{"id":5412,"date":"2018-02-21T16:44:39","date_gmt":"2018-02-21T21:44:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/?p=5412"},"modified":"2018-10-09T16:58:55","modified_gmt":"2018-10-09T20:58:55","slug":"365163-kinder-lent-week-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/365163-kinder-lent-week-1\/","title":{"rendered":"365+#163:\u00a0Kinder Lent-Wk. 1: 7 Days"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ash Wednesday:<\/strong> I started this first Be Kinder<\/em>\u00a0week with giving several things away and trying to bite my tongue from making a criticism. The latter was by far the harder. I was successful at taking 2 pairs of jeans and 2 tops to Goodwill. I also took 2 sheets to the Catholic Worker House. Yea! The problem came right after the Ash Wednesday service. During our parish Salad Supper that followed Mass, I commented that probably it would have been better not to sing a song during the distribution of ashes because I couldn\u2019t hear the words of the ash giver. I may be right but that\u2019s not the point. I was halfway through my comment at the dinner table when I caught myself and said, \u201cOh oh, I just violated my Don\u2019t be judgmental<\/em> resolution.\u201d Then I tried to wriggle out of it by rationalizing that I wasn\u2019t being judgmental about a person; it was just a comment. I can see that the temptation here is to justify my judgmentalism by calling it constructive criticism or giving feedback.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Day 2: Does it count?<\/strong> I wasn\u2019t sure how I would be kinder today so I wondered if I could carry over some of yesterday\u2019s give aways? \u00a0Since I gave more than one thing away, can I count it as several days? Since I took stuff to more than one place can it count for 2 days? The sheets weren\u2019t new. Should I just count them as one? I then realized that paying too much attention to what counts was not in the spirit of Lent. I decided to pay attention to who crossed my path on my walk, smile, and greet them. It wasn\u2019t much, but I saw a few people and it did bring a mindfulness to my walk.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Day 3:<\/strong> Beyond the usual<\/strong>. I went to a funeral of a friend today. I think that counts as being kind, but I would have done it anyway. Shouldn\u2019t a Kinder Lent<\/em> be about doing things beyond my normal habits? Yes. I decided to feed the hungry by taking a bunch of raw vegetables to our parish fish fry. I also dropped off a blanket to our local cold shelter.<\/p>\n

Day 4:<\/strong> Progress or backsliding?<\/strong> Two times I stopped myself from criticizing friends behind their backs. They were minor complaints but I held it in. Unfortunately, I also made an intervention that I thought was harmless but the person took it as a criticism. I guess I have a ways to go. I also helped push a friend\u2019s car that was stuck, but I would have done that anyway. It doesn\u2019t count.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Day 5:<\/strong> Be kind to self day. <\/strong>Since it\u2019s Sunday I took a long nap and watched the Olympics.<\/p>\n

Day 6: Be kind to nature<\/strong>. I recycled a dying plant by putting it in the compost and saving some of its dirt for this African violet.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Day 7: Be kind to an animal.<\/strong> This was one of those empty days when I wasn\u2019t sure how I would be kind. I just watched for opportunities. I reached out to a sad friend and then\u2026I saw a dead squirrel on my walk. Hmmm. I paused then decided to pick up the squirrel with a dust pan and bury it in the holler behind our house.<\/p>\n

In future weeks I won\u2019t bore you with a daily log of my acts or refraining from complaining, but I thought it might be helpful to me and to you, to see the process of trying to build a habit of kindness. It takes daily intentionality and holding oneself accountable. Have you ever tried to change a negative attitude or habit? What helped?<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ash Wednesday: I started this first Be Kinder\u00a0week with giving several things away and trying to bite my tongue from making a criticism. The latter was by far the harder. I was successful at taking 2 pairs of jeans and 2 tops to Goodwill. I also took 2 sheets to the Catholic Worker House. Yea! […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[30,17],"class_list":["post-5412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-being-kind","tag-faith","tag-musings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5412"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5412\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5535,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5412\/revisions\/5535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}