Day 1: What should I give up this year?

I have to be honest. I've been craving Lent -- the way I crave exercise after too many lazy days or vegetables after too much fast food. My soul is hungry for spiritual nourishment. I want to drink from the deep water -- cool, black, unyielding. I need some wilderness time.

Some years (like this one) I start thinking and planning what I am going to give up for lent in the fall. Some years, it creeps around in the back of my mind but I come up empty and I scramble on Ash Wednesday morning --- Shit, its lent already, what am I doing?

One of my best friends orbits nearer during this season. We find ourselves talking more often and sharing our lenten journies almost daily by text. The rest of the year, we check in and do the friend thing -- but this time of year is special and I can usually tell Lent is drawing near by the increased frequency of our calls and texts. I don't even have to look at a calendar. It is like the lengthening of days.

Last week, we had our "What are you doing for Lent?" call. As we spoke, it made me articulate how I think about Lenten practices and I thought that I would write a blog about it.

When I don't know what I am going to do for Lent I've come up with 3 big questions that hone in on something worth exploring.  They are:

1. What's my pacifier?

2. What's my second mountain?

3. Where does the light shine in?

Chucking the Pacifiers

Pacifiers are the easiest to find. 

These are the things I shove in my mouth, or put in front of my face to calm my brain and get through the day. They add color to life. Small joys. Low key addictions. Hidden cravings. 

 Fasting from these things create an empty, uncomfortable space -- some of these that I've given up in the past -- 

music in the car, 

to-do lists, 

shopping,

Diet coke

 Fast food.

Giving up these kinds of things pokes me and grows me in unexpected ways.  Sometimes it's easier than expected, sometimes harder.  Sometimes I learn things,  sometimes I just get frustrated and say Lent is stupid and cross my arms and tap my feet until Easter.  

If you want to look for your own pacifiers -- here are some of the questions I ask myself

1. What do I do to fill empty time?
2. What do I lean on to get through the day?
3. How do I quiet the voices in my head?
4. What is the extra -- the craving - that I have a hard time ignoring?

Climbing the Second Mountain

A few years ago, I read a pair of books -- The Road to Character and The Second Mountain -- by David Brookes. They are interesting reads and I highly recommend them. Through studying the biographies of a variety of people,  the author explores what it means to live with a depth of character and then embarks on his own journey to a deeper life. 

A concept that I have carried with me from them is the idea of a second mountain. Brookes describes our first mountain as the one we climb for ourselves. The achievements we go after, the fulfillment of the ego, the self. Building our resume,  getting a good job,  getting material wealth, etc.  The second mountain is the one we climb as we learn to die to ourselves and and live for something beyond us. 

For me, things on my second mountain include marriage -- the dying to myself to lean into partnership with my husband. Motherhood - the endless giving that comes from the caregiving and raising of young children and faith - this intangible pull towards God and a setting aside of self to pick up a call rooted in faith.

Our culture bristles quite a bit at second mountain living. Dying to self and living for something beyond self is hard to swallow in a culture that places the individual at the center of everything.

In fact,  I find the intentional lean in to my second mountain during Lent as an opportunity to explore that tension.  

A simple example from motherhood... 

Doing laundry and cleaning a house over and over and over for people who never appreciate it. Motherhood especially presses my buttons as I can feel at times like I'm losing "me." I'm always last. I'm always picking up the slack. I'm like all the mothers everywhere. There is a loud feminist inside me that screams about the whole construct. This is unfair to me.  

But also... what if I assumed my agency. I have choice.  I choose this. How many other amazing women have leaned into this role perfecting selflessness.  It is not being a doormat, but rather bringing strength of character to fill the role,  the commitment of motherhood fully. 

Any commitment, call,  marriage, life work can run the same tension.  The risk of being fully consumed by the giving and that loving and the tedium that comes with life work. The truth is -- it is damn hard to climb the second mountain. To choose a more selfless way when society screams that I should be spending more time putting me first.

So for Lent, I try to quiet my ego and look at areas that hinder me from loving well and tried to find a way to work on them. 

Not yelling at my kids

Not nagging my husband. 

Letting go of sarcasm for a time. 

These are hard. 

Harder than the pacifiers I've given up. But they work the heart. 

Here are a few questions to help find second mountain practices:

1. What things in my life are more important than me - if I found out I didn't have long to live - what would I want to attend to? Are there practices I could take up to more fully live into or bring grace into these commitments?
2. Where does my ego prevent me from leaning into work that I know is "life work"? 
3. Is there a place I can step out of my comfort zone to more fully embrace life that I know I am called to lead?

Where the light shines

Over the past year, I've been occasionally listening to Phil Visher's podcast "The Holy Post." On one episode, he was interviewing Philip Yancy, a fairly well known Christian author who may be most well-known for his book "The Jesus I never knew." Philip was on a book tour for his latest release called "Where the light fell" which is his memoire on his life and his faith. He called the book that because he feels like we all have special spaces where we best experience God. For him, these included music and nature. 

Thinking about Lent, I ask myself -- where is God showing up in my life right now. 

1. Where do I feel God near? 
2. Where and when is my mind most attuned to grace? 
3. Where does the light shine? 
4. If I were going on a hunt for God where and how would I look?

Making Lent

Lent is a beautiful period of time -- long enough to be a stretch but still time bound. It creates space to open ourselves up to God, to journey into the wilderness to be stretched or to lean into grace. It is the quiet end of winter, beginning of spring -- when death and barrenness feel close and yet, life is slowly reborn in the lengthening of days. It is a journey to the cross -- and to the resurrection. 

I sometimes choose practices that I can be hard-nosed about -- absolutely no X until Easter. Other times I choose things that I fail at and struggle with over and over -- awashing me in grace again and again so that I show up to Good Friday completely broken with all my lenten practices off the rails and feeling like a miserable failure only to find grace again and know that that's the entire point.

So here's to pulling out pacifiers and sitting in the emptiness, struggling with the rocky paths of the second mountain and resting in the lush meadows where the light shines through and God draws near. 

Here's to 40 days --- a very long road to the cross and to the hope that lies beyond. 

May you be fed. 

May your journey be blessed.

Peace be with you.