Giving it up for Lent

What are you giving up for Lent?

To be honest, I've never given anything up for Lent. My first Lent I was still just getting used to the whole idea and remembering to eat a tuna melt from the diner across from my work on Fridays. My second Lent (last year) I was enormously pregnant and working 40+ hour weeks trying to get my accounts in order and my position in line for my maternity leave (which, ahem, I never left).

This is my third Lent. And this time, for the first time, I've really had a great opportunity to prepare myself for it rather than it just sneaking up on me. I'm starting to understand and live the liturgical calendar. I find inspiration in other websites, blogs and books. I've menu-planned some of our Friday meals already! I'm set! But I still didn't know what I wanted to "give up."

Elizabeth Foss introduced me to the concept of the three pillars of Lent, prayer, almsgiving and fasting. We'll be fasting and abstaining on Fridays, we're being frugal and eating from our pantry and freezer and giving the excess to the church (almsgiving) and that brings me around to prayer. What I've been really wanting to do is print out and keep on me and/or around me the morning offering, Lenten prayers and purchase a copy of the Liturgy of the Hours. I also intend to pray the Divine Chaplet of Mercy every day of Lent.

I'm mid-way through reading Holly Pierlot's book "A Mother's Rule of Life" and in it I'm finding myself inspired by it. As a new homemaker, I'm really great at building schedules, color-coding them on my iCal, blogging about it, but I'm less good at actually following the things. I find them useful, don't get me wrong, because it helps me to keep track of what needs to be done, but I don't find myself following them every day. And I find myself behind and, frankly, uninspired and apathetic about them. I want a clean house, I clean it, but a clean house does not make ME. What I want to do is "schedule" in all those other things and consciously think about and pray about the 5 P's.

This Lent I have a few goals.

To grow closer to God
How?

• Reading and prayer. My Lenten book list includes reading all of the deuterocanonical books, finishing and beginning to implement "A Mother's Rule of Life" and beginning "Jesus of Nazareth" by the Pope. I also have "The Heart of Motherhood" by Donna-Marie Cooper O'Boyle which I hope to begin.
• Daily praying the Divine Chaplet of Mercy and focusing on the Sorrowful Mysteries daily.
• Not watching mindless TV. I'm not giving up TV, but I'm only going to watch what I sincerely want to watch (and those I normally DVR) and spending time in the evenings with my husband, baby, and the aforementioned books (or typing out those prayers and praying them! A seemingly simple task, I never get around to doing it! :)

To begin prayerfully considering the who, what, when, where, why and how's of what Holly Pierlot calls the 5 P's - Prayer, Person, Partner, Parent and Provider
How?

• Beginning a W. Family Home Binder. Not a housekeeping binder. I've seen those and they're great, but I want mine to be a HOMEKEEPING binder. With pages for prayers, prayer requests, family traditions and recipes along with pages for the weekly to-do list, housecleaning schedule and grocery list. This is a project I'm looking forward to (I'm a big nerd who loves fonts and graphic design and I'm just stepping into digital scrapbooking so will be using fun software to do this) and I will be using some other ladies' binders as inspiration.
• Beginning an exercise routine. T. and I have been discussing buying an elliptical machine for home and I think that we've chosen the one we're going to buy. I think that if I feel better physically, I'll feel better mentally and will be able to more easily focus on the other things.
• Praying, (see above)
• And a few others . . .

And I've determined what I'm going to "give up" for Lent.

Selfishness.

I'm going to consciously try, every day, to be more giving toward others. Casting out gossip and bad thoughts towards others. Trying to be more thoughtful for others and selfless to myself. This may be as mundane as remembering to ask my husband if he needs a glass of water when I'm in the kitchen getting a glass for myself, or instead of hearing a commercial for a drug that combats "persistent constipation" (I heard this one today) and thinking "Gross! Why is this on TV?" maybe praying a little prayer for the people who have said condition for comfort in their lives. Praying for Britney Spears every time I hear her name in the news rather than being shocked, or saddened or smug, by whatever it was that she just did that was deemed newsworthy. Thanking God for my little boy when he accidentally deletes an entire line I just wrote because he is excited to see the laptop out and loves everything electronic, rather than being frustrated that he did so! :) (and then putting it away and playing with him on the floor with his blocks!) Making "my time" and "me time" second to the needs of others. Little things add up to big things.

Pray for me!

And please, have a blessed, prayerful Lent.