{"id":6443,"date":"2012-03-05T06:00:13","date_gmt":"2012-03-05T11:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/?p=6443"},"modified":"2012-02-03T17:01:08","modified_gmt":"2012-02-03T22:01:08","slug":"empty-yourself-this-lent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html","title":{"rendered":"Empty Yourself This Lent"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"lenten<\/span>
\nFor me Lent is about emptying–a glass, a basket, a soul–so that it can be filled up again…with wine (or sparkling cider), peeps (think Easter basket), and hope. The forty days before Easter is one big humbling exercise–where you remind yourself that without God, you’re nothing but a pile of cinders.<\/p>\n

“Don’t kid yourselves, guys,” this liturgical season says. “Everything you have become and anything you have accomplished (i.e. your resume) is courtesy of the dude upstairs.” <\/p>\n

Wearing ashes on your forehead is supposed to have the same effect as, say, an author showing up to her book signing at Borders expecting millions of fans, only to see two people–her 85-year-old running partner and his wife–in the forty chairs set up for the event.<\/p>\n

This holy Wednesday is about remembering the beauty of “the nothing,” as St. John of the Cross describes in his poem “Nada”:<\/p>\n

So as to taste the best
\nlearn to taste of nothing<\/p>\n

So as to own all
\nlet go of everything<\/p>\n

So as to become who you are
\nwalk away from yourself<\/p>\n

So as to become wise
\nforget all you ever knew<\/p>\n

So as to arrive at where you are not
\nyou must walk the path of a nobody<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For me Lent is about emptying–a glass, a basket, a soul–so that it can be filled up again…with wine (or sparkling cider), peeps (think Easter basket), and hope. The forty days before Easter is one big humbling exercise–where you remind yourself that without God, you’re nothing but a pile of cinders. “Don’t kid yourselves, guys,”…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-inspiration-and-prayer"],"yoast_head":"\nEmpty Yourself This Lent - Beyond Blue<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Empty Yourself This Lent - Beyond Blue\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"For me Lent is about emptying–a glass, a basket, a soul–so that it can be filled up again…with wine (or sparkling cider), peeps (think Easter basket), and hope. The forty days before Easter is one big humbling exercise–where you remind yourself that without God, you’re nothing but a pile of cinders. “Don’t kid yourselves, guys,”…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beyond Blue\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-03-05T11:00:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2012-02-03T22:01:08+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/files\/import\/imgs\/lenten%20cross.jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Beyond Blue\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Empty Yourself This Lent - Beyond Blue","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Empty Yourself This Lent - Beyond Blue","og_description":"For me Lent is about emptying–a glass, a basket, a soul–so that it can be filled up again…with wine (or sparkling cider), peeps (think Easter basket), and hope. The forty days before Easter is one big humbling exercise–where you remind yourself that without God, you’re nothing but a pile of cinders. “Don’t kid yourselves, guys,”…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html","og_site_name":"Beyond Blue","article_published_time":"2012-03-05T11:00:13+00:00","article_modified_time":"2012-02-03T22:01:08+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/files\/import\/imgs\/lenten%20cross.jpeg"}],"author":"Beyond Blue","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html","name":"Empty Yourself This Lent - Beyond Blue","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/files\/import\/imgs\/lenten%20cross.jpeg","datePublished":"2012-03-05T11:00:13+00:00","dateModified":"2012-02-03T22:01:08+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/#\/schema\/person\/47318cdf8063cc052eccff0c99db4e75"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/files\/import\/imgs\/lenten%20cross.jpeg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/files\/import\/imgs\/lenten%20cross.jpeg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2012\/03\/empty-yourself-this-lent.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Empty Yourself This Lent"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/","name":"Beyond Blue","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Therese J. Borchard","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/#\/schema\/person\/47318cdf8063cc052eccff0c99db4e75","name":"Beyond Blue","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/45c\/45c6e619a20a364bd981e9dda64eaa02x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/45c\/45c6e619a20a364bd981e9dda64eaa02x96.jpg","caption":"Beyond Blue"},"description":"Therese J. Borchard writes the daily blog, Beyond Blue, on Beliefnet.com. She is the author of Beyond Blue: Surviving Depression & Anxiety and Making the Most of Bad Genes and The Pocket Therapist. You may find her at her personal blog, her website, or you may follow her on Twitter @thereseborchard.","sameAs":["http:\/\/thereseborchard.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/author\/tborchard"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6443"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6445,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6443\/revisions\/6445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}