Look at me, I’m so holy with my ashes and my fasting…

… So it’s Lent. I guess that means I’m obligated to write something on the topic. Oh, joy. Wait, I mean “Oh, suffering.”

I suck at Lent. In fact, I suck at most of these religious traditions and seasonal times of the year. I wasn’t raised Catholic so it doesn’t come naturally for me as it does for others. Plus I have a hard enough time maintaining any level of holiness throughout the rest of the year, in case you haven’t noticed. Now you want me to do some extra piety? Here, let me just set myself up for failure.

So what am I going to do for Lent? Probably the same thing I do every day … try not to assault anyone, be grateful for my blessings, love my family, pray for my enemies, and not get my blood pressure up.

So there it is. I can beat myself up over what a failure I am at being Catholic, which I pretty much do every Sunday anyway, or I can just accept this is who I am am and continue to try and “do better” every single day of my life and not just the 4 weeks leading up to Easter.

I applaud you all that can give up anything for two days let alone forty, because here’s what my Easter looks like after 40 days of deprivation…

It’s not pretty and it certainly isn’t pious.

So how ’bout you leave me alone and let me do my thing and I’ll let you do yours. None of the Lent competition, please. I don’t want to see the instagram photo of your meatless salad #suffering #Lent #imsoholy #starving #doinitforJesus.

Deal?

Good. Now get out of here. I’m busy trying to be all holy and junk.