Vice Vice Baby

Sugar is my vice. I love it, crave it, and if I don't cut it out of my life completely, I find myself with a mouth full of cookie dough and an ache in my gut. We all have vices. You know the list: caffeine, alcohol, tobacco, sex, shopping, gambling, exercise, etc. The list could go on and on because as human beings we are pretty darn good at finding something we enjoy and enjoying it to death.

I write this blog as a place to journal my own thoughts, but since I also post the link on Facebook, I'd be kidding myself if I said I just wanted my writing to go unnoticed. When I write, I hope someone will read, respond, and remember. Because dog gone it, I need people. I need people to keep me accountable. I need people to help me say, "hey, I thought you were off sugar?"

So here I am again... after a few months of being back on the sugar train to Chubbybunsberg, I'm ready to say, "NO" again. Again. With the big 4 0 approaching, my goal of being in the best shape of my life at 40-years-old is going to take some serious work. It probably means saying "no" to more than sugar. Those fries at Burgerville today-yep, that was the last time for fried food. Juanitas chips-gone. Oh stink, no more dip crack. (Dip crack = the amazing concoction that is created by dumping a can of RO-TEL, a block of cream cheese, a giant scoop of sour cream, enchilada soup mix, whatever other cheese I've got on hand, and a handful of spicy sausage crumbles into a crock pot until it is bubbling deliciousness.)

Just typing these words makes me want to curl up in a corner and cry. Detox from yumminess is hard and it makes me hungry. I'm sitting here actually trying to contemplate other vices I can have. In the words of my 11-year-old, "wow, Mom, seriously?" Seriously, because that's what we do. If we say we won't do one thing, we find something else to put in it's place. We are vice-a-holics.

Today I actually gave that advice to a friend of mine. I said, "well if you can't do that you can do this!" For about two seconds I thought I was brilliant. I actually said to someone, "Find a new vice!" Really. Wow, Michelle, seriously? See the problem with someone like me dispensing wisdom is that sometimes I'm not very smart. When you haven't done the spiritual, physical, and emotional work that a situation requires, it's best not to give half-donkeybehinded advice.

So, now I've had some time to think. And the truth is that nature abhors a vacuum. That's why when we see a space we want to fill it. Emptiness and nothingness are not happy words...unless you're a mother of little children who happen to be at the zoo with their grandparents for the day and you are home in an empty house with nothing but peace and quiet. So my suggestion to my friend that she should simply find a new vice wasn't off-base by the world's standards.

As a follower of Christ, I hope for more. I hope for more than healthier alternatives, new vices, and filled space. I hope to be content in the empty places. The places that aren't filled with anything and delight in nothingness. I hope to be so consumed by God's love that I don't need to consume anything else to feel fulfilled. I want to delight in a life not lived in pursuit of the next vice but delighted by the God who pursues me for eternity.