Post-Lent

This year,
Passover and Orthodox Easter
and Easter all lined up.

and Lent began on Feb 21st - the day I was baptized.

Usually,
I don't understand Lent.

Usually,
it seems like one of those traditions that meant something for someone at some point, but then someone else took the action and told other people to do it. Then those people had an empty action that they had to find some meaning for.

(This is not meant as an insult to those for whom Lent is meaningful, it is just a mark of my own disconnect between the way I understood the story and a different institutionalized ritual.)

I'd known lots of people who gave up chocolate or sweets or something like that.
I'd heard that the reason was to remember Christ's suffering.
I'd heard of others who didn't give things up, but rather took on additional things that they thought were more righteous.
It seemed to be a 40-day contract of sorts.

I'd tried a couple of different things, to see if performing the action would help me understand the meaning that others found in it. I didn't really get it. I would forget. Or overdo it. Or make such a big deal of it that it seemed to counter whatever purpose there might be.

This year, I started a little late, because I didn't realize it was Lent.
I wanted my 40-day contract to be something both meaningful and constructive and challenging.

Later on, the idea came to me.


So I gave up pride for Lent.


Yes, I slipped up now and again. A lot.
The idea was to be more conscious about which of my reasons for doing or not doing things were coming from issues of pride and working through those. At the end of the day, I would go through an evaluation of my actions and responses, making mental connections and trying to repent as appropriate. I reminded myself of what I was trying to avoid periodically with a green cross.

40 days is a decent amount of time to practice.

Some things which seem like a horrendous process to complete look much more possible when practiced for only 40 days.
Yet, at the end of 40 days, sometimes a good deal of progress, or even better habits can be made.

Practicing for 40 days gives me courage to continue.