The middle way frees one from the tyranny of cravings.
Moderation is finding a balance in all things and is crucial in healthy living. Going overboard in anything is one way that this trait is imbalanced, while depriving oneself is another. By experiencing everything in moderate amounts, one can live more wholesomely and find true balance.
Identify something you do in excess and cut back.
Is there something that you withhold for no good reason? Try integrating it into your life if it is good.
Identify a passion. Take a break from it for a week.
Meditation
Daily Questions
What were the seeds that started to affect your moderation today?
Is there an area where you struggle with moderation (clothing, technology, learning, trinkets, food, alcohol, etc..)? Do you have a plan to curb your habits?
Think of how you used the resources around you. Did you squander them, or were you excessive in their use?
If you were on the verge of being excessive, what did you employ that helped you curb this behavior?
Were you able to use prayer or meditation to help in your struggle with moderation?
What do you struggle to practice in moderation? Food, drink, study, work? Discuss…
Do you have a tendency towards asceticism (self-denial)?
Featured Articles
Quotables
When one engages in business or in an occupation to earn money, one should not be motivated by desire for gain alone, but by the necessity of supplying his basic requirements, such as food, drink, habitation, and marriage. -- The Ways of the Tzadikkim, The Gate of Love, pg 119
One should not eat and drink as much as he wishes, but only as much as is necessary to insure the well-being of his body and no more. -- The Ways of the Tzadikkim, The Gate of Love, pg 121
The righteous eat to their hearts' content, but the stomach of the wicked goes hungry. -- Mishlei 13:25
Who is mighty? He who subdues his passions, as it is written (Mishlei 16:32) 'One who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and one whose temper is controlled than one who captures a city.' -- Avot 4:1
Rabbi Eleazar ha-Kappar used to say: "Jealousy, lust, and ambition remove man from the world." -- Avot 4:28
If a person who withholds himself from wine is called a sinner, how much more so is one a sinner who withdraws from all of life's enjoyments. -- Taanit 11a, 11b
Better a patient person than a warrior, one with self-control than one who takes a city. -- Mishlei 16:32
If one oversteps the bounds of moderation, the greatest pleasures cease to please. -- Epictetus
It is not good to eat too much honey, nor is it honorable to search out matters that are too deep. -- Mishlei 25:27
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. -- Galatians 5:22-23