"Hangry": How Hunger Reveals Motive

One of my biggest pet peeves is the word "hangry."

A blend of "hungry" and "angry," this particularly annoying turn-of-phrase was popular during my high school years.

It seems silly now, but I knew too many people who would use it unironically.

If they missed a meal or didn't eat enough at the last sitting, they thought they had complete justification to act frustrated, short, and generally mean to those around them.

I shouldn't have been surprised. It demonstrated the typical emotional immaturity of high school kids and I had my immature tendencies too. Still, high school Addison felt a deep sense of injustice over the matter.

There was no accountability.

Fast forward a decade or so, and thankfully I haven't heard that phrase in a long time. Doubly thankfully, the behavior of 10th graders doesn't hold the sway in my life it once did.

However, I can't deny, I have been guilty of the same childish behavior in the years since then.

As an adult, I don't usually recognize why I'm being cranky, short, or brooding immediately. The understanding I need to address the problem is often found in hindsight.

If I'm being honest with myself, it's usually caused by a physical need I've neglected. I stayed up too late, didn't exercise, forgot to drink enough water (which caused subsequent headaches), or most hypocritically, I was hungry.

Knowing how miserable missing these needs makes me feel, why would I ever choose to not address them?

It didn't make sense until recently when I asked myself...

Why in the world would anyone choose to fast?

I used to see only two possible reasons anyone would choose to go without eating: health or belief.

Fasting for Health.

The reason behind fasting for health is varied.

Typically it's designed to help give the body a reset, help the person doing it assess their eating habits, and force the body to burn calories from sources (like fat) it normally wouldn't touch when enough daily calories are present.

One of the most common means of fasting for health, intermittent fasting (IF), has grown in popularity these last 5-10 years and is used to promote brain and heart health, in addition to weight loss.

Practitioners of IF typically skip occasional meals or choose not to eat for specific periods.

Fasting for Belief.

This is normally done to enhance spiritual strength and connection with the divine in whatever capacity the believer's faith defines it.

I always understood this as two methodologies.

1. Removing a barrier: If the diety was impersonal, fasting was practicing denial of a materialistic thing (such as food) to remove a barrier to reaching enlightenment, nirvana, or whatever elevated state the fasting person desired.

2. Earning favor: If the deity was personal, fasting was about changing the deity's opinion via self-denial to earn favor and other blessings.

When it came to fasting as a Christian, I always saw it as identical to #2.

It seemed fasting's purpose was to either have God take note of my piety to reward me with healing, blessings, and eternal life, or it was to push out the world (and my sinful nature with it) to allow God to come in and communicate better with me.

I saw it as practically no different than any other religion, just with a sprinkling of tradition and "Christian-ese."

It‘s was all about control.

The consistent thread I saw through all of these approaches was the need for control:

• Health: If I controlled my body by denying it food in the short term, it would help buy me more time on earth in the long term.

• Removing a barrier: If I controlled my body well enough, I would rid myself of anything preventing my peace and make it to heaven (ascending to the divine).

• Earning favor: If I controlled my body, it would become suitable for God. Without this change, His occupancy, attention, and favor would be out of pity and obligation, not choice.

I never bought into it.

As I discussed in The Power Pyramid, power is a need for control.

I saw shifting my focus from attaining power over other people (I was a mighty people pleaser) to power over myself wouldn't change my main tactic. I would just be manipulating God now instead of people to achieve power which felt even more dishonest and a bridge too far for me.

After I received deliverance four years ago, fasting shifted from what looked like spiritual manipulation to just plain pointless in my mind.

As a Christian I believe I don't need to do anything to "bring God down" to me (He already did that) or attain salvation by my behavior instead of Christ's sacrifice, so fasting as a believer walking hand in hand with God didn't feel necessary.

It wasn't until I was convicted by God to give fasting an honest shot that I understood the point:

Fasting orders our priorities.

For many of us in the US, modern living usually means an overabundance of food more than a shortage. We expect that missing a single meal or even a day of meals is the worst thing possible and it's why we can say "I'm starving" when we're slightly peckish.

If we speak that way and find ourselves permitting unkind behavior when that expectation isn't met, what happens when the situation becomes real?

What happens when it's a fight for survival?

There's a reason that the most grotesque human behavior is created by the absence of food and water in every post-apocalyptic movie (and in history too for that matter.)

When there is not enough to go around and we are deprived of something our bodies tell us we desperately need, that is when we find out who we are.

When extreme behavior is justified, and society gives a pass for "the sake of our survival," our need pushes us to preserve ourselves at the expense of others.

Fasting combats a needs-over-people mindset.

By not allowing hunger to control us, our body and mind are disciplined to put others first even in the small things.

In my day-to-day, it means living as Christ did by loving other people over my needs. This means claiming zero excuses to act "hangry" or any other way not in line with compassion.

And for the future, on a potential day when the last piece of bread I'm holding is the only thing that will keep me alive, and the person next to me is starving, it hopefully means not hesitating to give it up.

Fasting is practicing love over everything else.

Choose compassion,

Addison Collingsworth

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