Don't Kill Desire, pt. 3

I'm sorry that it's taken me so long to get this last post out. I needed to make sure that my schoolwork and stuff was under control. Now that I've finished with that, I finally have time to sit down and finish up my thoughts on desire. This is part 3 of my mini-series on desire. In part 1, we established that desire is at the root of various habits and problems in our lives, and that killing those unwanted desires isn't enough to help us to overcome those habits and problems. In part 2 we further clarified why attempting to kill desire isn't enough with the examples of overeating and pornography. Now we're going to dive into what to do about it.

One last caveat before we jump in: Attempting to kill negative (or unwanted) desires completely is nearly impossible by itself, or so I've found. Willpower isn't constant, and when it wanes, I have found that negative desires spring up.

Don't Kill Desire, pt. 2

A few days ago, I wrote about the concept of killing desire in relation to overcoming habitual sin. If you haven't read part 1 head on over and take a look. This post will make a lot more sense. Or maybe not.

You all caught up? Good. Allow me to try to clarify why I don't think trying to kill desire is adequate for having us overcome habitual sin. Let's pretend that I struggle with being overweight. (If you know me, you know this isn't a problem, but for the sake of the analogy, let's pretend.) I understand that some people are obese due to medical or other perfectly legitimate issues, but let's say that I'm overweight simply because I love food. I love the way it smells, the way it tastes, the textures as I chew, the feeling of satisfaction that comes after eating. I love everything about food. Now let's say that I have decided that I need to lose weight, so I start a diet that removes unhealthy, processed foods from my normal eating cycle. After four weeks on said diet, I've lost 42 pounds and feel much better about myself, so I finish up that special diet and everything goes back to normal.

Don't Kill Desire, pt. 1

Hey guys, so this post could be a lot less structured than my typical posts. As I was walking to school the other day, I was praying and found myself wrestling with the concept of desire. Basically, what I’m planning on doing here, is revisiting those thoughts, beginning with the concept of desire and expanding outward from there as my thoughts lead.

edit: As I was writing, I found that this post is stemming from the idea of overcoming habitual sin. One teaching that I run up against often is to kill off bad desire. I don't think that's adequate, and this series of posts will, hopefully, explain why it's not and what I think we need to do about it. Although it's directly applicable to overcoming habitual sin, in a broader sense, it's applicable to enacting any major change in your life.