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Archive for 2012


Work It

In Life on February 23, 2012 at 7:31 am

Oats, rice milk, Greek yogurt, honey, PB, raisins, cinnamon

It has occurred to me in the last 48 hours or so that this semester year (students speak of time in semesters the way pregnant ladies speak in terms of trimesters) is moving by entirely too quickly. The most glaring example of this being the fact that come June, this little lady needs a big girl job, a fact I have been avoiding for, uh, three years.

I’m actually really, really ready for a little stability, consistency and, you know… money. But I’m also dreading the inevitable return to (cringe) a full-time life of fluorescent lights and filing cabinets and skeezy break room donuts.

I suppose that if this is not what I want for myself, then it is not what I will have. But the fact that I haven’t nailed down an elevator pitch to the question “What are you going to do when you graduate?” leads me to believe I’ll be grasping for any offer that comes my way. An elevator pitch, by the way, is business jargon for the 15-second summary of your product/service/company that you could throw at someone in a short elevator ride that has them asking for your card before the door opens at their floor. My response to what I’m going to do with myself is not nearly so succinct or convincing. It’s more of a rambling: “Oh, uhhh… In June? Well. Uhhhhhh… I mean. I could do clinical work but I don’t want to be in a hospital. So then there’s maybe the health department with WIC and SNAP and all that but… I don’t know. Maybe school foodservice? I love kids, you know…”

I already see myself limiting my options to traditional career paths in dietetics but, as we know, my path has been anything but traditional.

SO. My mission after this super busy week at my current office (we’re hosting three events back to back to back) is to:

  1. Figure out what I want out of life.
  2. Get it.
I realize this shift means that I can’t just live my life in black stretchy pants anymore but… I’m ok with that.

Not black stretchy pants.

Since yoga has taught me that I can create my own reality, I’m convinced that I can create a position that moves me. Something that combines writing and food and yoga and service. Should you be in need of such services, contact Weaz for a copy of my resume.

SPREADSHEETS


Here’s This.

In Life on February 21, 2012 at 10:42 pm

Veggie burger, cheese, rice, beans, celery, hummus.

Coupla things…

I think my arms are getting pretty diesed.

Exhibit A.

I’m ok with that.

Sometimes I want to cut all my hair off. I mean all my hair. Like in a very dramatic THIS-IS-A-BAD-IDEA Felicity kind of moment.

Yeah, girl.

But something tells me it’ll come across more like this:

Oh Brit-Brit. I love you anyway.

My desk looks like this in night classes:

This is normal.

I have been laughing so much lately. I don’t know if I even noticed I’d stopped doing that. Everything is funny. Especially the “DO YOUR DOODY. SCOOP YOUR PETS’ POOP” and “LET’S GET NAKED!” billboards I saw on the way to work today. Thanks for that, Charlotte. Gearing up for the DNC, I see… I’ll take pictures the next time traffic is at a standstill, which will probably be tomorrow.

I’ve convinced my office to let me teach them yoga. Twice a week. It’s gonna be awesome.

Not like this.

I have no issue with Rihanna collaborating with Chris Brown and I’ll tell you why… Have you heard the song? Hello. “I’ma make you my bitch.” That song was already aggressive and filthy and empowering and the addition of her abusive ex to the remix just hammers home her message: “I’m in control here. You are my bitch.” Plus, publicity stunt. Steady chasin’ paper. Duh. Babygirl got game. I mean, think about it. When 50 Cent rapped about letting us “lick the lollipop” or when Lil Wayne welcomed us to “lick the rapper” (surely you caught the double entendre there, yes?) and assured us he’d “make it juicy,” women of the world sang along from club to car to cardio class. But when the tables are turned… when it’s about “licking the icing off”… when a woman owns the hell out of sex as an assertion of power, suddenly it’s a sign of weakness. Yeah, I get that he beat the hell out of her and he’s a dirtbag and he was wrong wrong wrong. But, in my opinion, she has his balls in a vice grip with that Cake Remix. Don’t you see that?

Go on, put your name on it.

Ri-Ri, you get it, girl. And it’s not even your birthday.


Learn to Remember

In Life, Yoga on February 21, 2012 at 7:11 am

Oh hey, blueberry smoothie.

So.

What have I been doing with my life?

Riding my bike.

Eating Starbursts.

Watching Bachelor with Weaz. ("SRSLY COURTNEY??")

Working.

Painting my nails to save cash money.

Going to school. Sort of.

Remember that class I forgot to go to for a month? Well. When I went back I took a test. I got an A on it. I also took a microbiology lab exam last week that I didn’t study for until the morning of. B. I’ll take it.

The point of this is not to brag on my intelligence but instead to highlight my stupidity. Oh, the things I could accomplish if I would only apply myself… The “good enough is good enough” attitude I’ve adopted in the last year as a survival mechanism is simply no longer necessary. My schedule is not as crazy. (Nor is my mind.) I think it’s high time I got my ass back in gear. That I be exactly who I am again.

I had a mild nervous breakdown in teacher training on Sunday. (Naturally.) It’s hard to verbalize but basically what I was feeling was a lot of doubt, a lot of fear, a lot of confusion. This process, for me anyway, has been like one big spotlight on my weaknesses–physical and mental–and it’s a whole lot to take in. It’s not a negative thing at all; it’s just an opportunity to grow. But it’s a lot. So I word vomited some of these emotions to a friend via text and he gave me exactly what I needed to hear.

“Basically this: You are perfect just the way you are. But you are not really just the way you are because you have piled up so much shit around the way you are. So you really have no idea what the way you are actually is. Yoga is an undressing of the spirit.”

It’s so true. And then yesterday, this from A Course in Miracles:

“You are only love, but when you deny this, you make what you are something you must learn to remember. As you teach so will you learn. If that is true, and it is true indeed, do not forget that what you teach is teaching you. And what you project or extend you believe.”

I believe I’ll be dragging my butt to ashtanga this morning because I have lacked the self discipline to practice on my own outside of teacher training. But I’m learning to remember that I am still as strong (willed) as ever. That I cracked under pressure, yes, but that even breaking requires strength. Soft, malleable things bend under force, which is good sometimes. It takes something strong and solid to shatter under force. And this is not really a bad thing because then the pieces can be put back together so long as you learn to remember where they go.


Meatballs and Milkshakes

In Seriously? on February 19, 2012 at 9:51 pm

Meatless meatball sub. Hello.

Listen.

I don’t believe in a life of mutual exclusion.

I believe in practicing yoga and drinking beer.

Clearly.

I believe in working hard all damn day and playing hard all damn night.

I believe in talking to god (or God or G-d… whatever) and cursing that asshole whose turn signal has been on for the last thirty miles.

I believe in vegan baked goods and a very serious string cheese habit.

Simply put, I believe in having my cake–blended into a milkshake–and eating it, too.

All the boys to the yard.

The situation was this…

Adam wouldn’t stop talking about meatballs. (He’s a vegetarian.) I wouldn’t stop talking about milkshakes with cakes blended into them. (I’m a dietitian… sort of.) The only movie we had to watch was Sarah’s Key. Now, maybe I’m the only one who thinks that eating meatball subs and milkshakes while watching a Holocaust movie is a poor choice, but the point is that the stage was set for a really ridiculous, rather incongruent little evening.

I don’t know where this milkshake+cake obsession came from, but it has pretty much consumed my life for the last week.

Last night, dreams came true.

In making my magical concoction it occurred to me that I have perhaps never made a milkshake before. Smoothies, duh. Milkshakes? Not so much. I guess I’d do it more often but I’d worry about all the boys showing up in my yard all the time…

You know.

“Don’t you have a recipe or something?” Adam asked.

How hard could it be? Ice cream… milk… cake. DUH.

Tah dah.

And that, my friends, is how it’s done.

Our meatball subs were equally as straightforward: Trader Joe’s meatless meatballs, baguette, marinara sauce, mozzarella.

Maybe I was sprawled out on the floor crying for Tums 15 minutes later, but you know what? I was also artfully crammed into this beauty eight short hours later…

Supta kurm-fuckthis-asana

Because life, you see, is simply not as black and white as we try to make it. It’s not about defining which foods are good versus which are bad. Or about defining those lifestyles or religions or people that are good versus those that are bad. Maybe sometimes it all just is. It’s all just an experience. Live it.

Think about a seesaw. It’s only fun with people on both ends, right? This is the only way to take it for a ride, with weight at each extreme. Life is like this, too. And it’s ok to live in extremes because this, I think, is also the only way to balance.


Caturday 2/18/12

In Cats on February 18, 2012 at 7:59 am

I'm on yer shelf... bein a book.

A very happy create-your-own Caturday to you.

Last night as I lay in bed well past midnight more physically exhausted than I’ve been since… ever but still wide-freaking-awake (damn you, coffee!), the cats started to seriously doubt my ability to rise early and post Caturday.

Oh ye of little faith.

BUT guess what we talked about in yoga yesterday, you little jerks? We talked about how intention can reconstruct your reality. How simply thinking something will make it so. So I set an intention to get up at 5:45am and not go back to bed as I usually do. Sure, there was an alarm (and three cups of coffee involved), but it happened, didn’t it? I will use my newfound powers for good only, which means I’m also going to eat a milkshake with a cupcake in it tonight. Intention = set.

I have a test on primary series today so Viva la Weaz has been quizzing me.

Nononono... it's downward facing CAT.

Weazasana

Ralph is not exactly helpful when it comes to yoga because she condemns it as devil worshipping. You all know Ralph is a conservative Christian, right?

I want you to know you're going to hell.

Thanks, Ralph.

I’m off to yoga my life away.

Good job, Weaz.


I Hate Mushrooms

In Yoga on February 16, 2012 at 9:24 pm

It's an orange, duh.

I was in over my head. I was in Copenhagen on a business trip trying to seal a multi-million dollar deal with one of our biggest clients. You may not know that in my other life, I wore suits and traveled to Europe and made lots of Excel spreadsheets. I fumbled the talk and stumbled the walk. My heart wasn’t in it.

Our office was super laidback. On our home field, I wore jeans and drank beer at my desk in the afternoon. On trips, though, I put on a show. I felt like a little girl playing dress up in her mom’s pumps and pantsuit. Trisha Yearwood lyrics resounded in my head: “She’s tryin’ to make it in her daddy’s world…”

But I wasn’t. I wasn’t trying at all. I hated it.

But this isn’t a story about my failed attempt at climbing the corporate ladder. No, this, shifting gears, is a story about food. And yoga. Bear with me…

When I traveled alone, I traveled the way I travel—haphazardly, authentically, cheaply. I’m all hostels and street food and walking to save cab money. If I was with colleagues, though, I got a little taste of how the other half lives and, on this occasion, eats.

We had a reservation at arguably one of the finest restaurants in the city, and, if you follow and agree with Michelin star ratings, one of the best in the world. Once serving as King Hans’ personal wine cellar, Kong Hans Kaelder is an intimate, elegant space with whitewashed walls and an open kitchen. We were greeted with hard-boiled quail eggs, butter emblazoned with the restaurant’s logo and a team of servers. It’s like nothing I have ever seen.

Cave

Fancypants buttah.

Everything was prix fixe with multiple courses and, naturally, there was nothing on the menu I could eat. Nada. So I (very discreetly) asked for a vegetarian plate, knowing that whatever it was, it would be good.

I wish I remembered everything I ate that night. Alas, I started blogging exactly one month later. One dish in particular, however, stands out. It was a small ramekin filled with some kind of something I’d never seen in my life that I could best describe (visually) as gigantic raisins. They were brown and bumpy with little craters. “I bet it’s some kind of organ meant,” I thought.

I ate it anyway. It was like pure butter. Pure salty butter. Perfectly savory and meaty but not meat. Were I willing and able to use umami as an adjective without making fun of myself, that’s how I’d describe it. “What is this?” I asked, a little too frantically.

Among my American coworker, French colleague and Danish clients, no one could give me the correct English word for these mysterious monster raisins.

It took a chance encounter in Whole Foods a full year later for me to figure it out. But before I tell you what it was that impacted my palate in such an intensely positive way, I should tell you I really, really hate mushrooms.

And this is where the yoga starts.

I do this thing where I make assumptions about everything.

  • That probably doesn’t taste good because….
  • That’ll probably make my life better because…
  • This will probably ruin me because…
  • She’s probably a bitch because…
  • They probably think I’m a bitch because…
  • He’s probably not into me because…

Sometimes it’s little stuff. Like, I don’t like mushrooms so I assume that anything with fungi in or around it will never taste good. Other times it’s kind of enormous. Like, I assume that everyone dislikes me unless they tell me otherwise so I distance myself until given a reason not to.

So I set myself up with these assumptions (“This is probably how something is/was/will be…”) backed by supporting evidence in the form of past experiences or current situations that I attach to them. Up until recently, I never once paused to consider:

(1) That the assumption is a story I created myself and is not real

(2)  That the “evidence” I attach to it is just as fake as the assumption itself

(3) Somewhere buried under all of that is reality

In Gregor Maehle’s Ashtanga Yoga, he puts it this way:

“The usual activity of the mind is to download sensory input relating to an object and then to compare it with all the data it has stored in the past. It then produces the most likely interpretation of what it believes the object to be.”

So because no one could tell me that what I was eating was a mushroom, because I couldn’t apply my previous assumptions about mushrooms to the dish, because I experienced it only for what it was, I loved (I mean loved) something I probably would have otherwise refused to even try.

So let’s say someone has heard that yoga is a for weirdo hippies who chant and meditate and don’t eat meat. Maybe they’ve heard that the physical practice is difficult and even dangerous, that it’s not for old people or fat people or inflexible people, that they won’t like it. They get invited to attend a class but immediately start applying these assumptions to the outcome of the invitation and, in the end, choose not to go.

If we could strip away all of these assumptions about what something (or someone) was or should be or will be, we’d be able to experience. Period. Experience something (or someone) for what it really is. For who they really are. And we might find that despite all our preconceived notions about how the experience will be, that it is actually better than anything we ever could have imagined.

“Only then, when we do not look anymore through the distorting glasses of our mind, can an object be directly experienced. This is the true meaning of direct experience.”

The point of sutra III.3 is that samadhi, or utter stillness of the mind, occurs only when we can perceive an object as it is without modifying it. The purified mind, they say, is “a clear crystal that is capable of faithfully reflecting whatever it is placed on.”

So this means it’s a mushroom and that’s it. It’s not a mushroom that probably tastes bad. This means it’s a yoga class and that’s it. It’s not a yoga class that will be too hard or too easy or too weird. This means you’re you and that’s it. You’re not you and your job or you and your spouse or you and your bank account. Just you.

I wish I could look at everything this way. That I could faithfully reflect everything and everyone for what it is and who they are. Why? Because I want to experience everything and everyone for what it is and who they are. And because I want people to experience me this way, too. And you know what’s cool? We can.

Oh, the giant raisins? They were morels. Kingdom: fungi. That’s right.

 


Use Me Up

In Life on February 16, 2012 at 8:56 am

Wee tiny jar o' dark chocolate almonds.

Yesterday was weird.

I think I have some pent up rage that is not being addressed in my current OMed out yoga state of mind because I spent the morning looking for places I can go simply to punch things. Turns out, there’s not a whole lot of kickboxing in Charlotte. What’s a girl to do?

First, I start weightlifting. Now I want to punch things. Also I RAN yesterday (this is unheard of). And then followed it with yoga. Watch out world…

Eeek.

Nope. Negative. Sorry, girl. I find that absolutely horrifying.

No, I think my current desire to push my body beyond its standard routine (yoga about six times a week) came from this realization that yoga has made me really, really strong and really, really capable. I’m doing things I once thought were impossible. So now I’m kind of like, “Hmmm, what else can I do?” It’s a nice feeling.

People ask a lot of me. I answer to a lot of demands all day every day. At work, in volunteering, at school. I have a lot of bosses. It’s exhausting. I don’t think these things tap into any natural talents or take me anywhere near my mental limit, and they’re certainly not physically demanding. But I’m asked to do things and I do them. I assume this is the same for most people. Just going through the motions.

But every once in a while, I want to feel like I’m working towards my full potential, like I’m really alive. And that has absolutely nothing to do with sitting at a desk, let me tell you what…

Right??

So sometimes I want to use myself for myself. And that’s what all this physical activity is about. I just like the feeling of being completely used up, of doing something I want to do, of doing something challenging. I like asking my body to give me all its got and then taking that for all it’s worth. This body’s not gonna move like this forever, you know? Use it now.

Yeah.

So yes, yesterday I was sitting at the laundromat with 30 minutes to kill on the hot cycle and all of the sudden I was running down the street.

Boooring.

Beauuuutiful.

I think I must’ve done about a 3-mile loop. It was 65 degrees and sunny. It was awesome. I used to run all the time. I’d go out and crush 10-mile runs just for the hell of it. I never trained for an actual race. But I did so compulsively and without proper form, warmups or cool downs. I paid the price in the form of a right knee that now craps out around three miles (I felt fine yesterday). But I’m happy with just three miles now. Plus, that running injury led me to yoga, which has turned out to be a life-altering journey.

The point of this rant, I suppose, is that we’re more capable than we realize. That only we can push ourselves to our limit. That, perhaps, everything does happen for a reason. And that dark chocolate-covered almonds are the jam.

 


Whatever, Science

In School on February 15, 2012 at 8:40 am

Smoothie? Microbial growth on an agar plate?

I am not a “science person.” I do words, not numbers. In college I was required to take two sciences to graduate. You know what I took? My senior year? Oceanography and avian biology. Yes. The study of the ocean spoke to my childhood dream of being a marine biologist (was this not every single girl’s dream from age six to approximately 15?) and I assumed avian bio would be little more than bird watching.

Turns out oceanography is all weather patterns and currents and erosion and shit and not a single mention of killer whales. Avian biology requires a pigeon dissection. Dear God. I also had to memorize 20 bird calls, which I played incessantly in my dorm, driving my hallmates to the edge of insanity. (I do have to throw in that I did get to capture, hold and release a wild cardinal in an avian bio lab and it was really, really cool.)

It would’ve been convenient if I’d taken, oh I don’t know, microbiology… chemistry… something I’m having to take now because I didn’t take it then. Hindsight is always 20/20, isn’t it? I mean, how was I to know I’d completely change my mind and drag my poor one-sided right brain through the act of “mastering” a science?

Microbiology blows is what I’m saying. The cruelest joke of this whole science thing? Lecture and lab. Gross. Who does that? I do not need five hours of this garbage twice a week. And I certainly don’t need back-to-back tests (one for lecture, one for lab) for which I do not study until an hour before they are to be taken.

Ew.

Anyway. I’m studying for my micro lab exam and my smoothie looks like a bacterial growth. That is all.


The Valentines You Forgot

In Life, Yoga on February 14, 2012 at 11:23 pm

You love love.

Hello, single people. Feeling sorry for yourself? Drinking wine with your cats? Checking your phone twelve billion times to see if maybe someone wants to do something with your lame ass? Well. While you were busy wallowing in self pity, drowning your sorrows in chocolate and alcohol, and posting sarcastic-but-man-I-so-feel-this-way status updates about the injustice that is “Single Awareness Day” (I abhor this reference), here are a few people you may have forgotten…

Your Parents – Hellooo. These humans made you (or adopted you). Maybe it was an accident, maybe not. But I bet they love you anyway. I bet they love you and your expensive education and your affinity for the F-bomb and your complete inability to pick up the phone and call unless something has gone terribly, terribly wrong (or you need money). They loved you through poop and pee and vomit and all kinds of bodily functions. They loved you through temper tantrums at two (and twenty-two). They loved you through heartbreaks when you were sure no one loved you at all. They love you when you make them proud, of course, and even more when you don’t. And you know what, they love you because of these things, not in spite of them.

Your Pets – I know. I know. Cat lady alert. But seriously. Have you ever seen a human as happy to see you as your pet is when you get home from a long day? Probably not. Because humans have a tendency to love with expectation. Animals, not so much. Animals just love you because you exist. (And maybe because you feed them.)

Your Best Friend – Aside from a “You’re awesome!” card, this is the only Valentine I got today and it’s absolutely one of the best I’ve ever read: Happy Valentine’s Day to My Best Friend. Read it. Do it now.

Hearts You Broke – I get that you’re feeling sorry for yourself today and that, helloooooo, this day is all about you because some jerkface broke your heart but… Don’t you realize someone is thinking the same thing about you? Someone, somewhere probably wants to be with you right now. Maybe it’s someone you broke up with. Maybe it’s someone you politely shot down. Maybe it’s someone completely off your radar at work or your friend-who’s-a-boy-not-a-boyfriend. But rest assured you are not the only one wishing you were with someone right now, which leads me to believe someone is probably obsessing over you, too.

People in Shitty Relationships – I realize Facebook is drowning in washed out images of roses delivered to workplaces and candlelit dinners for two and, yes, engagement rings but… These are just the vocal ones. I promise.

Tonight I went to a beautiful guided meditation which focused on the heart. The teacher walked us through this process of identifying someone in our life who’s hurting, visualizing ourselves (invisible) walking up to them, seeing their hurt (physical, emotional or otherwise) as a tangible thing (this little black dot), actively inhaling it into our bodies and walking away, watching them release into joy as the pain burst into white smoke inside us. Crazy, right? Don’t worry, I totally tripped out a little bit.

But I thought it was brilliant. How refreshing to focus our love on someone we probably would’ve skipped over today while we were busy instead worrying about ourselves.

Give a little love today. And every day. Let your love throw spark. Sooner or later it’ll ignite.


Let My Love Throw Spark

In Life on February 14, 2012 at 10:30 pm

The pants pajamas.

Hello, lovers. I hope you had a beautiful Valentine’s Day. It’s one of my favorites. Who doesn’t love candy and heartfelt cards and, hello, love? I know I do.

My day went a little something like this:

Oversleep. Get dressed in 10 minutes. The standard uniform will do…

Boots. Leggings. Too big clothes.

Shove PB+honey sandwich in face while driving to work. Play filthy rap music for motivation. Work like a MF boss.

Break for the gym. I lift weights now? Eat this salad:

Spinach, rice, refried beans, tempeh, salsa, peppers, celery

More rap music. Take care of biznass.

Yoga forever. Meditation. Ashtanga.

Oh hey.

Wanna see my new weightlifting guns? Ok…

Yeah?

Right? I think so, yes. They are there. Anyway…

Buy gifts for special Valentine lovers.

Yep.

Study microbiology. Study it so hard.

Eat conversation hearts like they’re going out of style…

It was a good day, a really good day.

And that is that.


I’m a Fast Shopper

In Life on February 13, 2012 at 12:15 am

Toasted. PB, applesauce, jelly, cinnamon.

I got hit on in the grocery store for the first time today. By a man named Herb who, by all stereotypical bitch-tastic assumption, was very very Herb-like.

“You’re a very fast shopper” was his line. This is a line, right? Forgive me if I’m a little slow to roll with the produce aisle pickup lines. Men simply do not talk to me. Anywhere. It’s always a little alarming.

And I am a fast shopper. I’m a fast everything. In and out. (Ok, not everything.) Bada bing, bada boom. Homegirl’s got places to be. Food to eat.

Anyway, poor Herb had to blurt out “YOU’RE REALLY CUTE” for me to stop darting back and forth from chickpeas to peanut butter thinking “Where the hell are the pickles? Pickles pickles pickles. Who has moved my pickles? God DAMN why can’t they leave things in the same plaaaaaaace? Who is this man following me?”

It occurs to me in retrospect that perhaps it’s not so much that men don’t talk to me but… (ack) that maybe I just don’t notice? Oh God. Because if it’s not a grocery list I’m reciting in my head, it’s some kind of life plan to conquer or to-do list to, uh, do or series to memorize that distracts me from noticing that someone’s been standing there the whole.damn.time. Whew. My mom has always said, “It will take an assertive man, a very assertive man to get this one to listen.” An assertive man with kittens, more like it.

Anyway, if you are moved by this encounter, I regret to inform you that Herb and I are not meant to be and that I lost him somewhere around the balsamic vinegar. I’m sure he’s a great guy, but, as he noted, I’m a very fast shopper. You’ve gotta keep pace.


I Made Pretzels.

In Baked Goods on February 12, 2012 at 2:22 pm

SOFT PRETZEL SOFT PRETZEL SOFT PRETZEL

Of all the things I should’ve been doing today–writing microbiology lab reports, studying sanskrit, cleaning up puppy hair, apologizing to the cats–the things I actually did would have fallen somewhere around UNNECESSARY on the “Get it, Girl – Get it Together, Girl” scale, should such a scale exist (and shouldn’t it?).

No, baking cookies and making soft pretzels were not really on the agenda today. But you know what?

WHATEVER.

I consider the successful execution of Alton Brown’s soft pretzels* to be my crowning culinary achievement, an accomplishment that, no matter how escapist/procrastinatory it may have been, is something for which I simply will not apologize. I consider the dipping of said pretzels into melted butter to be a basic human right, not a privilege, and a right that should be exercised. (Oh, and it was. It was.)

RISEN.

A skill I did not know I possessed.

Oh heeeeeey.

This little adventure took me hours… hours. I was sweating. Granted, during that time I also drank two cups of coffee, made three dozen banana cookies and juggled two cats and a puppy but… you know. (I washed my hands a lot.)

Anyway, any recipe involving yeast activation is an automatic NEVER MAKE in my book. I hate yeast. Yeast and I are not friends. Even with a thermometer I can never get the water just the right temperature. It’s either too cold and nothing happens or it’s too hot and I kill all the yeast (and nothing happens). Maddening.

BUT Mitch has been ranting on about soft pretzels for a solid week and with a couple “free” hours on hand, I just had to throw caution (or fear of yeast) to the wind and give it a try. And you know what? MF SUCCESS.

Victory is mine.

I wonder what other things I should tackle today that I’ve been avoiding for fear of failure… Nevermind. Let’s stick to baked goods. For now, just pass the butter.

* I altered Alton’s recipe ever so slightly. Instead of an egg white wash before baking, I simply spritzed with olive oil and sprinkled with salt. Which means… yes, my version is vegan.


Cheap, Effective Birth Control

In What's for Lunch? on February 11, 2012 at 2:31 pm

Bigass salad.

There’s one cat on top of the fridge. Crying. A puppy on the ground. Also crying. Another cat somewhere nearby just hissing for the hell of it. Welcome to my 4×6-foot kitchen. I just want lunch. Please, God. Lunch.

I’m looking at new mothers with a whole new level of respect over here. I bet you love me comparing your baby to a puppy, don’t you? Love me over dramatizing my 72-hour experience with a small animal. Love that I will trivialize the immensity of motherhood by comparing it to one weekend with a black lab. Throw me a bone (dog joke!) it’s all I’ve got to work with.

So yes. With this puppy, I am humbled.

You know the only thing that has shut him up and calmed him down in the last two days? Celery. Correct, celery.

When it rolled off the cutting board, perhaps he confused it for an animal part of some sort. But I assume it was really the novelty of seeing a vegetable for the first time (my brother does not consume produce). Whatever the reason, it kept him pleasantly distracted just long enough for me to craft a towering salad masterpiece and shove it in my face.

Yeah, boy.

You know what I want to do today? I want to bake a billion things. I want to get a pedicure. I want to memorize a whole lot of sanskrit. I want to go to three yoga classes. I want to ride my bike. I want to clean my house. I want to do my laundry. Instead? I am feeling trapped (quite literally caged) in my little apartment.

This is the most effective birth control I have taken in my life and the surest way to remind one as dead set on rushing towards stability as myself that maybe, just maybe a little free-wheeling, spontaneous, irresponsible, selfish time in my mid-twenties is a right fine place to be.


Caturday 2/11/12

In Cats on February 11, 2012 at 1:03 pm

... is he still here?

Happy Caturday?

I’m not sure. The cats are not very pleased with this whole puppy situation. I can’t say I’m dancing through the day either. This little nugget is too damn much. No one told me puppies are only cute to look at from afar.

I will eat your soul.

On night one, I slept approximately zero hours and took him out into the frosted grass to have explosive diarrhea multiple times. I’m talking, like, projectile fire hose kind of business. Had I been standing three feet down wind of him, I would’ve been hit. You’re welcome for that description.

2 o'clock in the damn morning.

As a result of sleeping zero hours through the night, I eventually must have fallen asleep in the wee hours of the morning because I slept through three alarms, a Google calendar reminder and a text from a coworker informing me I was an hour and a half late. VERY GOOD.

My brother asked only one thing of me and this was to not let the dog on the bed. That is going well so far…

SHMEEEEEEEEEEE

Whatever. I caved. On night two I simply could not handle his constant crying so I just put him in my bed. (That’s what she said?) Those five hours of uninterrupted sleep were the only five hours I have liked him so far. What a little angel when he’s not biting me or crying or projectile pooping.

I woke up to find Ralph AND Weaz in a state of total Paranormal Activity just hovering over the bed staring at us.

CUH-REEEEEEE-PYYYYY

The cats have spent the weekend puffed up to three times their normal size making strange guttural noises and ninja swiping Scout any time he walks by the couch.

Needless to say, this house is a royal shitshow. I am grateful for this experience only because it has shown me that I want absolutely nothing to do with a puppy or a baby for a very, very long time.

Of course, as I say this the little nug has finally passed out on my bed like a little angel. I am not fooled. But I will go rub my face on his ears for a little bit.

Baby.


Stop. Puppytime.

In Breakfast, Life on February 9, 2012 at 11:06 am

Toast, PB, blueberries, figs, honey, cinnamon

Thursday mornings are my sacred space. My holiest of holies. It’s the day of the week I don’t have to get up and rush anywhere. The day of the week I get to sit around in my underwear sipping on coffee and doing handstands. The day I don’t have to eat three meals away from home.

Today I slept until 9am because I was up until well after 1am driving around aimlessly. I ended up at the airport. What does that mean? (Everything.) My new three-cups-a-day coffee habit is killing me softly. That and, uh, everything in my brain.

Happy time.

Oh, and this week only… Thursday happens to be the day of the week I get Scout EEEEEEEEEE…

EEEEEE

This is my brother’s puppy and the closest thing my family has to a nephew/grandson at the moment so we like to make a very big deal about him.

We’re going to go to the dog park. And the dog bakery (where they bake dog treats, not dogs). And the dog bar. Actually, he’ll get carded at the dog bar. Puppies have to be a year old to get in. We’ll find him a fake…

And I’m gonna use him as a man magnet. And let him sleep in my bed (the dog, not the men). And ruin all the diligent training my brother has worked into his little peabrain.

[Speaking of peas... DID YOU KNOW that only two amino acids out of 102 differ in the DNA of a pea versus a cow? Cool.]

Mmmmmhmm.

Borrowing other people’s dogs is the best way to have a dog. Same goes for babies. Does anyone have a baby I can borrow? Are there baby bars? No? Nevermind.


Fact.

In Life on February 9, 2012 at 2:17 am

OBVIOUSLY.

Every well-stocked kitchen contains a freezer filled with frozen balls of cookie dough.

Ordering a double in a short glass gets you twice as drunk in half the time.

You don’t have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body. (C.S. Lewis)

He/She has no idea what you’re thinking. Say it loud.

Your employer considers you to be 100% disposable and replaceable. Use this to your advantage.

Sometimes movies are better alone (but with wine).

One, please?

You actually do know exactly what you want. Somewhere beneath the roar of everyone else’s opinions and your own self doubt, it’s there.

Grownups don’t get nap time because we get 3 o’clock coffee.

Your hard drive will crash one day. Don’t act like it won’t.

That breaking news story, adorable baby animal video or ANYTHING from The Oatmeal you’re planning to post all over Facebook and Twitter? We’ve all seen it already.

The answer to “Should I forward this?” is always no.

iPods are, in fact, better than the radio. (I’m about a decade late.)

Welcome to the future?

Cats eat cheese. And love it.

You’re the only one who thinks you can’t.

When you don’t want to go to bed, driving aimlessly is a suitable alternative. Sobbing uncontrollably is optional.

That moment in a wedding when the bride makes her grand entrance? Stop. Turn around. Watch the groom. It’s better.

That kitchen/bathroom/sink o’ dishes is not going to clean itself.

Your parents totally love you.

Your email will still be there tomorrow.

Sleep is overrated.


Refresh Refresh Refresh

In Life on February 8, 2012 at 9:47 am

Frozen banana, spinach, almond milk, cocoa powder, PB, flax

This week I took Facebook, Twitter and email off of my phone. It is the best damn decision I’ve made since I chose to keep the cats back in… 2008?

I know I’ve tried to abandon these social outlets in the past with little success and that this time may be no different. But I’m serious now. I am addicted to this mess. No joke. I don’t think people hear me when I talk about how desperately I want them out of my life. This is probably because they don’t realize how much they consume me. Refresh. Refresh. Refresh. What else is going on? What are people complaining about today? What words do I want to vomit right now? It’s exhausting. Not having access to any of it until I’m sitting down at my computer has made me feel so… free? Yeah, that’s sad. It’s true, though. This, I believe, this lack of refresh-refresh-refresh… is actually refreshing.

I’ve been playing with the idea of giving up all of it (except the blog) for a while just as a little social experiment to see how it affects my life. To see who still makes an effort to communicate with me. To see who I go out of my way to see. There was once a time when we all got along just fine without any of this. A time when we made plans and kept them. Instead of texting, “Hey! I’m too tired/busy/disinterested in you… can’t make it!” we just went. Instead of Facebooking, “Let’s have a coffee date soooooon” we just got coffee. Instead of tweeting condolences, congratulations or constructive criticism, we spoke it. It’s a strange, strange world, y’all.

I’ve been doing a lot of research (seriously, I have a folder dedicated to it) on social media and addiction, the psychology of social media and negative/positive effects of increased social media use around the world (car crashes due to phone use vs. political revolutions). It’s all very interesting.

I think, ultimately, there’s a way to use these outlets in a healthy, productive way that really does leave you feeling closer to more people, but, if used incorrectly, results in more isolation than anything.

“The most strongly felt desires were for sleep and sex. Unexpectedly, cravings for cigarettes and alcohol were reported as weakest. In terms of actual behavior, participants had the hardest time stopping themselves from checking social media when they preferred not to, and from working when that was not what they truly wanted to do, suggesting that these urges actually drove people’s actions more than drugs or sex did.” (Source)

I’m gonna go post this on Facebook and Twitter now…


No One Told Us We Couldn’t

In Life, Yoga on February 7, 2012 at 9:56 pm

I promise I will tell you the recipe soon.

Hello, meatmuffins.

I have become one of those people who looks forward to 3pm because she looks forward to MORE COFFEE. This means I have also become one of those people who takes herself to a 9:30 movie with contraband candy (and wine) on a Tuesday because she is wiiiiiired from her newly acquired afternoon coffee habit.

Since I’m skipping yoga to go to a movie, I’ve been coaxing my buzzing little caffeinated body into some inversions in my room. I just like to be upside down. The problem with this, of course, is that inversions make you feel AWAKE.

You're doing it wrong.

I’m doing it wrong. Don’t worry about it. I’ll get it. Today is actually the first time I’ve ever attempted this little one-handed deal. Slowly, slowly…

I know there’s a whole lot of attention on yoga in the media right now since William Broad’s NYT article How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body was published earlier this month. (He also has a book.) Today Broad was on NPR’s Fresh Air discussing the Risks and Rewards of Yoga. (I haven’t gotten to listen to it all yet.) And I’m not going to address any of it until I have, like, four straight hours to write. Until then, I will go in the complete opposite direction and share something my teacher mentioned in training last time…

He was talking about how “advanced” Charlotte is as a yoga community. How, in general, the city is full of practitioners who simply don’t take no for an answer. Now, yoga is, of course, not a competition. It’s not about mastering poses. It’s not really about the poses at all. Still, there’s no denying that people can do some pretty cool shit after practicing for a while. So we were talking about that… In doing so we cited people we know who have been told by someone at some point that they’re too fat to do yoga or too tight to do yoga or too old to do yoga. “I don’t know what it is about Charlotte,” he said, “but here, no one told us we couldn’t. So we just did.”

I love that. I love it so much. Yes, be careful. Yes, get to know your body and listen to it. Listen well. But take risks, too. Try the scary stuff. Odds are the only person telling you you can’t is you. (I’m talking about life, too. Duh.)

NOW. While I’m on a date with myself, I got you guys some reading material to keep you entertained…

PCRM’s Anti-Cheese Billboard Campaign

Seriously?

 Leftover Superbowl Snacks Feed the Hungry

Not in the trash.

Coolest Food Video Ever


Tough Decisions

In Life, School on February 7, 2012 at 9:04 am

Tofu scramble w/peppers, broccoli, salad

Here’s the situation.

I am over a month into this semester and just realized last week that I am enrolled in one class that I only went to the very first two weeks. (It meets twice a week.) I forgot! Anyway, this translates to approximately six classes I missed. I think. At any rate, when I figured it out last week and decided to finally go, I got there and class was cancelled. When I got in today, we took our first test.

When I tell people this story, they react in pure unbridled horror and tell me this is their nightmare. (I’m glad my reality is the rest of the world’s nightmare. Good feeling.) Me? I’m not so worried about it. Let me put it this way… On one of the days I actually went to class, we watched a video tutorial on how to use Microsoft Word. This is a graduate level course. You see what I’m saying here?

Plus, I picked the desk with THIS on it upon which to take my test today:

Because it's lucky.

In fact, I took not one but two tests atop that rabbitman today and am happy to report that both were just fine.

You’d think, though, that leading up to this little adventure I might have studied a little bit for the test in the class I don’t go to but… no. Nope. In fact, I had 30 minutes right before the test and presented myself with the option of sitting and reading through the lecture notes or hoofing it across campus to get coffee. You know what I decided?

Duh.

Tough decisions, y’all. Tough decisions.

I also had the choice of gym or yoga.

Both.

Cleaning out my itunes or filing my taxes… Sadly, I did my taxes.

It’s such a hard life.


Steady as the Stars

In Life on February 6, 2012 at 11:29 pm

It must be February...

I said it first. I suppose it stands to reason I’d be the last one hanging on.

I love you. Not like how I love my friends or how I love my family or how I love the cats. I love you like I’ve always loved you. Like I will always love you.

That’s what I’d have said, I guess, if I’d gotten in the car last night and driven to another state just to look at him looking at me knowing what I feel and seeing what he doesn’t.

But I didn’t. And I won’t.

It’s a funny thing, falling out of love. At first it’s all-consuming, paralyzing. Eats you up until you’re but a shell of yourself. After a while it fades, starts to fall away until one day you wake up and realize you haven’t cried. You haven’t cried in a long time. You’re not fine; you’re better. You’re back.

And then suddenly you’re in bed early on a Sunday night right back where you were six months ago. How does that happen?

Hell if I know. I’m making this up as I go along, you realize…

Through it all, people are there cheering you on, telling you to be strong. To move on. Everyone has an opinion.

Fair enough. I’d argue, however, that there is immense strength in holding on, too. It takes a fierce heart to love without expectation, to love unapologetically without being loved back. It’s easy to be loved. But I like to think that the crushing weight of unrequited love works our heart the same way weight on any muscle does. It makes it stronger.

So eventually you’re faced with a choice, right? Be strong and move on or be strong and hold on. To love or be loved. And there’s a very good chance neither choice is right or wrong. Some things just are.

Tonight on my way to yoga I was trying to sort through it all in a very pragmatic way. Why do I feel this way? What triggered it? What am I masking with it? What’s really going on here? Am I in love? Probably not. I’m probably just approaching another milestone and realizing it’s the first time in a long time I’m doing it by myself. Confused? Absolutely. Lonely? Ding ding ding.

Back at yoga, my teacher said something at the end of class that resonated so clearly: “It’s ok if you’re feeling confused. Confusion is the first step to clarity.”

Ain’t that the truth…

This is not a sad post.


Meat Muffins

In What's for Lunch? on February 6, 2012 at 8:14 am

Meat-free meat muffins (made with tempeh)

I keep seeing these meat muffins all over the food blog world and since I like saying meat muffin so much (and because I had a momentary lapse in sanity and decided maybe I’d start working out and following a ridiculous plan to do so), I decided to make them. Without meat.

To make meat muffins meat-free, you simply follow the recipe exactly but use two packages of tempeh (which you crumble by hand) instead of two pounds of turkey. Badabing.

Badaboom.

I topped them with a Greek yogurt + salsa sauce. Pretty enjoyable.

I think I’ve concluded that, while I am going to start weight training, I simply can’t get behind a rigid food plan. It goes against everything I know/believe/love about food.

And that’s that.

As for the meat muffins, yeah I’ll totally eat them. But I’ll also totally eat falafel and croissants and cupcakes. You know how we do.


Saturday in Summary

In Life on February 5, 2012 at 10:16 am

Ezekial bread, PB, blueberries, honey, cinnamon

Things that happened yesterday:

  • I went to yoga and felt like a damn machine.
  • I completed my first observation class for teacher training (we do 5 hours observation, 10 hours assisting).
  • I did 72 pushups. (Not in succession. 3×12 wide, 3×12 narrow.)
  • I went to the gym but I forgot my ID and they wouldn’t let me in.
  • I went to Starbucks instead.
  • I drank three coffees.
  • Apparently I am going to start weight training. Whenever someone will let me in a gym.
  • I made meat muffins but with no meat.
  • I made sweet potato bars.
  • I was on puppy duty while my brother was gone for the day.
  • The puppy pooped in the neighbor’s yard.
  • I “forgot” to pick it up.
  • I created an elaborate movie trailer daydream of my graduation in August in which I was the speaker and all my friends and family were there and I cried just thinking about it.
  • I don’t think I will actually go to the official graduation when the time comes.
  • I thought trailer was spelled with an O. Oh God.
  • I also can’t spell license. Ever.
  • These are my only two character flaws…
  • I quit (one of) my job(s).
  • It feels good.
  • I worked until 10pm.
  • I rallied like a frigging rockstar and went out with Mitch and her friends.
  • “Does anyone ever tell you you look like a white Rihanna?” No. But that is awesome.
  • I ate an omelet at 2am.

Viva la Weaz.

Weaz bitchslapped Mitch.

The face of a rogue pooper.

That pretty much sums it up.


Caturday 2/4/12

In Cats on February 4, 2012 at 1:16 pm

Oh, bother.

… and a very happy and productive Caturday to you, too.

Weazcheese is all mopey because it’s raining on her day off. Why… why does life have to be so hard?

I tried to invite her to a movie (she’s been dying to see Beauty and the Beast 3D), tried to let her help me bake (she’s been working on her yeast activating skills) and tried to suggest she just take advantage of the weather by taking a nap. But nothing’s working.

Ralph isn’t helping.

It's raining because God hates you.

But I think I know just the thing to snap her out of it…

Butter. Duh.

I’ve still never actually been to Butter, but I do like to pretend that it is Weaz’s favorite place on earth. She so loves getting slutted up and pretending to be more important than she is.

"Yes," she declared. "I shall rally."

And with that, we’re off to get our hair did.


Happy? Happy.

In Life on February 4, 2012 at 1:35 am

This is not a croissant.

Listen. I never did get that croissant that I haven’t been able to shut up about. Soon… soon.

I was going to go pick one up at Amelie’s after a lovely little afternoon at Latta Plantation.

Oliverrr

Cool.

I should get a dog. (No.)

I was going to bring it home, cut it in half, toast it and then stack it with avocado and tomato and salt and pepper and rainbows and unicorns and singing angels. I was going to sit by myself on a Friday night and drink white wine and eat my croissant.

Instead, I made a massive salad and studied microbiology. (And drank white wine.) I just kind of felt like the croissant was more of a lunch of meal. Tomorrow!

ANYWAY. I had a good day. Hell, I’ve had a good week. I’m in a good place. Driving home this evening, Charlotte’s skyline all ablaze in pink and orange, I had this very clear moment of: “Holy shit. I’m happy. I’m happy? I’m happy.”

I feel like myself again, which is such a damn good way to feel.

The funny thing is, nothing has really changed. Not for the better, anyway. In fact, I could dive into a woe-is-me rant right this very second about how, really, nothing is going the way I want it to. But I won’t because I actually feel very in control right now. I feel very in control of what’s going on inside of me. And so long as I maintain that control, my little world is whatever I want it to be.

Frozen banana, carob powder, PB - processed smooth

“There must be always remaining in every life some place for that which in itself is breathless and beautiful.” – Howard Thurman


The “I Hate Eggs” Omelet

In Breakfast on February 2, 2012 at 4:53 pm

I only hate you a little bit.

Omelets are funny little creatures, are they not? They are a favorite among meat-lovers and vegetarians, hungover 20-somethings and holier-than-thou churchgoers, rich people, poor people and everyone in between. They transcend socioeconomic status, taste preference, culture and just about any other divide you can think of. Everyone eats omelets. (Yep, even vegans.)

I feel like there are three situations in which you could find yourself eating an omelet:

  1. You are broke and don’t know how to cook. Omelets are dirt cheap, filling and easy enough for even the least skilled cook to prepare. If you fall into this category, you probably eat omelets, like, three times a day.
  2. You are uppity and/or hungover and enjoy “brunching.” Whether you find yourself eating the first meal of your Sunday at 2pm because you just got out of church or because you just woke up with a penis drawn on your face and a raging headache, odds are you are going to order an omelet. The difference between you and the people in Group #1 is that you are going to pay a billion dollars for your omelet. Enjoy it.
  3. You spent the night in a bed that was not yours. Since the night was completely unplanned (kind of like your impending pregnancy–zing!), there was no time for your “host” to purchase breakfast items. If you are not asked to leave (awwwkwarrrrd), you will be offered an omelet filled with whatever is in the fridge that is not moldy. Graciously accept it.

Up until approximately 24 hours ago, I hated omelets. I simply cannot eat eggs. They make me gag. I have found, however, that if I simply cook the living shit out of them, they are tolerable–nay, enjoyable.

This is how I do it:

Select stuffers. Here: kale, peppers, tempeh.

Saute stuffers in olive oil until tender. Season w/ salt/pepper.

Add eggs. Cook until burned to a crisp. Seriously... BROWN.

Fold. Fold. Serve.

I know this is not how you really make an omelet. This is how someone who hates eggs makes an omelet. Let me live my life and I’ll let you eat runny, mushy eggs.


Like a MF Adult.

In Life on February 2, 2012 at 4:23 pm

Smoothie bowl and instant coffee.

I don’t know what happened this morning. I woke up three hours late (yes, three) and didn’t even miss a beat. Granted, my first alarm goes off at 5am so even three hours doesn’t put me back that far. Nevertheless, I got up, showered, made a smoothie bowl and sipped on instant coffee because we ran out of K-cups and apparently refuse to buy more.

I didn’t plan to get my act together today but something deep inside my subconscious said, “Fix it. Fix it all right now.” So before I even knew what was happening, I was driving to the damn DMV. I stopped at Best Buy to return a thing I don’t need (and receive money I do), deposited checks at the bank, paid my electric bill and finally (finally) got the District of Columbia off my back by forking over the $65 they demand for parking in the wrong place (how was I supposed to know?) and not paying the fine for six months. Whoops. I got all my paperwork in order for filing my taxes and I figured out what to do about my impending end of health insurance coverage.

Basically, I was on my A game. It was all very this.

YEAH.

All of these little to-do’s have been hanging over my head for months and months and months, and the longer I let them go, the heavier they weighed on me. Part of it is the fact that the ignoring of such responsibilities has consequences, but I think more of it was just knowing that I know better and not doing a damn thing about it. Who is that person? I don’t even know…

So I’ve been avoiding these things (because this is what I do with everything that overwhelms me) and in doing so let them become exponentially bigger than they really are. For example, I went to the DMV with $200 cash, certain I’d owe at least that much in late fees, which is why I’d been putting it off for so long anyway. (It was $10.)

Now, with all this out of my way, I feel like I can breathe, focus my energy elsewhere and move the F on to bigger and better things.

 


Uncharacteristic.

In What's for Lunch? on February 2, 2012 at 12:09 am

WHAT IS THAT AN OMELET?

Weird. Today was weird.

First of all, I woke up in the middle of the night because I was having one of those dreams where you think you have to pee and it turns out you really do have to pee and, if left to carry on subconsciously, your mind will make you wet the bed. I was also dreaming about hot dogs. (I did not wet the bed.)

I don’t know the last time I woke up in the middle of the night. You know why I did?

Because of the second uncharacteristic thing I’ve been doing lately: drinking water.

The worst thing about drinking water is that it makes you have to pee constantly. Physiologically, this is also probably one of the best things about water, among so many others. I’ll deal with it.

Later on in this weird waking-up-water-drinking day, I skipped lunch. This is really unheard of in my life but I was busy at work and then went straight to class and straight to lab and my soup and salad and veggie sticks with hummus were just not portable enough. Plus, I was messin’ around with e. coli in the lab and just don’t like touching food immediately after that.

SO at 4pm I came home and did another strange thing: ate eggs.

I hate eggs. I hate them so much. The only way I can eat them is white-only and burned to a crisp. Even then it’s a little touch and go.

Yep. Still eggs.

I stuffed my omelet with tempeh and tri-color peppers and ate it with roasted broccoli and buttered toast. I’m happy to report I did not hate it.

Also a little unlike me… I started studying today for a test that isn’t until Monday. WHO AM I?

I wish I could say it was also uncharacteristic that I realized today that I’m enrolled in a class that I have forgotten to attend twice a week for the last two weeks. Unfortunately, this is pretty much par for the course these days. I have a test on Monday. It’ll be fine.

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention… Sweet Tater is on Facebook now.

TAH DAH.

Yes yes… Ralph and Weaz are on it, too.

Now I’m going to go to bed before midnight on a Wednesday. WHAT IS GOING ON?


Eleventy Billion

In Life, Rant on February 1, 2012 at 9:23 am

Smoothie bowl obviously.

I’m so full I cannot even look at that smoothie bowl without wanting to die. I want one tomorrow morning but I have no frozen bananas. Speaking of… Here’s a weird thing to say to a man: “Hey I left my bananas in your freezer.” Even if you totally did. (I did.)

Anyway, it was a spontaneous Mexican kind of night…

Happy Tuesday.

And that’s why I’m so full. I crave tequila more than the average American. Don’t even worry about it.

Tonight I’m going to do what bloggers do best and talk about myself in a self-deprecating, waggish manner making sure to sound just interesting enough that you think “I want her life a little bit” but just off-my-rocker enough for you to think, “Yes. We will be friends” or “I am better than you.” This is the magic formula for our genre, you realize.

SO. The dear and wonderful Amanda at Pickles ‘n’ Honey has tagged me in her 11 Random Facts game giving me free reign to rant away. I don’t know if I paid attention to the rules so I’m just gonna jump in…

1. Last night I had  a dream about hot dogs. 

2. I look like this right now.

It's true.

3. I don’t take shots. I know, I know. What kind of college graduate am I? Did I learn nothing at fraternity parties? I just can’t do it. I lack the physical mechanism to take down straight liquor in shot form. Sip it on the rocks? Sure. But if someone buys me a shot I will graciously accept it and then dump it into whatever cocktail I already have on hand. Works every time.

4. I don’t wash my face. Contrary to what’s going on in the picture above, I lack a dedicated “beauty regimen.” In fact, most nights I go to bed with makeup on my face. Ruh roh…

5. I secretly want “to fashion blog.” As a verb, yes, not a noun like “I want a fashion blog.” No, I already have a blog. I want to fashion blog. Look, I’m not going to apologize for taking pictures of myself. If Cher taught me anything in Clueless it’s that you cannot trust a mirror to tell you what you really look like. So I get dressed and take pictures.

 

 

6. I take a Flintstone’s vitamin every day. 

I want to eat the whole jar.

7. I want to get my brother to do yoga. My goal after completing this teacher training is to get my older brother into one of my classes. I cannot even verbalize how impossible a challenge this will be. When it comes to making this practice relevant to people who think it’s totally weird, he is my Everest.

8. I applied for graduation this week. Finally. Yes. I’m still not done and my graduation won’t be until August because I have one lone class hanging over my head for May-mester BUT… there is a light at the end of this long, boring, expensive tunnel. I cried when I printed the application out.

Yesssss.

9. I never drink water. This is terrible especially if you understand the extent to which I do not drink water. I’m talking like maybe maybe two glasses a day. Four on days I practice hot yoga. It’s ridiculous. Not drinking our abundant, safe, free source of water makes me feel like a real asshole since so many people have no water at all. I’m working on it. I thought about bribing myself to drink by donating a dime to the water charity of my choice for every cup I drink in a year. Eight glasses a day times 365 days is like just under $300 for the year. I could do that.

10. I want a kayak. Or a canoe or small paddle boat. Just some sort of sea vessel that I can take out to the middle of a lake and just sit there.

11. I don’t want a cell phone. I’m think I’m going to lock mine in my glove compartment for 30 days (so it’s there in case I crash, duh) and see what happens. I have a wager in the works. I’ve been saying I’m going to do this for well over a year and every time I do people tell me I can’t. I don’t like to be told I can’t do things. Not like, “Hey that’s illegal you can’t do it” because I’m a rule follower and I don’t mind following rules. More like “Hey you can’t do that because you just can’t pull it off.” This does not sit will with me. I want to see how it impacts my life–How do I make plans? Who is still willing to reach out to me? Who am I willing to reach out to? What is easier? What’s harder? Etc.

That’s it. Thanks, Amanda! I’m supposed to tag 11 more people but I’m just too lazy. So everyone do it now. Weeeeee.

 


In Defense of Rice Cakes

In Snack on January 31, 2012 at 2:23 pm

Do not judge me.

I don’t care what anyone says. Rice cakes are good.

Hear me out…

The beauty of the rice cake is not that it necessarily shines on its own. (Although some of us think it does.) No. The rice cake is not out for attention. It seeks not the approval of the masses. It steers clear of the spotlight. The rice cake is, instead, best described as the selfless supporter, the humble helper, the wind beneath the wings (cue Bette) of many of your favorite foods. Think peanut butter, avocado, hummus, cheese… NUTELLA. All of these things are fine on their own, yes. But what better way to shovel them straight into your face than atop a light, crunchy, salty little cake o’ rice?

Exactly.

So yeah. I eat rice cakes. I eat ‘em all the time. And you know what? I love them.

My most recent rice cake obsession goes like this (from bottom up):

  • Rice cake
  • Hummus
  • Sharp cheddar
  • Kosher pickles
  • Tomato relish

I know. I know. Gross, Katie. Don’t knock it ’til you’ve tried it. It’s all crunchy and creamy and salty and sweet and tart and PERFECT.

What about a sweet option? I’m glad you asked…

  • Rice cake
  • Peanut butter
  • Dried figs
  • Honey
  • Cinnamon

Looks like a carcass, I know.

So that, my friends, is that. Enough with the styrofoam comparisons. Give the little guy a chance.


Vegan PB Carob Bars

In Baked Goods on January 31, 2012 at 2:08 pm

Vegan peanut butter carob chip bars. Shit. Yes.

I know it’s only February but… this is the best thing I’ve made ALL YEAR. I realize the competition isn’t exactly stiff. There were those fig granola bars that ended up kind of sucking… And last night I made cornbread but totally used chickpea flour instead of cornmeal. Whoops. I should start labeling my flours…

Speaking of flours… I will marry the first man who does this to me:

THE POINT IS… These are amazing.

Domestic.

I made these because a fellow teacher trainee brought them to the studio over the weekend and they were the best damn things (plural, obviously) I’ve ever put in my mouth. So I went home and immediately made a pan for myself. This is normal behavior. Maybe there was a minor hormonal bake-my-emotions thing going on. Maybe.

What I thought could have only originated at the hands of Jesus actually comes from Bridget at Bake at 350. I learned about them from my friend Jen (Peanut Butter Runner, duh) and now here they are in my little world, veganized and chocolate-free because I am difficult accommodating.

Vegan Peanut Butter Carob Bars
Recipe Type: Dessert
Author: Katie Levans (veganization of original recipe by Bake at 350)
Prep time: 10 mins
Cook time: 30 mins
Total time: 40 mins
Ingredients
  • 6 tablespoons Earth Balance
  • 1/2 cup natural chunky peanut butter
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
  • 2 tablespoons ground flax seeds + 6 tablespoons warm water (flax eggs)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 cup white whole wheat flour
  • 1/4 teaspoon coarse salt
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 cup carob chips
Instructions
  1. Combine your ground flax seeds and water and set aside.
  2. Using an electric mixer (unless you are the Hulk), cream Earth Balance and peanut butter together until creamy. Add sugars, flax “eggs” and vanilla and beat until smooth.
  3. In a separate bowl, whisk together dry ingredients. Add wet to dry and mix until incorporated.
  4. Fold in carob chips.
  5. Pour batter into a greased or parchment-lined 8×8 dish and bake on 350 for 30 minutes.
  6. Allow to cool completely before cutting. I’m serious about this. Ok. You can eat SOME of the molten goo straight out of the pan. But then put it in the fridge and walk away. Just walk away.

Swoon.


Perception is Temporary

In Life, Yoga on January 29, 2012 at 8:34 am

Chickpeas, artichokes, tomatoes, tempeh, sriracha

The thing about Charlotte’s Trader Joe’s–the one I frequent, anyway–is that it’s located in a little dining/nightlife hotspot. It wasn’t always this way. Up until about a month ago much of the restaurant space was vacant. Back then I was free to come and go in my fuzzy slippers any time of the day or night. Now, however, when those of us who wish only to pop in to grab a frozen pizza and a bottle of wine on a Saturday night (winners) try to do so, we are met with lines of cars, parking spots only on the top deck and the realization that we are big ol’ losers.

It’s a tough life.

I mean, there’s no way I was going out last night anyway. Nineteen hours of yoga in a 48-hour timeframe will do this to a person. I just love it.

We’ve had a minor setback wherein our training was moved to an empty, unheated Rack Room Shoes:

Om shanti and shit?

The beautiful thing about doing this to a bunch of yogis, however, is that it’s met with: “Hey. This happened. It’s ok. How about rather than bitch about it we celebrate the fact that we got booted out of the studio because it’s packed with 70 people practicing yoga, many of whom may be doing so for the very first time and who would have otherwise been turned away if we were taking up half that space.”

Fair enough. It’s all about perception, my friends. Is it a shitty situation or one to celebrate? Is it a pen or something else? I love yoga.

Anyway, I am having a most delightful little time reading A Course in Miracles and wanted to share my favorite underlined passages so far:

Unspeakable love.

Lack implies that you would be better off in a state somehow different from the one you are in. Needs arise only when you deprive yourself. You act according to the particular order of needs you establish. This, in turn, depends on your perception of what you are.

Belief produces the acceptance of existence. That is why you can believe what no one else thinks is true. It is true for you because it was made by you.

You were created to create the good, the beautiful and the holy. Do not forget this. 

You can do anything I ask. I have asked you to perform miracles.

Everyone defends his treasure and will do so automatically. The real questions are, what do you treasure, and how much do you treasure it? Once you have learned to consider these questions and to bring them into all your actions, you will have little difficulty in clarifying the means. The means are available whenever you ask.

Tolerance for pain may be high, but it is not without limit. Eventually everyone begins to recognize, however dimly, that there must be a better way. As this recognition becomes more firmly established, it becomes a turning point.

Perception is temporary.

The abilities you possess are only shadows of your real strength.

Your worth is beyond perception because it is beyond doubt.

A good teacher must believe in the ideas he teaches, but he must meet another condition; he must believe in the students to whom he offers the ideas.

No force except your own will is strong enough or worthy enough to guide you.

I have reached a tipping point in my life where I no longer view all this personal exploration stuff as scary and overwhelming and depressing. Instead, I’m fascinated by it, motivated by it and simply can’t get enough of it. I gather from the wonderful comments and emails I’ve been receiving as of late (thank you) that you guys think I’m feeling weighed down and miserable, but the reality is I feel lighter than ever. I’m diving deep into some pretty intense stuff, but I don’t see this type of self evaluation as a negative thing. At all. And I don’t drag through my days moping around. I’m just passionately curious about all of this. Can’t get enough.

And with that… I’m off for eight more hours of yoga. Weeeee.


Caturday 1/28/12

In Cats on January 28, 2012 at 4:47 am

Heads Carolina, tails California...

Happy where-the-hell-did-January-go Caturday to you and yours. Ralph is feeling feisty and spontaneous and a little bit jealous that I went to the Bahamas without her and keeps trying to talk me into another trip. Talk away, Ralphus. Mamma’s got bills to pay. And you see that ominous stack of papers piling up on the desk? Those are tax documents. Look away. Look away, lest they burn a hole through your pure, innocent little tax-evading soul.

Weaz is definitely gonna get audited this year.

Bitch, please. I got biznass expenses.

Easily the most exciting thing that has happened in our (Ralph, Weaz and me) collective life this week was that I washed my sheets. And my comforter. I will not disclose the last time this happened.

Weaz supervised.

Colonel Weazface reporting for bed-making duty.

Ralph hovered there waiting, just waiting, for the perfect moment to sprawl out on my nice clean bed leaving an army of black hair tumbleweeds in her wake. Guh-ross.

Chop chop. This bed's not gonna shed on itself.

Mmmmmmmmmbed. I'm gonna pee in it.

What is with cats and my clean stuff. They do this to my clean clothes too. Which I leave in a pile on my dresser. Duh. Because my closet is tiny and it frustrates me to try and hang things in it. This is logical.

Hey Hoarders called. They asked if you want to apply.

And with that, we’re off to sleep in our clean bed. All three of us. Every night. Don’t be so jealous.


Change Your Mind

In Life, Yoga on January 28, 2012 at 12:59 am

Toast, PB, pear, cantaloupe, cinnamon

Hello, kittens. I thought very seriously about shutting this little operation down for a couple (six) months, but then I remembered I have entirely too much to say. Instead, I’ve decided to curb my Facebook/Twitter/email/phone usage. This seems to have had an immediate positive impact on my life. Onward and upward.

This is my second yoga teacher training weekend, and you know what that means: NEW AGE WEIRDO RANTS.

So grab your kabbalah bracelet and a nice hot mug of… water. Shit’s about to get weird.

Have you seen my spirulina?

Anyway. I’m actually not even delving into teacher training tonight because THIS has been consuming my life:

Everything looks cooler blurry.

I have no idea why I’m reading this book. That’s not true. I do. It’s a tangled web, a slippery slope, a long story… if you will. I believe the way this book weaseled its way into my life went something like this:

Someone posted a blog written by Gabrielle Bernstein, which I found relevant to my life. I then proceeded to stalk Bernstein and figure out her deal. Turns out she’s a drug addict turned spiritual guru often described as the “Carrie Bradshaw of spirituality.” It took me less than 30 seconds to purchase her two most recent books, Spirit Junkie and Adding More ~ing to Your Life. I regret to inform you that both books are horrendous and I read no more than 15 pages of each. HOWEVER, what I picked up on immediately was that everything Bernstein wrote about was prefaced with: “When I read A Course in Miracles…” And for some unknown reason I had to know what this book was about.

The first thing I did not see coming with this book is that is super Christian–like, written from the voice of Jesus, I gather thus far–and I am not. Not at all. Nor is Bernstein who was raised Jewish/Buddhist or “Jewbu” as she calls it. No big deal. I’m an “explorer of all faiths,” I suppose. Just didn’t see it coming.

So “Jesus” is talking to me (what?) through Helen Schucman who actually wrote it and I’m finding myself suddenly very motivated to read it all. All 1,400 pages. Because things like this keep popping up:

“Fear is always a sign of strain, arising whenever what you want conflicts with what you do. This situation arises in two ways: simultaneously or successively. This produces conflicted behavior, which is intolerable to you because the part of the mind that wants to do something else is outraged. Second, you can behave as you think you should, but without entirely wanting to do so. This produces consistent behavior, but entails great strain. In both cases, the mind and the behavior are out of accord, resulting in a situation in which you are doing what you do not wholly want to do. This arouses a sense of coercion that usually produces rage, and projection is likely to follow. Whenever there is fear, it is because you have not made up your mind. Your mind is therefore split, and your behavior inevitably becomes erratic… When you are fearful, you have chosen wrongly. That is why you feel responsible for it. You must change your mind, not your behavior, and this is a matter of willingness.”

Whew. This is the story of my life as of late. I kid you not.

Erratic behavior like, perhaps, trying to quit my job(s)? Trying to shut down the blog? Going to the Bahamas? Royally destroying relationships? Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep.

The problem, I think, is that what I want conflicts with what I do because who I am conflicts with who I tell people I am. Shwaa?? It’s a defense mechanism. Think about that.


Strange Way to Grow

In Life, Yoga on January 25, 2012 at 7:20 pm

Pretty.

There’s a difference between being alone and being lonely, I realize. It’s a fine line, blurry but razor sharp, and easily crossed if you’re not careful.

Sitting in a coffee shop reading and blogging and people watching: Blissfully alone.

Standing under a scalding hot shower at 3 o’clock in the morning, just standing there, until the water runs cold: Pretty damn lonely.

It’s all about perspective, of course. Is it a pen, or is it something else? I know the drill.

I feel like I’ve been going through this evolution this year from “Where am I going?” to “What am I doing?” to “Why can’t I do it right?”

At first I just wanted to run. I had this “anywhere but here” kind of mentality. I’ll find work anywhere but here. I’ll feel settled anywhere but here. I’ll be happy anywhere but here. It took a lot of growing up to let myself settle down, to just live somewhere without plotting my next move. So then it became not where you are but what you’re doing.

My mom always says “Bloom where you’re planted.” The point being that where you are (on the planet or in your life) shouldn’t dictate whether or not you thrive. Fair enough. So I started focusing instead on what I wanted to do with myself, independent of where I was. I thought I’d nailed it with the whole grad school thing, but we know I’ve been questioning that for a while now.

So then it becomes this question of: What am I doing wrong? Why can’t I get this right?

Today in microbiology (what the hell am I doing in microbiology?) we were talking about the growth of flagella on bacteria. (It’s the tail.)

Hey, guy.

The curious thing about flagella growth (that could be a book title… dibs!) is that it doesn’t move from the base outward like a plant rising up from the ground. Rather, it comes from the top down. Basically (I’m going to butcher this), a little cap attaches to where the tail should grow. But rather than the tail sprouting from the body and pushing the cap outward, the cap creates all these little layers that pile up on top of the base slowly pushing it up and away.

Shwaa? I know. In the end it’s the exact same growth in the exact same trajectory. But it leapt out at me today as I was sitting there just aching in class and my professor saying in her delightful British accent, “It’s such a strange way to grow.”

Ain’t that the truth.

That’s the only thing I wrote in my notes today: Strange way to grow.

Cool.

I think maybe that’s my problem. I’m fixing things slowly but surely, yes, but maybe I’m going backwards. I’m starting with the little details.

Where will I live? What will I do? Who will I be with?

And inching outward to bigger, scarier questions.

What am I doing wrong? What do I want? (Who do I want, perhaps?) Ultimately… Who am I?

I think that all of those questions are really, really difficult to answer. But I feel like the work I’m doing in yoga is getting me there. Like the whole practice has plopped down on top of my life like a little cap and it’s creating all these new thoughts, all this new possibility. Letting life build, layer upon layer of old stuff, to slowly push me upward.

Anyway. I watched the coolest documentary last night. Everyone in the world needs to see it.


The Saturday Spectrum

In Baked Goods, Life on January 25, 2012 at 6:23 pm

Fig granola bars

A Saturday night can usually go one of two ways: fun or boring.

But this is for normal people with normal schedules. For someone who works seven days a week, the Saturday night spectrum ranges from soul-crushingly unbearable to BLACKOUT DRUNK. (When you’re single you take the numerical equivalent of each extreme to the power of ten.)

You see, when you’re going nonstop and you get a hot minute to hit the town, you have pretty high expectations for where they night will lead you. Fall short and you fall into a pit of despair–”Noooo, my only night off WAAAASTED.”

Go hard and you’ll hardly remember you have a job at all–”My only night off and I’m gettin’ WAAAAASTED, bitches.”

Last weekend, Mitch and I went with the second option.

Cats included.

DREAM IT DO IT

Ladies and gentlemen, my brother.

I started out not wanting to go out at all but after a bottle of wine was most certainly whistling a different tune. It went a little something like THIS:

That song pretty much defines my college career. My parents are so proud.

So yeah, my day started innocently enough baking sweet little fig granola bars with pumpkin puree instead of oil and honey and things because I’m a dietitian or something.

Pure joy.

Figs make everything better.

And it ended barefoot in a parking garage somewhere uptown…

CLASS ACT.

Somewhere in between this happened:

One for each of us. Duh.

MITCH AND JOE PA'S FACES.

WHO ARE YOU

Whoops.

I’m a firm believer that this is part of a balanced, healthy life.


Flesh or Light

In Yoga on January 22, 2012 at 10:11 pm

Salads are for winners.

“I don’t know why you do that, Katie.”

Mitch is across the table from me, eight candles burning between us because I like to pretend they create an acceptable (albeit hazardous) makeshift fireplace on gray, rainy days. I’m giving her my most recent sob story and she’s calling it like she sees it, giving it to me straight like so few people do. I have immense respect for people who can and will put me in my place.

“I know you say you don’t have your shit together but as an outsider looking in, trust me when I say this, you’re the only one who thinks that. I don’t know why you do it.”

She’s right, of course. We humans have this incredible ability to build up intricate lies in our heads about who we are or aren’t, who we like and who we don’t, what’s good and what’s bad. We have the capacity to build entire alternate realities for ourselves, and the really amazing thing is not that we can do this but that we almost always choose misery over happiness when we do. (See: Right or Happy? Your Move.) Why do we do this?

There’s a story I keep hearing in yoga and reading in books about this concept, about how things are not themselves by themselves. They are what we think them to be only because of what we make them to be. Bear with me.

Think of an object, any object, and define what it is. In yoga the example is a reed pen. A teacher holds a reed pen up to a student, “What is this?”

“A pen,” the student responds.

“No,” says the teacher. “What is this?”

“… A pen?”

“NO. What is this?”

“It’s a pen.”

“No. What is this to a cow?”

“It’s… food.”

The point is that the pen is only a pen if the seer thinks it’s a pen.

You could go further with the pen. What is it to a warrior? A weapon. To a child? A magic wand.

Try again. Think of a park bench. What is it? A place to sit? Somewhere to sip on a latte? What is it to the homeless guy that slept on it last night? A bed, maybe?

How about me?

I blew through my life savings and can’t get my head back above water. Or… I invested in my future with higher education.

I’m at the mercy of an impossibly full schedule. Or… I’m busy because I want to be.

I sell black stretchy pants at the mall. Or… I’ve met some of my best friends at a fun job that gives me free yoga.

I’m letting everyone down. Or… I’m doing what’s best for me.

I don’t know what I want. Or… I already have everything I need.

I’m lost. Or… I’m exploring.

I read How Yoga Works in the Bahamas and it focuses a lot on this concept of things not being themselves by themselves. There is one page in the book that I’ve dog-eared, underlined, starred and shared. It is this (page 179 if you’ve got it):

He shook his head tightly, forcefully. He almost saw, and he didn’t see, and it was killing him. I picked the pen up from his desk and held it up between us–my shining golden sword.

“Is this a pen; or is it something to eat?” I demanded.

He shook his head again, violently. Help me.

I leaned over intensely and slammed my palm into his chest. 

“Is this flesh–born only to die; or is it pure and loving light?”

He looked up at me, his face changing.

“And your wife, and your daughter,” I said, loudly now, thrusting my palm there, at his chest, where the highest compassion of all lies choked. “Are they dead and gone forever; or do they stand at your side, waiting to be seen, waiting until you learn to see them, be with them, be them?”

And then I slammed my hand down again on the desk and held the pen up between us. “Is it a pen or something to eat? Answer me!” I screamed.

“A pen!” he screamed back now, nearly across the border. “A pen!”

“No!” I screamed back. “Not a pen! Never a pen! Never a pen! NO COW HAS EVER SEEN THIS PEN, AS A PEN, AND SO…” I waited for him.

“And so, and so… they would say… cows would say… that there are no pens,” he finished, still thinking it out.

“The mind makes it a pen,” he went on to himself. “It is not a pen… by itself.”

And then he looked down, at his own chest, where my hand had woken him. “And the body… my body, this flesh…” he said, holding his own two hands there, with a look of wonder growing on his face. “It is flesh, it is flesh, because… because… and only because, my mind makes me see it that way.”

It’s just… enormous. This whole concept. It’s huge. It’s all I’ve been able to think about for the last two weeks. I keep telling everyone but I feel like I’m not explaining it right. I want everyone to read it and get it and, more importantly, do it. Make the choice. What do you want? Do you want to be right or happy? Are you flesh and bone here to die or are you pure, divine, immortal light?

It feels so very out there–a little too “yoga,” if you know what I mean–but I choose light. Definitely.

Fire hazard. Look away, mom.

Stay in that one pure thought, and never forget it. That single most important thing: things are empty of being what they are by themselves. Yoga sutra I.43A


Caturday 1/21/12

In Cats on January 21, 2012 at 1:17 pm

WHAT DO YOU MEAN CHANTAL IS BACK?!

Oh heeeeeeey.

Do you know the last time I had a Caturday off?

Go.back.to.work.please.

ME NEITHER.

DAY OFF DAY OFF DAY OFF

I have big plans to sit around by myself and do absolutely nothing but bake and read and yoga and sleep and throw more things away (just kidding, donate). I love getting rid of things. Where do all these things keep coming from? No one knows. I just keep accumulating stuff… like cats.

They’re coming out of the woodwork.

HAAAAAAAAAA

Anyway. I don’t have anything to say about the cats. Except that Ralph has almost memorized the entire ashtanga primary series. And I’m proud of her.

Good job, Ralph.

Let’s go bake something. Happy Caturday.


The Little Wooden Reindeer

In Life on January 20, 2012 at 1:39 am

Completely unrelated cookie picture.

I have this very vivid childhood memory that I think sums up my entire being.

(Are you ready for this?)

We were at Farm & Fleet. Anyone who grew up in the Midwest understands this to be the kind of store that sells tractors and overalls and coon traps and tacky little knick knacks to distract the ladies while their husbands shop for deer-gutting knives. You could also probably find a sweatshirt with a “Hang in there” dangling kitten screen printed on the front if you looked hard enough. There is usually a hotdog stand out front on Saturdays. In the months leading up to Christmas they section off a significant chunk of the store with mysterious hanging tarps. Every kid in town knows that behind the hanging tarps is the most magical place on Earth (to hell with Disney World), the Alpha and the Omega, the Holiest of Holies… Behind the hanging tarps lies Toyland. Row after row of toys, glorious toys. Toys on the floor. Toys on shelves up to the ceiling. Toys as far as a three-foot eye can see.

Wouldn’t you know it, I didn’t care so much about toys, oh no. For along with Toyland came the Christmas decor display. A veritable fake tree forest sprouting up in the middle of the store, each plastic bough bending under the weight of hundreds and hundreds of ornaments. An awkward kid’s dream land.

Now. What you need to understand here is that I had this very peculiar childhood habit of attaching human emotions to inanimate objects. I’m not just talking dolls and stuffed animals and things that normal kids bring to life. I’m talking pillows and napkins and, like, wood chips. To me, everything had a story and everything had feelings and I was not about to go hurting anything’s feelings. I had to make sure that pillows didn’t fall off the bed at night, lest they feel rejected. That dirty used napkins be balled up with other dirty used napkins before reaching the trash, lest they end up in the dump scared and alone. Are you following this?

So anyway, we’re at Farm & Fleet at Christmastime. My brother and sister are in Toyland like normal children and I’m in the tree display like a lunatic. I circle the displays in search of the perfect ornament. Not perfect like the prettiest or the biggest or the coolest. Perfect like the weirdest, the straggler, the loner. The one that needed a home.

I set my sights on a simple wooden reindeer. No glitter or sequins or lights or anything. Just this one little wooden reindeer. The only little wooden reindeer, it appeared. I wanted the little wooden reindeer because the little wooden reindeer needed me.

I walked around with the damn reindeer for what felt like hours fretting over whether or not it would be mine come checkout time. I paced up and down the aisles. Set the reindeer down. Walked away like I didn’t want it anymore. Picked it back up. Put it back down, didn’t need it. Sidled back over, hid it behind other ornaments. Scooped it back up. Slipped it under tree skirts. Eventually put it back in its place and walked out with my family with not a word spoken of its existence.

That night I lay sobbing (I’m not kidding you, sobbing) in my bed. I cannot even imagine what my mom must’ve thought when she came to tuck me in and found me in such a state. Eventually, with much coaxing, through streaming tears and snotty sniffles, I managed to speak English. “I… w-w-w-wanted… the… reindeer… REINDEER ORNAMENTWAAAAAAHHHH.”

Oh, to have a photo of my mom’s face at that very moment. There was no possible way for her to have any idea what I was talking about. I envision shock, confusion, amusement and mild irritation.

“Tater. What ornament? What reindeer ornament?”

“THE REINDEER ORNAMENT AT FARM & FLEET THAT I FOUND AND I CARRIED AND I WANTED ITWAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH.”

“Well we’ll go get it tomorrow.”

“BUT IT WILL BE GONE OHHHHH GODDDDDD.”

“Well Tater, we didn’t know you wanted the ornament,” said Mom in that tone moms use when they know their child is being ridiculous but they know they’d also strangle a lion with their bare hands to protect that ridiculous child. “There was no way for us to know that. Why didn’t you just tell someone what you wanted?”

[Silence.] “I thought you’d say no.”

I never did get the little wooden reindeer ornament. I imagine I had forgotten about it the next day when some other helpless inanimate object needing my love and affection came along. Golf balls aren’t gonna tend to themselves, you know.

The point of this story is that I still do this. I always do this. I’m 26 years old and I’m still crying over little wooden reindeer. Only now things have gotten a little bigger and a lot less tangible than something so simple and innocent as a little wooden reindeer. But the story is still the same. I see something I want. I attach myself immediately. I fret over it. I hide it and disguise it and sneak it and convince myself I don’t want it or need it or deserve it. I keep it a secret because sharing it–because asking for it–opens the door for someone to tell me no.

And that, my friends, is the root of all my problems ever in existence. The end.


Sivananda: The Schedule

In Travel, Yoga on January 19, 2012 at 8:45 am

Om namah sivaya

“Do you have to be a guest of this resort to pass through here?” I called to a lanky security guard whose sole responsibility, it appeared, was to stop wandering freeloading yogis from taking up valuable five-star towel space.

I had this vision of the ashram being completely secluded, peacefully tucked away on its own little island, and when you’re on the grounds, that’s certainly how it feels. After all, I arrived after dark and, as far as I could tell from my vantage point in a little tent by the sea, was as far from civilization as possible. But after just one night on the compound the veteran residents started to fill me in on some dirty little secrets.

“Oh girl, you must be new. You know there’s a Starbucks five minutes down the beach at Atlantis, right?” Her name was Roicin (Rah-sheen), a feisty Ireland native with a heavy Gaelic lilt. She’d been tending bar in New York the last four years before moving to the ashram two weeks ago to complete their intensive, militaristic teacher training program, which she described as “BULLSHIT… bullshit, girl.” We became fast friends. As fast as two people who do little more than shoot cynical glances across the temple during satsang can be, anyway.

Tile floor is hard.

“You look like a guest to me,” the guard laughed with a wink.

This must be one of those sexist moments that works in my favor, I thought. Still, ever the rule follower, I hesitated.

“Go on, girl. Walk normal. Like you know what’s going on,” he said.

Little did he know I never walk like that. I carried on anyway past the pools and lounge chairs and rich people to a quiet little secluded spot as far away from everything as I could get.

“I’m Mario,” he called after me.

“I’m in the damn Bahamas,” I thought. “What am I doing in the damn Bahamas?”

Yeah. Do that.

So this is how most of my days went.

At 5:30am the first morning bell would ring. For some reason I did not find this to be a disgusting hour at which to rise (maybe someone slipped me some of the Kool Aid?), and I’d bound out of my sleeping bag and off to the temple for satsang before the second warning bell even sounded at 5:45am.

Mandatory morning satsang starts at 6 o’clock with 25 minutes of silent meditation followed by an hour-and-a-half of chanting and singing. Two hours is a very long time to sit on the ground, yes. At 8am the first yoga classes commence. The only practice allowed is Sivananda style, a long, slow two-hour ordeal with lots of inversions, savasanas and breathing exercises. Not my cup of tea but I played along. At 10 o’clock brunch was served, a vegan buffet usually involving some kind of soup, curry, rice, salad and fresh-baked bread. Caffeine and eggs are not allowed on the grounds.

YES.

Because I was not enrolled in any courses during my stay, I was free from 11am to 4pm when the second mandatory yoga session started. (Yep, same damn two-hour set series.) I used this time to quietly practice the ashtanga primary series (blasphemy!) and sneak down to Atlantis to lay around on the beach for the rest of the day. In case you’re counting, this brings my yoga practice count to six hours a day. I spent a lot of time walking up and down the coast, a lot of time reading and one metric shit ton of time sleeping. So much sleeping.

Whatever. Judge me.

Dinner was served at 6pm, same style as brunch. The second mandatory satsang started at 8pm but I regret to inform you that I only made it the first night. After dinner I would slip off to my tent “just to rest for a bit” and would pass out by 6:45pm. Every night. Like clockwork.

For me, the routine was exactly what I needed. The total disconnection. The solitude. The time outdoors. The time resting. My body told me what it wanted and I listened.

This morning I woke up at 5:30am, just like nothing had changed. I sat down next to my bed for 25 minutes of meditation and then sipped on hot water with lemon and coriander. Today I’m working 8am to 4pm at one job and 5pm to 10pm at another. It is my goal to hold on to the feeling of that trip in spite of my life’s rude interruption of the daily schedule. To walk normal like I know what’s going on.


So I Went to the Bahamas…

In Travel, Yoga on January 19, 2012 at 12:49 am

Mmmhm.

I had to buy a bathing suit at 10pm. Well, 9:54. Target closes at 10. That’s how last-minute this trip was and how completely unprepared for it I was. Who doesn’t own a bathing suit?

After relying on my go-to coping mechanism of avoidance for the last month, I finally accepted the fact that the flight was booked, a space at the ashram reserved, my bag packed and my excuses weak.

But…

  • I’ll miss work.
  • I’ll miss class.
  • I’ll miss… the cats.

All fine excuses, I suppose, if they were actually why I didn’t want to go. The real reason? I was scared. I was scared to death. I don’t know if it was traveling alone or sleeping in a tent or the weird cultish yogi chanting every day at 6am that awaited, or if maybe, just maybe, I was really just scared to be with myself by myself. No friends. No computer. No phone. Nothing to distract me from the fact that I had some healing and searching and growing to do.

Lovely.

So 24 hours before my flight was to take off, I paid my balance to the ashram, got my shift covered at work and started publicly announcing my “plan.” I still didn’t really think I’d do it.

Adam took me to REI to get a tent and a sleeping bag and a rain cover and all those things I was planning to just “figure out” when I got there. We went to yoga and dinner and rushed to Target to buy a bathing suit before they closed–but not before stopping for frozen yogurt. Duh. Priorities.

Oh hey. The bathing suit fit.

He set up the tent in the living room so I could pretend like I was a pro when I tried to do it myself a few hours later. We laid around in it right there on the living room rug and I realized this safe, comfortable little cocoon would look and feel quite different outside on a beach in the dark by myself.

Tah dah.

“If you leave the rain cover off you’ll be able to just lay here and look at the stars,” he said.

I don’t know why something so pleasant sounded so utterly terrifying to me at that moment. I don’t even know the last time I looked at the stars.

We took it down and he showed me how to properly fold it, which knew I would undoubtedly be unable to replicate.

“Don’t get sand in it,” he said.

“I won’t,” I lied.

“You will,” he laughed.

The whole night was one of those “Am I in a movie?” moments. Like all that was missing was a soundtrack.

I went home around midnight and started packing. This is when things got ugly.

What if my plane crashes? What if I can’t find the ashram? What if everyone is really weird? (They totally were.) What if someone kills me? What if I can’t set up the tent?

I fanned the flames of insanity by reading the retreat’s TripAdvisor reviews. Only the bad ones.

Cult or temple? You decide.

This sent me into a tailspin of irrational thoughts and actions, and I stayed up until 5am packing and repacking, binge eating an entire bag of Trader Joe’s olive oil popcorn and generally freaking out.

I eventually talked myself into at least two hours of sleep and prayed to God that I would oversleep and have a real reason not to go.

I guess God had other plans because here I am on a plane somewhere over Miami. I suppose this is happening.

Not a bad place to practice, really...

So that’s the first entry in my journal from the trip. More to come, so much more…


Tan and Talkative

In Crazypants on January 17, 2012 at 5:16 am

Hey, baby.

I’ve clearly run out of things to pre-post. It is now 4am the morning I’m supposed to be leaving and here I am blogging away like a damn lunatic.

The last time I went out of the country (Nicaragua), I didn’t sleep before getting on the plane either. I actually went to my friend’s wedding in Atlanta the night before and then drove all the way home arriving at, like, 3am. Then I packed and got on the plane three hours later. Ridiculous. My life is ridiculous.

Anyway, this seemingly irrelevant meal was one actually worth mentioning but I forgot about it so here it is now (as I grasp for filler) in all its glory:

  • greens
  • feta
  • nuts
  • dried cranberries
  • quinoa
  • tomatoes
  • carrots
  • celery
  • hummus
  • balsamic + olive oil

Yeah, boy.

Based on the reviews of the place I’m visiting, their “vegetarian buffets” are severely lacking any actual produce. Lame. I bet I really want an apple right now. I guess I’m not allowed to complain if I’m on the beach. But what if I’m writing from a time when I’m not on a beach even though when you guys read this I will be on a beach? What? Time travel. Messin’ with your head.

I’m sorry. I’ll be back tomorrow. Tan and talkative.

Oh, the stories I will tell…

 


12 Blogger Bad Habits

In Rant on January 16, 2012 at 6:36 am

Irrelevant yellow photo.

I’ve been wanting to write this rant for quite some time and since I’m safe and sound in a peaceful ashram on an island in the Bahamas, I figure now is an ideal time to share it.

Let me preface this by saying: Hate on, haters. You were thinking it, too; I just said it. Also, much like racist jokes and sexist jokes and homophobic jokes and all that mess, this is only ok for me to say because I am a blogger bad habit. My whole life is one big blogger bad habit list and, as such, I get to call all the rest of you out because I do many of these things myself. (But never #6. Ever.) It’s fine.

Without further adieu…

12 Blogger Bad Habits to Break in 2012

  1. Apologizing for not posting for 24 hours. I hate to break it to you but no one is waiting around with bated breath to hear you rant on about your oatmeal. Life, as they say, goes on. Even when we don’t post.
  2. Passive aggressively attacking readers on Twitter. “Ohmygawd, some commenters are so stupid when they as things like (insert perfectly reasonable question).” Guess what? Your readers probably follow you on Twitter, too. Now you look like a big ol’ bitch. But a big ol’ passive bitch, and that’s even worse.
  3. Calling your significant other anything but his/her given name. I’m serious with this. Just stop it.
  4. Posting shitty, irrelevant photos. See above.
  5. Talking about your traffic. Ever. Especially if you are living off your blog, this is basically like discussing your salary. Tacky.
  6. Using emoticons. This is the writer’s equivalent of putting a bumper sticker on a Bentley. Or iron-on patches on a couture dress. If your message is strong, your style natural and your tone clear, people will get exactly what it is you’re trying to say without the need for a winky face. Promise.
  7. Instagramming everything on Earth. I realize the hip fade makes your skin look flawless and your pumpkin spice latte look like a damn work of fine art, but please just take it down one notch.
  8. Passive aggressively bitching about people stealing your recipes. Every recipe is stolen, my friend. You probably stole the one you “wrote” and don’t even realize it. There are only so many ways to make a cookie. At some point, every recipe is an adaptation of something that came before it. Ask your great-grandma. She’s probably sick of the whole world getting credit for her goods. Besides, you can’t even copyright ingredients, only instructions. So write a compelling narrative on how to bake your cookie and then (and only then) can you complain if someone jacks it.
  9.  Calling yourself a writer. I’m sorry but… you’re just probably not. Eep. I said it. I’m ok with joggers calling themselves runners, but I’m not ok with casual gym goers calling themselves athletes. Do you see the difference? Someone who enjoys cooking is a cook, not a chef. Following? I’m ok with you calling yourself a blogger or even a freelancer or saying that you write as a verb, but you are not a writer. It’s a fine, blurry line, I realize. Respect it.
  10. Retweeting compliments. I totally do this. It is sad and pitiful.
  11. Acting like you didn’t just Google that. Stop spouting information like you knew it before Google told you two seconds ago. Cite your shit… even (or especially) if it’s Wikipedia.
  12. Thinking you’re famous. Just don’t.
What am I missing?


I Hope There’s Coffee

In Travel, Yoga on January 15, 2012 at 6:57 am

I love you.

First of all… All I can think right now (3am the morning I’m supposed to leave) is: “Oh dear sweet Jesus I hope they serve coffee at ashrams…” Do they? God, I hope so…

Anyway no, I did not bring my laptop to the ashram with me. But I seriously considered it. (Don’t judge me I HAVE A PROBLEM!)

They do have Wi-Fi here but I thought it counterproductive to bring my number one vice along with me to a place where I’m trying to seriously clean up my act by spending some quality time with myself.

SO… I pre-posted a few ranty-rants for your reading pleasure while I’m away. You are welcome.

The other night in class, Adam was talking about the fine line between knowing when to hang on and when to just let go. In yoga we see this (and feel it) in tough postures and long holds. For some reason, the body’s natural reaction is to tense up, for muscles to grip to bone for dear life, for our shoulders to inch up towards our ears, for our eyebrows to crinkle and our minds to flip out. “I WILL HOLD THE HELL OUT OF THIS POSE,” says the mind. “I WILL TENSE THE HELL OUT OF MYSELF,” says the body.

But this doesn’t make holding the pose any easier. It actually makes it harder. In fact, it’s straight up exhausting. The key to getting through a tough pose or a tough series or a tough class or, hell, a tough life is learning when to let go. When to take a nice long exhale and just let it ride. When to ignore discomfort and focus on inner peace.

As always, this is a big fat metaphor for our lives, too.

This is the mother holding on to her adult daughter because it’s too scary to let her live her own life.

This is the girlfriend holding on to her boyfriend because it’s too scary to start over.

This is the executive holding on to a job she hates because it’s too scary to follow your passion.

This is the controlling, Type A, paranoid blogger holding on to “content” because it’s too scary to move beyond her safe comfort zone.

Let go and let her find her own way. Odds are, it will lead back to you anyway. Let go and let yourself hurt. It’s temporary. Let go and live your dream. Life is too short not to. Let go and be uncomfortable. You have no idea how capable you are.

There are countless things we hold onto in our lives because we think that life without them will be worse. Relationships. Jobs. Material things. Addictions. But, really, there’s no way to know that until you let go. That’s when things really happen.

In yoga we pair our movements with breath. Inhale: hold. Exhale: release. It’s in the fluid release, not the rigid hold that our bodies begin to open.

Life will open up much in the same way if you can only learn to let some things go. How? Just stop holding your breath. Exhale: release. Just like that.

The day after that class, I walked into work and stepped down from one of my leadership roles. Just like that. It wasn’t fitting in my life anymore. It wasn’t something I wanted and was something I knew I could release if I simply let it go. So I did. It felt great.

What can you let go?


Caturday 1/14/12

In Cats on January 14, 2012 at 2:26 pm

Sorry, Weaz. No cats allowed.

Oh heeeeeeey.

I’m in the Bahamas.

WHAT.

I’m serious. I left this morning with a backpack, a tent and a yoga mat.

I know, right? Who do I think I am? I don’t even know. I can tell you it was definitely a last-minute decision. Like… I bought a bathing suit from Target at 9:54pm last night. I’m writing this Caturday at 2:32am. My boss doesn’t know I’m not coming to work on Tuesday (or Wednesday) and… My parents didn’t find out any of this was happening until I was already in Miami. (Sorry!)

NO ONE CARES

BUT… no one cares. Because it’s Caturday. So let’s cut to the chase and talk about who gets these gems if I decide to live out the rest of my days on an island…

My mom. Both cats go to my mom. I’m not kidding. She’s the only other person in the world crazy enough to treat them the way I do.

Moving on… Mitch is catsitting while I’m acting horribly irresponsible for a few days. I trust Ralph and Weaz will be perfect angels, right?

Right.

WRONG.

A little forewarning, Mitch-Mitch… Ralph might will give you attitude. She’s sassy. Don’t take her sass.

And if you can’t find Weaz, she is definitely inside something (think: closet, backpack, refrigerator) OR she’s on top of the refrigerator sitting by the air vent soaking up all our warm air.

Yeah, girl.

Actually, I think she’s trying to get to the wine. Keep it firmly corked or you’ll have to take her to the ER to have her stomach pumped. You know how she can’t stop after one drink bottle.

And keep an eye on my laptop. We don’t want her to get all drunk and send inappropriate pictures to her boyfriend in prison just like last time…

Gross, Weaz.

Alright, kittens. I seriously am in the Bahamas. Even though I’m writing this at 3 in the morning and at 3 in the morning I’ve actually decided that I’m definitely not going to get on that plane because it’s too scary and overwhelming and impulsive, I have faith that with at least a couple hours of sleep, this pre-posted post will find me alive and well on the sandy shores of a tropical island.

As my friend Jack so kindly reminded me in my state of complete and utter FREAKOUT: “”You have to keep showing up, being open, and doing the work. The journey into the self is not a group experience. It’s solitary work. But so many of us are afraid of being alone. So you need to experiment.”

Consider this my experiment. Holy moly.

See ya when I see ya.


Right or Happy? Your Move.

In Baked Goods, Yoga on January 12, 2012 at 8:45 am

Banana bread, y'all. The good kind.

I don’t know who I am or what I’ve done with the real Katie Levans, but I like what’s going on right now.

Maybe it’s all the yoga or the circling of the facts or the light academic load this semester or the fact that I just do not give a flying Weasel’s butt about anything, but I am so calm it’s frightening. I must be about to do something VERY stupid and impulsive… Oh, if only you knew…

So you know how I was saying that I completely resisted that whole circle the facts exercise? And it took a while for it to finally land with me? Well, according to my small-but-mighty teacher, this is why I was doing that:

I’d rather be right than be happy. And you would, too.

WHAAAAAT. Let it sink in. I know, right? Who does that?? You do. We all do. We’d rather be right than be happy. That’s what my teacher says, anyway.

Think about it. We get so attached to our stories, to these dramatic fabrications we weave in our minds, that we want to protect them, to uphold and honor them so that our point of view is seen. So we remain right. Even if they aren’t true.

We’d rather be right than happy.

It makes sense, I guess. Why wouldn’t we want to be right about the things we make up?

Of course she’s a bitch for looking at you the wrong way.

Of course he’s an asshole for not calling you.

Of course your manager is out to get you.

Because if they’re not… Well, if they’re not, then you’ve been putting yourself through a whole lot of misery for nothing. Think about how much time you spend trying to get people on your side, trying to convince them that your big dramatic goings-on are bigger and more dramatic than anyone else’s. And who wants to admit that the time put into that little effort has been wasted? No one.

Take my last relationship, for example. I think we both knew for quite a while that it wasn’t working and wasn’t going to work. But we held on to each other for dear life for entirely too long, both completely unwilling to admit that maybe, just maybe we were wrong about thinking we’d be together forever and ever. I (and I think he) had built up this whole story about our marriage and our future and all these things that didn’t exist. And since no one wants to be wrong, we put ourselves through hell to stay together just to make ourselves right.

So here we are building up our stories, doing everything in our power to convince ourselves and everyone around us that we’re right, and we’re feeling stressed and miserable the whole time. And you know what it would take to let go of the stress and misery?

Uh, letting go. Admitting you’re wrong. Admitting that you made up the “fact” that she’s a bitch or he’s an asshole or your manager’s a dictator because, really, you’re just feeling insecure or jealous or unstable and you need to blame it on someone else.

At this point in my teaching, my teacher literally held out a piece of paper, opened her hand and let it drop. “It’s just like that,” she said. “Let it go.”

But we don’t let it go. We let little things become big things. We obsess. We over think. We hold on for dear life. And you know why? Because we’d rather be right than be happy. Because if your little story  about how terrible everyone else is falls apart, then suddenly the blame is on you. Suddenly your happiness is your own responsibility. And I suppose that is a little bit scary. It’s a lot easier to blame someone else, isn’t it?

But you have a choice. You can obsess and fret and cry over things that don’t even exist outside your own mind, or you can let them all go and just be where you are right now.

So what’s it gonna be? Do you want to be right or do you want to be happy?

Also, do you want some banana bread?

Whew. I’m gonna need a book deal to get through this teacher training with all these rants I’ve got rolling around in my head… Somebody hop on that. My agent Weaz has been slacking.

Anyway, I made this bread yesterday morning before work because I was feeling particularly productive. It’s a recipe from Bittman’s How to Make Everything Vegetarian, but I tweaked it a bit to make it vegan and without the required one full stick of butter. You’re welcome.

“This Shit is Bananas” Bread
Print
Recipe type: Baked Good
Author: Katie Levans veganization of Bittman’s original recipe
Prep time: 10 mins
Cook time: 45 mins
Total time: 55 mins
The minor tweaks here to Bittman’s original recipe include using ground flax seeds and warm water to replace eggs and omitting one full stick of butter, which is replaced with a combination of oil and pumpkin puree. Brown sugar instead of white would also be beautiful here.
Ingredients
  • nonstick spray
  • 2 cups whole wheat flour
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1.5 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/4 cup oil (any will do, I used canola)
  • 1/4 cup pumpkin puree (or sweet potato)
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 2 tablespoons ground flax + 6 tablespoons warm water
  • 3 ripe bananas
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1/2 cup chopped nuts of choice
Instructions
  1. Combine ground flax seed and water and set aside. This will form your “egg” replacer.
  2. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, salt and baking powder.
  3. In a separate bowl, mash bananas and mix in remaining wet ingredients (sugar, flax egg, pumpkin, vanilla).
  4. Pour wet mixture into dry and mix to combine.
  5. Fold in nuts. Pour batter into a greased loaf pan and bake for 45 minutes on 350 degrees.

I took this to my office without even trying it (they don’t even know they’re my guinea pigs) and people went nuts. My bosslady even called to tell me that if she were 10 years younger and a lesbian, she’d ask me out just because this banana bread is so good.

I can do anything good.

Yeah yeah yeah

 


Food for Thought

In News on January 11, 2012 at 9:02 am

Foamy coffee

I opted to pass on yoga this morning in favor of sipping coffee, baking banana bread and reading about food in my bed. I love today. Here are some stories of interest…

Food X-Ray Scanners – Ew. Apparently Costco is having trouble with people breaking teeth on bone fragments in hotdogs (to the tune of 15-20 complaints per month) so they’ve invested in some X-ray machines to scan their food products for foreign objects before hitting the shelves. Disgusting. [Source: NPR Food]

Macroeconomics and Obesity – An infographic from the Food Service Warehouse shows how much food people in different countries eat compared to how much they spend on it. Americans consume by far the most calories (3,420 cals) and yet we spend the least percentage of our income on this excess (6.9%). On the other end of the spectrum is Angola where they consume just 1900 cals but spend 80% of their income to do so. Why are we able to eat so much and spend so little? Most of what we eat is highly processed food made with cheap subsidized ingredients. [Source: Food Service Warehouse via HuffPost Food]

A visualization of the 20 highest and lowest calorie consuming countries compared with those same countries’ percent of income spent on food. Built by Food Service Warehouse.

Source: Food Service Warehouse

Where Expired Food Goes Past Its Prime – From discount grocery stores to the dumpster and sometimes even the deli case, where expired foods end up is an eye-opening look at the American consumption:waste ratio. [Source: The Atlantic]

New Girl Scout Cookie Fails to Earn Badge – Apparently the new Savannah Smiles lemon-flavored Girl Scout cookie (suspiciously similar to the retired Lemon Cooler) is a big fat fail. Everyone knows homemade versions of all those cookies are better anyway. [Source: HuffPost Food]

No badge for you.

 Cool. – Tell me this is not the coolest picture you have ever seen. [Source: Laughing Squid via Saveur]

Awesome.


Circle the Facts

In Life, Yoga on January 10, 2012 at 11:15 pm

Sesame crusted tofu, spicy peanut broccoli slaw, greens

My cats will not stop sitting next to me–nay, on top of me–and licking themselves. I want to backhand them. MOUTH NOISES.

ANYWAY.

Oh, how yoga works in mysterious ways…

So one of the exercises we did over the weekend in teacher training required us to write out a detailed narrative about something that’s bothering us. We were instructed to really get into it, censor nothing, tell it like we’d tell it to our best friend. Once we were all worked up and well pleased with ourselves, our teacher then asked us to go back through and circle the facts, only the facts.

Turns out, there’s not a whole lot of truth to much of what bothers us. Most of us went from a page-long story to a couple phrases.

For example, a long-winded story like: “My dictator of a boss is clearly out to get me ever since this one time I was late to a meeting and he clearly noticed because he made me stay late to work on some report on a Monday, which he knows is Bachelor Night, and now I need to find a new job because I simply cannot work with this dickface.” might become: “I was late to a meeting. I stayed late to work on a report on Monday… I love The Bachelor (fact).”

You don’t know if your boss noticed you were late. You don’t know if the incident was in any way related to working late. You don’t know he knows you love The Bachelor. You see what I’m saying?

This is a terrible analogy. I should just share my story but… NO WAY IN HELL.

The cruel joke of it all (and the point of the exercise) was to show us how we create these stories and this drama that get us all worked up and, in the end, it all exists only in our heads. When you pare it down to just the facts, it’s not all that bad. A realization that is at once so frustrating and so freeing.

I hated this exercise. Straight up hated it. And I was vocal about it. I hated it not because it was a bad exercise but because it was late in the day at the tail end of the weekend and I was tired and my butt hurt from sitting on the hard floor and I was sick of talking about my emotions and I couldn’t think of anything that bothered me other than the damn exercise itself and, honestly, I just didn’t want to know any more about myself.

This would be an example of what we in the yoga world call “resisting.” It is me resisting the deep, heavy, introspective, earth-shattering stuff because it’s uncomfortable and I prefer to stay in my safe little closed off world. The problem with this, of course, is that it’s the deep, heavy, introspective, earth-shattering stuff that forces us out of our comfort zone and into a life far more thrilling.

ANYWAY… not 48 hours later, this damn little exercise is all I can think about. Sitting in my hell hole office for eight hours today, I found myself drifting into my familiar habit of fretting about the future, overanalyzing the past and drumming up unnecessary drama in my own head.

So I jotted this little reminder on my arm…

Remember your yoga.

And it worked. Suddenly all of the: “Oh my god I have so much to do… Why didn’t I pay that parking ticket 8 months ago? I probably have cancer… Let me check my phone… I should definitely look up doctoral programs… I bet if I had done ________ differently, ________ would have happened… Let me check my phone… When is the last time my oil was changed? Let me look at new cars just in case I need to buy a new one when not getting the oil changed makes the current one die… Let me check my phone… What’s the weather in Nassau right now? I should go to India… Where’s my phone?” kind of just went away. And all I was left with were the facts:

  • It is Tuesday.
  • I am at work.

I feel like I’m not making any sense at all. The point is, it worked. The stupid exercise I didn’t like worked. With my little reminder on my wrist, I’ve found myself thinking before I speak, not overthinking and really just trying to take things as they are and not as I misinterpret them to be.

It’s all part of an effort to take what I do on the mat and live it out in the real world. Often easier said than done.

Whew.

SO. Before you go getting all:

  • WHY HASN’T HE CALLED/TEXTED/EMAILED/TWEETED/FACEBOOKED ME I BET HE’S SLEEPING WITH BITCHES LEFT AND RIGHT…
  • Well I heard she totally (insert misconstrued thing you totally don’t know)…
  • My boss/roommate/classmate/friend hates me because (insert irrational thing here)…

Just stop, breathe and circle the facts.

“Yoga is learning to stop how the mind turns things around.” Yoga Sutra 1.2


Begin Again

In Life, Yoga on January 9, 2012 at 7:49 pm

Big awesome salad.

Back at it.

I hope you missed my Tupperware collection because it is back in all its plastic-y, hideous glory while I spend all my hours away from home for six.more.months. I realize it’s disgusting to eat at my desk but… try to stop me.

Actually, one of my assignments for microbiology is to inoculate a specimen I find anywhere in my daily life. Perhaps I’ll swab my keyboard so I’ll be forced to start bleaching it. I’m trying to think of a way to leverage this lab as an instant bad habit breaker by swabbing something I like to touch but totally shouldn’t… Like my cell phone. Or my laptop… Weasel. Free peanuts at the bar. Certain human beings. It could get awkward is all I’m saying.

So school was good… My microbio professor is British, which automatically makes her 100% more interesting to me. I sat on the edge of my seat with bated breath just waiting for her to say “lah-BOR-ah-tor-ee” again. This is going to be good.

Such praise for my research methods class is unavailable, but I do think that it will be an easy one to skip and still get an A in so… There’s that.

My day went a little something like this:

  • Wake up
  • Pack lunch (rejoice when all vegetables are already prepped from the night before)
  • 6:30am yoga
  • Shower at the studio
  • Discover that top packed simply will not work with ensemble planned. Opt to wear the tank I slept in instead. It’s January. Whatever.
  • Assemble breakfast in the car.
  • Work.
  • Microbiology.
  • Field lots of questions about whether or not I’m cold in just a tank top. Yes I am, thanks.
  • Microbio lab.
  • Research methods.
  • Ashtanga at home.
  • BACHELOR.

I actually practiced what I preach and prepped produce.

Center console coffee bar.

Tortilla with peanut butter, figs and honey. AH!

Eat. Sleep. Breathe. Yoga. (Where's Weaz?)

My first yoga teacher-to-be task is to memorize the primary series in Ashtanga yoga. It’s pretty much awesome. I have limited exposure to Ashtanga because I spend all my yoga hours in power vinyasa classes but… turns out I love it. I love the history behind it (some 3,000 years). I love the unwavering constancy of the practice over all that time. I love the feeling of doing something bigger than myself. I love the discipline. I love the challenge. I just really love it.

I tend to avoid things I don’t think I’ll be good at. But my new flirtation with this very old and intimidating practice (and the immediate enjoyment I got from it) leads me to believe that by being so damn careful I may be missing out on more great things than I’d like to admit.

RIGHT??

 


I’m Ready

In Life, Yoga on January 8, 2012 at 9:35 pm

Lovely

Whew.

Hello.

What a weekend.

This was my first weekend of teacher training, and I think I’ve decided not to share my experience here.

WHAT?? I know. I have boundaries. Who knew??

It’s just that most of what we do doesn’t really have anything to do with the physical postures most people associate with yoga, and, in fact, much of our time is spent journaling and sharing and definitely crying. It’s a little bit deep and heavy and intense and also fun and light and uplifting all at the same time. Mostly, much of the things discussed in our little windowless cave of a room for 10-hour stretches of time (we get breaks) are not my stories to share. There’s a level of trust and respect amongst the trainees that I simply can’t violate. You understand.

I’m saying this like it was my idea to not violate the trust circle, and it wasn’t. It’s a rule, actually. What we say in teacher training doesn’t leave teacher training. Period, as Mitch would say.

Don’t get me wrong, I will most certainly be ranting on about sutras and poses and practices that hit home with me and resonate with my personal life. But the rest, I’m afraid, is for our little group only.

Here are some shareable details:

  • I love this and it was the right decision.
  • I am overly eager to teach and need to just calm down and learn.
  • Sitting on hard floors for hours on end makes my butt hurt and my attention span dissipate.
  • I am far bendier than I thought. I am also far less bendy than I thought. All at the same time. You know.
  • Dried figs with peanut butter make my world go ’round.
  • No discussion of bodily functions is off limits in a room full of women willing to share anything with each other.
  • Showers are completely overrated.
  • Dry shampoo is my friend.
Also. This is what we worked on today…
Uddiyana bandha, y’all.
Yeeeeeeah. You think that looks weird? Just imagine what it looks like when we get into the whole undulating, in-and-out deal. (Behold.) Looked like a damn rap video up in that yoga studio. (PS – I can do it. NOT what the girl is doing in the video. Good god, who do you think I am? Just the whole in-and-out deal. I attribute this to my belly dancing days…)
So tomorrow is my return to reality. School starts back up and with it comes my commute and my ridiculous schedule. Notably absent this semester, however, will be my negative attitude, overcommitment and exhaustion because I’m going to take it a day at a time. More importantly, I’m going to take care of myself. I promise.


Caturday 1/7/12

In Cats on January 7, 2012 at 7:32 pm

Oh, hello. May I offer you a nightcap?

Happy first Caturday of 2012. The world is ending this year, right? I hear that only people with 2+ cats will be raptured. Or will die like everyone else but at least be reincarnated as cats. Also all the current cats in the world will become humans and we’ll all switch places. So y’all should really all stock up on some felines. I’m just saying.

Something like that, anyway…

THIS IS MY FIRST WEEKEND OF TEACHER TRAINING.

I feel like this:

EEEEEEEEE

But this day is about cats, not yoga. Or is it…?

LOOK what Emily sent me:

Maaahahaha

A Yoga Kittens calendar. All I know is I cannot WAIT until November 2012…

Aaaahahaha

Thank you, Emily. I think it was a very thoughtful and timely gift. Ralph and Weaz, however, would like to just point out that it is not edible. And they want some treats.

Since Mitch and I are going to be at the studio for the rest of our lives, the cats now have free reign of our humble abode. Ralph has decided that what’s Mitch’s is hers and is spending an inappropriate amount of time in her bed.

I do what I want.

Weaz appears to be playing a never-ending game of “don’t touch the lava” and, as such, spends all of her time on counters and tables I told her not to ever touch.

Technically speaking, I'm not on the table.

Jerks.

I don’t know what I’m talking about. I’m too high on yoga right now. Sorry you had to see this. Here’s a chihuahua in a hoodie for your trouble:

Bitch, please.

I’m gonna go eat Indian food and say things in sanskrit. Just kidding. (No I’m not.)


Temporary Burn

In Yoga on January 6, 2012 at 2:18 pm

Taco night at casa de Rachael

Last night I was in yoga (as I tend to be) and it was awesome (as it tends to be). I had ventured beyond my home studio because I figured if I’ll be doing my training there for the next six months, I should probably branch out and experience other studios whenever I can. I have this incredible opportunity available to me to learn from as many teachers as possible and I want to soak that up like the eager little sponge I am.

So there I am in this music-less, mirror-less studio (not my cup o’ tea usually) and the teacher is all “kundalini… standing splits… kundalini… standing splits… kundalini… standing splits.” You get the idea. Or perhaps you don’t… It’s basically a whole lot of standing on one foot. Crouched down with one foot hooked behind the other at first and then fully extended with the body folded over one straight leg while the other leg searches for the ceiling.

An uncomfortable burn builds up in the ankle and, as is the case in most uncomfortable situations, you have this urge to retreat. But that exact moment, as most teachers say, is precisely when your yoga practice really begins. That’s when it shifts from a physical practice to a mental practice. It’s a chance to control your emotions and just breathe through it.

“Learn to keep your feelings in balance, whether something feels good, or whether it hurts.” I.33D

I kind of wanted to drop my raised leg to take some of the pressure off my burning ankle but then I decided to just stand there and take it, to just feel it. And wouldn’t you know it, not 30 seconds later when the teacher called dragon lunge and my burning ankle released to the back of the mat, the discomfort ended almost immediately. “The burning is always temporary,” she said.

Life is like this, too. Bad things happen and uncomfortable situations arise and our instinct is often to retreat. But imagine for a second how it would feel if you were to stand there and just take it, just feel it. How fleeting the pain is, how inevitable and all-consuming the release will be. It may not happen quickly, and sometimes it may feel like it won’t happen at all. But whatever you’re fighting and wherever you’re hurting, just take it. Just feel it. Peace is always coming because the burn is always temporary.

“The pain you’re feeling can’t compare to the joy that’s coming.”

After class I went to taco night at casa de Rachael with my doting husband Mitch.

Viva la Rach

What a dreamboat.

And I felt really, really grateful for the miserable year I had–for my aching heart and my battered spirit–because it makes the current release feel that much better. I am overwhelmingly at peace with everything. I am so ready.


Sesame Crusted Tofu

In Recipes and Meals on January 6, 2012 at 10:53 am

Sesame crusted tofu, quinoa, roasted broccoli.

Hey, vegetarians. Ever watch your friends order seared sesame-encrusted ahi tuna and think, “I sure wish I could order something sesame encrusted…”? Wish no more because have I got a solution for you…

Remember how I said there’s a way to make tofu that’s not mushy and sponge-y and tasteless? (Press, marinade, bake.) And remember how I’m on a crusade to turn tofu doubters into believers? (Everyone knows this is your fast track to heaven.)

Well. Consider this your gateway recipe into the coagulated soy product promised land…

Have you ever had gomasio? (Why do I have so many questions? What is this, a test?) You must. You will love it.

Gomasio

It’s a Japanese dry condiment made from toasted sesame seeds, salt and sometimes seaweed flakes. It’s a big part of the macrobiotic diet (Have you noticed I’ve been flirting with that lately? How obnoxious of me…) and it will rock your world. You could make this with plain ol’ sesame seeds but… what fun is that? Just get some.

This is definitely the best, crispiest tofu I have ever prepared, which has a lot more to do with the length of time it was pressed than with the sesame crust itself. But the sesame seeds add a pleasant crunch and nutty flavor to everyone’s favorite flavorless food.

Sesame Crusted Tofu
Print
Author: Katie Levans
Prep time: 5 mins
Cook time: 20 mins
Total time: 25 mins
Serves: 2
Ingredients
  • 1 block of extra firm tofu, pressed overnight
  • non-stick spray
  • soy sauce (or liquid aminos)
  • gomasio (or plain sesame seeds)
Instructions
  1. Drain liquid away from tofu and place in a press. Refrigerate for 24 hours, or at least overnight. Periodically pour off the separated liquid.
  2. Slice pressed tofu into strips.
  3. Coat a baking pan with non-stick spray and arrange tofu strips.
  4. Spray strips, as well, and then drizzle with soy sauce and sprinkle with gomasio on each side.
  5. Bake in a 400-degree oven for approximately 10-12 minutes on each side, or until light golden brown and crispy

1

2

3

 

That’s it. I ate this for three meals straight served with quinoa and vegetables.

Do it.

Whatever, tuna.


Goals and Good Ideas

In Goals on January 5, 2012 at 9:39 am

Move cookbooks to fridge = good idea.

Sometimes I have good ideas.

Get the cookbooks off the tiny counter to free up space for the fruit basket so it doesn’t sit on top of the fridge filled with rotting pears you can’t see. Good idea.

Use a mini Patron bottle for salad dressing on the go…

Good idea.

But most of the time I just have a lot of bad ones. For example…

Leave the oven on for 12 hours while you are sleeping. Bad Idea.

Do not buy this coat even though it is cheap and adorable.

Bad idea. Go back and get it.

Wear skinny jeans to get a pedicure. Bad idea (unless you like watching someone struggle to roll your pants up).

Luckily, I haven’t made any monumental life decisions (good or bad) in a while. Perhaps it’s because I’m about a week late on rewriting my goals for 2012. Time to hop on that gravy train. What is a gravy train? No one knows.

If you are also slacking on the goal front this year, check out the latest episode of A Healthier Charlotte where we chat resolutions, goals and all that good stuff.

Oh hey.

I chatted with Dr. John Hoctor of Hoctor Chiropractic, Jon Davis of Elements 2 Lead and host Bobby Demuro. Great guys.

(See the episode here.)

On that day of filming, I also shot a 7-minute segment on quick, healthy breakfasts. Look for it on an upcoming episode.

 


Carpe Diem?

In Life on January 4, 2012 at 10:36 am

Two hours in, she refuels.

OK.

I’ve been up cleaning my house for four-and-a-half hours. It is 9:30am. You do the math.

Yes it is my day off and yes I would like to do one billion other things, but sometimes a girl just needs a clean house, you know? So this is happening…

AH!

My house is actually never really dirty or disorganized (that’s not true… CAT HAIR) but every once in a while I feel like it is so I go completely batshit crazy and start moving things to different drawers and throwing things away and convincing myself I will lead a far more productive life as a result. It’s a little bit OCD, little bit PMS. In the end, it pretty much just looks exactly the same as it did when I started, except that I can’t find some of the things I moved.

In my morning adventure, I found a roasted chestnut under my dresser, a chaptstick I knew the cats stole months ago and a pearl necklace covered in melted chocolate. Do not even ask. It is currently soaking in a bowl of hot water.

I also assembled a bathroom shelf for our million bottles of shampoo and vowed to never again purchase a piece of furniture that requires assembly. Hold me to that.

What have you been up to today? Feeling comparatively unproductive? Don’t. I’m about to go get a pedicure and shop and spend, like, five hours at the yoga studio. I just happened to get a jump start on the day.

Duh.

 


Vegan PB Carob Cups

In Dessert on January 3, 2012 at 6:41 pm

Vegan cocoa-free peanut butter cups. Holy shit.

Holy shit.

Sweet holy shit.

Listen. When I’m about to get my period, one of two eight things will probably happen…

  1. I will yell at the cats.
  2. I will yell at a human.
  3. I will go on a cleaning/organizing rampage.
  4. I will throw away most of my worldly possessions.
  5. I will try to quit my job(s).
  6. I will think the world is ending.
  7. I will cry.
  8. I will make dessert.

And since I don’t actually track my cycle (what am I, a scientist?), these telltale signs are my most reliable warning of what’s to come. Never fails.

So since I cried last night in yoga, made these PB carob cups afterwards, snapped at a coworker today and have big plans to clean the fuck out of my house in about 15 seconds… I think we all know where this week is headed.

I don’t know if these peanut butter cups are the best thing I’ve ever eaten in my life because of my current hormonal state or because they really are the best thing I’ve ever eaten in my life. Kind of like how it’s hard to tell if drunken french fries at 3am are really the best french fries you’ve ever eaten or if perhaps you’re just obliterated. You know what I’m saying.

These are Alicia Silverstone’s vegan chocolate peanut butter cups from The Kind Diet with a few minor swaps on my end. You see, I have somehow surrounded myself with people who are allergic to chocolate (the horror) and refuse to believe that they can’t eat all the things I make with a few simple modifications. Y’all know how I feel about making vegan, gluten-free, allergen-friendly foods that everyone can enjoy. It’s not that difficult to accommodate specialty diets and it makes people happy so… there’s that.

SO, yes. Alicia’s recipe works perfectly well when subbing carob chips for chocolate chips. You could certainly use sunflower or soy butter for anyone who’s allergic to peanuts, and gluten-free cookies can take the place of traditional graham crackers for people with Celiac. The milk can be absolutely any milk you have on hand. It calls for soy, but if you’re allergic you could use rice, almond or coconut (my choice).

Tah dah.

What the hell is carob?

Carob is a legume related to the pea family.  It can be processed into powdered, chip or syrup form and used as a substitute for cocoa. Carob chips and powder are widely available at specialty markets, and Sunspire is the brand I see most often.

Now, if you’ll excuse me… I have a house to clean and one dozen peanut butter cups to consume.


Apple Muffins

In Baked Goods on January 2, 2012 at 10:14 pm

Vegan apple muffin

Weaz and I are really upset we missed the Charlotte casting for The Bachelor.

Though my mom begs and pleads with me not to go through with it, I will be on that show one day. Just you wait. What could possibly go wrong? I get a couple months off work. I get to be all up on TV. I potentially fall in love or potentially get a show of my own. Boom. Done.

Unfortunately, according to my mom, I will end up on the cover of tabloids and bring shame to the Levans name. I guess her theory is slightly more plausible.

So since we couldn’t be on The Bachelor this season, Weaz and I are watching with one collective scrutinizing eye.

Whatever, horseback rider.

We are not impressed.

Ben could’ve been mine. All mine. Instead, he’s being wooed by these bitches on horses. I will no doubt wake up tomorrow and promptly create my video application for next season… And these apple muffins will give me the energy I need to make myself sound more interesting than I am and look more beautiful than I am.

Is no one else horrified when they see the ages on those girls? I’m like… YOU’RE TWENTY FOUR?? I’m 26 and I look like a 12-year-old next to you, you fucking pin-up.

Where do they find these girls? (Model castings.)

Anyway, these are apple muffins…

Single lady bachelor muffins.

Just use Katie’s single lady cupcake recipe (can you tell I love that thing?) and add cinnamon, chopped dried apples and one apple ring on top. I always double the recipe and make two. Duh.

This just in…

Mitch: “There’s a girl from Charlotte!”

Katie: “God DAMN it. It could’ve been me.”

And with that, I’m off to waste my life away with this four-hour premiere episode. See ya, brain cells.


Spicy Maple Glazed Tempeh

In Recipes and Meals on January 2, 2012 at 3:27 pm

Spicy maple tempeh, quinoa, steamed kale.

“What the hell do I do with tempeh?” is perhaps one of the most frequently asked questions I receive, second only to “How do you do your hair?” (I don’t) and “Can I have Weasel?” (No).

The problem with me telling anyone what to do with tempeh is that I like tempeh a whole lot. So much, in fact, that I’ll eat it cold straight out of the package. (See?) But if I tell people to do this then no one will like tempeh (at all) and my work here on this planet will be completely for want of a nail… except I guess it’ll really be for want of a decent tempeh recipe…

SO… Here’s a quick and simple (but not cold and raw) tempeh prep that’ll ease you into eating this fermented delicacy. It’s a little bit sweet, a little bit salty, a little bit spicy and a little bit perfect. Serve it over quinoa and kale or stuff it in a pita pocket with red pepper hummus and spinach.

Spicy Maple Glazed Tempeh
Print
Author: Katie Levans
Prep time: 5 mins
Cook time: 16 mins
Total time: 21 mins
Serves: 2
Ingredients
  • 1 package organic tempeh
  • 2 tablespoons maple syrup
  • 2 tablespoons oil
  • 1 tablespoon soy sauce
  • 1/4 teaspoon chili flakes
Instructions
  1. Slice the tempeh into strips
  2. Combine remaining ingredients and marinade tempeh in the sauce
  3. Coat a pan with nonstick spray and arrange tempeh strips on it
  4. Bake at 400 degrees for 16 minutes, flipping tempeh half way through cooking time

Cut.

Marinade.

Bake.

What’s the difference between tempeh and tofu?

Tempeh and tofu are both soy-based products. Tofu is made by solidifying soy milk with a natural coagulant (usually a seaweed) and tempeh is made by fermenting whole soybeans with a mold. Technically, tempeh would be the “less processed” option, as the whole beans are used rather than first being processed into milk and then used. You can make both at home so I consider each to be perfectly acceptable, minimally processed foods.

Tempeh is denser than tofu, which is light and spongy. It holds up nicely under most prep techniques, including baking and frying. It is also perfect for crumbling into sauces and soups (almost like a ground meat substitute).

Tempeh is higher in protein than tofu, packing a whopping 20g per serving, almost unheard of in animal-free foods.

Now you know.

Tempeh Recipes

Copycat recipe: Mellow Mushroom’s Tempeh Sandwich

Deconstructed Vegan BLT Salad

Stupid Easy Vegan Chili

BBQ Tempeh Sandwich

My Go-To Tempeh Sandwich

Curry Tempeh Stuffed Peppers

Baked Honey Mustard Tempeh

 


Hello, 2012.

In Life, Yoga on January 2, 2012 at 12:39 am

Smoothie smoothie smoothie

I don’t know about you, but I was pretty happy to bid 2011 farewell. In a lot of ways, it should have been the worst year of my life (a sign I’ve had a very easy life, I realize) and in a lot of ways I guess it was. It really was. I had just walked away from a great job and into financial strain I had never before experienced. I moved to a new city with a man I thought I’d marry and watched the relationship crumble under the weight of some very big plans I’d made for myself without regard for anyone or anything else. I pushed myself past the brink of mental breakdown with a schedule that demanded more than I could reasonably give. I filled every second of every day, taking on more and more and more to distract myself from… myself.

But I realize now that what was happening wasn’t all negative. I learned a lot about myself (good and bad), about what I’m capable of (a lot more than I thought) and about what it means to be vulnerable. I learned it’s ok to lean on others and formed some incredible bonds doing so. I learned it’s ok to not be ok and shouted from the rooftops that I was not. I learned I don’t have all the answers and also that sometimes there simply isn’t an answer. Some things just are. I learned that sometimes all you can do is laugh, even if it’s at yourself. Most importantly, I learned that I have a hell of a lot more to learn, about the world and my place in it.

Today, the first day of 2012, was flawless. Absolutely flawless.

I drank hot water with lemon because it felt like the kind thing to do to my body after drinking a bottle of champagne last night. I walked to brunch with one of my very best friends and grabbed coffee on the way home. I had a beautiful fireside yoga practice at a tiny studio not far from my house. There was live music and kirtan (call-and-response chanting). It was very yoga, if you know what I mean…

Anyway, the teacher talked a lot about the new year, about setting an intention and creating a vision for 2012. This rocked me:

“That is the past, and it is beautiful. This is my future vision, and it is so.”

So simple. So powerful. The subtle use of the present tense gently tugs you out of your head and grounds you right here, right now. I have a hard time living in the present because I’m always overanalyzing the past or fretting about the future. But with this, it’s all in the present. It’s not “That was the past, and it was beautiful.” You can move on from the past without abandoning it entirely. That is the past and it is with me right now. That is the past and it brought me where I am now. That is the past and it shapes who I am.

And it’s not “This is my future vision, and it will be so.” It is so. It’s already happening. If you can dream it, you can do it.

DREAM IT DO IT.

It’s going to be a very, very good year. I will finish my masters, complete my 200-hour yoga teacher training, write a feature story for Charlotte Magazine,  film my own cooking series for A Healthier Charlotte and pay my rent with blog revenue. This is my (immediate) future vision, and it is so.

Happy 2012 to you. Thank you for spending time here.

May the light of your soul guide you.
May the light of your soul bless the work
You do with the secret love and warmth of your heart.
May you see in what you do the beauty of your own soul.
May the sacredness of your work bring healing, light and renewal to those
Who work with you and to those who see and receive your work.
May your work never weary you.
May it release within you wellsprings of refreshment, inspiration and excitement.
May you be present in what you do.
May you never become lost in the bland absences.
May the day never burden you.
May dawn find you awake and alert, approaching your new day with dreams,
Possibilities and promises.
May evening find you gracious and fulfilled.
May you go into the night blessed, sheltered and protected.
May your soul calm, console and renew you.

- John O’Donohue