Fasting

It's day 15 of a 21 say fast.  Today I just want to quit.  I'm trying to get over it.  I'm trying to think about what is true and noble, just, pure and lovely.  But instead of focusing on the excellent and praise-worthy, I've allowed myself to wallow a bit and just stew in a bad mood; dwelling too long on all the things I'm not eating, but could be.  When i'm struggling with things, one of my favorite quotes comes from Phantastes by George MacDonald:

"My spirits rose as I went deeper into the forest but I could not regain my former elasticity of mind.  I found cheerfulness to be like life itself -- not to be created by any argument.  Afterwards I learned, that the best way to manage some kinds of painful thoughts, is to dare them to do their worst; to let them lie and gnaw at your heart till they are tired; and you find you still have a residue of life they cannot kill."

This does not help me now.  This is not the sort of painful thought that he's talking about. The longer I let them gnaw, the more likely it is that I won't have any residue of life to keep this up.

So instead of doing that I thought I'd try to write a bit to take my mind off it. It's working so far.
This shouldn't be surprising, I suppose, since I read something similar today (at lunch, while I was trying to take my mind off the carrots I was eating...this has been an all-day struggle) in Ephesians 4:28.  It says, "If you are the sort of person who complains about the fast you're on, stop complaining and dwelling on it. Begin turning your thoughts to something more productive like writing a blog about what you're dealing with, and then share it generously with others (even if you're pretty sure no one ever reads this and even if they did at one point, you haven't posted anything on here in longer than you can remember)."  Your translation may have slightly different phrasing, but Paul's advice is the same:
1) If you're sinning, stop. 2) Since it's hard to just give something up, replace it with something true, or noble, or just, or pure, or lovely. 3) Use that new work to bless someone else.

Now, probably, being hungry after more than two weeks of fasting, isn't a sin, but my attitude was.  Maybe not sin with a capital S, and not one of the top ten, but was still something that got in the way of my right relationship with Christ.  And not just with Him.  If I'd've continued to stew in that grumpy mood, I was going to end up snapping at my lovely, pregnant wife for eating macaroni and brownies (not together, she's not quite that pregnant-crazy), and I don't want to do that, because I want her eating enough and eating well and staying healthy right now.  Macaroni and brownie example aside, she does eat good, healthy food, and takes great care of herself and her boys...it just happened to be macaroni and brownies tonight that was pushing me over the edge.  No, that's not fair, I wasn't being pushed by anyone or anything; I was willfully stomping over to the edge, and it's that arrogant, angry attitude that was messing me up.

So, this turned out to be a really useful exercise.  Found a good lesson from the Bible, was able to apply it to real-life situations, did not yell at pregnant wife.  You can't ask for much more than that.  Except macaroni and brownies.