Next Right Step

A feast is made for laughter.

—Ecclesiastes 10:19

I’m learning, slowly, a rhythm of feasting and fasting that brings a rich cadence to my year. I use the word fasting loosely, as an opposite term to feasting—permission and discipline, necessary slides back and forth along the continuum of how we feed ourselves.

The weeks between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day are a feast. I love the traditions and tastes of the season—sweet potato biscuits with maple butter, Aunt Mary’s raisin bread, toasted and topped with melting sharp cheddar slices.

And then in January, fasting gives me a chance to practice the discipline of not having what I want at every moment, of limiting my consumption, making space in my body and spirit for a new year, one that’s not driven by my mouth, by wanting, by consuming.

Fasting, I find, starts as a physical act, but it quickly becomes spiritual: Am I slave to my appetites? Am I ruled by my hunger? Do I trust that God meets my needs, or am I impatient and ravenous, needing to meet them all myself? The rhythm of flavor and feast and celebration during the holidays, tempered by limitations and structure in the new year, draws me closer to God, more dependent, more connected, more grateful for his presence.