40 Days And 40 Nights - Thursday Thoughts

This year is the third year that I have participated in ‘Lent’ by giving something up for the 40-day lead up to Easter Sunday. I am not particularly religious but I find doing this really cleansing and motivating as I push myself out of my comfort zone. I have always given up all desserts out of my diet for the 40 days. That is no chocolate, sweets, cakes, biscuits; any kind of dessert – even things like hot chocolate and coco pops!

Pancake day is a great day in the calendar, everyone has to admit. My boyfriend Jacob claims that it is better than Christmas but I beg to differ. However, I am not belittling it by any means because I have always celebrated it. This year it was the first time I was away from home but we celebrated better than ever with a full pancake dinner with my flat mates at Uni. With a spread of melted chocolate, strawberries and bananas, maltsters, lemon and sugar, syrup and Nutella, we gave ourselves a lot of washing up to do!

Something my Mum has always said is that I have really strong willpower, and by doing this I have shown myself that I am. If you know me, you know how much I love to treat myself by indulging in chocolate like on a Saturday night or even at Uni in-between classes or working in the library. I can’t believe how easy I have found it to just completely cut out this whole category from my diet that I am usually so dependent on.

My attitude towards this has been to just tell myself that ‘I can’t have it’ and therefore this has reduced any temptation. In previous years I got a bit of a headache a couple of days into starting this due to the amount of sugar that had left my body and not been replaced. This time however, I haven’t experienced this but I know this is down to my student life and the additional drinking I did compared to the last two years.

I don’t do this to particularly lose any weight, but I do it to feel like I have a cleaner lifestyle for a good period of time whilst I have been going to the gym and cooking well for myself at Uni each day. Surprisingly, I don’t even have a slight craving for sugary desserts so in just over a week’s time when the 40 days are complete, I don’t think I will even be hugely interested in my Easter chocolate.

This time, I feel like my eyes have really opened to what my body does and doesn’t need; I really haven’t struggled without sugar and desserts and could easily stick to natural sugars for the majority of the future. It is a fact that a small square of chocolate can solve a craving of the food, not the whole bar and I will try my best to remember this when I am back to being addicted to desserts…and the time will definitely come!

Leave a comment if you have given up something for lent this year too.

Thanks for reading! Keep smiling and have a great day! Liv xxx