It's the Great Easter Bunny, Bad Shakespeare

Lent. Amiright?

Today is the first day of Lent, that magical time of year when McDonald’s breaks out the deals on fish sandwiches, and no one is freaked out by a magical bunny that leaves eggs all over the place and treats him like he’s normal.

I’m sure no matter what your religion, you’ve at least heard of Lent. It’s the time of year that Christians tend to “give something up” until Easter. Some people treat it like another chance at their New Years Resolutions, which at this point have been forgotten as quickly as the first Girl Scout came to their door and they find themselves knee deep in opened Thin Mint boxes and no memory of what happened the night before. But traditionally it’s a chance to give something up, deny yourself for 40 days and 40 nights. (Like the movie. That was terrible.)

I normally do this, but the thing is, this year, I don’t really feel like giving something up. Oh, I have my vices.... plenty of them. There’s plenty I can give up if I really think about it. There’s plenty I could “give up” for 40 days, then further binge on when the Easter Bunny comes out and sees his shadow on Easter Sunday. (I’m still fuzzy on the concept of what the Easter Bunny does. Give me the Great Pumpkin. THAT guy knows how to run a holiday.) 

I still think I should do something, but this year I should do something different. Things haven’t been going well for me, that much is clear. The “just wishing it would all get better” strategy isn’t working. So, I decided to use Lent to jump start a lot of what I want to do. I’ve decided that this year, I’m going to do one thing each day of Lent to improve my life in some way.

That’s sort of a lofty goal. I’m not really sure what it’s going to mean just yet every day. But for instance tomorrow, I’m going to make sure I get up and work out. One day I’m going to submit something to be published. I’m going to take more time out to relax. I’m going to play a video game instead of stressing about something that I shouldn’t stress about. Maybe it means I’ll just work harder to achieve my goals. Maybe it means I won’t raise an army of cats to do my unholy bidding. You never can tell with me.

I really think it’s more important to do than to just “give something up” or deny myself something for a few days when I will be binging on it when Lent is over. I want to see a result in myself at the end of it. I don’t intend to stop improving myself when all of it is over, but I’m hoping that this year I’ll see the results and get a chance to really keep moving forward.

But hey, at the end of the day, at least it will be fun to write about.