#LENT
The arrival of March means it’s time for Lent. The New Years Resolutions you’ve long forgotten about are irrelevant and you are presented with another opportunity for denial and subsequent failure.
Although traditionally Lent is an event observed by Christians, its purpose being for prayer, repentance of sins and forgiveness, religion doesn’t’t really come into it for many these days. The 40 days are more often spent in a battle with will power and more often than not, a guilty relapse.
This year’s Twitter users were as keen as ever to publicise what they would be “giving up for lent”. Naturally most were riddled with sarcastic and ironic undertones such as; sex, work, lent (and Justin Bieber which I’m hoping is a joke). The list is endlessly unoriginal, however it did encourage hundreds of thousands of tweets in the first 24 hours of Shrove Tuesday.
Reading through the personal vices people will be sacrificing for this year’s Lent I’ve decided to address some pros and cons of giving up the most common addictions and consider how likely it is you will avoid them until Easter.
Let’s start with the most obvious: Chocolate.
Pros:
1. This makes the most sense since on Easter Sunday, when you are provided with an unhealthy amount of egg shaped chocolate, you can revel in your victory.
2. If you purchase chocolate more than three times a day, it’s probably time to take a break.
3. If the last two sentences made you think of Revels and Kit-Kat’s, you should definitely consider giving up chocolate.
Cons:
1. You’d have to give up chocolate.
2. You will most likely end up replacing it with something equally bad for you and eating your bodyweight in that instead.
Next on the list: Smoking.
Pros:
1. Prolonged life, which, as far as benefits go, that’s a pretty encouraging one.
2. If every smoker in Aberdeen takes part I won’t have to wash my hair three consecutive times after a night out simply because I visited the smoking area for 7 seconds to ironically, “get some air”.
Cons:
1. If you are a regular smoker, you may start to go a little crazy without your routine cigarette break.
2. There shouldn’t really be any other cons- giving up smoking should be something to always try to do, not just for 40 days.
And last but certainly not least attempted: Alcohol
Pros:
1. Gives your liver a rest from the contents of whatever £4 bottle of wine is on sale each Wednesday.
2. No more hangovers!
Cons:
1. March and April at Aberdeen University is a time for essay deadlines or exams, neither of which can be achieved sober for 40 days.
2. You’d likely have to give up a large percentage of your social life, being sober in Institute is simply not an option!
Despite my hesitant stance on giving something up for Lent, I too have attempted to give up bread along with one thousand and fifty other Twitter users. However I have a pitiful level of willpower and judging by the figures Historical Twitter Lent Tracker I am not alone! We’re all starting to embrace our vices and the blocked arteries that come with them, so I’m not holding out much hope. Good luck!