As Passover approaches, we asked our readers and writers: What do you need an exodus from? Here’s the next installment in our “What’s Your Exodus?” series.
Although I religiously make a list of resolutions–for both New Years–there’s one thing I have yet to overcome. I now yell less, run more, and once went six whole months without Diet Coke (not pretty). But try as I may, I have never been able to kick a certain disgusting habit, and this year, I aim to celebrate the Big Exodus by breaking free.
You see, my secret shame is that I eat things off the floor. I’m not talking about the five second, or even the five minute, rule here. For me, it could be five days, five weeks, or even five months. In fits of either boredom or hunger (or both), I have eaten hardened fruit leather from the playroom floor, stale cheese crackers from inside a rainboot, a fossilized gummy worm from under a seat in the car, a piece of candy corn covered in sand from the depths of a backpack, and in a moment I’d rather not recall, I ate what I thought was a brownie stuck to the back of a kitchen chair.
But this year, freedom, I march toward thee. I heretoforth renounce the urge to pop in my mouth whatever crumb of crap I see lying around. And if I ever have a moment of weakness, I will remind myself that I’ll never really know if what I ate that day was a brownie.
Last Rosh Hashanah I made a resolution to start loving my body. I had spent a lot of years wishing to be thinner, prettier, and just dying to look like someone else. I finally realized it was a lot of wasted time. So, I committed to figuring out how to honor and love my body for what it is instead.
Now I can truly say that I have never felt more happy with who I am on the outside. But, in honor of Pesach I’d like to break free of some of the negative self-doubt I have that still runs through my mind about who I am on the inside. How I don’t measure up to my peers and feel inadequate in so many areas of my life. How I am not a good enough mother or a giving enough wife. How I don’t have what it takes to reach my personal goals. I just want to leave all that negativity behind once and for all!
This Passover I’m freeing myself from Facebook analytics. It’s so easy to get caught up in the numbers; how many people did I reach? Even as I acknowledge the importance of maintaining online connections with readers and students, I am emptying my mind of anxiety about numbers. Whether I was able to reach another person with my clever status update is irrelevant: I know the definition of “total reach” is when my arms reach around another person in an embrace.
What’s your exodus this year? Let us know tweeting @Kveller with #WhatsYourExodus.
Like this post? Get the best of Kveller delivered straight to your inbox.
