As my coffee tin inexorably approaches empty, I'm getting nearer and nearer to Lent, when caffeine (in tea as well as coffee) is foresaken, along with alcohol, meat, dairy products, salt snacks, confectionary, chips etc, and a strict fruit, veg and fish diet is adhered to. Water, 100% fruit juice and fruit or herbal teas are the only liquids. All for 46 days, starting on Wednesday 19 February, and finishing on Easter Sunday. This will be my 19th consecutive Lent of strict fasting.
Physical exercise - sit-ups and push-ups - enforce the will to do (as opposed to the will not to do). I shall also write more (more creative writing).
Since I gave up driving to work in July, my cycling and walking have ensured that my current pre-Lent weight is some 7lb/3kg less than at this time in previous years, so I will not have to make the same effort to get down to my university graduation weight of 11st 7lb (73kg).
The period of Lent is a good time for abstinence and reflection. The Lenten time of year, before spring kicks in, was always one of physical hardship. After the jovial excesses of Xmas and the Carnival season (which in Poland stretches from New Year's Day to Shrove Tuesday), the body and soul start looking forward to the self-discipline of Lent.
So - join me. By setting aside earthly pleasures, one can contemplate the Eternal. There's a month to prepare. It is worth it - you will feel much better, physically and spiritually, for doing Lent.
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5 comments:
Well, no; actually. I can't take you up on that one. I've been trying to gain weight all my life, to no effect. Where you're aiming to return to your graduation weight, I am too, but from the other end of that weight bracket-thing. I worked on a beer-belly once; it kind of produced results, but looked ridiculous and also carried various side effects, which my family and friends found unacceptable. And as to the whole notion of eating the flesh of dead animals...really! What an awful thought.
I read your Lenten posts last year and it got me thinking. I have been looking forward for Lent. I will follow your example, except I need a cup of coffee in the morning or I can't get started.
Andrew in Calif.
We'd better get our skates on then for that whisky tasting evening :)
I could never understand the whole concept of religious fasting. Why make a sacrifice of yourself to get more connected with anything eternal if by definition the eternal is an exact oposite of the earthly life - which includes the suffering body - and for this reason is equally accessible (or inaccessible) for the obese and for the gaunt ?
Henry Ford proffered some good advice which I have followed all my life, Exercise is bunk. If you are healthy, you don't need it: if you are sick you should not take it.
He lived until the ripe old age of 83 - a good innings!
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