What are you giving up? If anything...

Calm_Mind_Latias

Calm_Mind_Latias

I am giving up competitive battling, as I cannot watch competitive Pokemon battle or participate in one (although I haven't done the later since the morning of January 27 where I had 34 battles in a span of about five hours). Formulating various tactics and strategies and rehearsing possible match-ups in my mind once consumed much of my mental energy, and this would liberate some cognitive resources for spiritual pursuits. I already chosen this as my sacrifice since January.


All until the glorious celebration of the Paschal Mystery of His Resurrection the sacrament of cannabis consumption on April 20th.
 
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Social time.

When I'm really busy, I do that.

(and you can probably feel it by now, I guess)
 
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I find it a lot better to resolve to do more of something over Lent rather than not to do something. If I do the latter, I've normally broken the vow within a week and then I have little motivation to continue.
 
I'm giving up swearing. It's gonna be hard as shit for me.

But mostly I'm going to try and do more instead of do less. I'm going to start running (*rugby season opener anxiety intensifies*).

And I'm going to work on my arms because I leg press like 800 but I can barely bench 200 #bitchweight
 
lean

(actually though I've given up drinking because money + finals so I'll pretend it's for lent)
 
I haven't done a Lenten promise or a New Years Resolution since I was in elementary school. I've never seen much point of it. Almost everyone who makes one of these things breaks them because they are doing it just for the holiday's sake and not for their own. No one is going to quit smoking or eating bad and stick to it for long if their largest motivation is because of a holiday. If you wanted to change or improve your lives, you would have done it before based on your own reasons and forces.

For new years, my girlfriend swore to me that she would start eating better and exercise more because she kept complaining how bad she was looking. I was as supportive as I could be for her, but I knew that she wouldn't follow through. She lasted a week before she gave up drinking two glasses of water a day. The cookies came out after she weighed herself after week two and saw she lost 4 pounds. She stopped exercising and taking walks a few days after that. Now for Lent, she wants to give up junk food again... It's maddening.

I'll never understand why people make these goals to begin with. Do you guys really think that you're going to follow through with the things you're saying? Do you really even care if you do? If you do, what makes this time so different from the other times you have said or done something and haven't followed through? It is just crazy to my why people are so obsessed with these kinds of things when in practice they really don't give two shits and a rats ass...
 
Leafshield said:
I'm giving up swearing. It's gonna be hard as shit for me.

But mostly I'm going to try and do more instead of do less. I'm going to start running (*rugby season opener anxiety intensifies*).

And I'm going to work on my arms because I leg press like 800 but I can barely bench 200 #bitchweight
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Thank you for making me feel great about my weight room accomplishments of leg pressing 480 and benching 150 max.

With that out of the way, no I don't plan to give up anything, but my brother is giving up swearing and my little sister is giving up candy.

I'm not sure who will crack first.
 
ButteredToast said:
I haven't done a Lenten promise or a New Years Resolution since I was in elementary school. I've never seen much point of it. Almost everyone who makes one of these things breaks them because they are doing it just for the holiday's sake and not for their own. No one is going to quit smoking or eating bad and stick to it for long if their largest motivation is because of a holiday. If you wanted to change or improve your lives, you would have done it before based on your own reasons and forces.

For new years, my girlfriend swore to me that she would start eating better and exercise more because she kept complaining how bad she was looking. I was as supportive as I could be for her, but I knew that she wouldn't follow through. She lasted a week before she gave up drinking two glasses of water a day. The cookies came out after she weighed herself after week two and saw she lost 4 pounds. She stopped exercising and taking walks a few days after that. Now for Lent, she wants to give up junk food again... It's maddening.

I'll never understand why people make these goals to begin with. Do you guys really think that you're going to follow through with the things you're saying? Do you really even care if you do? If you do, what makes this time so different from the other times you have said or done something and haven't followed through? It is just crazy to my why people are so obsessed with these kinds of things when in practice they really don't give two shits and a rats ass...
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I concur...

A sacrifice must be done sincerely for one to get closer to God, in loving imitation, although ersatz, of the Son's trial of forty days in the desert. It is not something that one cannot causally do, nor should be to trivial in significance, or motivated by personal utilitarian gain (such as pursued for health reasons). It should not be solely for form of self-experimentation, such as trying out a new diet, and should be chosen with some degree of introspection.

I am most certainly serious with my Lenten resolution... and the competitive aspect of the game really did distract me from my spiritual life in the sense that during homilies I often rehearsed numerous match-ups in my mind, I did not pray often, and I spent much of my time running damage calcs for numerous attacks. But I lost much of my interesting in battling during February (not even enough to try to get the suspect reqs for the Genesect, Deoxys-S, Lucarionite suspect test which probably required about ~80 battles on both ladders at a Glicko skill level of 1700), and most of my posts here during that month were on discussions about whether Genesect or SwagPlay should be banned.

Still, I suppose that is also a testimony of the merits of competitive battling, since it does require a high degree of intellectual engagement in order to be good, but that is besides the point.

Perfect Cell said:
Thank you for making me feel great about my weight room accomplishments of leg pressing 480 and benching 150 max.

With that out of the way, no I don't plan to give up anything, but my brother is giving up swearing and my little sister is giving up candy.

I'm not sure who will crack first.
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ButteredToast said:
I haven't done a Lenten promise or a New Years Resolution since I was in elementary school. I've never seen much point of it. Almost everyone who makes one of these things breaks them because they are doing it just for the holiday's sake and not for their own. No one is going to quit smoking or eating bad and stick to it for long if their largest motivation is because of a holiday. If you wanted to change or improve your lives, you would have done it before based on your own reasons and forces.

For new years, my girlfriend swore to me that she would start eating better and exercise more because she kept complaining how bad she was looking. I was as supportive as I could be for her, but I knew that she wouldn't follow through. She lasted a week before she gave up drinking two glasses of water a day. The cookies came out after she weighed herself after week two and saw she lost 4 pounds. She stopped exercising and taking walks a few days after that. Now for Lent, she wants to give up junk food again... It's maddening.

I'll never understand why people make these goals to begin with. Do you guys really think that you're going to follow through with the things you're saying? Do you really even care if you do? If you do, what makes this time so different from the other times you have said or done something and haven't followed through? It is just crazy to my why people are so obsessed with these kinds of things when in practice they really don't give two shits and a rats ass...
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Same deal as New Year's Resolutions really; it's a tradition that gives people a kick up the arse to better themselves. Some people simply need that kick and it can have reprecussions long beyond 40 days and 40 nights. For example, I gave up fizzy drinks for Lent once...13 years later and I still haven't touched one.

We live in an age where people are eating worse than ever so a tradition that has, over time, effectively became 'stop eating/drinking [bad food/drink] for 40 days' is a-okay with me.
 
Lee said:
Same deal as New Year's Resolutions really; it's a tradition that gives people a kick up the arse to better themselves. Some people simply need that kick and it can have reprecussions long beyond 40 days and 40 nights. For example, I gave up fizzy drinks for Lent once...13 years later and I still haven't touched one.

We live in an age where people are eating worse than ever so a tradition that has, over time, effectively became 'stop eating/drinking [bad food/drink] for 40 days' is a-okay with me.
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It often does have an impact... during my first Lent, I was an adamant Marxist-Leninist who admired Joseph Stalin, and I gave up visiting and post on a far-left message board, and my activity on that forum diminished after Lent. (And after that Lent, instead of singing canticles to Uncle Joe, I become a conservative Catholic who now has an uncompromising obligations to vote for the Republican Party because they are against abortion. I still haven't found an alternative political ideology that filled the vacuum, so I still consider myself a "Marxist-Leninist" if I had to declare an ideology since it is still the political philosophy that I can defend most facilely, and it still resonates with my moral sentiments.) In retrospect, I really did believe that sacrifice had great significance, since Christianity is not a political ideology whose ultimate end is to influence citizens or the government or arouse disenfranchised masses in order to acquire political power in order to affect the social order. Political ideology always intends to impose its will upon others, for better or for worse. But an import element of being is Christian means being Christ-like: humbling submitting oneself to do the Father's will and emanating His love through one's sincere and pious example while being joyous and peaceful under the Spirit's influence, not trying to persuade or ridicule those who do not yet adhere to your creed and ideology. For this and other personal and intellectual reasons, I am also dismissive of the value of Christian apologetics; indeed, I experience greater intellectual satisfaction reading the works of secular philosophers, such as Karl Popper, David Hume, and Peter Singer, especially Hume, who eloquently presented arguments that cast doubt on the existence of God. Saint Augustine is probably the only Christian writer (although I haven't read that much) who I find his apologetic/polemic work engrossing.

Certainly, one should not merely be lukewarm, and merely see Lent has a traditional occasion for one to acquire the impetus for self-improvement in the secular sense. Indeed, one of the most poignant passages during the period of my conversion is Revelation 3:16-17, which is Christ addressing the Church of Laodicea. One's sacrifice should be chosen to get chose to God and an expression of one's fervent love for Him; it should not merely be an empty gesture.
 
Stallion said:
280 pounds with a bench of only 200, Jesus Christ you must have big legs. I'm 185 and can max 265 on bench, and I'm not even especially jacked. Ridiculous leg press though, I must see pics of them.
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Yeah I'm an offensive lineman, so I guess the whole legs thing comes with the territory. My bench is seriously bad, so I gotta get that work in and even myself out.

Might do picks later, idk
 
For some reason I'm reluctant to admit I like anything or provide positive feedback of any sort. It might feel weird at first, but why not, lent's as good a time as any to start saying "I like that" more often.

This is actually totally serious and not just an excuse to randomly "like" things in this thread, btw. See: the fact that not every post is liked by me.
 
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