Points to Ponder

Emptiness

offwhiteliving

Empty yourself of everything.
Let the mind become still.
The ten thousand things rise and fall while the Self watches their return.
They grow and flourish and then return to the source.

– Lao Tzu

This week I experienced emptiness.  True, physical emptiness.  It was grand (well, it was grand after it was miserable).  My emptiness occurred out of pure accident.  Food poisoning (PC term: Food born pathogen), left my husband and I in, eerr… a rather precarious state for about 36 hours.  I’ll spare you the details, except for the  glorious feeling that I had once the trauma was over.

Physical emptiness feels enlightening to me.  In part, this is because I really rarely allow myself to feel it.  Hunger is uncomfortable for me, so I’m always rushing to fill its need.  Yet here I was, able to survive on little but tropical fruit (the only thing I wanted) and bubbly orange water and ice for nearly 2 days.  Once I felt better, I felt truly refreshed – like I’d been ‘reset’ by some divine force of nature.  It was refershing to allow my body to NOT have food it it and to allow my mind to NOT think about food.

Physical emptiness is also enlightening because it creates internal space.  Not just physical space, but emotional space.  Lying on my back, with little energy to do more than watch HBO movies and sleep, I could think in a way I’ve not given myself permission to do in a long time.  I could think without boundaries, expectations, deadlines or pressure. I allowed my mind to be idle.  I wish that I could tell you I devoted some of my illness time to deep meditation or even journaling, but I didn’t.  In a way, this is my journal entry of all those feeling that fed my spiring during my hiaitus from life.

You all have heard me say, in one form or another, that my relationship with food often mirrors my relationship with life.  Of late, I’ve been cramming it in – food and life.  Going too fast, expecting too much.  Not allowing space for emptiness or freedom from the ties that bind.  So nature found its own way to set me right again.  It dawned on me that it had been a long time since I simply thought about doing creative things just for the sake of them, or since I just took a walk for a reason other than to boost my cardiovascular health or that I allowed myself to rest, to just be.  Why do I forget how essential these elements to life really are?

So, I’m going to thank my period of emptiness for helping me resent my mind and body, and for reminding me of how far off the mark  I tend to get.  Happily, I found myself eating much less today and appreciating what I did eat for what it was -a nourishment to my body and spirit instead of something to soothe my worrisome soul that has been overworked and under played for the last 8 weeks (School!).

We live in a time where emptiness only comes when we get ill or we deliberately seek it out through fasts or cleanses.  How lucky are we?  Fortunate yes, but also I think we miss out on something really powerful that only happens when we do go without, even for a short while.

overcoming fear without food

offwhiteliving

“Once there was a young warrior. Her teacher told her that she had to do battle with fear. She didn’t want to do that. It seemed too aggressive; it was scary; it seemed unfriendly. But the teacher said she had to do it and gave her the instructions for the battle. The day arrived. The student warrior stood on one side, and fear stood on the other. The warrior was feeling very small, and fear was looking big and wrathful. They both had their weapons. The young warrior roused herself and went toward fear, prostrated three times, and asked, “May I have permission to go into battle with you?”  Fear said, “Thank you for showing me so much respect that you ask my permission.”  Then the young warrior said, “How can I defeat you?” Fear replied, “My weapons are that I talk fast, and I get very close to your face. Then you get completely unnerved, and you do whatever I say. If you don’t do what I tell you, I have no power. You can listen to me, and you can have respect for me. You can even be convinced by me. But if you don’t do what I say, I have no power.” In this way, the student warrior learned how to defeat fear.”

Pema Chodron in “When Things Fall Apart”

This short parable sums up a lot for me about fear and how I’ve been dragged into battle with it and used food to overcome that battle.  Sometimes this is so subtle, and I  think it stared so very long ago that I can’t even remember the first time I ate to soothe an internal fear.

This also reminds me that I need to share with you what I learned at the food addiction syposium.  I’m going to post several times about what I learned because it touched me at many levels.

First, there is STRONG evidence that certain food substances (ie palatable foods, like sweets and high fat/high sugar foods) are addictive in certain individuals.  More on that later.

Philosophically this whole symposium really got down to the essence of addiction to me, which is fear.  Fear usually means a concern that something is going to be taken away, or taken out of our control.  We learn at a young age sometimes that food will soothe this very base emotion.  I’ve often heard that the opposite of love is fear.  Love is harminious and self-love is usually associated with good boundary setting, self-care, self respect and awareness.  It’s hard to feel a deep/strong self love and give into fear at the same time (in my experience).

I think culturally we too use food to mask our fears.  Commercials tell us to savor the flavor of some product and we’ll be sexy, wealthy, our celebrating with friends.  So we keep buying in (literally) and replacing our intrinsic coping mechanisms with this false promise.  They play to our fear of being alone or unwanted in a subtle way.  We feel food insecurities even when there are none, and we feel culturally entitled to having the same freedomes with food that we have with life – we should be able to have access to what we want, when we want.  But, what does that do to us?  It makes me personally reliant on that external substance (sugar) as my coping tool, as my reassurance that life is okay.   It means the voice of fear is larger than the voice of inner trust.  I can recall a moment of awareness when I moved to San Diego and, having  taken a job that paid 50% less than my previous job, I was obsessed with grocery shopping.  Groceries were my new form of abundance because I needed to feel that I was okay and life was okay even with less income.  It go worse when I started my own business (very shaky ground, in my mind) and my sugar addiction EXPLODED!

During the symposium, what was interesting is that the most successful “treatments” for food compuslions, binge eating or chronic overeating revolve around mindfulness, spirituality and attitude changes.  Not once did we talk about nutritional changes to get people to kick the habit.  Sure, nutrition is really important and cravings can be instigated by chemical imbalances perpetuated by poor nutrition.  I think that is 50% of the story, but not necessarily the most powerful, or the origin of the problem.

But I thought the juciest messages were in the power of our minds, or spirits and our need for community support to get us beyond the fear of letting go.  What would happen if you didn’t say ‘yes’ to that piece of cake, extra handful of chips, or large coffee drink?  I’ve seriously felt physical fear when imagining never having a certain food again (hot chocolate for me – that is my big attachment).  Physical fear, people.  Crazy.  It’s just a substance but I’ve projected onto it a false sense of security that I think gives me extra ‘power’ to deal with life’s demands.  But it doesn’t.  It creates more demands instead of less.  It distracts me but I’m caught up with the distraction because it’s familiar.

I was very excited and reaffirmed by the symposium because there are people in this world other than me who want to understand food behaviors and want to help others and themselves change for the better.  It’s certainly new frontier in the science world and that is exciting.  It’s also a new frontier when for most of us when we, for the very first time, dive into our inner landscape and have to tell that fear, to it’s face that we don’t have to listen to it.  Can you do it?

Would love to hear your ideas about fear and food.  Agree? Disagree?  Somewhere in the middle?  Do tell!!


Then and Now

offwhiteliving1 Comment

Funny how life always seems to come full circle.  Yesterday I found myself in the Nutrition 10 office grading undergraduate diet projects.  The full circle aspect of this is that when I was 18 I took Nutrition 10 (Same professor even!) and I too did my diet projects.

Looking at the dietary habits of 18-20 yr olds really got me thinking back to what I was like at an 18 yr old.  Ha!  I was nothing close to an off white eater, though my belief was that my diet was rather healthy because it contained mostly fat-free foods (remember the fat-free craze of the 1990’s??)

Here’s a little glimpse into my THEN and NOW dietary habits

THEN (living at UC Davis dorms, eating dorm food, rarely eating out)
Age: 18            Height: 5’3″                      Weight: 128-132 (from teens to twenties)
Dislikes: celery, potatoes,spices, sauces, anything creamy/fatty, red meat, ethinic food, except chinese, avocado, large meals, hot melty cheese
Likes: plain noodles, pasta, bread, bagels, salad, any fruit, chicken,  anything low fat and high sugar, chinese food, quesadillas, pretzels, yogurts
Major Weakness: sugar in any form, including sugar cubes, which I would eat at work while making copies.

Breakfast
cold cereal: Golden Grahams/Captain Crunch/Raisin Bran/Corn bran combo + 1% or nofat milk and a banana.  I probably ate 2-3 servings of cereal in 1 bowl

Lunch (Hungry by 10 am, so my lunch got portioned out all day)
Apple, bagel w/nonfat cream cheese OR fat free yogurt, carrot sticks, water, turkey sandwhich on bread w/no mayo and maybe 1 slice of cheese (sometimes in place of the bagel, sometime I had both)

Dinner (almost always between 5-5:30pm)
1 bowl of salad: lettuce, corn, carrots, red beans, croutons, maybe some cucumber and nonfat vinegareette, veggie burger, turkey burger (both with bun) or pasta with red sauce.  Maybe some pizza every now and again.   Usually topped it off with the frosting from a piece of cake or a small vanilla soft serve cone.

Snacks: Candy, Candy, Candy!  We could buy little pieces of candy for 2-5 cents, so I’d get Laffy Taffy, mini-Junior mints, Blow pops, etc.  Never chocolate.  I also supplemented my candy consumption with regular slurpee consumption and frozen yogurt as much as possible (I had a snack card that gave me $$ for snacks every quarter.  I spent most of it at TCBY yogurt.   Every now and again I’d switch it up and get some pretzels because they are low fat)

Activity level: moderate – I worked out about 3-4 days/week: running, weights, step aerobics.  I biked and walks most places.

NOW (cook at home, eat out 1x/week)
Age: 33           Height: 5’3″              Weight: 132 – 134 (same for about 6 yrs)
Dislikes: creamy sauces,mayo/cream dressings, potato chips, extemely salty foods, celery (except soup), hot melty cheese, crappy, processed foods, food that makes me crave sugar
Likes: just about everything else.  Still like the sweet things, just don’t eat them as much.  Haven’t had a piece of candy since 2004 and no gum since 2005
Major weakness: SWEET, CREAMY BEVERAGES: hot chocoate, tea with half/half, even decaf coffee w/almond milk and honey…..oh goodness……

Breakfast:  Usually 1 of three meals: 2 eggs + fruit, protein smoothie + fruit/veggies, or oatmeal or quinoa with nuts/fruit and maybe protein powders.

Lunch (Not hungry for approx 3-4 hrs): at least 1 full cup of veggies (mostly salad, which is like 2-3 cups), sweet potatoes, beans, leftover chicken or fish, or burger patty, hummus, avocado, oil based dressing.  70% plants at least!

Dinner: much like lunch, usually add fruit at the end for a dessert.  Often have lean protein in larger serving.  Likely to skip the grain if I had grain with breakfast, for a total of 2 grains/day.  Rare occasions (1-2x/yr): Pizza.  If I go out, its Chipotle, mexican, or maybe thai or Pluto’s salad bar.  I eat all meats and love sauces, spices, etc.

Snacks: not a snacker, try to eat in a way to sustain energy better.  I do drink tea and hot almond milk and hot chocolate, which is a between meal occurrence.  1 of the 3 is likely on a daily basis.  Also LOTS of water.
Veg and hummus or 1 hardboiled egg are favorite snacks.  I also love chips/guac but can’t put the breaks on w/that dish!

Activity level: moderate to high.  Exercising 1 hr x 5-6 days/week, mix of running, spin, yoga, cycing, climbing, weights, plyometrics, and walking.  Whatever sounds fun.

In some ways my food has gotten better, but the mental obsession with sugar/emotional eating has gotten worse since I was 18.  While I was obsessed with thinness, I just figured my diet was great back then so I didn’t associate eating sugar with any feeling state.  Now that I do, the struggle to relinquish that urge to eat under stress has gotten more of my attention.  I’ve grown a lot as a person, having to look inward and what role sugar plays in my life, but it’s also consumed a lot of my mental energy. However, the journey I’ve been on has been the catalyst for this blog, and most of what I do, so I’d not change it for anything..well, maybe I’d change it for a dozen donuts but we won’t talk about that 🙂

Warning: Eating off white may change your life

offwhiteliving2 Comments

Changing your diet is going to do more than just alter your waisteline.  Whether you go off white, simply reduce portions, go Atkins, go Zone diet, or just stop eating junk food, something is going to change.

The non-weight related changes that happen when we change our diets is a seriously undervalued concept, in my opinion.  I think its these somewhat ‘immeasurable’ changes that actually drive people to continue making good dietary choices because they are the stuff that real life is made of.  It’s not like being skinnier by itself is a lifechanging experience, but rather the new behaviors, attitudes, relationships, etc that happen.

I was recently inspired by a client who mentioned that a week of eating healthy made her want to color her hair, as an act of self-care.  Who knew that eating healthy could lead to a better hair day?  So I thought it might be helpful to you off-white readers to know what to look out for when you make healthy choices.  This by no means a comprehenisve list, and I’d love to hear for YOU about how your life changes when you eat well.

Some of the ways healthy eating can change your life include:

  • A desire to wear the cuter clothes in your closet
  • Increased interest in managing your money better, including less money wasting, more saving, and just more caring about where it all goes
  • Willingness to reason things out with loved ones when you fight
  • Taking the stairs more than the elevator
  • Starting or finishing those craft/photography/sewing/whatever projects you started a million years ago
  • You can actually get a good night’s rest
  • You can taste the flavors in real food
  • Looking people in the eye when you talk to them
  • Better sex, or just having sex in general
  • You laugh more, because life is funny, isn’t it?
  • You shave your legs, even when you don’t have a date
  • Treating yourself to the new make up/lotion/nail polish/shampoo, etc that you would never buy before
  • You want to see your friend b/c you feel good about yourself
  • More time in the kitchen, less time in the drive-thru
  • Looking at your thighs when you sit down doesn’t drive you as crazy as it once did
  • You sign up for a half marathon/5K/triathalon
  • Exercise clothes take up more laundry space than lounging around clothes
  • You want to get dressed on the weekends….but not all the time.  Jammie days are still a vital part of life
  • Your skin is clearer
  • You care about how the inside of your car looks, and you clean it more regularly
  • People start asking you for advice on how to cook healthier/eat better
  • You appreciate your family more
  • Less crying, except for the happy kind
  • Less PMS
  • You can recognize when you need a time out, and you take it!
  • Bubble baths are fun again!
  • Your spiritual life and practice improve
  • your spouse is no longer the root of your problems…nor the solution to them
  • Work isn’t as bad as you once thought
  • You’re looking for a new job (if work really is as as you thought)
  • It’s okay for you to be in a photograph, even next to your skinny friends/sisters/brothers, etc
  • You’re planning a vacation and might actually wear a bathing suit or at least shorts
  • Tank tops are no longer off limits
  • You don’t have any more room on the kitchen counter because it’s covered in fruits and veggies every week
  • You know how to pronounce quinoa

And the list just goes on and on!  Thanks to all of those who have shared their stories and inspired ME to think about all the wonderful reasons why I love to eat healthy because I forget sometimes too!

How to love Kale

offwhiteliving

(Photo courtesy of www.encyclopedia.com)

I often forget that not everybody loves kale.  Strange, I know.  What reminds me are random things like strange looks I get when I drink my kale-infused smoothie for breakfast at school, or when I see people’s eyes widen with confusion when I unearth my lunch and reveal the green leafy and onion sautee (over  a bed of quinoa  typically) leftover from the previous nights dinner.  For me, this is just standard fare.  How quickly I forget my anti-kale roots.

I get it.  Upon first glance Kale looks uninviting.  Almost angry.  With its curly leaves and almost snarly looking appearance, it doesn’t exactly exude the a welcoming vibe.  Not to mention that your only exposure may have been to the kale on the side of your “Eggs over my Hammy” plate at Denny’s or as the decorative green below fruit and cheese platters at dinner parties.  That was certainly how I first knew kale.

But underneath all of that ruffage is a really tasty, nutritious and versatile veggie.  But like all relationships, it simply takes time.  My first adventure with kale was probably in 2005.  I’d gotten the book Vegetarian Cooking for Everybody, by Deborah Madison and I was on a mission.  Each week I chose a new veggie and accompanying recipe.  Until that point I was a romaine lettuce and baby carrot girl, with the occasional salsa diversion.  Now I can’t think of a veggie I don’t like.  Even brussel sprouts.  My grandmother is probably rolling over in her grave for that one!

Can I recall my first kale dish? No, but I bet it involved other flavors, as to hide the taste and texture.  Turns out that kale, when cooked, is rather soft and pliable, not all all mean and offputting, as it looks in the grocery store.

Tip #2 for learning to love kale is to broaden your sense of what kale is.  The hyper-curly variety is only one option.  Dino kale is my fav – leaves are easier to work with (less curl) and it just has  a nice, mild flavor.  I also like red kale or a mix of several kales.  Try putting them in minestrone soup, or veggie and chicken soup.  I bet you won’t even notice your new friend, but your body will reap the benefits.

It’s not that you have to go nuts with kale like I do to have a healthy vegetable appetite.  It’s simply that if you can make friends with kale, you’re probably in with most other veggies too, and that means lots of variety.  I mean, who can eat romaine salads with fat free dressing and a few coarsely chopped baby carrots forever?  I certainly couldn’t.    My veggie repetiore needed a facelift.  I’m glad I found kale.  It’s a keeper in my diet.

PS:  I don’t recommend eating it raw if its your first endeavor with dark leafy greens.  It’s called ‘ruffage’ for a reason, people…get my drift??

Too excited to sit…

offwhiteliving3 Comments

Today I’m excited. I have all these ideas running around in my head about interactive food experiences I’d like to put together.  I just don’t know where to begin.
Maybe it’s the vegan clease that is giving me this energy….or is it the MASSIVE CHEAT I had today when I gulped down a 16 oz decaf coffe w/sugar free vanilla creamer.

Well, technically the creamer was nondairy, which might still be ‘vegan’ but I’m certain there was nothin’ clean about that combo.  But damn, it felt GOOODD going down, and perked me up.

What can I say, this week I”ve been studying the fascinating topics of cellular signaling, fatty acid synthesis and teaching a physiology lab about the electrical properties of the heart.  Hmm… its a far cry from cooking shows, cook books, and my newest idea:  “Chocolate and Chaturanga”.  I borrowed the idea from a recent article about fusing yoga and foodies together.  Brilliant!  So now I’m hot on the trail of how to put together such an event.

Yes, this is much better than reading the paper sitting in front of me, entitled ” Epitacechin mediates beneficial effects of flavanol-rich  cocoa on vascular function in humans” .  Although I think there *might* be something about chocoalte in there somewhere……..

Nighty night bloggies.  What do you think about “chocolate and chaturanga?”

I’m in

offwhiteliving4 Comments

By the way, I should absolutely be grading lab reports right now . Absolutely, without question I should be doing that.  But I’m not…and I don’t even feel that bad about it.  Sometimes a girl just needs a break.

Amidst all my grad school chaos some  good news came today.  Some of my cooking classes got approved for teaching at the Davis Food Coop.  Yes.  I’m in.  Watch out Davis, here I come!

Not your average french fry

offwhiteliving1 Comment

The vegan clease allows for potatoes…okay, so not what I’d usually have on a ‘cleanse’ but since I’m opting not to have corn or any flours at all (even GF), I’ll take an inch when its ‘allowed’.

Being the creative kitchen gal I am, I wanted to raise the potato bar and do something fun.  Besides, it was day 4 and Matt was starting to get might cranky, missing his favorite dairy and meat foods.  We decided to make  a vegan burger and fries meal:

Grilled portabello with spices
Green lettuce leaf ‘buns’
fixin’s: mustard, red onion, and tomato
“cheezy” fries.

See video below for the fries, but basically I cut up 2 lbs of red potatoes, marinated them in EVOO, salt, pepper and brewer’s yeast (what gives them the ‘cheezy’ appeal) and baked at 400 for about 17 minutes.  Delicious!  The whole meal was tasty!

Afternote: I definitely ate too many fries and it made we me want sugar.  I satisfied my urge with a not-so delicious apple, but it worked.  And hey, part of this clease is about facing those cravings and realizing the feeling is transient, relatively meaningless, and I feel much better having gone for the apple and not for some other treat!

Enjoy the video, and remeber, it is homemade (AKA, not perfect)

Hello world…

offwhiteliving2 Comments

This is what gets me going everyday.  It’s my magic bullet (ironically, you use a magic bullet to make this too!).

Yes, my friends, the rice protein smoothie has made its debut back into my life during the cleanse.  Not that I don’t eat a smoothie for breakfast quite a bit, but this one has some secret ingredients that will hopefully get my GI humming and my cells smiling.

Those secret ingredients would be mustard green, kale or spinach leaves and ground flaxmeal.  You really can’t taste the greens, I promise!  Add enough berries, cinnamon, and vanilla rice powder and your palate will overlook the bitter greens.  Try it, really.

I love this because I can make it the evening beforehand, store it in the fridge, and then sip it through my biochem class EVERY DAY at 8am.  I swear I can feel my brain cells perking up with every sip as more anti-oxidants enter my body.

Fun fact for ya: The more unsaturated fats (plant fats) you eat, the higher your requirement for anti-oxidants.  That is because unsaturated fats are prone to oxidation, which produces free fradicals (BAD).  Anti-oxidants are like cellular vigilantes that come in to wrangle up those free radicals and keep our cells happy and well.  So, eat those colorful veggies, especially if you eat a lot of unsaturated fats.

Consequently, this is also why its not advised to do high heat cooking with many unsaturated fats – the heat oxidizes them and makes them rancid….so I guess its back to butter and eggs after this 21 day cleanse for me.

Okay, back to work.  Smoothie recipe below

Toodles….

3/4 cup frozen berries
1/2 cup green leafy veggie leaves (kale, spinach, mustard – NO COLLARDS!)
1 tbsp flaxmeal
1 tsp cinnamon
8 oz or so of either water or unsweetened almond milk
1 serving Vanilla rice protein powder

Put ingredients in a blender and blend.  Add more liquid as needed.  I don’t recommend you put the protein powder in first, as it sticks to the bottom of the blender at my house….