The Lenten season

One of my favorite sites is FlyLady.net I have subscribed to her emails for years. Before FlyLady I tried the Sidetracked Home Executive (SHE) card file system. Some of the things make sense. I've used the menu system for almost 20 years. But we still live in CHAOS (Can't Have Anyone Over Syndrome).

FlyLady seldom sends out anything Christian in nature. Last year she sent out an email about Lent & she did again this year. As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints we do not celebrate the Lenten season.

I have always thought Easter was way overdone. We, our family, haven't celebrated Easter for years as the rest of the world does. We don't do the Easter eggs or the fancy Easter dinner. I did not want to lie to my children about the so-called Easter bunny like we did for Santa Claus. I figured one stressful holiday was enough.

I've always liked the Advent calendar & the 12 days of Christmas. Maybe it fits in with my OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder). I can do things for a certain amount of time, but to do it for any length of time is just incomprehensible to me.

I'm doing pretty good on my morning routine. I get up, make my side of the bed (Don's already made his side of the bed), fill my CPAP humidifier with water so I don't have to do it just before I go to bed, get dressed to my shoes, comb my hair, feed & water the cats & take my meds.

Bedtime is another story, sigh.

Anyway, I digress, as usual. She sent out an email from a lady that had just come from church & was thanking FlyLady & saying she was going to declutter for Lent. FlyLady emailed her back & said she had written a book about decluttering. The FlyBaby replied:

I have it and have partly read it .. its lost in my clutter LoL

She could be describing me. I have it, have partly read it & it is lost in my clutter, or my storage unit, or Mother's storage unit, or maybe it is in Don-Mike's storage unit, or did I mention it might just be lost in my clutter??

So, FlyLady sent out a request for FlyBabies to send their ideas for things to give up for Lent. She's not saying you have to give up anything for Lent, but she planted a seed.

Instead of giving UP something for Lent, one lady said:

I decided that instead of giving up something for Lent, I would ADD something healthy to my life.

Ok, the Lenten season is to commemorate the time Christ spent in the wilderness & was tempted by Satan, I thought. Another interesting thing that I just found out as I searched the Internet for Lent is that it depends on where you live & what denomination you belong to as to how Lent is calculated!! Western Christianity calculates Lent as starting on Ash Wednesday & goes to Holy Saturday (btw, I've never even heard of Holy Saturday), leaving Sunday out! So, Lent is actually 46 days, not just 40.

Again, I digress. I've decided I'm going to add something to my life for the next 46 days & I'm going to sacrifice something for the traditional 40 days of Lent.

I'm going to set a bedtime & stick to it. Now, that's a novel idea, go to bed at the same time. Me, go to bed at the same time? I haven't decided when I'm going to bed, after all, I've still got 2-3 days to think about it. But it should be at a decent hour & before midnight.

Now, the sacrifice. I liked this:

Dear FlyLady,

I picked up this handout at church recently: The Forty Trash Bag Challenge. It looked like a great idea, and it fit right in with the Decluttering for Lent email I just got in my inbox. Here is the Forty Trash Bag Challenge:

Every day during Lent this year, empty one bag of 'stuff' that is no longer needed from your house, totaling a loss of forty bags of stuff!

Then there were 5 ideas & it ended with this paragraph:

As the family accepts this challenge together, bonds will be created that will last a lifetime. Lessons are also learned not just by saying, but by putting it into practice. Here, the simple lesson will last throughout life that having fewer things can lead to a greater contentment in life.

(Credit due to the Archdiocese of Cincinnati for this handout on vocations and family faith formation)

So, I am publicly posting this on my blog so that I will be accountable. I will make an entry each day to report my success and/or my failure on my endeavor(s).

Stay tuned ..........