Temperance is the act of moderation or self-restraint, especially in the categories of “eating and drinking”. As the first moral virtue tackled in 2013, I have only partially succeeded in my endeavors.
Alcohol: Temperance and its connotations largely denote itself from the temperance movement of the Progressive era, which eventually led to the 18th amendment (which banned the manufacturing, sale, and transportation of alcohol within the United States). Sadly, in the wee hours of the New Year (Tuesday), I had already over-consumed alcohol to the point where my speech was slurring and my emotions were flaring. Benjamin Franklin was largely a womanizer in his party days in France, and in the olden days daily consumption of alcohol was commonplace, thus making this the first “moral virtue” on his list of 13 that he tackles in his Autobiography. Being that I did many things I regret on the dawn of 2013, I refrained from any more alcohol consumption the rest of the week. (In all honestly, the only time I could have imagined consuming more alcohol was during karaoke on Thursday). So I only partially succeeded in my efforts to “Drink not to Elevation”.
Food: Food is much more difficult to avoid the consumption of, considering the eating habits I have developed over the last couple years of being in college. I already screwed up on the early hours of New Year’s day in the consumption of Jack in the Box at 3-4AM in the morning. I tried to resist in more consumption by only eating a small sandwich at Carl’s Jr, and eating dinner at home. Sadly, AMY ruined my ability to perform temperance that Tuesday when we went to Teabo-Teabo, which sadly also smelled like fish sauce. She ordered way more “dessert” than we needed, in the form of BrickToast, “The Monkey”, and Sweet potato fries (which we didn’t finish, needless to say). Wednesday was much better for me as I ate dinner at Shabu Shabu, which wasn’t really fulfilling at all. At the same time, I refrained from any consumption at Volcano Tea and Lee’s Sandwiches which followed afterwards. I resisted too much consumption at Genki Living on Thursday by splitting a crepe with Howard and Nhi, and not ordering a drink like either of them. On Friday I made the error of going to Starbucks and Lollicup in the same day, but compensated by only eating two slices of pizza. (I remember those good old UCSD days when I would eat an entire box of pizza by myself). Saturday and Sunday involved the consumption of only two meals, with little to no snacks in between (and refraining myself from getting Korean BBQ, which would have been definitely overeating). There were so many nights I stayed up hungry but refrained myself from indulging in consumption of anything. Again, I was only “mildly” successful in my efforts to “Eat Not to Dulness”. But I tried my best to fulfill this one basic physiological need by eating till I’m not hungry, as opposed to eating till I’m full.
The Balance of Time: As much as drinking and eating are important elements of temperance, I believe balancing all the hours in one’s days and weeks with differing activities is just as important, which is why I wrote down the times I did all activities for this week, as provided below:
If you look closely at the weekly planner you’ll notice under the Notes all the hours I spent on each separate category of activity. If we were to put this on a pie graph of all the activities I did this week, it would look much like this:
I tried my best to refrain from “overly” socializing, which meant going out too much. In doing so I realized by mid-Saturday afternoon I needed to refrain from leaving the house to allow myself the potential to acquire a “life in balance”. This entailed increasing my hours not only studying for my CSET exams next Saturday, but also in engaging in “at-home activities”. These include errands such as cleaning, going running, or simply talking to people who visit me (as opposed to physically going out socializing). This also includes Facebook, which I limited myself to only using an hour a day MAX. I also tried to prevent myself from over sleeping, but still failed a bit with an average of about 7.5 hours of sleep a night.
The End Result: I give myself a C+ for the week, mostly due to the fact that I perhaps went out more than I should, I did not drink in moderation, and I should have just eaten at home instead of eating out at all. In the end, achieving a life in balance proved itself slightly difficult, as I felt my efforts just tired me out in the long run.
The Take Away: And of course, Project Morality (and in this case, Project Temperance) has an underlying purpose. I will take away from this week the ability to refrain myself from over-consumption of anything (food, drink, socializing, facebook, etc.). I want to be one of those people that can be happy in the company of others (socializing and such), and at the same time happy independently (in the company of my own home). To do so requires a new framework of thinking. The process repeats itself, the week starting on a Monday and ending with a full report on Sunday.
Next Week’s Moral: Silence. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself. Avoid trifling Conversation.
