The most pathetic Catholic ever

I win the award...The Most Pathetic Catholic Ever award.

If you asked any member of my family yesterday evening, except maybe the one who lives on campus, if mom is a very nice mom, you would get a resounding, "Absolutely not."

I admit, I hate Ash Wednesday.

I am pathetic.

I "can't have" a Biscoff with my tea, a yogurt between lunch and dinner, a carrot stick while I prep veggies for dinner, and it makes me cranky. I don't mind going to Mass, and wearing my ashes all day, but tell me I have to limit myself to two small meals and three altogether and I get cranky.

Pathetic. Absolutely pathetic.

Nothing tastes better than breakfast on the Thursday after Ash Wednesday. And my breakfast was lovely slow cooker steel cut oats, with toasted almonds and blueberries on top.

I think it's fabulous that Valentine's Day landed on the day after Ash Wednesday and I have all my meals planned, within normal Lenten limits, of course.

I saw this funny meme the other day and laughed and laughed.

Ain't that the truth? Just give up one bunch of "I can'ts" for another.

I've written about Lenten fasting before. I'm not big on sharing my fasts -- you know the whole left hand / right hand thing -- though I may (or may not) be attempting to make the same sacrifice I wrote about in that linked to post (you can see I'm already doing a great job).

When I read this meditation by Caryll Houselander in yesterday's Magnificat, I was just dumbstruck. Yes, Yes, Yes. She got it.

As to your Lent...I can only tell you my own experience.  A mass of good resolutions, I think, are apt to end up in disappointment and to make one depressed.  Also direct fault-uprooting:  it makes one concentrate too much on self, and that can be so depressing.  The only resolution I have ever found works is:  "Whenever I want to think of myself, I will think of God."  Now, this does not mean, "I will make a long meditation on God," but just some short sharp answer, so to speak, to my thought of self, in God.  For example:
"I am lonely, misunderstood, etc."
"The loneliness of Christ at his trial; the misunderstanding even of his closest friends."
Or:
"I have made a fool of myself."
"Christ mocked--he felt it; he put the mocking first in foretelling his Passion--'The Son of Man shall be mocked, etc.'--made a fool of, before all whom he loved."
Or:
"I can't go on, unhelped."
"Christ couldn't.  He couldn't carry the cross without help; he was grateful for human sympathy--Mary Magdalene--his words on that occasion--other examples as they suggest themselves--just pictures that flash through the mind."  This practice becomes a habit, and it is the habit which has saved me from despair!...

Different people have different approaches to Christ.  He has become all things--infant, child, man--so that we all can approach him in the way easiest for us.  The best is to use that way to our heart's content, and not to trouble about any other.