I Give Up

I owe you an apology: I’ve apparently not been clear this Lenten season.

One week ago today I wrote this:

Popular question for many this week has been,

“What are you giving up for Lent?”

I’m giving up giving up.

Apparently that was understood to mean that I was stopping this ancient Easter preparation practice of Lenten self-denial, and encouraging you to do the same.  That was not at all my intent.

What I was trying to express was a painfully deep desire to back away from drowning in discouragement, despair, and even depression.

In other words, I’d like to stop feeling like simply giving up.

I want to stop giving up, on many things.

I want to stop giving up, at many levels.

I want to stop giving up, for many reasons.

So: let me try this again…for Lent 2014, I want to give up caving in to negative feelings of pointlessness and emptiness.

Maybe this is an easier way to say it: I want to give up on giving up.