Reflections on Self-Love - PASSION; Co-Op Visit, First Photos from the Farm

Hope everyone's midweek is going well. This is the penultimate day of reflections on self-love! It has flown by, even with going on this trip, and I sincerely hope that its energy will endure well past the 30-day period.

So many treats at the farm - I try not to think about the fact that we can't grow this stuff up where we live:

Gorgeous heirloom tomatoes - they are just delectable. Ordinarily, I don't think I do that well with tomatoes, but these are just wonderful, and no better time to enjoy them. Some little tomatillos in that bowl - I adore those too.

Here's a box of filberts that have been through the cracker (picture to come) and are ready for us to sort through and dry for preservation:

More tomatoes, some grapes, some beans (both green beans and 'orca beans.' In the steel bowl were some cherry tomatoes, but I think we ate them all! Loads more out in the fields...

Just a little memory trip - this is the last salad I made up in AK - so green! So many different good greens, (and I could easily grow lettuce and herbs here too) but quite a color contrast.

Today, I came to work at the Natural Foods Co-Op. There's no natural foods store in Homer, so it's so nice to come to it. And its wifi is faster than the one at Fred Meyers yesterday! I've never had the photos upload to blogger so fast! I didn't even need hardly to multitask while waiting on them going up! It says something very complimentary about Corvallis that this co-op actually has two branches in the town.

I was a little disappointed by how few raw products they had: I was sort of looking forward to treating myself to trying something I don't usually get access to. Maybe when I take a trip to Portland...

But they do have kombucha starter kits (never seen one of those in a store before!)

And an amazing bulk section - all kinds of grains, beans, trail mixes, candy, nuts, seeds, but also olives, pesto, nut butters sauerkraut, etc, refrigerated

And a whole bank of liquids, oils and syrups. And they even have frozen berries and veggies in bulk.

I also love that they have reused plastic and glass containers for people to put their bulk buys in. I brought one of those amazing tomatoes from the farm and an avocado to have for lunch, but I'm probably going to have to buy some of their kim chee to have with it, and maybe get some of their very-well-priced bulk raw tahini also.

OK - Tina's reflection on self-love today is about PASSION - what an awesome topic! I've long paid lip-service to the idea that the universe wants us to be at our best (which means, doing what we love and have most affinity for), because that makes the universe its best too. Lip-service, but for a long time I've also not really lived that in my life. I feel like I'm just starting to learn how to make it real in my life. And self-love is absolutely key to that. NOt living my passion is about not loving myself enough to be my best.  Tina asks, "What things are you most passionate about? How do they affect your life?"

Thank you for this question: I think it's good to ponder this question very regularly, to check in and make sure that you are in fact making the time in your life to do that which really inspires and impassions you.
What lights me on fire? Well, as this post so far shows, I'm passionate about growing and harvesting beautiful food and sharing its beauty with others. That was the bulk of what I was doing when I lived in Hawaii, one way and another. But it is only a part of my passion, and it isn't, perhaps, the most important part, although it's definitely important.

My true passion is my writing - and especially my poetry writing. Writing my blog is so much fun and so gladdening, but it doesn't give me quite the sense of being completely in tune and in the flow that sitting down and really working on my creative writing does. For me, poetry writing is the deepest work that I can do toward being my best, because it is connecting with my spirituality and with the sense of GOD as 'Good Orderly Direction,' even when the poem is all about chaos!

I've been working a lot on my translation jobs recently, and on other things, and with the trip, visiting, working on the farm, etc, I haven't been making much time for this writing and connecting. It feels so good to be reminded to think about how important it is to me. And the next step is to honor myself, and it, and make the time to spend with it!

What are  you most passionate about?

Reflections on Self-Love (in Oregon!): The Deeper Issues; Visit to Phil's Timberland

Greetings from Oregon! I'm online courtesy of Fred Meyer supermarket, and am experiencing reverse sticker-shock. Not just produce, but everything  is so much cheaper than in Alaska! Ok, I knew that. Get over it.

Not having gotten online yesterday, my inbox was overflowing and I was behind on work, so this will have to be somewhat brief.

In today's reflection on self-love, Tina talks about using negative self-talk or behavior as a shield or smoke-screen to avoid dealing with the real, deeper issues. Even with only three days left to go (yes, really!) we're not even getting close to running out of important areas to explore.

I'll come back to that in a moment, first want to talk about what we did earlier today and how it brought up some 'real stuff' emotions, for Phil in particular.

Phil has a twenty-some acre piece of timberland, consisting basically of a north-facing and a south-facing hill-slope about 40 miles away from the family farm. He bought it before I was born, planted it in Douglas Fir and logged it a few years ago, just before we got together. That means that I was involved in the replanting over the last few years - planting baby trees into the ground still treacherous with fallen branches, in snow and sleet and horizontal rain. Because he adores them, and because he adores a challenge, he planted in Western Red Cedar instead of Douglas Fir, with an admixture of alders for nitrogen fixation, oregon grape and vine maple (natives) and some native hardwoods (madrone and chinquapin) that volunteer there. He left some of the old trees up when he had it logged, for diversity. Here's sort of what it looks like today:

Close in shot with ferns and deadfalls:

Madrone clump in the foreground and a great view into the distance:

Unfortunately, the deer love Western Red Cedar above all else. They think it's candy! It's so frustrating: if we could get them to leave the baby trees alone for two more years, the whole area would be a wondrous habitat for the deer! Phil had heard from family members that stopped by in the early spring that the deer predation had been bad this past winter. Last fall, everything was in great shape. Today, a lot of those plastic tubes had been pulled off the baby trees and the deer had eaten back all the year's new growth. (Phil and I spent so much time replacing and straightening those tubes that I took to calling them 'deer candy-bar wrappers'!) It takes just one smart deer to figure out how to do it, and the jig is up. But, if that smart deer can be eliminated or sidetracked, it might set back the predation. Deer aren't ordinarily considered predators, are they? They're our biggest problem here!

Other problems are poison oak, certain invasive blackberries, and thistles. With all the dead branches that haven't yet rotten down overgrown with blackberry vines, it can be very treacherous hiking.

Here I had a blackberry wrapped around my legs and a thistle in between my legs! Ouch!

And it's pretty steep too.

Theoretically, a forest land is the ideal kind of land for an absentee owner - once the trees are up, it takes far less maintenance than any other kind. And Phil has loved just knowing it's there.

But today he was really down about how it looked, how poorly so many of the trees had done, thanks to the deer and thanks to the fact that he lives so far away and hasn't been able to take care of it. This was an emotional response to a very real situation - no smokescreen at all. It's especially challenging when Phil gets down, because ordinarily he's so positive. I just did my best to give him space, offer my ear when he wanted to talk possible solutions, and be as loving as I possibly could be.

And what of the reflection on self-love? Tina asks why we do this cover-up activity, and asks for any tips to avoid it. I think her own tip is especially excellent: she says, "I liked simply to ask, "Why?" about everything. Whenever I feel myself getting emotional or negative, I ask, "Why?" I don't deny my feelings, but when I realize the source, often I realize their insignificance and move on naturally."

I am going to remember that one and try it! Negative self-talk and behavior can definitely be a kind of self-indulgence - I retreat into the familiar ground of "I'm too fat," or "I suck," rather than looking squarely at why I can't stand it when I make a small mistake, or why I feel so uncomfortable when I am out of my comfort zone. At the moment, having a certain cushion of 'comfort zone' is important to my healing, so I'm recognizing that part of my self love at the moment is maintaining that. Asking 'why'? instead of indulging in self-flagellation will be a helpful way for me to gauge how well I'm doing at a given time, and to make sure that my body is getting all she needs in order that I can be my most loving and gracious self during our visit.

Phil's family is awesome and varied and challenging, like all families. I'm starting to feel that it's especially important to be our best in the family setting, because it's precisely the setting in which it's easiest not to be! What I hope for is eventually to be able to be at my best without having to be tense with it.

Thank you to Tina for this great topic - with love.

Quick Post - Reflections on Self-Love: Numbers

Hey everyone!

I keep saying I may not get a chance to post, with our journey coming up. Yesterday, I thought I might not get anything posted, and ended up posting a full-on recipe! Well, today's is going to be much briefer, as I'm not packed yet (piles of supplements, no-sugar bars, etc, all over the place) and we're out of here in less than four hours, but Tina's reflection on self-love for today is so important that I needed to share a few words also.

It froze here last night!! And the bear that keeps hanging around our place and our neighbors' places was right up on the porch last night. Phil heard it, opened the door and it practically walked in. When he slammed the door, it didn't even bolt, just walked off slowly. Unfortunately, last night it also dug up compost we'd been burying, which will be a major incentive for it to hang around here more, rather than foraging for its natural foods farther afield. Sadly, we'll have to take our last batch of food scraps to the dump on our way out of town.

Ok, so reflections on self-love.  Tina just says it so beautifully today. While numbers are useful tools, they can take over our lives and we can get caught in the trap of measuring everything.

I can't do better than just quoting what she says: "We need to stop using numbers as a measuring stick for who we are. You can't put love for others on a scale. You can't put passion in a bank account. You can't put fun and enjoyment on a tally sheet. You can't put friendship in a spreadsheet. We must look past numbers to the bigger picture of what makes up our lives."

Amen sister! So well said. She asks, "Have you ever been caught in a number trap?" - and, crucial follow-up question - "What could you have focused on instead of the numbers?"

Ahh - is there anyone for whom this doesn't ring true? Whether it's numbers on a scale, numbers of dollars in the bank account, or even numbers of heads of cabbage you managed to get past the slugs... It's a dangerous place in which to locate our self-worth.

These days, I'm on a self-imposed (but also naturopath-ordered) 'scale strike.' I don't get on the scale. I'm hypersensitive to the smallest fluctuation in my size anyway, and jumping on a scale would invite me to focus on that and obsess about it, make myself miserable. I love Tina's question about what one could focus on instead. For me, part of not getting on the scale should be gauging my energy levels, gauging how happy and loving I'm feeling, being grateful for all that I'm able to do now, rather than tormenting myself over whether my thighs have gotten close together.

Numbers are so alluring, because they give an illusion of control. But it really is an illusion. You can know this, and be controlled by it at the same time. For a long time, I literally could not eat something, unless I had put it on the scale first to calculate its exact number of calories. And I'm talking even a piece of lettuce! I could be too exhausted to hold my head up, but no, I couldn't eat the banana in my backpack until I'd somehow gotten myself home to weigh it. What insanity! And even at the time, I knew that the scale wasn't accurate; I knew that every ounce of banana couldn't possibly have the same number of calories: you can taste how much sweeter some are than others, and there's a reason for that. And yet, the numbers, the illusion of control, ended up controlling me.

It wasn't a joyful kind of existence, and I was stuck there for too long. I really hope not too many other people have to experience that.

OK - I must go pack!
lots of love to all.

Getting Ready To Go! No-Sugar Halvah Bar; Reflections on Self-Love - Body Parts #4

We're leaving here after lunch tomorrow to start our journey! And I was on the road all day yesterday. Had company for breakfast, having company for dinner, I'm trying to get everything packed and figure out all the food I'm taking - it's going to be a hectic couple of days after this. I hope I'll get to blog, on self-love at least, tomorrow and Monday, but it may not be possible.

I went back and added the photos to yesterday's post - not spectacular but maybe they add a bit, at least.

Phil's daughter is coming to dinner, and she's avoiding sugar at the moment, so I whipped this up for her (I get to have a bit of dessert too when she's on her diet!)

It's a halvah bar (guess I connected with my Mediterranean roots). The base is: 

1/3 cup sesame seeds, 

1/3 cup shredded coconut

1/3 cup golden flax meal

4 tablespoons xylitol,

2 tablespoons coconut oil,

pinch salt

couple drops water

processed until crumbing up, then pressed into loaf pan.

Topping is:

1/2 cup soaked sesame seeds,

1/2 cup water

2 tablespoons lime juice

4 tablespoons xylitol

pinch of salt

piece of vanilla bean

good dash of ceylon cinnamon

blended in Vita-Mix until smooth; then add:

1 tablespoon cacao butter

3 tablespoons coconut oil.

This was completely  off the top of my head, made within minutes of hearing that she's coming to dinner.

I hope she'll like it. Does it sound good to you?

Reflections on self-love: it's come around again! Time to reflect with gratitude and love on four more body parts. Tina asks, "What are you thankful for from your body today? Try and think of something different." I'm embarrassed that this is so hard for me - feel like I'm being a little drama queen.

I actually asked Phil for some help with choosing some loved body parts.

One suggestion of his that I liked (and wasn't x-rated!) was the little notch between my two collarbones, above my sternum, where he can sometimes see my pulse. What a great spot to pick. It is like a keystone of an arch - so many things meet there. It's also right at my throat chakra, to do with vocalization and self-expression. It's close to my thyroid, which has had such a hard time and so much mistreatment, and which is just about hanging in there with all the help and supplementation that it's getting.

OK - where else? Well, I should give my adrenals a little shoutout - they are troopers. It's probably remarkable that they work at all! As we're about to go into the stress of a long journey and being away from home, I need to make sure that I'm especially nice to them and not get tempted to push myself too hard. A good moment to remember gratitude to them.

And finally...um.... well, actually, maybe this is corny, since I've featured my eyes in an earlier 'body parts' post, but I've always liked my eyebrows! They are dark, full and straight, and give good definition to my eyesockets. At their inner tips (nearer my nose), the hairs stand up straight, and then grow horizontally for the rest. I used to enjoy looking at those vertical hairs when I was a little kid, wondering how they did it! I've never plucked them in my life. I like how they are so long and straight, whereas many people have half-moon-shaped eyebrows (which looks just fine on them).

(It was so cold this morning but then the sun came out - Phil took this at lunchtime: the sun is in my eyes and you can see my slight green smoothie mustache!)

Fall Coming! Reflections on Self-Love - Rest; and Old Blogging Locations

I'm in town - the Big Town, Anchorage - got rides to and from my appointment thanks to Craigslist.

I'm at the Anchorage Barnes and Noble - which is, incidentally, a member of the list of places at which I'd blogged before getting internet at home. The connection is slow and I'm not sure when my ride is coming, so I'm going to just write now and add pix later so I'm not caught waiting.

First - I mentioned the herbs I was drying and apologized for no photo - silly me, I had taken photos! Here they are!

Clockwise from top left - raspberry leaves, jalapenos (bargain produce, not from garden!) yarrow flowers, and lovage leaves and seeds. Lovage is a kind of wild celery that grows on the beach - herbal, intense and aromatic.

And here are arugula seed-pods

We have been so lucky so far this fall here in AK: thus far, we've had beautiful fall colors and no windstorms. Here's the hillside of Homer with some fall colors maybe discernible :)

And you can see golden birch leaves behind Phil here:

 Last year, just about the very day the colors turned, a couple huge windstorms blew all the leaves down in a day or two!

But after a glassy-calm day yesterday, last night the wind came in. Phil and I got up at 5am - way earlier than even my early start on the road required - because the wind was howling and wuthering and thumping. It's not just blowing down leaves - whole branches too! Walking around in Anchorage after my appointment, I was literally almost blown over several times! Must have looked like a comedy act, trying to walk along...

I was trying to get a picture of all the leaves and berries being blown down...

Reflections on Self-Love - ah, rest - so important! Tina reminds us that both our minds and bodies need rest - that in order to have the well full, we need to have empty time too. She asks, "How will you rest today?" I love this invitation to commit to that. It's so easy to think that any second that's not accounted for can be filled with more activity. Only recently and slowly have I begun to learn that I need slots of time every day with nothing in them. Especially with my recent body image worries, I've been pushing myself to exercise more, and didn't sleep well last night due to muscle soreness. It's also getting cold here - didn't reach 40 degrees F until well after 9am, and I think I'm more tense when I'm cold.

So, I'm not putting the photos up here yet, and might not even manage to do so until tomorrow. And when I've written this, soon after, I'll go get myself a hot herbal tea and warm myself from inside. And if I can snag one of the comfy armchairs here, I'll lay back in one for a while. Even if I can't, I will sit back and 'rest my eyes' some.

Hope you are having a restful Friday!

Garden Drawing to a Close; Reflections on Self-Love: Out of the Comfort Zone

Almost the end of the week, almost time for us to fly away! And I'm going to Anchorage and back tomorrow, so busy busy… I'm so glad that people are liking the look of my no-sugar energy bars with 'chia-sweet.' If you search for that tag, I've actually done a ton of posts on them, gradually developing it. I'm glad that it's something that seems to work well for me, and hope that it might help someone else too.

Tina asks, "What challenges have you overcome? What goals have you achieved? Let them empower you today!"

Comfort Zone? Trust me, they're all relative! I'm married to a guy who likes to tackle some of the world's roughest seas in a patched-up rubber boat!

And to carry it overland when the sea runs out. And I join him sometimes.

I live in a cold northerly clime with no running water and I don't like to be cold. I used to live in Hawaii, sometimes with no running water or electricity, sometimes with no bug-screen, surrounded by voracious mosquitoes and centipedes, and nigh-lethal nematode-carrying slugs. You get used to it. I've worked bees with no protective equipment at all, and then I've worked bees so aggressive that I was stung all over even through protective clothing.

Humans are so supremely adaptable!

But I have to refer back to my post about persistence and setting goals from last week, in which I told my story about coconut tree climbing, and how it wasn't really an appropriate goal for me. I also think that for me at least, a lot of the 'living rough' that I've done has bordered on disrespectful of my body. Starvation's an obvious example, but so is living in a situation where you can't get cleaned up easily, or have an ant's nest under your bed, or don't have any light to read or write after dark.

My biggest lesson, though, has been that being around people who are not uplifting or kind or willing to work on themselves is not a good kind of 'out of your comfort zone' to be. No matter how kindhearted and well-meaning you are, perseverating in a situation where you are not valued and appreciated is not a recipe for progress nor happiness nor self-love!

I feel so grateful that now I am living with so much love around me, with a small number of friends whom I love and who appreciate me in return.

A smaller challenge that I feel some pride in overcoming today: remember my confession that sometimes I don't take best care of all my fermentation and harvesting projects? Well, today I tidied up all the yarrow flowers, lovage flowers and seeds and raspberry leaves that I had drying, before they lose their potency.(Sorry there's no photo of those.) And then this afternoon, I checked my kraut concoctions and got them covered and refrigerated. It's exciting to be able to think that I'll be eating from the garden even after the ground is all frozen. Proud of myself that I respected myself enough to take care of these concoctions, rather than letting them slide.

Cauliflower kraut-

- and chard and kale krauts in the back there!

Lol for the butter in the foreground - the food that I probably have the strongest aversion to of any food in existence, but I buy it for all the baking I do for Phil and our friends…

What's in the basket today? 

Well, the bottom of it's full of more raspberry leaves to dry - you can't see those. There's a whole bunch of chives, some of which I'll dry, some we'll eat fresh and some will go in kraut or pesto. There's a few sweet little broccoli florets. Back right, a bunch of curly parsley. Front right, stinging nettles to go in my smoothies for my journey tomorrow. Front left, a whole lot of arugula to be made into pesto with the parsley and chives. And a couple little lettuces outside the basket too. Ahhh - enjoy it while we can!

Reflections on Self-Love - Forgiving Oneself; No-Sugar Cookies

Ahhh, self-forgiveness - what a crucial element of self-love! Busy again today (run-up to going out of town, lots to finish up, lots to prepare) but I wanted to just check in with a few words in response to this.

I think it has to tie in with my recent observations about needing to let go of the past and future and be in the present, which is the only place that anything can be accomplished. It's a horrible habit, to dredge up every error and shortcoming that is in the past and hold it up in the present like a glaring piece of ugliness, when it isn't even real anymore! I also know, having been a teacher, that it would be a pretty terrible teaching style if you want someone to make progress - why focus on the failures?

Tina asks, "Is there anything you have trouble letting go? Are there any ways you try to "punish" yourself?" Heck, yes. Aside from the whole behavioral element of feeding oneself right, and getting out of 'fat talk,' which I have to work on every single day, I punish myself for needing special foods! I mentioned that I had at one point tried to make one meal-plan work for both Phil and me. Instead of just dismissing it as a bad idea when it didn't work out, I beat up on myself for having these extra needs, as if his needs were 'right' and mine were 'wrong!' Needs don't have a right and wrong - they just are. Sure, it would be more convenient if I could just 'fit in' with whatever meat and bread and potatoes when we go to the farm, but I'm choosing to feel glad that I can make better choices for myself and hopefully not offend or interfere with anyone else.

I also love to be very careful in my speech, but sometimes I get so enthusiastic that my tongue carries me away and I say something that wasn't meant or that comes out wrong. It seems like I am always far more traumatized by that than anyone else is, even the person to whom I said the inappropriate thing - it dogs me and haunts me.  I'm excited to be putting this out there to let go of it, to live in the present instead!

So, making these no-sugar energy bar-type things to take to Oregon is part of acknowledging my own needs; part of self-love.

This one, just made this morning, was a cup of chia-sweet made from warm water, 2 teaspoons white stevia, 1 teaspoon lemon extract and 7 tablespoons chia seeds. Mixed together with about a cup of shredded coconut, 3-4 tablespoons coconut oil and 4-5 tablespoons flax meal. Just a  little bit of coconut flour at the end to hold it all together.

And this one, which is all dried now, was a cup of chia-sweet made with warm water, 2 teaspoons stevia, 4 drops chocolate flavor extract. Mixed with about a cup of very fine-shredded coconut, 2 tablespoons (soaked and dried) sesame seeds, a sprinkling of poppy seeds.

What is self-forgiveness about for you?

Reflections on Self-Love - Purpose; Two Outings, Two Dinners - Homer Events

We had guests over tonight - a lot of fun - but now it's past 9pm here, which means it's way late everywhere else. I was doing my work and fixing the dinner all day but had my photos uploaded and ready to go, and have been percolating this post in my head, so hopefully I'll keep it brief but have it make sense.

Today's reflection on self-love is about a sense of purpose - recognizing our own uniqueness and connecting with our role in the world. Tina asks, "In what ways does your life have purpose?"

I'll come back to this at the end of the post, but it's been a very perplexing question for me at times. I have struggled with the lack of clarity over whether I'm at liberty to create/recognize my own life purpose, or if my purpose emerges as I'm tugged along by events. Today, I felt like working on my translating job and preparing a dinner for guests were parts of my purpose, but Phil had invited the guests, whom I didn't know very well, and my translating job is translating a dictionary, so parameters are tight!

Be that as it may, while I gave up trying to fix 'compromise' foods that would work for both of us a long time ago, and now fix wholesome but regular omnivore food for Phil and any guests, always with a big salad with  good dressing on it, I know that part of my purpose is to feed myself so that I'm at my most functional.

Here's part of the experiment: I actually went out both Saturday night and Sunday night. Neither time did we get home that late, but two evenings out in a row is a lot for me - I'm not much good come evening. I had two very different dinners those two nights and there were definite results and consequences.

On Saturday night, I went to hear Corrina Delgado, a performance poet from Anchorage. I love going to poetry events and hearing what other people are doing. I loved that she performed everything from memory and used rhyme and rhythm to make it a very oral (and aural) medium. A fascinating meld of hip-hop-type rhythm, intense confessional and mythological comparisons.

I kind of wanted a smoothie beforehand but couldn't be bothered to make it (tired already), so had this instead;

It's soaked wakame, pickled beets, peeled and chopped-up broccoli stalks, broccoli flowers, cilantro, some coconut kefir whey, curry powder, bit of avocado. With some romaine lettuce on the left and some coconut kefir (which I promise I'll explain soon) on the right.

Then, on Sunday night, I had this for dinner

(smoothie with nettles, mint, cilantro, kefir whey, herbal tea, flax, chia gel, slice of avocado, spirulina, chlorella) (oh yeah, and the end of the spoon in my hand when I was taking the photo! No photoshopping here, lol)

before we went out to be part of the basket-burning party.

Above is how it was the day before...

On the evening itself, there were a couple hundred people there, and it was festooned and garlanded. It is an 'impermanent art exhibit' - a monster basket built/woven from local materials. People were invited to add notes saying what they wanted to release.

The sun came out for the only time that day, just in order to set, which was the signal to set the basket on fire! There was lots of drumming and dancing.

And as it got darker, the flames of the basket mounted higher!

It was magical - very social and community-feeling but also intimate. There were folks spinning poi, some of them very good (couldn't get decent pictures in the dark). And then there were these amazing fire-lanterns - like a parachute in reverse, or a miniature hot-air balloon. They were lit and released, and they went up and up and up until you could no longer see them. So cool...

And the verdict on the two dinners? Well, beautiful though the first one was, I was definitely 'aware' of it in an uncomfortable kind of way while listening to the poetry performance. Whereas on Sunday night, I felt lightly but well-nourished. I was wiped out at the end, because we had a hike to get to the gathering and then stood for a long time, but my guts were no problem at all.

So much gratitude for the Vita-Mix! I talked myself out of smoothies with all kinds of rationalizations for ages - blenders are expensive, they pull too much power, have to wash them, etc... And then, when I was trying to make the same food for both Phil and me, he abhors the texture of smoothies and blended food - he'd rather have something to crunch on. Good enough for him, good enough for me, I thought. Well, that was foolish. Phil has an extremely strong digestion, and I have the opposite. There's probably a reason why I'm drawn to smoothies and love them: I tend to feel better afterwards. Now, when I start up inner talk about 'shouldn't use the blender,' I remind myself that making smoothies is being loving to myself.

Is smoothie or salad more self-loving to you?

Back to self-love and a sense of purpose: I mentioned above the dichotomy between the feeling of choosing and connecting to life's purpose and that of having it emerge as you're tugged along by all the different things that bump up against you. For me, I feel that perhaps both are valid. My purpose in any given moment or situation may be somewhat governed by the situation: but I will have a special role and response that won't be just like anyone else's. Furthermore, as I'm bumped around by all these events, I am compelled to write about them. I feel that my poetry writing is my truest life purpose and that part of what I need to do is to fulfill my given role in a situation to the best of my (not anyone else's) ability, and then I need to go do my writing!

How does sense of purpose relate to self-love for you?

Heading to the Farm - The View From Here/Up For This Week - Communication and Preconceptions - Reflections on Self-Love: One Life

The View From Here

We love our beach hikes! I've shared before Phil's avid harvesting of seaweeds as fertilizer for our garden beds - 

- and today I picked up some dulse from the tideline, hoping to dry and eat it.

Something that makes us sad when we hike on the beach is seeing the stuff that gets dumped there. Anything that my Herculean husband can lift, we haul out…

… but this gutted-out ATM machine was just too darn heavy!

It's getting quite cold here now, and we have less than a week left before we go down to Oregon to stay on the family farm, visit Phil's mom and family, help out with harvest, firewood, etc. 

I'm worried absolutely sick.

When I first went to the farm with Phil, I'd been living on communal farms in Hawaii for several years, where the ability to see what needed doing and get on and do it was prized, and where things were generally quite rough and ready. That was the preconception from which I came, and the way that I understood things. Unfortunately, that did not equip me to hear subtly phrased comments like 'that's not how we do this here.' In my Hawaii background, that would mean 'let's have a conversation, how do you do it?' But almost everywhere else, it means that you're not doing it the way it's supposed to be done in someone else's place. So, although I was trying to listen well, I wasn't able to hear what I needed to hear.  

Have you ever been in a situation where you think you're understanding what someone says, but actually what they're implying is completely different? Or have you tried to tell someone something and been frustrated that they simply don't get it?

I've learned better over the last couple of years, but have still not gotten it right.  I am periodically eaten up with remorse, guilt, shame, grief for the offense caused by my misunderstanding, and by fear that I'll somehow make too much mess or do something wrong this next time. I feel like I can't trust myself. I also feel anxiety over my very real need to control my own food in a place where I don't have kitchen access. 

So, how does this fit in with today's reflection on self-love? Tina talks about how we have to seize the day - there's no point in wasting our life on the small things. In order to live life to the full, we have to love ourselves. She says, "if we want to live the most fulfilling and satisfied lives as possible we need to love ourselves. We can waste our lives away with worry, regret, doubt, and negativity. We can spend too much time concerned with trivial matters of what size pants we wear or what other people think of our hopes and dreams." Tina asks, "What can you focus on today so that you end your day knowing you cultivated your best life? What should you ignore that tries to rob you of joy?"

Well, wow. I think I have the answer to that question. I'm preventing myself from focusing on enjoying the gorgeous colors and objects around us, as well as the people around me, by worrying over something in the past, and something else in the future. 

I worried myself crazy over my Fairbanks trip in July and had a wonderful time. Things are often not as bad as I think they will be. I used to work so hard at the farm that I didn't have the energy to pay extra attention to people's subtle communications or clean up fast enough. This time, I can resolve to treat myself with more respect so that I'm not running myself into the ground and unable to be attentive. I can resolve to keep smiling, keep listening, keep paying attention, and be constantly respectful and sensitive. I know that I know how to do that! I can prepare as much food for myself in advance of the trip, take my little hand-blender to make smoothies in our bedroom if need be, and just relax. I can put this whole pain of anxiety aside and go into the situation determined that things will go well.

Up For This Week

I'm going to continue to make kraut and pesto, and other things to use up the last of the garden goodness. It's supposed to get close to freezing here this week, and will be pretty thoroughly frozen by the time we get back in October!

I'm going to keep on sharing the message of self-love. Yes, I've been in a funk the last few days, but I think it's still lifted me above where I might have been with it.

I'll write whatever else I can make time for in here, about gardening, adventures, words, etc.

love to all.

Confession of the Week - Sauerkraut - Reflections on Self-Love: Fat Talk

Hope everyone's having a great weekend! Today's reflection on self-love was an extremely powerful one for me: not only did Tina raise the ugly demon of 'fat talk:' she also gave a striking example of how she had countered it and talked herself out of it. What a lifeline of an idea this is, that we don't have to be stuck with berating our bodies: that we can consciously choose better ways to talk to ourselves.

I'll come back to that with some reflections on my own in a bit. First, though, my confession of the week. My confession is this: I love to have so many projects going on, especially growing/culturing/fermenting projects, and I don't always stay on top of them. And the worst thing about it is, sometimes I haven't just plain forgotten: it's in the back of my mind that something needs doing but I just don't get around to it. This makes me sad. Sometimes I have kombucha, kefir, sauerkraut, sourdough culture, sprouts I'm growing, mead wine…all on the go at once! And more often than I'd like, I don't take the best care of everything for it to be its best possible. I've just been using yeast to make Phil's bread lately but recently started a sourdough, and then didn't take sufficiently regular care of it, and it went bad. Sourdough culture gone bad is a variety of stench that you're really not missing if you can avoid ever smelling it!

One thing that helps me not to mess up like this, and also keeps my anxiety down in general, is to make a to-do list. Somehow, if it's on the list, it'll get checked off! Even if it doesn't make it that day, it'll go on the next days list and eventually get done. I've noticed I'm less anxious if I make a list every day. Otherwise, it's easy to think I've done nothing because I discount all the myriad little things that I do.

OK, so with our garden season coming to its end, I'm pleased to be able to report that my first batch of beet kraut came out great, and that the past couple of days I've put on two more batches of kraut and am determined to pay them good attention.

Back in August, our cauliflowers were the best I've ever had…

…and then the slugs came. What a difference a month makes! It's not just that they're not as pretty (the purple on this one is because I had beet on my hand lol) - they get embittered by the predation of the slugs. So, I chopped the cauliflower up fine, ensuring that there were no slugs still lurking in there ;<), added some of my batch of cabbage-jalapeno kraut to get things started, and about a tablespoon of rock salt, and ensured that the kraut is submerged in liquid.

Today I did the same with chard. I'm going to keep them as warm as possible given how chilly it's getting here, and within a couple of days they should be fermenting nicely. 

OK - back to today's reflection on self-love. Tina calls it "that inner dialogue of self-doubt that puts down our image and denies us our true beauty. I actually like to think of it as 'self doubt talk,' because I believe it plays in more than physical appearance." I am so strongly in agreement with this. I have never been a person who read the 'fashion icon' magazines, dressed fashionably, or even paid much attention to all of that side of things, and yet 'fat talk' has dogged me pretty much forever. And it's all to do with a feeling of unworthiness, a feeling of taking up too much space, a sense that nothing you can do could ever be good enough. 

What if we are enough? What if doing our best is plenty, even if the level of it varies from one day to another?

I am so profoundly grateful for Tina's story about how she has learned to stop that kind of self-talk in its tracks. And along these lines, here is a bonus confession for the day: I am aware that this talk has been such an integral part of my inner voice for so long that there is some ambivalence about stopping it in its tracks. There is some comfort in familiarity. But it makes me ashamed to say that evidently there is a part of me that wants to beat up on myself like that: surely, this runs counter to my goal of doing my best; to my recognition that to love others authentically, I must love myself, with love being a comprehensive, pro-active state of being and doing?

So, how about stopping it in its tracks? Going back to the gifts of the body, when I get down on my thighs and butt (like I did when I saw the above photo), I can remind myself that I'm able to hike every day now - maybe not so far some days, but a few months ago I'd have to rest for several days after one not very long hike. I could point out to myself that they are long and shapely, even if I see some cellulite when I put them in certain angles. I could remember to feel gratitude that they carry me so far and work so tirelessly. I know that I eat very healthily and not too much, and that I can't give my body the message of starvation because it's being trained not to have that message all the time. In the same way, why not train my body to believe that it is beautiful, lean, proportioned just how I want it to be, so that it reflects externally my inner beauty rather than my inner frustration with myself?

Reflections on Self-Love - Loving Others - Saving Fall Colors

We were fogged in this morning but it burned off and it's so glorious outside, I can hardly bear to be indoors! So I'm going to keep this short.

Those fall colors we have here at the moment are spectacular.

We are soaking those colors in, imprinting them on the insides of our eyelids, to sustain us through the coming winter months, with the lessening of earthly color. (It's true, even in the winter, we get some spectacular skies here.)

I'm going to follow Tina's lead and keep this post short and sweet, but today's reflection on self-love has to do with loving others. Tina asks: "How are you going to show love to someone this weekend? We have numerous people in our lives to love - be open to all!"

Well, for me, it has to start with Phil, with snuggling in bed this morning and not getting up until almost 8; with giving thanks for getting to spend my days beside such a remarkable human being.  I am gradually getting to know more people here in Homer, but I have so many people that are so dear to me in places that I have lived prior to Alaska. Almost every week, I think of picking up the phone and calling one or another of them. I do manage to talk to my mum, who is a wise and wonderful woman, every single week. But otherwise, I really have not been good at calling my friends and telling them I love them. So, this weekend I'm going to do some of that. We even have free minutes on the cellphone at the weekend, so then the only excuse is that the cellphone doesn't work very well at home!

Especially since having gotten internet at home, I am pretty good at keeping up with people by email, and I consider many of my blog and other long-distance friends as very dear to me too. I hope that writing a daily post in support of 30 days of self-love can be construed as an expression of love to everyone who cares to read and join in.  That piece of advice comes into play again, that the best gift you can give to others is to take the best care of yourself. I have found this daily post to be a real help with my own mindfulness in a self-love process, even while chelating and getting to that time of the month where I might be feeling worse about myself or cranky. 

Thanks and love to Tina for the inspiration!

Reflection on Self Love - Body Parts Again; Psychic Moments; Fall Colors

Happy Friday!

Once again, the weather didn't co-operate, so we stayed around Homer, but we did go for a beautiful hike in the hills, above the fog, and saw some wonderful colors.

Here's that same view from when we hiked up there in mid-August - so quickly summer becomes autumn here!

Today's reflection on self-love - back to body parts! Argh... I'm not feeling good about myself today, just generally out of sorts. Been working too hard, getting anxious about our trip to Oregon that's coming up so soon and all the chores still to do here before everything freezes.

Here's the 'body parts' post from last week, where I highlighted hands, nose and lips.
And here's the one from two weeks ago, where I highlighted ears, brain and heart.

Today, my first though was to do hands , but no fair since I did them last week. My fingers have just been tapping out miles and miles with all the work I've been doing typing away!
Ok, so instead, today I celebrate my wrists. They are so mobile and flexible, and they do such hard work as a conduit for all those nervous and muscular impulses coming from my brain. They are narrow and shapely, and they let me know when I need to take a break.
And I thank my eyes. Nowadays, since I had Lasik two years ago, they see extremely keenly; but even back when they were myopic and astigmatic, they were - and are - keenly observant and good at picking things out and spotting things, whether typos in a manuscript I'm editing or the movement of a deer hundreds of yards away.
My feet also do a wonderful job. They connect me to the ground. They give me so much information about what is all around me. They carry me over all kinds of rocky terrain - tussocks in boggy terrain in the hills, boulders and pebbles on the beach. Great gratitude to them!

Here is angelica going to seed with some fireweed turning autumnal behind it.

There was some discussion on Averie's blog about psychic moments and impulses a couple days ago.
I had two psychic moments yesterday, one good, one bad. The good one: night before last, I was sweeping some dirt off our bed in the loft by hand, and my wedding ring went flying off into the dark. The next morning, and off and on all day, I looked around for it but didn't find it. Then, in the evening, I was sitting at the computer on the couch and it suddenly occurred to me that I still hadn't found it. I then looked up and looked directly at it - and it was hidden under something, barely visible and probably not visible from any other angle!

So it's back in place, as I show this nagoonberry from our hike -

Then, the bad premonition: I was making bread for Phil, and as I did my usual dance backing away from the initial cloud of flour to avoid breathing it in, I found myself thinking about the dangers of cross-contamination and wondering how other allergic folks who fix gluten food for their partners manage. A minute later, the sack of flour fell over and tipped flour all over my new batch of no-sugar energy bars that was drying in front of the heater! A total loss - Phil isn't interested in eating them and there was nothing he could suggest for getting the flour off that I was comfortable with. Gluten means 'glue' - you don't get flour off something once it's all over it!

I hate throwing stuff out, and got pretty morose over that, I'm afraid! Could not find a funny side to it, and having had a premonition a moment before almost made it worse. They were specifically to have food for our trip today, so since we didn't go, it wasn't so bad. But grrrrr! That kind of thing brings home to me the frustrating parts of living in such a small space that you can barely turn around without banging  into something, with no water except what you haul in, etc, etc. Fortunately, when I get on that tack it's very easy for me to think of lots of good things about living here to counter that with, so that's what I'm aiming to do.

Love to all!