Lessons from a juice fast....

My juice fast was supposed to be 6 days, but I made it to 4 1/2.  Here's why:

I was starving!!!!!

And green juice is disgusting.  Sure it's really cool when the little Hispanic lady at Mother's is preparing your meal with handfuls of organic kale and cabbage and (vomit) parsley.  You feel inspirational.  You feel smarter than the rest of the world.  You think about the 30 pounds you will lose in 6 days.  You imagine your body radiating a vegetable Ora that will single handily bring about world peace. 

She hands you the juice.  You notice the color is similar to that of something you once saw in India but swore you'd never repeat. 

And then you taste it and you realize you have made a horrible mistake. 

The juices that were better were the ones I would put lots of fruit in, which isn't really weight loss friendly.  So I endured grass in liquid form for four and a half days.  People.  For a person who still enjoys The Pop Tart and gives fake food an enthusiastic two thumbs up, this is extremely difficult.  Most of the time I would drink nothing at all because I just couldn't handle the juice. 

The mental battle was exhausting.  Constantly telling yourself to keep going, to not eat, that the headache will go away.  But the emptiness... 

I decided to break the fast early because as I told Brad, I wanted to feel full again.

And that's what I learned. We eat because we feel empty.  It sounds obvious, but it was a relief for me to remember.   Not many of us go without feeling empty for too long nowadays.  With the world as it is, we can meet our needs before feeling the pang of hunger.  This fast reminded me that when I feel empty, I feel vulnerable. 

And to know the difference from our stomach's emptiness and our Soul's, is a journey this fast has helped put into motion.