Liquid Gold

I first learned about ghee, and specifically Ancient Organics ghee, from Deborah Madison's book Vegetable Literacy.

"I was smitten the first time I tasted Ancient Organic’s Ghee; it’s that delicious!
Slip as little as a teaspoon (or less) into a bowl of hot cereal and it’s suddenly transformed into something very special. Eggs cooked in ghee are divine. So is ghee on toast – and this is just breakfast. I use it all day long, with vegetables, grains, in soups, desserts. I scarcely buy butter anymore. The flavor of this organic ghee is so deep and rich with caramel overtones, that it transforms the simplest things, from a baked potato to a bowl of polenta."

 I found it at my local PCC shortly thereafter and now...we go through A LOT of ghee in our house. 

Made from organic pastured butter from Straus Family Creamery, it truly is transformative. Aside from salt, it is becoming the first thing I reach for in the kitchen.

Ghee is considered one of the best fats for baking, sautéing and frying due to its high smoke point. Butter burns at a fairly low temperature but once the milk solids have been removed, ghee, or clarified butter, becomes a very pure oil with a smoke point of 480 degrees.

Aside from being incredibly delicious, ghee has been used in Indian Ayurvedic cooking for centuries as a health aid for digestion, ulcers and the promotion of healthy eyes and skin, and as a topical treatment for burns and blisters. Read on at My New Roots.

In Vegetable Literacy Deborah goes so far to say, "Ancient Organics ghee has more going for it in the flavor department than other brands I've tried and even that which I've made myself. " Trust her and get the real deal here. 

Exercise Less, Move More

When I was first learning Pilates, one of the first things I noticed was how I became aware of my body during the rest of my day and not just when I was in the studio working out for an hour. I noticed that I sat hunched forward with my neck sticking out when I typed at the computer. While driving I sat crooked with my left leg cocked to the side.

This was a revelation. Up until then I went about my day without ever giving a second thought to how I moved my body. It was as if my body and mind were separate. My body was left on autopilot while my mind occupied itself with the important distractions of "modern life."

I started to make little changes throughout the day, putting my head and legs back where they belonged in proper alignment. I began taking deeper breaths and found myself pulling my stomach in when vacuuming or carrying the groceries. And that was the whole point of Joe's method of Contrology (now known as Pilates). He didn't want you to spend hours and hours in the studio exercising. He wanted you to learn and translate his method of movement into your normal everyday life so that your body and mind worked together to become the best, most balanced, happy and healthy version of itself.

“Contrology is complete coordination of body, mind, and spirit. Through Contrology you first purposefully acquire complete control of your own body and then through proper repetition of its exercises you gradually and progressively acquire that natural rhythm and coordination associated with all your subconscious activities.”

— Joe Pilates, Return to Life

With the current state of our largely sedentary lifestyles, there have been a few recent articles stating the importance of moving, and moving often, rather than focusing on being at the gym a few hours a week. From Outside Magazine:

“Even those with excellent exercise habits spend most of their non-exercise time not moving. When we’ve checked the exercise box, we perceive ourselves as active, but it is the almost-all-day stillness that is the problem.”

Paying attention to how we walk, sit, stand, pick up the groceries and all the other tasks that make up our day is valuable.

This was all in Joe's manifesto as well, written 70 years ago...

“One of the major results of Contrology is gaining the mastery of your mind over the complete control of your body. In practically every instance the daily acts we perform are governed by what we THINK we see, hear, or touch, without stopping first to analyze or think of the possible results of our actions, good or bad. As the result of habit or reflex action, we wink, dodge, and operate machines more or less automatically.”

With this attentiveness and control comes balance to the mind and body and allows you to move efficiently and effectively all throughout your day. 

Even if you've never practiced Pilates there are a few easy things you can incorporate into your daily life to improve your quality of movement.

Breathing. Most of us breathe very shallow, especially true when under stress or anxiety. Pay attention to your breath throughout the day and remind yourself to fully exhale, squeezing all the air out of your lungs.

Fight gravity. Whether you are sitting or standing, strive to be ever taller. Try to keep your head on top of your spine reaching the crown of your head to the ceiling. Visualize making your spine as long and straight as you can from head to tail and pull your stomach in and up to support the length.

Walking. Keep your eyes forward rather than the ground. So many of us, particularly women, walk with our eyes cast down. The eyes direct the body where to go so if you spend a lot of time looking down, the head shoulders and upper back will follow suit. Keep your eyes looking straight in front of you as you walk, and practice fighting gravity.

There is natural grace and strength in all of us. We just have to start paying attention to ourselves and see the potential. Move well and enjoy life.

Finding Home

photo by Aran Goyoaga

Aran's incredibly beautiful blog and book are two of my favorites. Reading her post this morning about finding home in Seattle really struck a chord. Especially this...

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“I think what lies under this sentiment is also a sense of growing up. Realizing that I am the only one who can create my community that I was craving so much, to find the jobs I want or to surround myself with beauty. It is all up to me. And it only took about 20 years for me to finally realize this.”

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Read her entire post here.

Solitude and Resolutions

photo of my son D at Kerry Park

I am reading this amazing book - Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking. Whether you are an introvert or an extrovert, it is a fantastic read.

You can listen to the author, Susan Cain give her Ted Talk here (which has been viewed more than five million times).

In the chapter "When Collaboration Kills Creativity" she writes on the now-famous study conducted by Anders Ericsson. Regarding the value of solitary practice among the elite in their fields (violinists, chess players and athletes):

What's so magical about solitude? In many fields, Ericsson told me, it’s only when you’re alone that you can engage in Deliberate Practice, which he identified as the key to exceptional achievement. When you practice deliberately, you identify the tasks or knowledge that are just out of your reach, strive to upgrade your performance, monitor your progress, and revise accordingly. Practice sessions that fall short of this standard are not only less useful--they’re counterproductive. They reinforce existing cognitive mechanisms instead of improving them.

Deliberate Practice is best conducted alone for several reasons. It takes intense concentration, and other people can be distracting. It requires deep motivation, often self-generated. But most important, it involves working on a task that’s most challenging to you personally. Only when you’re alone, Ericsson told me, can you “go directly to the part that’s challenging to you. If you want to improve what you’re doing, you have to the be the one who generates the move. Imagine a group class-you’re the one generating the move only a small percentage of the time.”

You can read a fantastic summary on the study's findings here.

Reading about this at the same moment I've been slowing down and thinking about my life and my goals for the new year feels very apropos. I've been cleaning house both literally and mindfully, and working to, in the words of my very wise mother-in-law, "clear out of your mind that which has outgrown its usefulness" to make space for the new. As life picks up speed next week as we settle in to 2014, I will continue to make time for the Quiet; to recharge, be inspired and appreciate all that is around me.

NeilWhat?

This summer when I was coming down with an unseasonable cold one of my clients said I had go get this thing called NeilMed. She was emphatic and said "It will change your life!" This is a totally un-glamorous thing to write about, but seriously this thing is sort of life changing. I had tried to use a neti pot before especially during high allergy season but I never could get the angle right. Instead of the water going in one nostril and out the other as it should, it always felt like the water was just pooling in my sinuses and it felt so horrible that that was the last I touched it. But THIS thing is like a neti pot for people who are afraid of neti pots! It is pretty foolproof to use.

So this week when the first cold of the season hit our house, I pulled it out again. There is something so satisfying seeing all that gunk get flushed out that you could never otherwise get to and I swear it has made my colds that much shorter just getting all that stuff out. Enough with the un-glamorous details. Just go get one at your local pharmacy to keep in your wellness arsenal for cold, flu and allergy season.

A New Mantra

self portrait of my son D

speak less, listen more

say less, do more

worry less, work more

ride less, walk more

eat less, chew more

start less, finish more

correct less, prevent more

blame less, forgive more

wrestle less, embrace more

compete less, cooperate more

take less, give more

have less, be more

frown less, laugh more

From Joslyn's perfect post here.

Feeling under the weather...

I woke up yesterday with a cold so I thought it would be a good time to share my favorite and super effective cold remedy. A few years ago I read this article in Vogue about Dr Daphne Miller who has a integrative primary care practice in San Francisco. I see a Naturopath as my primary doctor and her approach resonated with me. My favorite part of the article was this: "Patients who come to Miller for relief from the sniffles get a "prescription" for mushroom-ginger soup. She points out that ginger is an excellent decongestant, and there's scientific evidence that mushrooms boost your immune system. Patients with depression or diabetes might leave with recipes that feature omega-3 rich fish or slow-release carbs along with their standard prescriptions. 'If you have certain illnesses, it's better to use medications as a complement to foods,'she says."

I wanted to know what her mushroom-ginger soup recipe was so I googled it and sure enough (bless the internet) I found it here!

Daphne Miller's Mushroom Soup with Ginger

1 ¼ cup shiitake, white button, maitake, cremini, or oyster mushrooms cut in

¼ inch slices

1/2 inch cube of fresh ginger (you can add a bit more if you really love ginger)

2 cups cold water

1 tablespoon white or red miso paste

1 tsp Mirin, sake or rice vinegar

1 tbsp finely chopped scallion

Put mushrooms, ginger and water in a pot with a lid and bring to a boil, immediately turn down heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Remove from heat and take out ginger. Put ¼ up of broth in a bowl and stir in miso paste and Mirin.

Stir this mixture into the pot. Serve topped with scallions.

Serving size: 1 dose

The next time I felt a cold coming on I made it and couldn't believe how well it worked. It is amazing. Every.single.time I am under the weather this does the trick and I feel better, I won't say instantly, but ridiculously fast. It is my secret weapon.

A few other things I try to follow when battling a cold are eliminating dairy and sugar, take a good probiotic and drink as much water as possible. I also love ginger and drink this concoction daily even when I'm not sick.

- Grated ginger (the easiest way to do this is to keep a nob of ginger in the freezer and grate as needed using a microplane zester)

- Juice from 1/2 a lemon

- Honey to taste

- Pinch of cayenne (optional)

- Add hot water

As a final note, Daphne Miller wrote the Jungle Effect which is a very interesting read and I just noticed she has new book out, Farmacology, that I just added to my Amazon wishlist. You can read more about her here.

Be well.