Dear Avocados and Sweet Potatoes, I'm ignoring you.

To prepare for the beginning of this crazy experiment to rebel against excess, I’m eating cookie dough for breakfast.

Yes, this is a confession. I actually think cookie dough for breakfast is perfectly acceptable and even desirable. There was a time, hazy in my memory at this point, where I actually cared deeply about eating healthy. I ate vegetables every day. EVERY day! I chose balanced meals. I ate meals sitting down, not standing behind my kitchen sink, checking email on my iPhone and fulfilling all of my children’s requests like a short-order cook.
“Eggs! Scrambled! No Ketchup! Apple Juice!”
“Egg! Fried, no yucky yellow part! Ketchup! Water! No Ice!”
“No eggs! Waffle, with whipped cream and chocolate chips and syrup!”

There used to be a time when I bought organic foods and (gasp) made my own baby food. There was a time when I cared, and then there was student ministry. Since I’m back re-living my middle and high school years, I’ve resumed thinking of chips as their own food group, eating Peanut M & Ms and Diet Coke as a power meal, and insisting fruit snacks actually count as fruit.

So, starting the Seven Experiment (if you want to join in you’ll need to read back on these posts) is as much about opening my eyes to how my appetite determines my actions as it is about recognizing that God created fruits and vegetables for a reason. For the next week, beginning tomorrow, I’m copying Jen Hatmaker’s food month by eating only seven foods:

• chicken breast
• spinach
• apples
• sweet potatoes
• whole wheat bread
• eggs
• avocados

You’ll notice that this is NOT a fast like the Five-Day Challenge, a restriction of food to eat like the bottom half of the world does every day. The five day challenge is a painful (and incredible) experience of making poverty real and supporting hunger relief organizations.

This is an experiment in making healthy choices and divorcing myself from the many food choices that take up my mental and emotional head space. This is a rebellion against responding to my every appetite whim as a way to control emotions. (exhausted? coffee! bored? brownies! stressed? M&Ms! Rushed? Sure, a string cheese is lunch!) It’s a nod to the fact that God has housed our souls in mortal bodies–bodies that need healthy food, rest, balance. It’s facing the reality: that “abundant life” means more about my grocery store choices than it does about self-discipline, sustaining the planet and living simply.

And it’s a challenge–to me and to you if you’ll take it–to lay every cultural norm under the microscope of God’s word. It’s not too late to join up. Grab Seven: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess (which is funny and piercing all at once). You can check out more about it on Jen’s latest blog, For the Cheaters, Shirkers and Cherry-Pickers. And let’s see what shakes out.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some coffee and cookie dough to eat. I’ll get to those avocados tomorrow.

(And, if you want some moral support, let me know you are participating with a comment or an email. We can complain together.)