Coming Full Circle

This week, I am reminded of how I ended up with this once-upon-a-time-fairy-tale kind of life that I now find myself living. Spending a week cooking for an exquisite women’s retreat helped me to reflect how my intentions have come full circle, and how the seed for this whole business began. 

My first retreat experience ever was about a decade ago, when on a whim I attended a women’s retreat that I learned of rather serendipitously. That first gathering was magical in so many ways – the deep connection of sisterhood, the outdoor shower under the stars, the towering redwoods that held space for us. Every aspect of the retreat was so perfect, except one – the food. It was tragic to me that in a setting where so much attention had been dedicated to the schedule and execution of events, food was seemingly considered an afterthought. With no dedicated chef present, the retreat assistants would scurry into the kitchen between activities and heat up an array of packaged Trader Joe’s foods that were uninspiring and in no way contributing to the transformational work that was unfolding that week. Dinners of pasta with canned sauce and iceberg lettuce salad were a total bummer after deep heart-bursting sharings each afternoon.

My practice at that retreat became one of gratitude, learning to accept each meal without judgment or expectation. I can’t say I always succeeded. At the end of the retreat, I provided feedback to the organizers about the quality of the food and how it seemed to me that meals were a missed opportunity to foster the inner blooming that was taking place in our circle.

Two months following that retreat, I made the leap to ditch my sociology PhD program, with nothing more than a vague intention to somehow dedicate my livelihood to something to do with food and yoga.

Within a few weeks, I’d met someone in need of a chef for day retreats in Sonoma County. As soon as I heard the word retreat, I remember a big inner resounding YES pulsating through every cell of my being. From the first humble retreat lunch I prepared, to the multi-day extravaganzas I’ve been part of in all corners of the world, nothing excites me more and lets me feel more purposeful than providing food to support inner transformation.

Showing up to a retreat, no matter the theme or setting, is always an act of courage.  It’s normal for retreatants to arrive with at least some degree of anxiety or uncertainty. The quality of a meal can help ground participants, help them to feel safe and like they’ve fully arrived. Each meal at a retreat is an opportunity to support the deeper transformative process that is unfolding on the mat or in circle. I am forever grateful for the science of Ayurveda and her wisdom, which empowers me to create menus that nurture retreat participants both physically and more subtly.

I am blessed that so many groups each year trust me to provide the gift of nourishment for them, and contribute to the their collective transformation in this way.

This evening, someone asked me if I ever get tired of hearing how much my food is appreciated. I had to say no, because every compliment is a reminder that I am living my purpose, in action.

I’m grateful to the women of Wild Roots Sacred Wings for holding the space for me to remember how I got here, and to feel my purpose perfectly fulfilled. Thank you for letting me nourish you – you nourished me on so many levels as well. <3

Your Mind is Like A Smoke Alarm

This morning I awoke to prepare breakfast at a retreat center, and was surprised by how many people were up at 6 a.m.  As it turns out, one of the smoke alarms was chirping, giving most people in the house an early wake-up call. The alarm became a topic of conversation as retreatants sipped their morning tea and coffee. They were clearly annoyed and disappointed in being robbed of a precious opportunity to sleep in a little before 7 a.m. meditation.

As I listened to the conversations, I had the thought that our minds are a lot like smoke alarms. As humans, we often are consumed by repetitive thoughts, many of which are unproductive and often self-critical, and can become annoyances in our daily lives, slowing us down in our creative processes and self-growth. Yet, many of us keep listening to them, again and again, which is akin to letting a smoke alarm chirp for hours or days upon end.

I think some of it comes down to a belief that our thoughts are out of our control. Meditation, mindfulness practice and self-inquiry teach us there is another way. Being able to identify a thought that doesn’t serve us, and proactively taking steps to quiet it – whether through deep breathing, walking meditation, or other techniques – is like taking the time and effort to change the smoke alarm battery.

Trying to quiet our minds by giving in to cravings, addictions or unconscious habits is like the makeshift solutions we try when the smoke alarm is sounding – jiggling it around, pushing various buttons – which might offer some short-term quietude, but ultimately the noise starts back up. Some of us disconnect the alarm or remove the old batteries to get the sound to stop, but then the alarm doesn’t provide any function. This is likely completely numbing out our mind so that we enter a stupor, unable to tend to our life demands.

When you notice a repetitive thought, let it be a wake up call, a call to action. Find techniques that work, and change the batteries in your mind. If you were to put new batteries in your smoke alarm and it kept chirping, you would assume a battery was bad and try another one. If the same thoughts return, change the battery again, maybe trying another technique that you know has the power to bring you to a calm place.

 And just like smoke alarms require maintenance (we’re told to check them every couple months), find routine practices you can do – daily or weekly – that cultivate the same sense of peace in your mind.  In the same way you’re unlikely to ever hear the low-battery signal in your smoke alarm if you’ve changed the batteries regularly, a regular meditation or mindfulness practice helps to eliminate the repetitive thought cycles we get caught up in.

Unlike so many things that are beyond our control – traffic, other people’s reactions and so on, thankfully both smoke alarms and our minds can be tamed with ease. Be grateful the ability to quiet your mind is just a breath away – no ladders needed. 

The Best Meals Begin With...

If you answered great ingredients, you are technically correct, and I'll admit I asked that as a bit of a trick question. The answer I'm going for today is a great shopping list. And since a great list will get you great ingredients, it's easy to see how the two go hand in hand.

When I talk to people about cooking, whether informally or in cooking classes or other events I lead, I overwhelmingly find that a good majority of people I encounter hate grocery shopping. Hate might even be putting it mildly...for many, the thought of shopping inspires full-on dread. When I press people to look at their feelings toward grocery shopping, I commonly hear that people find themselves ending up in the store with no idea what to buy, walking in circles, and then getting home to find they are a few items short of a good meal. Hence, where the list comes in.

Anyone can make a shopping list. Whether scrawled on a post-it note or the back of a junk mail envelope, or typed into a new-fangled shopping list app, many of us have trained ourselves to compose lists and stick to them. But if you really want to make your shopping experience as smooth and breezy as possible, it's essential to make a great list.

And what make a great list? A great shopping list is not only complete but it is also organized. I am a queen of good lists, thanks to a smattering of Virgo in my astrological chart. I perpetually get stopped by strangers in our local food co-op who stop to admire my lists. Sometimes they engage me to ask about them and remark about my penmanship, but more often, I catch them sneaking furtive glances as they pass by my unattended cart while I'm off grabbing something down the aisle.   

When you make a great list, you separate out the page into different sections, by type of item (this system works best on paper I've found, although you could do it digitally if you're so inspired). Doing this saves you minutes, maybe even hours of your life over time, by preventing you from having to traipse clear across the store after completing your produce gathering, when you find you've forgotten to get carrots because they were buried in the middle of a list of spices and dry goods. 

To keep things simple and instill a routine, it helps to put the same categories of items in the same place each time. For example, in my own lists, I divide the page into two columns, and the left hand side of the page is always for produce. In the right-hand column, I put bulk food items in the upper quadrant, followed by dry packaged goods, with bulk spices occupying a tiny bit of real estate at the very bottom. 

To make your list work for you, include sections that are relevant to you - this might include frozen foods, health/beauty aisle items, dairy, meat/fish, etc. 

If you shop at multiple stores, say a farmers market or Costco as well as a conventional grocery store, make a list for each place to avoid overlooking anything. Keep your list in the kitchen and add to it between shopping trips. It can be tempting to just "remember" items and not actually write them down, but trust me - put them on your list. There is nothing like that moment when you walk through the door after a shopping trip and remember that you're forgotten that one key ingredient you have sworn to "remember."

Be diligent about keeping a list, and rhen you arrive at the store, you'll breeze through the sections. People who've adopted this system have reported spending significantly less time at the store than previously.

Best of all, if you stick to your list, you'll avoid coming home with excess snack foods, or more food than you actually need. A great list requires a bit of foresight, but if you take the time to plan out a couple meals, you'll save yourself from those moments of paralysis later in the week when dinnertime approaches and you have no idea what to make.

Have a try at making a great list, and let me know how it goes. I'd also love to hear your own list-making tips!

Lower the Dimmer Switch on Your Seasonal Stress

Some call it the most wonderful time of the year, others call it the most stressful. The holidays can bring us great cheer, but in our quest to be festive we often find ourselves depleted, between all the parties, family interactions, and indulgence in sugary treats. Add to this short days and longer nights, and pretty soon all you want to do is hibernate like so many creatures are preparing to do this time of year. In this season, or other times where we let stress overtake us, it can be easy to go, go, go at such a pace that we completely use up every last ounce of energy. While this tactic can feel productive in the moment, it can tax both the body and mind in damaging ways that take time to recover from. Think of it like this: if you drive your car until it runs completely out of gas because you're too busy bouncing from appointment to appointment to stop and fill it up, what happens? You end up spending a lot more time on the side of the road dealing with AAA or finding someone to bring some gas to you than you would have if you'd simply taken a couple minutes in the midst of the craziness to simply put some gas – even just a gallon or two – into the tank. 

The same goes for your body and mind: taking time – as little as a minute – to refuel can have lasting an profound effects for your whole day. Anytime we consciously stop the busyness and interrupt our stress, we automatically send the body a signal to take a momentary break from operating in its "fight, flight or flee" mode, where we tend to spend a lot of our waking time especially this time of year. When we are able to do this, we activate our parasympathetic nervous system (responsible for rest, digestion and rejuvenation), which sends powerful signals throughout the body to perform simple maintenance-related tasks that support our health and well-being. 

When we push ourselves to our edge day after day, we often become like the car that's run out of gas - we are more prone to get sick, we become irritable and lacking in holiday cheer, or find ourselves completely depleted and unable to keep up at the pace life demands.

In an ideal world, we might take a couple days to retreat in a season such as this, but given all that our modern lives ask of us, instead of hitting the off switch completely, many of us are simply grateful to have a "dimmer switch" to lessen the intensity of our stress.

Here are four great ways to dim your stress this holiday season, all in 30-minutes or less. Choose the amount of time you have and take a moment to practice being instead of doing. All of these activities are great ways to dim your stress and let the radiant light of your true being shine a little brighter:

1 minute: Set a timer, then close your eyes. Take a full, deep inhalation followed by a long, slow exhalation. Continue until time is up, seeing if you can lengthen each progressive in/out-breath pair. When the timer sounds, take just a moment more to notice the effect this quick practice had on your state of being.

13 minutes: Grab a cushion and listen to my guided recording of one of my personal favorite meditations. I learned this one from Pablo Das, who received it from Dr. Rick Hanson, author of the amazing book Buddha's Brain. I've taught this meditation to many people, and so many of them have credited it for getting them through some pretty tough and dark times. This meditation specifically builds up parts of the brain that help us conquer our feelings of lack or deprivation. So if you're struggling because you feel like you don't have enough – or that you are not enough – this practice is for you! Click here to listen now (or right-click the link to download).

20 minutes: Try a mindful walking practice. Allow yourself to be attentive to each step, feeling as your foot connects with the earth. Bonus points if you sync your steps with your breaths! You could simply take a walk near your home or office or get out into nature for some time away from it all. You can even practice mindful walking when you're out in the hordes doing last-minute holiday errands. Allow yourself to go slow and see what happens.

30 minutes: Break out your yoga mat and enjoy this free Rest and Rejuvenate yoga practice with Jillian Pransky. I had the great good fortune to complete a restorative yoga teacher training with Jillian in October, and she is truly a masterful teacher. I hope you enjoy this as much as I did!