9th of Av Fast

So far this fast is going very well for me.  I am very happy that I spent the past few days preparing myself physically and emotionally.  I have eaten a very limited amount of solid foods, focusing mostly on smoothies and juices.  Today, although I am having a bit of a foggy brain, I am not obsessively focusing on food.  In fact, despite my original intention to do this as a water fast, I've ended up just doing it as a dry fast, because I just haven't felt like I need the water for these 25 hours.

I had another thought today that makes me feel like my evaluation vis a vis fasting not being about just mortifying our souls.  As the day progresses, our mourning is supposed to DECREASE.  For example, we don't put on tefillin in the morning, but we do in the evening.  Yet, if the emphasis on the fast was on being hungry, well, that would be counter the goal.  We'd be getting hungrier and hungrier.  

Fasting for clarity is really making a meaningful impact on me though.  I am glad with this orientation.  For the first time, I don't hate this fast or feel the need to binge on cherry garcia icecream the moment I get home by myself (yes, I did that once)

As a side note, I have had several bm's today.  All very easy and good.  I really feel that my body is dumping out a lot over the past few days.  DF even noticed it when he saw me yesterday, he said that my face looked thinner.  I suspected that I was noticing the same when I looked at myself in the mirror lately.

Plugged Up

Well, I hope that it doesn't turn off too many readers that I am starting off with the topic of bowel movements and constipation, but that's what's on my mind and the truth is that feeling plugged up right now is going way beyond my belly.

All of a sudden, last night, it felt like my bowels just turned off.  And it's just not comfortable.  Physically, I understand the cause--half a loaf of homemade Challah.  I've been taking it easy today--for breakfast had 32 oz of celery/grape juice (can we take a moment and acknowledge how delicious Celery juice is?) with some chia seeds thrown in (hoping the mucilage would get things moving).  Later this afternoon did a saltwater flush—my first one and nowhere near as untasty as I had expected it to be.  That went through me, and when the chia seeds came out, they looked narsty.  There is for sure stuff being cleaned out.

But, here's the thing, I think that this is more a physical manifestation of an emotional/spiritual blockage.  I've become to reasoned, too logical and too methodological in my thoughts.  I used to believe in and long for magic and wonder.  I was a romantic and willing to entertain the possibility that maybe things happened that I just didn't understand.  I have however become a cynic and that cynicism is making me bitter and stuck.  I haven't loved my faith in a long time, I haven't been excited by the thought and the dream of spirituality.  

As I prepare to start law school in the fall, I know now that I will need to find some way to engage the dreaming part of me, the imagining and fantasy loving part of me.  If I don't I'm going to have to become used to the idea of being plugged up and in pain.  No thank you.