The Weight of the World

The Leap Day - Day 24

2008-02-29T10:05:00.000-08:00

How wonderful that we get the opportunity to celebrate another leap year. In my life I have seen six leap years and never gave any of them much thought but I am enjoying the thoughtfulness of today which gives me chance to think back to all of my four year segments, where I was, what I was doing, how I felt, etc. I am feeling so good right now, just over half way through my fast. Last week, I welcomed some energies from the waters and brought some fish meat into my diet. I have never seen my skin and hair look so nice! I feel good this way and have determined to keep this up for an entire year! There is nothing better than taking the time to appreciate your own body and your own health. Last weekend I was at the annual IWIN
Pink Pajama party for breast cancer which is just the most beautiful and full hearted experience ever. Yesterday I took the girls to their local pediatrician for a check-up and as I was filling out the form and checking "no" under the illnesses and conditions history for the girls, I realized how very very blessed we are to have such great health and strength. What a heart warming week. I feel more and more every day how I need to reach out into the community and put my heart into service and motion. We must give and we must move. When we are stagnant, we rot and fester and become toxic. It is so interesting to me that I have felt so drawn to water spirit. I have always been so earth/metal/fire centered. I am welcoming this natural balance and the way it has served my wellbeing. My temper certainly needs it as well! I have been so snappy and sharp, the water needs to bring that down and it is, slowly - surely and beautifully.

Day Three

2008-02-08T10:33:00.000-08:00

Today has been wonderful. Last night, I lay there listening to the twists and turns of my digestive tract completely convinced that it was in revolt against me, but I awoke this morning feeling light and calm. Being Friday, I have committed my self to to only one whole meal today and so enjoyed a homemade roll with almond butter and concord jam for both breakfast and lunch with some loose earl grey tea. It has been so rewarding and liberating not to have to worry about eating meals. I know it is not a great thing to do on a regular basis, but this temporary abstinence has been so so nice. I think for dinner we will have udon noodles with a chinese vegetable "sauce" in honor of the first full day of the chinese new year. the year of the rat! oh how i hope all those savvy and cunning traits help me this year. there is so much to learn and share!

Food of the Day: Bergamont
Bergamont is more of an herb than a food and it is found in most Earl Grey teas. It has a slightly fragrant citrus tone and has been shown to be an effective aromatherapy for quitting smoking.

Intention for the day: Greatfulness
My spirit is full of gratitude and grace. My life is a gift.

40 days to Wellness

2008-02-07T07:14:00.000-08:00

Since the middle of the second century, Romans participated in a season of great feasts and parties leading up to 40 days of fasting and renewal to greet the coming spring. Today the tradition carries on as cities all over the world celebrate the time from Christmas to the Epiphany to Carnival to Easter. In fact, the actual latin derivative of the word carne vale translates to "farewell to the flesh" and it invites us after such feast and merrymaking to seek balance and renewal in body and spirit - to move from outward behaviours to inward reflection.

I invite you to join me during these next 40 days, the deepest dog days of winter, to seek a lengthening and renewal of your spirit by chosing better habits daily. Yes this time can be challenging, but growth is always a challenging undertaking, even a small seed must push through a deep dark earth before it meets the sun. In the same way, our spirit climbs toward a great light and warmth through obstacles and darkness.

I will be journaling daily through my experience and I invite you to journal as well and share your experiences, trials and growth with us all. Before I begin though, I want to leave you with this wonderful quote from Oscar Wilde. May it be an inspiration to you at this time and always:

Keep love in your heart. A life without

it is like a sunless garden when

the flowers are dead.

The consciousness of loving and being loved

brings a warmth and richness to life

that nothing else can bring.

Day one/two

The last 32 hours have been challenging. The weather, though warm, has been gray and wet between a drizzle and a drop but never quite a rain. I have spent the last two mornings waking up with the self-same feeling reflected in my own heart. It seems as though this drab weather invites melancholy and it takes every bit of sunshine in me to rise against it and bring energy into my day. Whew, what work it is but always made so much easier by the beautiful faces of my children!

Yesterday morning as I warmed up my body to the new day I contemplated what the day could possibly bring. Perhaps it would be nice to start each day with an intention and keep it in mind all day, like a goal to constantly be working toward. I thought I would try that out later though because my first line of business was feeding my body; finding ways without the aid of animal flesh to supply myself with the greatest amount of energy possible.

Well, in the heart of winter this fresh start seemed to be a little challenging but I easily found my way into a warm bowl of oatmeal accented with cinnamon, gogi berries and ground flax seeds. Although this was nice, it didn't hold me over too long and before I knew it I needed a mid-morning pistacio boost. For lunch I had avocado rolls, dijon/balsamic braised greens and a vegan butternut squash croquet inspired by a recipe from Libya. Mid afternoon snack included baby carrots and a handful of green grapes and I ended with a late dinner of a tofu vegetable stirfry. This morning I tried the oatmeal again to no avail and ended up two hours later with a hemp milk latte and a homeade roll with almond butter... much better. Lunch will be more of the veggie fried rice from last night and dinner will be a pasta fagioli made with whole grain gobbetti and white beans topped with nutritional yeast (as a tasty cheese flavored substitute and B vitamin extravaganza!). Seems like a good start so far!

As for my spiritual health, I have made a commitment to meditate and pray daily and I feel renewed already at the thought of such a venture. Although I spent the first 11 years of my life in Catholic school, I don't feel I ever properly learned to pray. What is this art that some seem to fall so easily into and others not at all? To me it doesn't seem quite right to treat prayer as a conversation with God or a bargaining session. Nor does it seem right to simply ask for things or just say thank you. Prayer is a process of becoming closer in your relationship to God and I don't know what that means for me or truly even what it is like. How do I start, where do I begin, what do I say or think or do. Where is this God and how do I know I am authentic in my own presence of mind, body and soul? This I hope to gain insight into and in this insight gain the steadfastness of spirit to grow.

Food of the day: Nutritional Yeast

This food is a deactivated yeast often used to supplement the diet of vegans or health conscious individuals because of it's vitamin and nutrient rich qualities. It is especially high in the B-complex vitamins and protein both of which help regulate moods and stress. The flavor is often described as nutty and cheesy and makes a great snack on top of popcorn. Try it!

Affirmation of the day: Love

My heart is full of love and light and I am filled with joy.

Love Your Self

2008-01-21T15:31:00.000-08:00

With the coming of Valentine's day, I thought it would be wonderful to post a challenge to all of the members of this blog. Love your self without limits this month. Think of your self as your own most coveted lover. Write love letters and send them in the mail or leave them out for your self every morning for you to see. Get a massage and take one night to eat chocolates and drink champagne with fresh strawberries. Treat your skin to a decadant lotion or body oil, buy a new perfume, fill your house with flowers. Each day bring home a gift to your self, a nice fruit or a beautifully baked cake. Be glorious with your self, honor, protect, nourish and love unconditionally. Be blind in your love. Smile for no reason at all and keep it up all day. Work those subtle smile muscles at the edge of your mouth, work that inner Mona Lisa! Listen to great music and dance freely. Jump on your bed and have a pillow fight. Treat your self to a nice dinner out at a fancy restaurant and be sure to order dessert! Watch a movie or go ice skating. Get out and show the world this new love of your life. Show your self off with pride! Glow from inside! Bring it all out this month, that is what I challenge!!!!!

Stuff - ing

2007-03-27T18:16:00.000-07:00

It occurred to me today, as I was desperately trying to finish my spinach salad that cost me ten bucks, that it must be close to impossible to overeat whole, natural foods. Could you imagine sitting down and just chowing an entire bag of jumbo carrots or a basket of apples, or a bucket of greens? No way! Our bodies have these natural cues when we eat real foods that tell us we are sick of chewing, or full in our bellies, or at that point that we could not take one more bite of the spinach flavor or we'll explode!

Many people have said that the true way to eat without overeating is to eat until the flavor is completely gone, or until it starts to taste bitter or strange. Our bodies have a natural tendency to "turn off" the pleasure signals when it is sated. But I don't think this works with junk foods. First of all, so many of them are saturated with sodium, sugars and fats and the flavor itself is an artificial invention that is made to continuously supply a flavor, so in effect we trick our bodies into believing we are still hungry. Think about that, it's the same principle as putting nicotine into cigarettes or cocaine in the original Cokes - artificial flavors are just another ingredient put into junk to keep us addicted to that particular product. This isn't so far fetched, anyone who has eaten Cheetos or Doritos or Lays - "betcha just can't have one" know exactly what I'm talking about. That specific, strange, unnatural flavor coats your taste buds and haunts you. Then you get to thinking you just want more because it leaves that really weird aftertaste and your body wants that first bite back. Before you know it, the bag is gone!!!!!!

To avoid this battle all together, we just need to stop eating so much drug food, crap, junk, stuff and remember that our bodies are meant for food; real, wholesome actual food. We can eat however much we want of this stuff and never feel bad or sick because it is impossible to take in too much. We are set up to stop, our body recognizes the food and assimilates it. We are in perfect communication with our selves.

Hunger

2007-03-20T10:33:00.000-07:00

I think that we are vastly mistaken in eating when we are hungry. Hunger is a feeling from the body that alerts us of a need for nourishment. But we are nourished from so many things besides food. Sometimes I hunger for sleep, touch, love, alone time, a better job, more space, clean air, a good time. And yet, it seems that every time I feel hungry I don't ask my self, what is it that you need. We were asked this weekend in class to ask our bodies in the most loving way, what we could do for it to give us the best energy and love ever. I think feeding your body what it REALLY needs when hungry is a start. Next time, ask your self, what is it I am really hungry for and how can I make that. I think we often resort to food because even when we know the answer to the question, we feel we lack the means to arrive at the true meal. If we live our lives this way we become under-nourished and starve. Isn't it funny that we say to be courageous "takes guts". Because in the end, isn't that what we honor when we truly listen to our selves and our hunger, and then truly respond to that hunger? It really does take guts to be well.

The long expected truth...

2007-03-18T14:24:00.000-07:00

As I was sitting here today, taking in information and feeling. Crying, thinking, hoping, wanting and suddenly hungry, it occured to me that the stories we make for our selves not only guide us in how we live our lives but also how we eat and what we eat. Our foods create our bodies and these vessels become the way through which we interact our souls with the material world. But if our stories guide our food which make our bodies, then who we seem to be to the world will only literally be a figment of the imagination. After all, that is all a story is right? So I thought to myself, what is my story with food and how does it shape me today?

To start, I grew up in an Italian-American family in the restaurant business. For me food WAS life. Together with my mother's large Polish-Italo-American family and my father's carefully knit immigrant family, food was always the convergence point. Food was the place where we all came together and met, it bonded us, it gave us tradition, it filled us beyond any physical capactiy. Indeed we always cooked enough to feed an army and in a way, in our breaking bread, we were an army together. Our dinner parties and gatherings brought us such strength that nothing could stop us, or break us, and yet, many things did.

Aside from pulling my life together, food had an uncanny way of pulling us apart. The resaurant business is so much more than food, it is food taken out and made vulnerable because in serving it, you invite others to take part in actualizing their own food stories in one space. In a way, when you eat in public you make your self vulnerable, you share a very personal, intimate experience with total strangers in plain site and by making this the means by which you make a living, this vulnerability can lead to many possible outcomes. In the case of my parents, this lead to a disconnect in their relationship, communication and marriage. Somewhere between the salad and dessert, the water and wine, other people's stories became entangled in their own and the personal, protected, promised unit of two began to break down.

So for me food is a source of bringing together and pulling apart. To me, the act of cooking and eating is almost a magical play of power and control, of bringing together people who may otherwise never talk or of isolating myself from others I feel I would not have a voice or be heard with. But then again, this is just a story, based on a story. The actual stories, the happenings of our lives will never change, CAN never change. They happened, they are real, they are valid, they are past. But the myths and fiction we make up about them are the continuous act of creation and imagination. It is the mind making itself up at every moment. But we are not mind creatures, we are not only a head, and food is not meant for thought.

To truly nourish our bodies and understand our bodies, I think we need to look first at the facts and fictions that surround our power struggles with our world and our diet and our lifestyle choices. If it is true that the oracle of Delphi quoted to Socrates that the one ultimate virtue was to "Know Thyself" and if also it is true that we are what we eat, then to truly get a grip on what we are, thyself, we must look at what we eat as part of that. And if our food choices are guided simply by ideas we create about our selves and the world based on little stories, than we are nothing more than a figment of our own imagination. What then will it take to wake up, show up, be present and powerful in the real world. Where are we most of the time? I do know it certainly is not at the bottom of a sea salt and vinegar chip bag! In the end, isn't that why we peer down an empty bag of chips or look in the can of coke when we know we've finished it, or open the refridgerator for no good reason at all. What we really needed and wanted wasn't ever there, but somehow we got tricked into the process of looking anyway... Every time.