The first thing you’ll notice about this monthly update is that there is a conspicuous absence of update.  No measurements.  No weight.  No pictures.

WARNING:  For non-Christian readers, there will be some overtly Christian content in the following.  I certainly understand if those who are not Christian would prefer to skip it.  However, while you may not be interested in the Christian message at this time, there may still be something in it for your THM journey, and I would encourage you to just take a few minutes and read it anyway.

The day after my last update, my Bible study group began the Beth Moore Daniel: Lives of Integrity, Words of Prophecy Bible study series.  If any of you are familiar with it, during the introduction video session, Beth speaks on Daniel’s diet of vegetables (the Hebrew for this term includes vegetables, fruits, and grains) and water as referenced in Daniel 1:12.  She shares that she will be fasting from, as she puts it, “the richer cuts of meat” for the first six weeks of the study and invites anyone who feels so led to join her.  I’ll be honest, since starting THM any mention of messing with my diet throws up major brick walls.  Okay, to be perfectly honest, even before THM, any mention of messing with my diet threw up major brick walls.  As someone whose diet was very controlled by people other than herself, criticized by those same people, or dependent on severely restricted finances, for the first 24-ish years of her life, I’m not very willing to let other people call the shots on my diet, period.  And frankly, with THM I already eat way more chicken than I’d like.  So, if I was going to fast, the Lord was going to have to be VERY clear that I was to participate, and He didn’t seem to be indicating a food fast was in order for me.  What I did feel the Lord leading me to do was fast from the scale, measurements, and pictures of my THM journey for those 6 weeks.  As of this update, we are 4 weeks into the 6 week fast.

Spiritually speaking, the reason behind this particular fast is for participants to be reminded that while we may be in a world of overindulgence and excess, we are not to be of that world.  Our focus is to be on eternal things.  During a fast of any kind, each time you reach for what you have been called to forgo, it is a reminder to turn to God as your sustainer.  It should not become a source of pride or be used as a bargaining chip with God (i.e. I’ll fast for 6 weeks and God, you make me thinner).

I’m a daily weigher (not recommended).  And, while most of my goals are non-scale goals that relate to health, I am a human and, as vain as it may be, still very focused on the visual results of THM.  The visual, factual record keeping of my THM life has been a difficult thing for me to give up, which is the point of it.  There is nothing to learn in giving up things that are easy for us to live without.  In addition to spiritual growth, this period of fasting has given me a chance to let the visible, tangible progress of my THM journey take a back seat by reminding me every time I see the scale and am even a little curious about what it would say that what it says is not important in the grand scheme of things.  In the end, I need health—not a lower scale number and not a smaller jean size.