Positive Social Connection

Freedom

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When I started eating differently, I was afraid. Of what, I could not tell you. Perhaps some rouge tofu might attack me at the grocery store once it found out I was looking at recipes with beans and lentils. I am still, truth be told, a little wary of tofu.

But, it always seems to be like that, doesn’t it? Trying something new is scary.

Six months ago I talked my mom into trying a Silver Sneakers class at her Y. She was nervous and reluctant. But I know my mom. She likes people, music, and dancing. And we just happened to walk into the best class in town with Lisa leading the way. Now when I am back visiting we don’t miss her class! It’s a room full of people dancing and moving and health and life surround it all.

But pushing someone else to try a new thing is so much easier then doing it yourself. I like to learn about new things, but actually doing them is a different story. For example, I read about cooking tofu for months, but when I actually touched the tofu, I wore my skeptical face with wrinkled up nose, and kept repeating, “Remember… this is just soybeans…you like soybeans…”

Fast forward to this 4th of July. I talked my dad into trying a recipe for grilled carrot dogs. It couldn’t be more scary than the weird white soybeans, right? Besides we were in this adventure together.

But they were delicious! I’m still in disbelief myself. If you are laughing at me right now, know that I am laughing too!

I noticed that I try new things when people I love and respect encourage me down a road of change.

I thought of this on this Fourth of July. The few who tried a new way. Trusting the people. A belief that we are always better as a sum of our parts than any one of us alone. We need each other because change is scary. And because not a single one of us has all the good.

But each one of us can take another’s hand and walk toward health and life. That direction is easy to recognize: healthy living is always a building force and not a destructive one. It is free-ing.

So make that positive social connection in real life, take a friend to a joyful exercise class, or laugh while grilling carrots. (Have we now seen everything?!) Take that chance this Fourth of July and see if your heart feels just a little more free.

Whole Food Plant Based Diet

Traveling Plants

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I should tell you that I love airports. Airports and Pilot gas stations are fascinating to me in their variety of offerings and intersection of different people. Where else can you chat with someone from another country and someone from your favorite college, see families in action at all ages and stages, witness grief and glee, buy a bobble-head or a shot glass, AND get your nails done all in one hour?

At the airport I love the spiritual practice of looking at the people around me, imagining their stories, and trying to see them like God might see them. Today I also walked around with Turnpike Troubadours playing in my ears and laughed as my fast walk started to turn into a walk-dance combo. But who cares?? It’s the airport!

It’s all fun until I start to get hungry. NOBODY wants to witness me while hangry (Ask my husband about that…or then again, please don’t.) So, to get down to important and earthly things, what am I going to eat??

When I switched to a whole-food plant-based diet I didn’t want to focus on what I “couldn’t” have, but instead I focused on what could fuel my body and my mind well.

The truth is that before I changed my diet, all the edible things were available to me. And, still, all the edible things are available to me. I just choose differently. And so a fun scavenger hunt was born.

I do pack a few simple meals or “lunches” in my bag. I have always been one of those people who, when traveling, become weirdly food insecure. Chances are there will be a Walmart somewhere nearby the places I go (or the Kenyan equivalent), but put me on a plane and I pack food like we might be going on an Arctic expedition.

So today I made some lunches out of some lentil curry and black beans I had left-over or had pre-made. (Picture above) Throw in some greens, tortillas, tomato, farro, hot sauce and fresh fruit…and the person on the plane looks at you enviously as they munch on their pretzels!

I have also previously packed raisins, tangelos, peanuts, soy-nuts, or edamame. Once someone in LaGuardia security took my hummus, but the food otherwise makes it through security just fine.

In the airport I look for nuts without added sugar and oil, these amazing pickles, these fruit bars from Starbucks (4g of fiber) and other great snacks. I try to avoid added oil and sugar as an ingredient because this adds up quickly as I travel and I end up not feeling the best.

On this particular trip I was reminded to also pack my grace alongside my plants. I was boarding the plane when I noticed we had a female pilot. It wasn’t until I squealed to the welcoming flight attendant, “We have a girl pilot!!” that I realized I should not call her a girl-pilot. I am perhaps the most sexist feminist I know. I blame being a child of the 1980s. It was a confusing time. I saw the flight attendant extend me some grace for my comment and I packed that grace in my appropriately sized carry-on to pay it forward. And, just so you know, this particular pilot was a bad ass. Truth.

So it turns out travel is just like the rest of life lived eating a whole-food plant based life; it’s an adventure, needs a seasoning of grace, completely possible, and fun!

What do you like to pack for the plane and the airport?

Stress Management

Guarding Our Hearts

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“Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life” – Proverbs 4:23

I love following a certain musician on social media.  His music feeds my soul and his life story is inspiring. Yesterday, I decided to visit his page on social media.  My heart was full and content as I had experienced a productive morning full of purpose, the sun was out, and I had a delicious lunch in front of me.

I opened up the social media app and was greeted by the latest news cycle.  I started doom-scrolling.  In under 15 minutes, I went from a heart that was full and content…to texting my husband that we needed to move out of the country because our young adult boys would be drafted and surely killed.  After all, World War III was just around the corner.     When I looked up from my phone, I was physically in the same place, sitting outside on a beautiful day, but mentally I was in a very different space. The beautiful breeze and sunshine looked at me mockinly as if to say, “Yeah, this is all coming to an end soon.”  I felt helpless and hopeless and unsure what to do next.

As I went about my afternoon, with now a heavy heart, I kept circling back to the future vision that my heart held after the doom-scrolling. (I never did make it to my favorite musician’s page).  It was bleak.

Then I looked up on my wall where I had a framed picture of  Proverbs 4:23, “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.”

In my most recent health coaching class we talked alot about nutrition and cardiovascular (heart) health.  We talked of cholesterol, diabetes, blood pressure, or in other words, “the plumbing” of heart health.  But yesterday I started to see how not guarding my heart, and engaging in doom-scrolling, I was also hurting my health.

As cortisol and other stress hormones were released my heart was gearing up for a fight, or a flight, just like if there was a tiger in the room.  And if I was being honest, I had let this tiger in the room.

What we do know is that our hearts, bodies, and minds, are not meant to live in a state of “fight or flight” from tigers.  Tigers are supposed to be infrequent and temporary.  Our caveman ancestors would say, “For goodness sakes, get out of the tiger’s lair!”

But now with the world in our hands, we can call up the tiger anytime we want.  And we do.  Maybe we feel like we should.  Maybe we believe we are doing something productive.  But, on the contrary we are doing damage.  We are not guarding our hearts.

My heart needs fresh foods that are whole, and colorful, largely from plants.  It needs love and connection and a little sunshine.  It needs exercise and purpose.  And it deserves and needs a place to be protected from the tigers.  This is ALL my responsibility.

I can’t change the fact that there are tigers out there in the world, but I can stop inviting them in for a cage match in my mind.  I can instead  ask myself, “What is the next right thing to do?”  It may be to vote or run for office, but it may also be to find out how my neighbor is doing, smile at the check-out person, tip generously, or other things that can nourish my heart and make it grow.

What can you do today to guard your heart: to nourish it and watch it grow? Let’s make a list in the comments below!