to make these food choices of what is driving you to have this relationship with food, this relationship with yourself, this relationship with exercise, it might be non-existent. You might hate doing exercise, but if I can change your relationship to exercise, you’re gonna have a different psychological understanding of what that is.
Therefore, then you’re going to be more likely prone to holding onto it and doing it long term if we can make the relationship healthy and your understanding to that is a healthy understanding. , [00:31:00]right? So we work with emotional people that deal with emotional eating, stress, eating, binge eating, right?
Unhealthy, toxic relationships with their body, with themselves, with all sorts of, of, of relationship issues in that format,
De’Vannon: as it says in the, in the book of Proverbs, in the, in the, in the Bible. In all, in all that I get and get understanding . That’s right. So, that’s right. So we’re gonna, so we’ve talked about some of the some of the skinny boy issues.
Now we’re gonna talk about some of the some of the obesity issues. Mm-hmm. . And before we get into Eric, Eric is his best friend’s name and he’s gonna tell us Eric’s story. And but I, I wanted to read some of the statistics that we had discussed before because I feel like it leads into that. So I’ll read this, you can talk about that, then you can tell us about Eric.
Cool. And so it says emotional stress eating is something that affects between 83 and 88% of [00:32:00] Americans, and it produces 75, 70 5% of all overeating. A recent article by C N B C revealed that 11 million people die each year due to non-communicable diseases caused by poor eating habits. And I pulled this from David’s website.
He has two emotional eating support.com, and then David hernandez.co. Of course, all that will go in the show notes. So just speak to us about those statistics and then tell us about Eric.
David: Look, these statistics are meant. Not to alienate or not to bring shame or bring judgment to anybody. They’re simply to bring awareness to help us recognize that this is a potential threat to many people’s lives.
And if there’s a threat, the threat is to let us know while, let’s avoid falling into that, or let’s avoid being impacted by that threat. Or if I’m in that threatful situation, right, [00:33:00] being impacted by this, let’s do something about it. Let’s change because I believe we can do something about everything. If we’re still breathing, we can impact it and bring change.
Right. And my best friend was one of these individuals. He was part of this sort of of, of group, of people growing up. He was that kid that just. Kind of never fit in. He was husky, he was slow. He wasn’t good at sports. He was he w he didn’t, he wasn’t coordinated, right? So he always felt like this outcast, and I was the opposite.
I was skinny athletic, into fitness, into sports, super coordinated. So we had this really unique dynamic of a relationship that I loved him for who he was, but I [00:34:00] ultimately also wanted better for him because he desired it for himself. And so, through the years, we’d work out together, we’d do things together.
I’d, I talked to him as much as I could about health because he was overweight and he always battled with being overweight. And his, his, his battle was, I wanna release weight, but I don’t know how. I don’t know what to do. And that’s where I would come in. Right? I’d give him as much as I could at the time to help him.
18 years after high school, we split. I moved to Miami to study nutrition and culinary arts, and he stayed in Texas and we kind of lost, we went our separate ways, so to speak. We lost communication for several years, and at the age of 21, I got a phone call, you know, that he had passed away and I couldn’t believe it.
I said, what happened? How did this happen? So he got so obese and he became so desperate to get the weight off that he went to get a gastric bypass surgery. Two days later, he got an infection [00:35:00]and he died. Right? And that tore me apart because I started blaming myself. I started to feel guilty. I started to.
Blame. Why didn’t I do more? Why wasn’t I there? Why didn’t I support him more? Why didn’t I help him get that weight off? So after about eight months of this self sabotaging guilt and shame, I finally had to come to a place and realize, well, there was really not much more I could have done. There had to be something within him that really ignited to do whatever it took to fight for his own health.
But after that, I looked at, well, what were the reasons that kept him stuck in that it was his relationship with food, even though he wanted to release weight, his relationship with food was so specific. Eating, [00:36:00] eating processed. Right, eating junk food all the time. He would love chips with cheese and hot sauce, right?
He would eat that as a snack. He would love burgers. He would love pizza. He would love all of these foods that were leading him to this path. And so his relationship with food and his own psychological understanding of food was what kept him trapped. He was an emotional eater. He loved sugar, right? And it didn’t matter how much he worked out.
It didn’t matter how, how, how he tried to change his food choices. He just could not give up what he already knew. And so when we look at people that are in this place, right, according to the statistics, it’s we’re using food for the wrong reasons. Our relationship with food is an unhealthy relationship.
Therefore, our psychological view of food or [00:37:00] understanding of food is also an unhealthy one. And if we do not fix this or get to the core of these reasons as to why a person is making these choices, to get ’em to become obese and stay obese. Doesn’t matter what diet you do, doesn’t matter what exercise program you follow.
It doesn’t matter what ills you take, what supplements you take. The root, the core of what makes you up is your relationship with food and your psych, psychology of food. Therefore, if we do not change that identity piece, you’re gonna stay stuck and you’re gonna continue to go back to these habits. Right?
Go back to these choices. That’s why these statistics are so alarming and so eye-opening that if we don’t do something about it, somebody in that state can become one of those 11 million. Right? And it’s a staggering number. Hmm. [00:38:00] because of this poor relationship with food. Right. Meaning the poor habits that we have with food.
De’Vannon: And you know, if when people go out and get these surgeries and everything, if their relationship with food doesn’t change, they’re just getting the weight back. Anyway. That’s
David: That’s right. That’s it. That’s what I’m getting to. A hundred percent. Right. And we see that through many stories. But here’s the thing.
People go to that place because they’re desperate. Mm-hmm. , right? And oftentimes people are just desperate. Give me a quick fix. Give me something. Just, that’s why trends and the fitness industry makes so much money off of this. I have news for many people out there. The fitness industry doesn’t care about your life.
They care about your. , which is why they take out new supplements every year, new trends, every six months, right? Because they’re playing off of your emotions because they know you’re vulnerable. They know, a, as humans, we become very vulnerable [00:39:00] and become desperate for answers. So therefore they go, oh, now it’s this.
Ha ha, we just made several billion dollars. Okay, now it’s this. Ah, we just made more million dollars off of this. And supplement companies know this, right? And that is where a lot of this toxic relationship starts to happen. But if we can pull back for a moment and say, okay, let’s stop chasing these quick fix, let’s stop going to just a quick, simple solution.
Let’s stop doing that and let’s simply focus on this component. It’s a small piece, but it is a large makeup of who we are. If I can teach you, That your relationship with food happened at a certain time in your life. And if I can help you change your relationship with food, therefore impacting your psychological understanding of food, your own psychology of food, we’re gonna be able to [00:40:00]rewire your brain, which is now going to make sure that you don’t go back to these unhealthy choices.
You don’t change you, you change those issues. Now you change you as a person. Now you don’t need a diet program now. You don’t need supplements right now. You don’t need these quick fixes because now you’ve changed your core essence. And if we can change you and your makeup, you’re gonna be able to stick to it.
De’Vannon: It’s been a long time coming, but change is going to come, so. So in your coaching, do you have like coaches that work under you? Do you deal with everyone yourself? How does that work?
David: Right now everyone is myself. I do have, you know, other people within my business that help me with the management that help me with different of the technical side of things.
But right now it’s really just oversee by me because I’ve set it up in a way where I can manage it through group [00:41:00] trainings. If it’s a larger base format through one-on-one type coaching. I only take a certain amount of students at a time to ensure that I’m bringing the best coaching to every individual.
And then we also work with corporations helping them create corporate wellness programs for their own employees.
De’Vannon: Marvelous. Now I wanna talk about, like, get a little bit more granular about some of like the the, the the health implications of becoming overweight. So it’s not really about like looking fat so much as what it is doing internally.
Yes, we buried somebody who was. In their mid twenties, you know, and he, because he was overweight, he, he, he was like, like his, he couldn’t breathe. Mm-hmm. . And so before he, when as he was dying, he was in the hospital on a breathing machine and they had to induce a coma. Mm. You know, to just basically [00:42:00] let him pass, because what, what a lot of weight does it, it like, it strains everything.
So That’s Right. If you’re, if you have like extra as they call it in the, in the, in the health world, Addie, post tissue, that’s the scientific way of saying fat. That’s right. That’s right. I learned that in massage therapy school. Yeah. So if, if you have extra weight hanging on you, then it takes strain on the body.
So that means your organs have to work harder to do what they’re doing. They’re less efficient. Your blood doesn’t flow as well, because it has all this. added post tissue. In fact, to move around. It’s like it’s like if you feel a car full of just a whole bunch of junk and weights, it’s gonna drain the gas faster, it’s gonna grind the gears faster.
The brakes are gonna wear out quicker of the extra weight. If you pick up a 50 pound weight and then you put it down, you feel lighter. Yeah. And so when you lose weight, you can move about easier, you sleep better, your whole quality of [00:43:00] life. Hell, for me, when I’ve been, like, when I’ve had a extra weight on me, it was hard for me to reach down and like time my shoes and shit like that.
Like absolutely little simple like that, that simply get, like, that goes a really long way for like mental health and emotional wellbeing. Just That’s right. Being able to, and then, then, you know, you know, sexually too, sex drive goes up when the weight goes down. That’s right. So diabetes, heart disease, stroke, sleep apnea, which is kind of what I was talking about earlier.
But tell us about, you know, your take on how this affects people in their daily lives and internally in their organs.
David: Well, think of, think of a Python or a serpent that com contracts and compresses, right, and strangulate. When we have an excess amount on our body of this tissue, it’s literally doing that.
It’s compressing our organs together. It’s compressing our heart, it’s compressing our veins, it’s [00:44:00] compressing our tissues, it’s compressing our lungs, a lot of it, and it literally starts to impact us in ways psychologically, emotionally, physically, right in bed to sleep, to have sex, to have relationships with people, to communicate.
Most people that become overweight or become. In any of the levels of obesity also become very introverted, right? They’re shamed. They don’t wanna go out, they wanna stay inside, they get depressed. There’s a lot of impact that happens to our life, and it’s not so much about simply living, it really comes down to what is your quality of life like, what type of life, what quality of life would you like to have?
So if we’re in this state of being overweight and possibly OB obesity, your quality of life [00:45:00]isn’t at a good standard. It’s not a good quality. And when it’s not at a good quality, it starts to really do a lot of damage, not only health-wise, but emotionally, psychologically, right? Which tears us down even faster.
That is why health is a responsibility that we have to give to ourself and it’s bigger than us because it doesn’t only impact you, but it impacts everybody around you. It impacts your relationships, it impacts your mood, it impacts the way you speak. It impacts your energy levels. It impacts your relationship with your kids, with your spouse, with your boss.
It impacts your performance. And so that is why I’m such an advocate of understanding that health is a [00:46:00] part of my life, my makeup. If we can take the view of it, our perspective of it in that way, which is why I’m really on a mission to change the scope of how people view health, right? And how people view healthy living a lifestyle of healthy.
Freedom versus simply wanting to lose weight, simply wanting to look better. That’s part of it, but it’s not the makeup that really is the impactful part that should be impactful for many people’s lives. Mm-hmm. .
De’Vannon: Mm-hmm. , very well stated man. Very well stated. And I, and I also wanna point out like, you know, obesity in younger people.
Yeah. It’s like, it’s like, just because you don’t have like negative health problems specifically today mm-hmm. , sometimes it, it’s like a [00:47:00] lagging indicator. It’s like if you keep that weight on you for too long it can. That’s right. Cause you to have problems later. Because, you know, sometimes some people go, well, you know, I feel fine.
All my labs look good. I’m able to mm-hmm. , you know, but the thing is, Is that is that shit is sneaky, you know, it catches up. That’s right. And lab, lab results and tests only things have to get bad enough for the lab results to the lab tests to be able to pick up on it. That’s right. You know, it’s like if you don’t have enough of a problem, you know, those, those tests are not that thorough where they can just pick up on a little bit of an issue.
It has to be enough of it. Yeah. For it to manifest on a test, and then by the, sometimes by the time that shows up, then it’s too late to really deal with it. Yeah. So what I’m saying is don’t think because you are young and you know, and you, you, you’re, you’re eating all of this. You what, how you know you’re [00:48:00] overweight, that your health won’t like suddenly fail you one day.
Yeah. Like, I don’t want people to fall into this trap of thinking like, well, everything looks good. So That’s right.
David: Yeah. Yeah. Because in the same way, it, it’s just one moment, one. One consistent choice away from making all of that flip. Right. And look, and it’s the same for skinny people. Did you know that skinny people are, have the highest heart attack rates than anyone out there?
No, because they believe, because their metabolism, right. Is keeping them in this state of being thin. They believe that, oh, I can eat all this. I can eat this food, I can eat this, this burger, I can eat all this. So their intake of fatty food, of sugary foods are at a higher rate oftentimes that then causes that heart attack to happen.
Right. And so it, it’s, it’s, it goes back to what is our [00:49:00] relationship with food like, what is our psychology of food like? Because if it’s unhealthy at some point or another, it is going to break. It’s going to blow up. In the same way, when we look at a relationship with a partner at the beginning, there might be some arguments, there might be some fighting.
Then comes a push. Then that push becomes a slap. If the relationship is unhealthy, it starts to get unhealthy. If we don’t address it, it’s just a matter of time for it to blow up, right? Which is why a lot of what we do when we’re even talking about obesity, I believe obesity is learned. Because when we look at, well, what makes up a person to become obese, if we’re talking about the relationship with food and their psychologic psychology of food, well, we learn that at some point we were taught to eat this way.
Food was introduced to us [00:50:00] from our young age. Therefore, in those moments of us learning how to become a human, how to eat, how to react, how to act, it stemmed from home. So if growing up all we were given was frozen food, ramen noodles, fast food, right? , as you grow up, you’re gonna stay with that same relationship and sometimes it’s gonna magnify to go from ramen noodles to eating, I don’t know, one cup to five cups or whatever it is, to another type of food.
Very similar to that. To salty foods. Right? To sugary foods. And that is why it’s important parents, right? Or those that are adopting kids. We’ve got to learn for ourselves how to develop a healthy relationship and a healthy psychology psychology of food so that then we can teach that to our young kids so that then they can grow up with a healthy relationship the same way.[00:51:00]
De’Vannon: Yeah. And I feel like marginalized and a lot of like ethnic. Communities are impacted more by this sort of thing because, you know, when you growing up in the hood and in poverty like I did mm-hmm. You know, you know, you too, the parents and everything are too focused on keeping a roof over the head or keeping you from getting murdered or shot or whatever.
Yeah. So we never talked about like, okay, this is you gonna balance this plate. Like I have a dietician now, and so, you know, through the Department of Veterans Affairs and awesome. So they’re like, and nobody’s ever explained to me before. Okay, so if you’re going to eat, say, boiled eggs, you just need two of those per day.
And then you be sure that the most of your plate is vegetables and not proteins. You don’t actually need that much protein. That’s right. Like actually laying up re reading the back of a food label, paying attention to mm-hmm. , the amount of servings not being all quick Oh, a hundred calories. But it’s Tenten servings in the [00:52:00] Yeah, that’s right.
That’s exactly thousand calories. Yeah. Yeah. And so, So I just really
David: wanted to, and how much is the serving? 10 chips? 14 chips, right? And we’re eating the entire bag saying, oh, okay, great. There’s no problem with this. Right? And look, we’re responsible for our own, for our own body, for our own health, right?
It’s our responsibility. But we also have to look at, look, our environment may not be helping us, right? Let’s look at the American standard diet, right? It’s not the best. So it’s very quick to sometimes say, well, this is the reason. Well, our boss is the one that brought these, these things. My friend is the one that brought my coworker, brought these donuts here.
But just because things are like that in our environment doesn’t mean we have to give into our environment. Doesn’t mean we have to conform to these things. It doesn’t mean we have to say yes every time they invite us to go get ice cream or to go do this. Right. It really ultimately, like you said, is educating ourselves [00:53:00] and taking this as our own responsibility.
Because if I can be responsible for my own health and I can teach those around me as an example piece of how to be responsible the same way, then we can start to really take control of this thing that has just really spiraled from us, right? Mm-hmm. .
De’Vannon: Absolutely. And so we just have a few minutes left here.
I want to So we, so we, you know, we, we, we’ve given people some very, very heavy Yes. Information right now. And so I wanna lighten it up for a little bit. it takes back heavy again because I’m gonna have you close us out towards the end with your near death experience. So let’s talk about some ways that people can maybe implement this.
So for me, what I found is that I’m, I’m, I’m from Wakanda, so I like it hot. I don’t do Yeah. Temperatures below like 70 degrees. I’m like, bitch, it’s cold. I’m [00:54:00] putting my teeth
David: up, and running. I’m inside the house with the sweater and the, the, the ACS off ,
De’Vannon: right? I’m like, I, so I, I observed within myself. I work out when I w used to try to go to the gym, come like October, I’m like, fuck all that.
I’ll see y’all again in April. Yeah. And so my weight would go up in the winter. Right. So what worked for me was I had an empty room in my house and then I put a treadmill in there, which you can get them from like Walmart at Target. Yeah. A weight bench. I got adjustable weights so that they take up less.
Beautiful. That’s right. And then my dad gave me one of those multi-function machine thingies and so, so that I had to bring the gym to me, so that’s perfect. Yeah. That’s what worked for me. So what suggestions do you have for people to, to make it work for them or anything like
David: that? Look, that’s one example of a great way we can do that, but might, some people might say, well, I don’t like working out in that format.
Okay, great. It’s [00:55:00] how can we keep things simple? If one thing you take away, I want you to take away this is asking ourselves, how can I make health or healthy living? Simple meaning, what’s one thing I can do? That is simple that I can achieve, but that I can make it fun. We forget that healthy, a healthy life should be fun.
And when we get to these states, they’re darn well fun because you’re able to do more. So in today, if we look at, well, all I can do is walk. Okay, great. How can we make walking freaking fun? Can we find a, a partner that we could do with? Can I listen to some awesome music? Can I watch a video while I walk?
Right? Can I, can I skip? Oh, what are people gonna think? Who gives a rats? [00:56:00] What can you do that is fun? You like to. Put on a freaking show in your living room. You like to sing, freaking sing your heart out in the living room while you dance. That is part of exercise that is part of fun. I had a student a lady, she, she loved to country line dance.
What would she do? She’d go dancing as many times as she wanted, as she could line dancing, and that was her exercise, right? Get some pool noodles and freaking sword. Fight with your partner, get some Nerf guns and play outside, right? Like, it really is about how can I make it simple and how can I make it fun finding something today that you can do?
What is one thing? Oh, well, I don’t have time for this. Oh, well, I don’t have time for that. What can you do? Let’s stop being negative and look at what’s One thing I can do. Another thing that I tell my students is every time you go pee, when before or after you’re done, do five squats. Do 10 squats. [00:57:00] How much does that take you?
That literally takes you five seconds to do that takes you 10 seconds to do. You go pee 10 times. How many, how many squats did you already do in one day? 50 to a hundred squats in a matter of seconds. Right? So it’s really about how can I simplify this thing? Because if it, anything that we do in life is overwhelming and complicated, look, oftentimes we overcomplicate it, right?
But if we can simply keep it down to, to the core essence, what is health? Health is being active, okay? What’s one thing I can do to be active? Go up and downstairs while you listen to some cool music. Go walking, go punch, get a punching bag, put somebody’s face that you hate and punch the snot out of it. I don’t know.
Let’s get creative because it’s so able, it, it, it’s accessible and it’s so achievable, but it really just comes down [00:58:00] to us.
I
De’Vannon: just love to hear you speak and y’all, he has a, a book that he’s working on that’ll be out eventually and I can’t wait to get my fucking hands on it. To, to, to, to devour the written version of this artistic poetry that you weave with your vernacular. And so Yes, yes. But where, where are you? The book anyway,
David: we are, first draft is done.
We’re going. Making tweaks and adjustments and we should be working on that second draft here pretty soon and hopefully becomes the final draft and then we can send it off to, to printing. So we’re excited.
De’Vannon: Oh, oh my God. If you could get a book edited in three drafts, I would be impressed. It took me 10, I believe it mine.
My,
David: what helps is my wife is she’s like a, a, a really strong, she [00:59:00] didn’t get her English major, but she got her psychology major, but she is one of her strengths if she could go back to school, would be to become an English major. So she’s helping me make sure that that thing could be ready as soon as possible.
So we’re excited. And what’s the
De’Vannon: premise of the book or the, or
David: it’s, the premise is really to introduce this concept, this understanding of the root causes of why we stay stuck in certain behavior patterns. And it’s really to shine insight on, it’s not just that. There’s a flaw in you or that you can’t be healthy, you can’t release weight.
No, no, no. We all can. If we can really simplify it to the core principles that makes up this, which is really our choices and our behavior patterns, right? So we’re really breaking this down into a very simple, digestible understanding for people to learn this, this side of of health, because I believe it’s gonna really be groundbreaking for people to [01:00:00] start changing their choices that yet then changing their behavior patterns to become healthier.
De’Vannon: Okay. I can’t wait to have you back on the show to discuss that. So, before you talk about your near death experience, it just occurred to me, I’d like you to, to address some, some people may say, well the healthy foods only at places like Whole Foods, and I can’t afford that shit. , you know, what, what would you say to people who may have like, budgetary concerns or believe that Great question.
The healthy food is, is super expensive.
David: Yeah. Great question. Great question. I believe we can all be healthy in any budget, right? Because we don’t ha we don’t have to eat all foods, we don’t have to eat everything in a grocery store, right? There are core principles that if we can adopt and understand, we can make good food choices.
And that starts with understanding, well, what is a lean protein? There’s, there’s four makeups, right? In the way we should be eating. There should be [01:01:00] some type of protein in every meal. There should be some type of fiber, right? There should be a small amount of carb, right? To give us energy. Our, our primary food, our primary energy source from our body comes from carbohydrates, right?
And then there should be some sort of essential fat. That is the key essential fat, right? Not just fat of all, of any kind. Right. So it really, if we can simplify it and look at, okay, what lean, what protein can I get that is inexpensive right now? Prices have gone through the roof. Okay. Can we get canned chicken, right?
Can we get tuna? Can we get things that are proteins that are fairly inexpensive? We don’t have to have the high processed foods. When we’re talking about carbohydrates, there’s low glycemic carbohydrates, meaning they have some type of fibroid substance that allows it to be [01:02:00] slowly dispersed in our body to turn into sugar, right?
We don’t need the chips, we don’t need the ramen noodles, we don’t need the pasta. We can find a list of low glycemic foods. Carbohydrates that help us find good sustainable energy. Right. We got our brown rice, which is very inexpensive, right. There is couscous, which is also fairly inexpensive, right? We have whole grain foods that we can find that are fairly inexpensive vegetables.
Oh, well I don’t like vegetables. Okay, well why don’t we start with one that you do like that we can eat, right? And then, like you said, is having a vegetable with every food choice, with every meal, as many as we can. Right? So it’s, again, it’s about the education piece. It’s about the knowledge piece. Can I understand what good or healthy relationship with food is so that I can then start to implement it?
Right? So it’s find these three cores. [01:03:00] If we can have a protein in every meal, if we can have a carbohydrate that is a low glycemic carb with every food, and if I can have a vegetable. More than likely we’re already cooking within essential fat anyways, like an olive oil or some type of, of avocado oil, which is a, a essential fat.
That’s really all we need. Hope that’s helpful.
De’Vannon: Very fucking helpful. So tell us about your near death experience and then that’ll pretty much wrap us up.
David: Fantastic. I’d love to. 2018, I went on a mission trip to Haiti. Went to go work with a lot of help and support kids, orphanages. We have a close friend who’s out there who has a, a men’s kids, young men’s orphanage, and a w and a young girl’s orphanage.
So we went to support him in what he was doing. I got back five days later. I was rushed to the hospital, what seemed to be a cold, but I had very high fever, about 110, 109. They [01:04:00] couldn’t take it down with anything. Two days in there I was misdiagnosed six times. They couldn’t figure out what w what I had.
The third day there, there was a doctor from Puerto Rico who happened to be there. He overheard a conversation. He comes in and he says, I know exactly what you have. You have dengue fever and two other tropical viruses, and you’re gonna feel like you’re gonna die and you just might because there’s nothing else that we can do.
It’s up to your body if it wants to survive. And he walked out. So, to give you a kind of a, a of a picture of this, I was at my strongest and biggest in terms of physique in size. I was actually training to compete the following year in body building. So I was about 245 pounds. I had about 25% body fat, a lot of muscle on me.
I was the biggest I’d ever been. And after telling me this, I wanted to die. What we know about the dengue fever is that it’s called the bone [01:05:00] crushing virus. It literally breaks up your bones from the inside, and it starts to shut down and eat your organs from the inside, right? It eats the muscle fibers, the muscle tissues, everything from the inside.
My left lungs shut down, my organs were starting to shut down. My kidneys were about to shut down. I was one step away from hemorrhage and I wanted to die. That was it. I didn’t wanna fight anymore. And so I just stayed there, literally unconscious for 10 days. And on the 10th day, the doctor came in and he said, well, we’ve got good news for you.
You’ve beat this ding. And he said, had it not been because you were so healthy and you had so much muscle on you, you would not be here today. There’s no reason you should be alive. And I said, well, if it wasn’t because I was healthy and I had that muscle mass and because of God, I wouldn’t be here today, right.
Based on my faith. And so that experience turned everything around for me because [01:06:00] after I got out of the hospital, there was like this little internal, small voice that said, now that you’ve been given a second chance of life, what are you gonna do with it? What are you gonna do about it? And I woke up, I was like, wait, what do you mean?
I thought I’m doing my best. I thought I could be more. I, I, I thought I, I am doing a lot with my life. But that really brought me into the turning point of what I was doing with my business, right? I was only, like I said, working with very exclusive clients. And at that point it was like, well, I’m not doing enough to impact as many people as I can with what I know.
And that’s what really put together body by purpose. That’s what changed my whole concept, my whole value of life, my whole appreciation to people. Because when I, I, I made a commitment with my best friend that as long as I knew of somebody, I wanted to help them avoid what my best friend went through.
But I really wasn’t holding myself to that fully right? And so that’s why I say that this experience, near death experience was the best [01:07:00] thing that could have happened to me. It changed my perspective on life. It changed my perspective on so many things. And obviously I don’t take life for granted ever, but also the way I live life has also changed for me.
How,
De’Vannon: how in the hell does somebody catch UE fever? Is that from, so did something bite you? Is it air, mosquito bite?
Well, , I’m glad That’s right. I’m glad that your body decided to just, you know, everything happens for a reason. Yeah. And and it seems like the, the lower, you know, God takes us knowing he’s gonna pull us back up. It’s like we’re stronger. That’s right. For it. Yeah. I was devastated when I got H I V and I thought I was gonna die and I had this whole nervous breakdown, but now I’m like, you know what?
I’m glad everything happened the way it did because it refined me, you know? Very well said. Yeah. So many different ways. And so, yeah. Alright. Yeah. So his website is [01:08:00] David hernandez.co emotion. His other website is emotional eating support.com. They click through to each other, and I will put all of this in the show notes with David’s social media.
Yeah. Well do you have any closing words for
David: you’re incredible. I mean, if y if I can get you to understand that and what that really means, that I don’t know what life situation you might be in. There is still a makeup and a creation inside of you that is far greater than your experience and far greater than what you’re living. You’re incredible and you’re able to do much more than you might sometimes give yourself credit.
And if we can simply lean in to work on. Meaning, I’m going to honor myself because I understand the value that my life has being born. A human one in [01:09:00] 400 trillion that are the, those are the odds, which means that the Creator, whatever you believe in, thought you were so special to create you and make you a part of this world.
So if we can understand our value in our self-worth, that you are incredible, you are valuable, you have worth far more than the, what the situation in your environment is telling you, we can truly craft our life to become unstoppable.
De’Vannon: Amen and amen. Amen. I can say to that y’all, thank y’all for tuning in Sex drugs and jesus.com.
Don’t forget to check out everything we’ve got going on in David’s websites as well. See y’all next. Thank you for having me, man. Oh yeah. Thank you for coming on. Anytime.
Thank you all so much for taking time to listen to the Sex Drugs and Jesus podcast. It really means everything [01:10:00] to me. Look, if you love the show, you can find more information and resources at SexDrugsAndJesus.com or wherever you listen to your podcast. Feel free to reach out to me directly at DeVannon@SexDrugsAndJesus.com and on Twitter and Facebook as well.
My name is De’Vannon, and it’s been wonderful being your host today. And just remember that everything is gonna be all right.
