Fasting Update

Ok so I'm not a very good faster (if that is even a word!). I was doing really good up until yesterday and then I had a pretty weak moment.
Note to self: Don't fast right before your period of you will turn into a MASSIVE not-so-nice person because at that point, its more then just hunger!!

But the reason why I'm not a very good faster is because I didn't pray or read my bible once. I'm so weak.
It was just avoiding food that was my downfall because I did do pretty good at that, but my weakness was realizing my prayer life sucks & I couldn't pick up the bible it seems if my life depends on it.
And in a way, my life does depend on it. My spiritual life depends on it! I believe my spiritual life has been dead (and I mean DEAD) for some time now. Sure, I come off as so spiritual and holy, ok in my mind I picture myself like that (oh the Fantasy world I live in), but in reality I am LAZY.
LAZY, lazy, lazy. I'm lazy.
I've gotten so lazy with everything in my life that I almost make myself sick. I'm sick of myself. Sick of living this life how I've been living it. I can feel myself right on the edge of change & then somehow I dump myself right back into the lazy life I've been living.
Its not like its hard people! ITs not hard! But I make it HARD!!
I haven 't been commited to anything in so long that I don't even know how to do it anymore!
I can't clean my house (ok this isn't totally shocking-I do work full time!), I can't keep up with laundry, I can't help my son practice his spelling words or his bible verse of the week, I can't CONCENTRATE on anything right now!!!

How good would my life be if I did have a healthy spiritual life? And when I say healthy, I mean a life that is well fed thru prayer and reading the word.
What could it be like?
I Can't even FATHOM it! Of course I can't! How can I limit God!?! Who knows how much he could bless me all the more if I put some effort behind it! If I put some effort behind trying!! Just try.
That is what I feel like God is saying. Just try. Try Me, he's saying, try me. Bring it on!

The only sense of clarity I have from this fast I realizing I suck at fasting and suck at my spiritual life. If that is what God wanted me to know then, I now know!
Apparently my fasting isnt' working because I was battled again last night. I was battled during my fast....hmm...
BUT if I had been praying for an answer and seeking out his wisdom on the subject then I might not be so battled!!! Urgh!!!!!

Another thing I "came to" about was that I am incredibly, incredibly lonely. I'm incredibly lonely. So lonely that it hurt. It was extremely painful to think and dwell on it. I wanted to throw things and rip books in half!! (yeah, that was a lame joke)
Has anyone else out there just felt so upset at yourself for putting Yourself in the situation you are in?!?!
I did this to myself.
Its my choice.
And its God bringing it to the surface.

In our bible study last week, Beth Moore discussed how Jacob wrestled w/ God and that was when God struck him in the hip & made him walk with a limp as a reminder of that experience. But what got me was the wrestling part.
How many times have I wrestled with God, but I never wrestled long enough to receive my blessing???
It says in Genesis 32:24-30 (Message Bible Version)

24 -25 But Jacob stayed behind by himself, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. When the man saw that he couldn't get the best of Jacob as they wrestled, he deliberately threw Jacob's hip out of joint.
26 The man said, "Let me go; it's daybreak."
Jacob said, "I'm not letting you go 'til you bless me."
27 The man said, "What's your name?"
He answered, "Jacob."
28 The man said, "But no longer. Your name is no longer Jacob. From now on it's Israel (God-Wrestler); you've wrestled with God and you've come through."
29 Jacob asked, "And what's your name?"
The man said, "Why do you want to know my name?" And then, right then and there, he blessed him.
30 Jacob named the place Peniel (God's Face) because, he said, "I saw God face-to-face and lived to tell the story!"

How many times have I wrestled with something, but never finished it and received my blessing? Too many to count unfortuantly.
I gave up. I gave up a lot of the times. I didn't fight until I saw the light. I just gave up and a lot of times just gave in.
I love how Beth puts it in our study guide, "Few things define us more then how we struggle. When we struggle through the crisis with God all the way to the blessing, we are gloriously redefinded."
Which is what happened with Jacob, he was renamed from that point on. No more was he defined as deceiver and cheater (which is what Jacob means!), he was now Israel.

I want to be renamed. I want to be another person. No wait, strike that, I long to be the person God defines me to be. How he sees me.

I'm coming out of this fast knowing that I need to do some major house cleaning--literally & spiritally! I realized as much as I hide behind my prayers for other people, it wouldn't hurt to pray about the things I've left wrestling with behind.

In every struggle do not let go until the blessing comes....do not let go.