Anime Lectio: This Monster Wants to Eat Me

                                                            1. Why do Anime Lectio? 

Anime Lectio is a time for us to stop and take a breath. Between work, activities, family life, and social media, our minds are always moving. We rarely take time to contemplate and ask, why am I watching this anime? What’s the point of all this? And, how is this making me feel? 

2. Put away all distractions 

(phones, work, etc.)

We are so enslaved to things that stimulate our minds. Let this be a moment for us to free our minds, look inside of ourselves, and be at peace. The only device you need is the one you use for this blog.

3. Deep Breathing - Open yourself to God’s Presence

Take several deep breaths. Let your mind relax. If you’ve had any questions, desires, or struggles that

you’ve been hiding or stuffing away, let them rise up to the surface. Remember God places all our

thoughts and desires inside of us, and He uses them to draw us closer to Himself. God gives us a

community to help us understand who we are and what He is calling us to do. The faces of people you

know and don't know are like signs of God’s presence. 

4. Think About What’s on Your Mind in Relation to the Anime

Think about what’s been on your mind in relation to the anime.  The following is an example of such thoughts written by me. 

According to the counselor who works on the property where I live that I see for individual sessions, there's a difference between surviving and living.  When you survive, you're just there without really doing anything but just being around and doing what you think you are supposed to do and want to do.  However, when you live, you do more than just survive, but do want you really want and need to do, not just what you need to do.  This can be seen in the series This Monster Wants to Eat Me.

5. Brief and written explanation of the anime

Pay attention to how the brief and written explanation of the anime seen on this blog, or seeing the anime for yourself since that's better than any explanation, might “speak” to you or shed light on the things that have been on your minds.

A girl who is clearly depressed due to her family dying as a result of a car accident when she was younger manages to live on her own due to her thinking she heard her family say to her that she must survive before they died.  However, she struggles to do this, despite having a friend who likes to help her, as well as everybody else around her.  The depressed girl also ends up meeting another girl, who is really a mermaid (yokai, or monster), who says she is going to eat the depressed girl, but only when she is happy since that will make her taste better.  After attempts of trying to make the depressed girl feel better, with the continued help of her friend who is also a yokai (fox demon), the mermaid girl tells the depressed girl that they actually met before when she was happy since her family was still alive and that she gave her some of her blood in order to protect her, which is why she didn't die in that accident with her family (she's also the one who said she must survive).  It's also the reason that she doesn't really want to eat the depressed girl since she would taste terrible no matter what since she has some of her blood in her, which makes the depressed girl mad at her, but after reconciling, they continue living their lives.

6.  Reflect on the anime

Has this brief and written explanation of the anime shed any light on what's been on your minds?  The following is an example of a reflection on the anime from me.

Even if it's not clear whether she heard the words you must survive or you must live (different each time she remembers it), it's clear that the girl who hears it just survives until she meets the mermaid girl again despite having a friend who already supports her. Having another friend would help and even though her two friends don't really like each other, they can still agree that helping their depressed friend is what they need to do. The depressed friend goes along with what they do for her and it seems like she's just doing it for their sake, but wouldn't that be good for her own sake too? And if the one girl says she's going to eat the depressed girl, which is what she would want, but not until she's happy, would she still want to be eaten? Is the one girl just saying that, even though she promises her that she will do that again despite also telling her before that she tastes terrible now due to giving the depressed girl some of her blood, in order to make the depressed girl feel better? I'm guessing that all of this, as well as what else the two yokai friends of the depressed girl do for her, does help make the depressed girl feel at least a little better, as well as able to move on with her life, since in the end, she can see the faces of her family in a picture she was in with them, which she wasn't able to do earlier in the series when she looked at it.

7. Final Prayer

Please voice any prayer intentions for friends, family, or people around the world that relate to this anime.  The following is an example written by me.

Let us pray that we can understand the difference between living and surviving.