giving up

"What are you giving up for Lent?" A popular question for Ash Wednesday.

I have decided to give something up again this year. Usually, I give up chocolate, but at some point, I either 1) miss that something had chocolate in it and accidentally eat it and feel horrible, or 2) get really cranky and borderline homicidal and only chocolate will soothe the savage beast. This year, I have decided on something different (which is personal, so I won't tell you what it is --it's not about trying to impress you anyhow).

So here's the obvious question: Am I religious?

Here's the less obvious answer: No, not at all.

Then why celebrate Lent? George Mallory's explanation for climbing Mount Everest is as good a response as any: "Because it's there."

Why engage in a religious obligation when you aren't religious? It's not so much the religious aspect of it that appeals to me; it's the giving up. 

It's the doing without. 

It's the being thoughtful and deliberate.

In my limited experience, things given up for Lent fall into two categories: things we want, and things we don't want. 

I'll put chocolate in the first category. Do I want chocolate? Yes, please. Oh yeah. Giving it up for a period of time makes you enjoy it more when you have it again. Imagine how much you love chocolate (if you don't love chocolate, stop reading this blog because there is no way we have anything in common). You say you love it, but you'll never truly know how much until you set it free for six weeks. You will be weeping happy tears when you are reunited --believe me on this because I've been there.

In the second category, I'll place my Bad Habit that I'm going to work on this year. I don't want to do it, but I do it without thinking. When I don't do it, I notice because it's a compulsive thing. I have to do it. I want to do it. But it is a Bad Habit. I shouldn't do it, and intellectually, I know that.  This Lent experience will force me to catch myself and find substitute behaviors that won't be as harmful to me (or harmful to me at all!) in the long run.

All of this is well and good, but why Lent? Why not just do it whenever? 

Because Lent happens once a year around the same time, so it's a tradition. Because my family are all practicing Christians, and I was raised with it, so it is familiar. Because there are a bunch of people doing the same thing at the same time, and that's a nice feeling, doing things with other people. And because I don't hate religion. It has a lot of problems, but I also recognize that it helps a lot of people, too, and like most tools, it's all in how you use it.

Religious celebrations from other religions (Ramadan springs to mind) would work just as well. Try any that appeal to you. One of these years, I might try fasting. Or not. Anyway, giving up is a good idea every once in a while to help you be more mindful of what you have and what you do.

So, good luck to my Christian friends as they abstain from things during the Lenten season. I'm with you in spirit.