Day #7--The Demon Acedia

Fail #2.

And it's only been one week.

What's funny is, I've tried diets/fasts like this probably at least 100 times. And can never follow through. Ever. Consistency has always been completely out of my reach. I've tried accountability, food charts, alarm clock reminders, everything. What's keeping me from wanting to pursue the best for myself? I can't constrict this to simply food. This trend is everywhere in my life. I don't think there's one thing I do regularly, without fail. Except the things I don't want to do.

Usually, when I fail in a commitment like this, I fight it by motivating myself again towards deeper legalism: restricting myself more, making stricter schedules, putting notes up everywhere to remind myself of the goal. A few days go by where I'm super pumped, but those days are soon followed by a crash, and I go back to square one.

This is more complicated than a lack of self-control. Somewhere in my life there is a disconnect.

Yesterday I stumbled upon Gregory Boyd's website, and there's a Q&A section filled with the most common questions he gets from readers. Here's Gregory Boyd's response to a question from a man asking Gregory why God created him with an uncontrollable sex drive.
"The challenge is not to suppress your sex drive – which you’d probably have little success at doing anyway. The challenge, rather, is to make God the highest priority of your life. Seek first the Kingdom, Jesus said (Mt 6:33). You’ll find that the more you pour yourself into being a disciple of Jesus, the more power you’ll have over your sex drive."
Okay. Being a disciple of Christ brings about the fruits of the spirit, one of those being self-control. So, if you're a Christian, and you're struggling with self-control, the answer is, be devoted to Christ.

But, what if the very thought of being a disciple makes you shrug your shoulders?

Being very candid, that's where I'm at. I feel like my life is one big yawn. It's not that things are boring--it's that I just don't care. I feel like I have to make myself care about anything. This isn't depression and it's not laziness. And this isn't a symptom of some wound. It's not some misconception of God I have. Not this time. This is something that's rooted itself into my whole being. I can feel it. It's this perpetual apathy in everything and lack of strength to uproot it. I'm scrambling around trying to fight it with more and more commitments and schedules, but all that's doing is showing me that nothing inside of me will comply. And all I'm saying is, if Satan has a best way of making a Christian ineffective, it's this. Because you're not wounded and on your way to healing, you're not depressed and working through pain, you're sitting in the middle of an amazing, bustling life with your arms folded, picking at your nails wondering when it will all be finished.

I'm at a loss, honestly. I guess I need prayer. And I'm not giving up, day #8 will still come tomorrow.