A couple of months before the new year began, I decided I would partake in a fast, for the umpteenth time. I have done fasts before just to get a good detox from life. However, I wanted to get back to the old days and just do a good 21 day reset for the new year. Like most people, I wanted to start off the new year the “right way”. What other way to do so than to be off of social media and eating twigs for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. That’s a joke but seriously the idea of fasting from a spiritual perspective in the new year felt like a good thing to do given the season I’m in (still trying to figure out what this season of life is called LOL). I was pretty set on what I wanted to hear from God during this 21 day fast. I had a whole layout in my notes and was excited about what the next 21 days would bring. I was about 2 weeks in when I realized I was focusing more on what I had given up for the 3 weeks. I wasn’t feeling anything special or holy and to be honest I felt like torture and constant hunger. To be fair my mind has been through some unprecedented times so I knew it would be a bit of a challenge. But what I did not expect was the clarity I gained from God as I journey-ed through the fast.

Days 1-7

Let me preface this by saying I have not done a food fast in about two years and the revelations that came from that fast was so powerful that I knew going into it, it would be something good but not in the “good” I imagined. You know the usual “reveal who my friends are” “Show me if this relationship will last” (not saying fasting to get answers for these topics are bad at all do you boo, I’m just prioritizing other things right now). I have not done a Daniel fast since undergrad, so it’s been a HOT minute to say the least. This go round though; I was wanting to hear from God about what my next steps in life are. I wanted God to show me how to get “unstuck”. Now, like most of us, since Covid made its round, this world is simply not the same. On top of that, in my personal life adulthood has come with its not so feel-good moments and I have just felt so tired and super overwhelmed. To the point where I don’t feel as if my life is taking off in any particular direction just a loop in the same circle. I’ve gone to therapy, done breathing exercises, meditated, done stretches to open my hips (I still do all of these things by the way) just to still feel…blah. So, for the first 7 days of my fast I was determined and eager to hear from God on how to move on with my life because something has to give, right? Keep in mind I am still keeping up with my daily activities (work, housework…LIFE). I’m the most confident at the beginning of my fast with just enough discipline to fight through the hunger pangs and headaches from quitting processed sugars cold turkey. I have an opened mind and heart about what God has to say to me and I’m anxiously waiting for what the response will be. Is God going to send me a dream about the new job I am so desperately trying to get? Is God going to take “away” the pain and grief and BOOM I’m back to my old joyful self. I am not sure what exactly to expect but I was willing to embrace the unknown to see what responses I get. While I was “waiting” to get receive answers to the areas in my life that felt rather, gray. I allowed myself to dive into cleaning up around my place and enjoy the quietness.

Days 8 -14

Week 1 was not as bad as I thought. Despite the headaches and slight irritation, I still felt pretty good. Week 2 though??!!!! It was like a switch went off and the pressure was WORSER. I still felt the same and was not hearing from God. I consider myself to be in my adult body and am in peak adulthood right now. So on a stressful workday I am wishing the fruit I substituted for processed sugars are zebra cakes or cookie sandwiches. The headaches from week 1 have turned into irritation and increased anxiety. I know studies have shown over and over that processed sugar addictions are similar to being addicted to illegal drugs, so the withdrawal symptoms are expected, and this isn’t my first rodeo with removing processed sugars from my diet, but recently I have packed on the snack cakes and chocolates. It’s at this time I am no longer waiting or listening out to what God has to say about my life. No, I am more focused on what I am no longer indulging in. I’m focused on the fact that I can’t eat anything sweet and have to eat fruit instead. I’m not thinking about the next steps. I’m thinking about stepping into the parking lot of Bojangles and getting a supreme combo. I’m sneaking logins through my safari web browser and google search as if I’m the one who didn’t set the do’s and don’ts of the fast, so who was I sneaking from? It’s at this moment I began to think about giving up on the fast. I quickly latch onto the repeating thoughts of “it’s ok to indulge for now and just start over tomorrow”. I go back and forth between my inner thoughts and the version of myself who sees this thing through. I would have liked for this post to be about how I overcame my inner thoughts and stuck it out the entire 21 days without a slip up. I knew and KNOW that God would not be upset with me, so why was I being so hard on myself?

Days 15-21

*Post-Sugar Clarity*

After my indulge in a final wrestle with myself on whether or not I wanted to continue my fast considering I wasn’t hearing from God anyway, I sat with myself for a few to reflect. I mean I had already started back eating regular foods anyway, so why continue? As I sat in those thoughts, I kept thinking back to when I first started writing about what I wanted to gain from this fast. The words “Grace & Compassion” kept repeating in my mind as I wrote down the things I wanted to see done differently after the fast was finished. My inner self kept saying “The only thing that’s going to carry you through this is Grace and Compassion”. At the time I was saying those words to myself as a reminder that the fast would not be easy and that would be alright because I’m at a different stage in my life compared to when I did a similar fast years ago. I guess I didn’t expect to really have to put those words into practice because I just knew this would go my way…as if LIFE ever rarely does that. I felt as if God was shifting my focus from what I thought I needed to get from this fast to exactly what God wanted me to see from the fast. “Make the Choice” rang in my head one night. And then again “You simply have to make the choice” I sat up on my couch and sat still to really take in what was being said. From focusing more on what I could and could not do, to indulging so soon and to beating myself up about everything let me know that my heart, while in the right place wasn’t necessarily in need of another fast. Now I am a true believer in observing your thoughts and actions from a place of compassion and not as good or bad. What also might be true is that withholding sugars, social media and other things simply because I felt like it was the “right way” did not yield the results I thought it would. There is absolutely nothing wrong with fasting, it’s great and I will more than likely do another. At this moment though, the idea that in order to move on required this big movement or drastic movement when in reality I simply needed to make the choice to move on mentally and physically. Don’t clutch your pearls yet, hear me out. Imagine thinking or waiting on some big moment for your life to change. Imagine waiting on hearing from God about what’s next when the next steps are simply to make the decision to take the big step to the next step. Imagine just doing the thing you need to do and not waiting on some external thing as if it’s not within you. I am not here to subtract from the goodness of God, what I hope to achieve is for people to begin slowly making the choice to choose different. I think it should also be stated that the simple human reaction to withholding certain things drastically did not ruin or mess up the goal of the fast. There were other things that were laid on my heart such as re-starting this blog, LOL. After the fast was over I actually made it my mission to continue building different habits slowly. Therapy is still in my life; meditation is still a part of my journey, and God is at the forefront of it all. The fast was still beneficial for other areas in my life just as the donuts I consumed were a part of the journey, too.