Today's Agenda...

[miss_yt]

Today is Yom Kippur. I am not in synagogue, obviously - for a number of reasons, although they all generally boil down to being a not-good-enough Jew¹. But I am fasting, as I did last year. I have a particular reason for doing this. Partly it is to make up for not going to service, and for repentance in general. But it is a very particular kind of repentence. My major sin - if we may dip into Christian theology for a moment - is gluttony. I tend to eat too much and I eat the wrong things, at the wrong times, even though I know better and have the wherewithal to get better things. I've improved somewhat, but really, I lack self-control where food is concerned. So I feel it is appropriate for me to observe the fast: to exercise self-control, to make up for when I didn't, and to feel what it's like to really be hungry, not just peckish.

Of course, I am also planning what I will eat to break the fast come sunset, which may defeat the purpose of this exercise.


¹I wouldn't classify myself as an entirely bad Jew, because even if I don't go to synagogue regularly, not even on the high holy days, I believe in God, I study our traditions (even if I don't know them too well), and I try to practice the virtues of patience, rationality, honesty and charity. I am far from perfect, but I try, in my way.

Oh, and also, although my boss is Jewish, I don't get an automatic day off for religious observance and I have to save the ones I've got for later this year. If he were Christian I would probably have gotten off...

Comments

[alashiya.livejournal.com]

That's my besetting sin, too! Isn't it a bitch? You can't let your guard down for a minute. Don't give up, though. Pray without ceasing. People have beat it, and I figure if they can, we can too.