Day One Of 8th Annual End Of Summer Fast & Detox: The Root
What's Your Why?
We are officially 24 hours into the 8th Annual End Of Summer Fast & Detox. How are you feeling? I hope you are ready and open to all that this time has to offer. This year, I fought really hard to decide what things I needed to give up. It was extremely hard for me, because I wanted to make sure my three things were of value and were going to actually challenge me. I didn’t want to just give up things, just because. As I was trying to decide what things to give up, I created posted notes and put them on my wall. After talking with my really good friend, she helped me get clear on the things I needed to give up. During this time, I’m not watching television, I’m not aimlessly scrolling on any social media, and I’m not drinking any alcohol. Now, these may seem like three simple things, but the reality is I wanted to go deeper. With this fast, I am trying to have a clear mind, which is why I gave up alcohol. I want to break the spirit of idleness that’s taken over, which is why I gave up social media and TV. I want to get more disciplined, which is why I’m creating and following certain routines during this time. See how all of my things flow, that’s how deliberate I wanted to get this year. A clear mind breaks idleness which leads to discipline. Make sure that the things you gave up, will really stretch you. Make sure they’re things that you do daily or if not every other day. Don’t cheat yourself, but more importantly, don’t cheat God.
Lord, thank you! Thank you for this time of stillness. Thank you for quieting all the noises that try to take your place. Thank you for redirecting our focus and attention to you. Lord search our hearts and reveal to us the mess that’s inside. Cleanse our hearts and make them new. Father, I invite your Holy Spirit to fill us right now. Help us in our weakness, and teach us things we don’t know about you. Help us to live like you. We put all our expectations in you. Lord, we repent of the times we expected other people or other things to meet our needs, when we should have been looking to you. We pray that you take your place as the driver in our lives, as we take the backseat. Open our ears to hear your voice. Lord have your way in our lives, not only for this fast but for the rest of our beings.
In Jesus name I pray amen.
For day one, I want you to define your why. What are you fasting for? You can fast for anything, and it doesn’t have to just be something physical. Are you seeking more intimacy with God? Do you need a breakthrough with different areas of your life? Do you have a decision that you need to make? Are you searching for clarity for what your next step should look like? There are plenty of reasons why you can fast, and it can be for multiple things. Take some time to write down what your why is. This is going to help you when things get hard. For me, one of my why is because I need better discernment of God’s voice, so that I can be obedient. Times that I want to stop and watch TV, I think about my why and it pushes me to not watch it. If you’re having a hard time defining your reason for this fast, I want you to look at areas of your life where you need God. This isn’t the time to act like your life is perfect and everything is all together. This is a time for you to be real. Think about what parts of yourself you’ve been hiding from God, consciously or without you even knowing. I want you to write down three questions that you want God to answer. They can be as deep as you want them to be. In order to define your why, you need to do a heart check. Most people think that your mind controls your heart, but that’s not the truth. Your heart controls your thoughts. Thinking begins with believing and believing begins in the heart. There are countless scriptures that discuss the heart and the importance of guarding it. Proverbs 4:23 says, “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.” If you want to know your desires, check your heart. Your motives for this fast will flow from the heart. If your heart isn’t right, that’s ok. This is the time to clear and cleanse the heart. People always talk about your hearts posture, and you may not know what that means. I can write a book on all the seasons that weren’t the best, and a lot of them have to do with my hearts posture. Your heart posture is simply your attitude or position in relation to God. One prayer that I find myself praying every single morning is, “Lord search my heart, if anything is in my heart that’s pulling me from you, remove it. Cleanse my heart and purify it. I want a heart that loves what you love and a heart that hates what you hate. I want a heart that is aligned with you and your will.” From the heart flows everything in your life. I didn’t mean to go on a tangent about the heart, but this is the first step with this fast. Invite God into your heart. This fast will be a complete waste, if you can’t check your heart and find your why. It’s hard to know where you’re going if you don’t know where you currently are. Think about it, when you put directions into your maps, you need a to and from location. If you don’t know where you currently are, it’s hard to tell where you’re going. This may not be easy for you to explore, but I promise it’s going to help you for this next season. 1 Chronicles 28:9 says, “For the Lord sees every heart and knows every plan and thought. If you seek him, you will find him.” During this fast, I pray that you earnestly seek him. I hope the things that you gave up leave space for you to seek Him. It’s not enough to just give up things, you have to be actually replacing that time with time with the father.
For those of you who are detoxing, whether you’re not religious, or simply detoxing along with fasting, I have some questions for you. I want you to get clear on your why as well. Why do you need a change in your life? To prepare for this next season, you have to sit in analyze your current and past seasons. I want you to also define how you’re going to replace your time. You gave up three things, but how will you replace them? For example, if you gave up alcohol, will you replace that with more water? If you gave up TV, would you replace that time with journaling and reading? Only you can define how you will replace your time. Replace the time with something that will better you for the future. Who are you? This is a time for self assessment, look at your life in totality. Back in school, we used to do a SWOT analysis, (strength, weakness, opportunity and threats.) Today, I want you to do a personal check in with these questions. First, I want you to ask yourself to think of three words to define your current season. Who are you now? Where are you strong, and what areas are you lacking? Also, identify two habits that are holding you back in this season? Next, how do you want0 your next season to look? Who is the person you want to become? This is all about visualization. What do you need in order to become that person in this next season? For me, I want to be someone who has consistent routines, in order for me to get there, I need a schedule that I can actually follow. Another example is, I want to be a person that moves her body daily, and in order to be that, I need discipline to workout. I was recently reading How We Heal by Alexandra Elle, she has an exercise titled, Identifying Pain Points & Feelings. In the exercise, she has you make three columns in a journal title each column with: 1. What Hurts? 2. Why It Hurts? 3. How Do I Want To Feel? I challenge you to spend some time thinking about different feelings and events that happened in this current season and figure out how you want to feel. I’ll give you an example: What hurts? Ending my relationship even though it was time. Why it hurts? Because I felt like we had time and emotions invested, and I hate the feeling of starting over. How do I want to feel? I want to feel loved even while being on my own and for my next relationship to be mutually beneficial. Take some time to sit with your feelings and figure out how you want to feel. I know how heavy this may be, but I promise you, it will help you get to where you want to go.
I know day one seems extremely heavy, and like it’s a lot of things to do. But, these are all things needed in order to get to the next step. I know I said it earlier, but you can’t know where you’re going if you don’t know where you currently are. The reality is, our feelings are messy, and sometimes all over the place. Our heart is deceitful, and will lead us to a path of destruction. Whether you are fasting, detoxing, or both, sit and reflect on your why. Don’t run from heavy feelings, don’t run from your mess. Nobody is perfect, no matter how things may seem. We all have things inside of us that are ugly, but the first step is acknowledging them. I pray day one treat you well, and that you discover some things about yourself that you’ve been running from.
