Find a truly original idea. It is the only way I will ever distinguish myself. It is the only way I will ever matter.

–A Beautiful Mind (2001)

This time apart from social media sites has given me the freedom to explore beauty and in that discovery, come up with something brilliant in that escape of the weight of daily dogma—the expectations of society of the position I should take on... whatever. As a bemused, befuddled, and bemoaned follower of Jesus, there are all sorts of overt and covert expectations volleyed from a wide range of hosts: from bible thumpers to libel humpers; there are too many, ill-conceived boxes that were never meant to package me. When I was on the other side of the fence of academia, I felt the pressures of relativism, a rancid relativism that at my core, I cannot believe, but nevertheless I defended because that was my archetype... safe... lukewarm water.

However, this epiphany is no epiphany; it is merely the removal of desk clutter to see my desk calendar; it is Windex and a rag to clear my Sitka window to the see the mountains that offer their wilderness.

I further define fasting as just that. Over the years, I've tried to encapsulate exactly what it means "to fast." I don't have an answer for it and likely, I'll never be able to communicate it beyond a metaphor of what it is like, not unlike the use of parables by Jesus to describe the kingdom of God.

But, a Facebook "fast," is merely an appetizer to the spiritual realm of an actual fast from food. It has been challenging to get my mind to a place where I can seek God through a fast. So many earthly desires tug at me as I trot off in the direction of my Scooby Snacks. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?