after nearly 12 years of being vegetarian, this year for Lent, moved and inspired by my Buddhist practice and a desire to lessen aggression and increase compassion within myself I am giving up dairy to lean more into being vegan.
renunciation is a sacrifice, but it can be a sacrifice for benefit – for oneself and for those around us, even extending from our own little microcosm out into the macrocosm of life including animals.

All beings tremble before violence.
All fear death. All love life.

See yourself in others. Then whom can you hurt?
What harm can you do?

He who seeks happiness
by hurting those who seek happiness
will never find happiness.

~ from the Dhammapada (translated by Thomas Byrom)

 
Those who wish
to protect themselves and others
swiftly should practice the great secret:
exchanging oneself for others.

~ Shantideva

Every living thing,
without exception,
is a song
written in the heart
of the Beloved.

~j