Obsessive avoidance of backsliding, or, I feel bad about my bread.

Alert readers, especially those who came from Cathie's blog, remember that I keep up with my family's need for sandwich bread pretty well using a bread machine.  Also that I experimented recently with acid-soaking flour in the bread machine and came up with a more-or-less reliable method for adapting bread machine recipes to an eight-hour soak.

  (Acidulate the liquid if needed with 1 Tbsp white vinegar; halve the yeast; remove added gluten at first, and experiment to see if you need to add some back; hold back the salt, mix the dough 5 minutes on the quick bread cycle, reset the machine to make whole wheat bread in 12 hours, and put the salt on top for it to be mixed in when the cycle starts)

Soaking the flour, while it is more nutritious, is marginally less convenient than not soaking because of the plan-ahead factor.  And the method isn't perfect (yet) -- the loaves are always edible but occasionally don't rise properly.   So I've soaked every loaf of whole grain bread I've made since I developed my technique, but... I've also made less bread and allowed us to run out from time to time.

This morning I didn't have any bread but I need some for lunch, so I went ahead and started a non-soaked loaf for the first time in months.  I feel kind of guilty!  

* * *

This is a problem I have, my own special kind of perfectionism.   I avoid developing new good practices unless I am sure they are permanent.  All-or-nothing:  once you add, don't cut back.   For some reason it seems okay to say "I know I ought to do such and such, but I haven't figured out how to fit it into my schedule yet."  But it seems not so okay to think about saying in the future, "I used to do such and such, but then I decided I didn't have time for it."

This is probably the number one reason why, for example, I have never even attempted to add any daily Masses to my schedule with my kids.  I dread coming to a decision where I have to say "Sorry, I have to cut back on going to Mass."  Even though I know very well that going to Mass more than on Sundays is optional and not at all required, I fear that once I've established a practice of going more than once a week it will feel like "CHOOSING SOMETHING ELSE OVER GOD" if I ever decided to back off from that.

(Thank God for liturgical seasons, by the way.  They give me the freedom to try out devotions without the stress of commitment past the end of Lent or past the end of Advent.)

I recently decided to try out instrument lessons for Milo over the summer.  I explicitly announced to everyone "This is just trying it out, we might not continue in the fall," and I deliberately cut out preschool music class for the summer to make up for the extra cost and time.  I'm trying very hard to be committed to deciding whether it makes sense with our schedule, but I am still anxious about the possibility that I might have started something we'll need to stop.

In short, I'm good at saying "No" to too much commitment up front.  I'm not so good at being a quitter.  Or, at least, I feel bad about the possibility of quitting. This even though some of the best decisions I ever made have been decisions to quit something.

So, Cathie, if you're reading this, please tell me I have your permission to occasionally bake some bread that hasn't been soaked.  I think I will feel a whole lot better.  

Comments

[Cathie B]

You have my permission! I, too, suffer from the same problem, so I can totally relate! I think it has something to so with being achievement oriented that makes not want to go back to something "less". And, you've got good reason to relax your standards ;-).

[Cathie B]

Sorry for the typos/grammar problems...that's what happens when typing while nursing!

[Amber]

I completely understand where you're coming from - I have the same sort of issue. I'm getting a lot better about it, but still it is challenging at times to say no to something that I've started, because I think so hard about what I've started doing before I pick it up. I'm working on it though... because I've noticed how much pride is in my motivation to keep going, and I know that is not a good thing!