Friends, Romans, Countrymen, Lent Me Your Ears (i’m sorry, that was bad)

Today is the start of the Lenten season in the Christian calendar and, although I’m not Christian by faith, I feel called to partake in some of the traditions associated with the lead up to Easter. Albeit with my own twist.

That being said, I've never really been into Easter (if you can even “be into” a religious holiday). Granted, I've only ever engaged with the more secular, commercial side of things, but it always felt like it was all about the chocolate. And I love chocolate, but you can have too much of a good thing.

Lent is not a completely new concept to me. Living in England, Anglicanism is the dominant denomination of Christianity and my understanding is that it's one of the more liturgical forms of Protestantism (in other words, Lent is a thing). But I’d never really thought about it, until I recently watched this video by YouTuber, writer and Christian mystic Sara Raztresen about the themes of Lent, the 40 or so days leading up the Easter:

So why now, in the Year of Our Lord 2026, do I feel enticed by the idea of observing Lent in some way?

Well, I’m glad you asked.

Reason 1: Helping Me Better Witness Suffering

There is a lot of suffering and death happening right now. Like, a lot. So much that it’s overwhelming. The problem is, our society and culture has taught us that the way to cope with the sheer amount of terribleness in the world is to ignore it, block it out, and indulge ourselves to feel better when we inevitably notice it.

But that’s not coping. That’s bypassing.

Many spiritual traditions have rituals or observances centred on the suffering and pain in our world. Whilst for Christians Lent links the suffering of the world today to the impending suffering of Jesus on the cross, I’m choosing this time to focus on the suffering in the world right now, and finding ways to regulate my nervous system that don’t involve turning away and disengaging. Because change can’t happen unless we solve that problem.

And that leads me onto…

Reason 2: Partaking in The Lenten Sacrifice

If your thinking, “what the frick is The Lenten Sacrifice?”, it’s essentially what most non-religious people know Lent for (apart from no meat on Fridays): giving up a vice.

For some people it’s chocolate (ironically). For others it’s booze or cigarettes. And for me, it’s watching YouTube on my phone (also other longform media like podcasts, but mostly YouTube).

Online media is the way I numb. I can honestly spend an entire day with something on in the background. I find it so hard to be in silence with my thoughts. I spent most of today singing to myself because I’m so unused to not having some sort of media blaring. YouTube is also where I go whenever I see or read anything upsetting. And that would be fine if it was one video and then I moved on. But no, I find another one, and then another, and another. I ignore the hourly reminders I’ve set to take a break (that x is so easy to press), and even setting time limits doesn’t work when I can just go into the settings and extend them. Or delete them all together.

In short, I have a problem.

YouTube is stopping me processing my grief and pain and alchemising it into meaningful action to help change the suffering we’re witnessing daily. And on top of that, it’s stopping me do the personal shit I actually want to do. Like writing (poetry, plays, blog posts, you name it), singing practice (aka, my job!), making YouTube videos (ironic, isn’t it?), doing crochet, making zines, going on walks, reading… All of these things I “don’t have time to do”. Why? Because YouTube is a one way time machine to the future and I hate it!

Also, not nearly as important, but YouTube ads are getting on my last nerve!

So, for the next 46 days, my phone is a YouTube-free zone.

Sidenote, I’m also not watching YouTube on my laptop except for on Sundays because a) I don’t want to binge 46 days of missed uploads after Easter and end up back at square one, and b) this is about discipline and (re)learning moderation, not stripping all joy out of my life.

Reason 3: Facing My Mortality

Ok, hear me out.

Obviously, Easter is all about the death and resurrection of JC. And death is a huge part of that because you can’t really resurrect an alive person (at least, last time I checked). So it would make sense that Easter and it’s lead up would be a thematically resonant time to think about death more…I’m going to go with “personally”.

I’d imagine the Christian version of this would be contemplating the state of your immortal soul were you to unexpectedly shuffle off your mortal coil later in the day. But for me, I’m looking to foster a more practical, down-to-earth relationship with the fact that one day I’ll be pushing up daisies.

This isn’t a completely new journey for me. For a long time I’ve been following Caitlin Doughty, aka Ask A Mortician on YouTube, who you should absolutely follow if you’re contemplating/already on a death-acceptance journey and/or are a nerd with a slightly macabre bent.

(I just need to tangent to say that when I went on YouTube to find Caitlin’s channel to share with you all, I saw a new episode of the “After Dark” podcast had dropped a mere hour ago at the time of writing this sentence and the way I wanted to to click on it so bad and it’s only Ash Wednesday y’all please send me encouragement/prayers/hugs/stellar vibes okay back to the blog post.)

Also, whilst I haven’t written a death plan, I have started to think about some of my preferences (not so hot on cremation, pun intended). But I think I’m ready to take things to the next level.

I also think that, as a culture, our relationship to death (our own, our loved ones and in general) is pretty unhealthy, to put it mildly. I think I’ve been given a slight head start in redressing this; Caribbean culture typically has open-casket funerals so I saw my first dead body (my granddad’s) when I was eight. However, there’s a lot about particularly my own death that makes me deeply uncomfortable to even acknowledge, and I think accepting you’re own mortality - really accepting it - can help to clarify your life’s priorities. Nothing seems to stop you caring about other people’s opinions more than remembering your finite time on this planet.

So, those are my three main reasons for participating, in my own way, in Lent this year. As another sidenote, I do enjoy that Ash Wednesday and the first day of Ramadan are on the same day this year. Let me know if you observe any or all aspects of Lent, and if you’ve decided to give up anything this year, so we can cheer each other on!