Willpower and Success: Yom Kippur Fast

Last night both girls went to services with me and my friends. As I mentioned, I go every year. I go to a nice liberal synagogue where the rabbi is a lesbian with adopted black children and nobody talks about Zionism. It's not embarrassing to be Jewish in a place like that.

The 12th grader wanted to fast, and then the 8th grader got curious about it, too. Of course they did. They are teenaged girls. I was not planning to fast today. I haven’t fasted since high school, when dieting was a way of life anyway. I have avoided it partly because I tend to get shaky if I don’t eat; partly out of fear of triggering a dormant eating disorder; and partly because I assumed I lack the necessary self-control to make it for a day without eating, so why confirm the worst? Also, partly because I just don't care. I'm a secular agnostic atheist Jew. 

This year, though, I was thinking about fasting more seriously than I have. Someone I sort of know mentioned she likes to fast because it helps her to feel grateful for all that she has and reminds her that other people go hungry every day. Very noble. More noble than I, or at least than I intended to be.  She got me thinking, though, and then the kids were interested.

Of course the 12th grader's comment was, “I’ll sleep ’til noon and then it won’t be that hard.” So when I woke up this morning I resisted food. I didn’t even have my morning glass of water. I decided that I could make it until noon. If my kids were going to sleep away half their fasts, I could just half-fast. And I made it until noon. It really wasn’t hard, especially once I allowed myself the treat of reading Pride and Prejudice in bed, instead of going for a run/walk. Then I found some Crest white strips in the bathroom and I put them in for two hours. I meditated for awhile. 

Finally, noon arrived and I made coffee with soy milk. I ate a tiny bit of muffin, too. And then the girls woke up and proceeded not to eat. Somehow that strengthened my resolve. They both have such great willpower. The 8th grader asked me to make her a grilled cheese sandwich around 1pm; but when the 12th grader said, “Oh come on, it’s only five hours until dinner,” she thought better of it. And I thought I could wait, too. Willpower is contagious, I guess. 

I think of myself as pretty weak-willed. I’m not big into deprivation. It makes me feel so lonely.  And the specter of reviving an eating disorder does lurk. I don’t want to go there. However, it feels pretty good to be getting through this day. Unfortunately, according to what I learned at temple last night, I’m not actually fasting correctly. This involves abstaining from water, food, sex, bathing for pleasure, and sex. I realize I wrote "sex" twice. I meant to add "leather." So coffee with soy milk and tiny bit of muffin technically means I broke my fast. 

Do I care? 

Is this a spiritual lesson? I mean, I’m thinking about my diet, my waistline, what the scale might say if I actually had a scale. I’m thinking that I can probably eliminate some snacking every day. These are very self-centered thoughts. Furthermore, it's clear that the 8th grader is competing with her sister, and I don't want them to totally show me up, either. None of the three of us knows why we're suppose to avoid leather today. This seems random and nonsensical. 

But. I am learning that I can actually get past my urges and that I have more willpower than I thought. That feels good. It is useful to know that I can force myself to endure a little hardship. I now know that I could get through much worse from necessity if I can push myself through this little thing by choice. We all want to know we’re made of strong stuff, and I have suspected that I really, really ain’t. No strong stuff here. I mean, beyond enduring childhood and all that. Maybe I’m wrong, though. Maybe I can have more confidence in my stuff. Maybe it is stronger than I thought. And I know that if others around me show their strong stuff, I can gain strength from that, too.

The 16-year-old is working on college essays on an empty stomach. The 13-year-old has just bathed - not for pleasure, I assure you, but out of necessity. She is torturing both of us by talking about grilled cheese and her “famous” (at least around our family) pesto sandwiches. I’m thinking about tuna and my mouth is filling with saliva; but we will be strong. We will make it. 

The Uninvited Guest & Pressure to Look Good

Nothing to do with this post, except that I picked this up at a tag sale
and the husband doesn't really like it. So it's an uninvited guest, I guess

The other day at the Y, I ran into a woman I've seen practically every time I've been there over the past five years. I've never met her, though. She's about my age and she exercises strenuously. She was talking to another woman and I couldn’t help overhearing her complaining that no matter what she did she couldn’t get rid of “this.” (She slapped her midsection, which, yes, was a little bulgy. Like mine.) And for some reason, I barged in on their conversation.

“Oh, I hear you! Nothing works,” I said. (Although, it's possible eating less might help.)

She turned to me and said, “I call it my ‘uninvited guest.’” She slapped her midsection again. “And nothing works. And it doesn’t help that I can’t eat just one handful of nuts.”

Well, I was startled by her vehement slapping, but then again, I wasn't. I have vehemently slapped my midsection from time to time. I did it just the other day in Pilates, in fact, and my teacher said, "Yes, I know that workout." 

Anyway, my uninvited guest. I love the phrase. I could parse it. In fact, let’s. The use of the words “guest” and "it" suggest that this flesh doesn’t actually belong where it is, and that it’s not a part of you, normally. Both of which things I feel about my midsection bulge. 

Looking at my body that way is not healthy. After all, as my annoyingly tall and skinny therapist says, shouldn’t my focus be on how grateful I am for everything my body does for me? All parts of it? And not so critical of individual aspects of it? Ideally, yes. After all, my rational self knows that "me" and "my body" are not exactly two separate entities. Without my body, there is no me. We haven't achieved "brain-in-a-box" ability yet. 

The nuts comment, by the way, reminded me that I want to know exactly whose hand is measuring that handful of nuts? Because if it’s a male hand, then I can eat a lot more nuts than I think I can. 

Later, a friend was talking about Weight Watchers and said she was thinking of going to a nutritionist.  I told her I’ve made an appointment with a nutritionist, but I’m a little nervous that it might trigger my old eating disorder. I’m going to go anyway, because maybe this nutritionist will help me dislodge my uninvited guest. 

Or maybe she will help me accept that it’s a permanent tenant. 

As I said to my friend, it’s a question of how much deprivation you want to undergo versus how much self-acceptance you need. 

Which brings me to this metaphor of riding the rough edge of the wave. I thought of it while walking the dog today. It just came to me. I love reading about extreme surfing. Which I wasn't. I was walking the dog. But I was thinking about an article I read in the NYTimes Sunday Review by author Jennifer Weiner about the pressure to look good and the image of a surfer came to me. As a woman, I do some extreme surfing here on land when it comes to body image and self-image. Jennifer Weiner’s riding the wave, too. The rough edge of the wave. Talking about being a feminist and yet feeling pressure to get Botox, pressure amplified by social media. All too relatable, I’m afraid. “How do you preach the gospel of body positive when you’re breathless from your Spanx? How can you tell your girls that inner beauty matters when you’re texting them the message from your aesthetician’s chair?” 

Exactly. Do you talk about Jolen cream bleach and facial hair? Or do you just shut up and let them find out about it themselves eventually? 

And then there’s the other side of the pressure to look good: it can be fun to make yourself look good. Legions of style bloggers will swear on their Bobbi Brown makeup books that spending time to make yourself look good on the outside will help you feel good inside. 

Recently, I took advantage of the personal shopping service at Lord & Taylor. It’s complimentary, by the way. I looked into it out of desperation. That uninvited guest had rendered some of my nicer clothes unwearable and I have an event coming up for which I feel some Pressure to Look Good. After shopping on my own in vain, I noticed an office that said “Personal Shopper.” I asked for a card, and I contacted someone called Blair for an appointment. I arrived feeling pretty crappy about my body. 

And I left feeling really great. I had three outfits under my arm. Yes, I only needed one, but I am suggestible, and that service is complimentary for a reason. Anyway, these things looked good. Having someone professional look at clothes on me turned out to be good for my self image. And it wasn’t as if she yessed everything, either. She had assembled six or seven possibilities for me, and she evaluated them all somehow without evaluating me. Imagine. Instead of me looking at something and saying, I'm too matronly to wear this, and falling into a stupor, Blair said, “That dress is not flattering on you. It makes you look matronly. Let’s try something else.” There was no judgement of my body. It wasn’t about whether my body was suitable for the clothes. Instead, the judgement was whether the clothes were suitable for me. 

Interestingly, one of the dresses she picked out for me was one I had tried on by myself. All I saw by myself were lumps, so I had decided it wasn’t the kind of thing I can wear anymore. Stupor followed. But when I put it on this time, Blair and her assistant said it looked great. I mumbled “Spanx” and she said, “Oh, absolutely. Everyone needs Spanx for that.” See, again, no criticism that my body wasn’t perfect. 

So, it’s true that looking good will help you feel good. Yes, Readers, of course I understand that is because women feel better when society thinks they look good. It’s the catch-22.  It’s the rough edge of the wave. Until such era exists where no one is judged on appearance, those who take time to look good will reap some rewards internally as well. When that era of total equality arrives, well then we can all dance with the uninvited guest and sport facial hair, no matter our gender identity. Oh what a glorious and boring era that will be.