Lent report

I committed to three practices during Lent: something I wanted to give up, something I wanted to add, and giving to a justice-making organization.

I gave up Facebook. That was not difficult, except once or twice when I really wanted to post a link to some outrageous item. My forays back onto FB in the past few days are marked by greater caution. I look up what friends are doing (I missed that), but I’m not checking every half-hour, and I’m noticing the difference between sharing information and killing time.

I added daily drawing, except that I really didn’t. I drew on one-third to one-half of the days of Lent. A big shift from my usual once-a-week, which has itself been a big shift from my practically-never, but daily got difficult. Watching my resistance was interesting. A lesson: do things like this early in the day. (Maybe instead of posting to my blog, ahem?)

I knew I wanted to give to an anti-slavery/trafficking organization, so I did some research. It’s hard to know which groups are most effective until I am more involved in the issue.  For now, for my donation, I decided on Not For Sale because it focuses on building a grassroots movement and has a particular outreach to faith communities, so I can also see a path for me to get involved. I had heard its president on Forum a few months ago and was impressed; in fact, that program was one of the things that put this issue in the front of my concerns. Also, it is based here in the Bay Area, which makes other kinds of involvement possible. Their home page just flashed that their next global summit will be in Silicon Valley in October, and I’ve signed up.