Hello beautiful people~
I hope you are doing well and taking good care of your mind, body and soul.
I wanted to drop in to share some words for March and also my favorite porridge bread and homemade nutty milk recipe. I eat a slice every morning and froth up a cup of warm nutty milk in the evening with some carob powder. (so good!) I thought you might enjoy trying them.
I am happy to help you source ingredients. I have searched high and low for the best of the best when it comes to what I put in my body.
As always, I am here for any, and all, of your wellness needs. Feel free to reach out should you find yourself in need of any of my offerings: group classes, private training, nutritional guidance, life coaching, health coaching, meditation, yoga, breath work, home organizing, voice dialogue, recipe inspiration, and more!
I look forward to seeing you where the magic happens.
1. Set aside quiet time, every day— Quiet time to yourself is a vital part of life. Like spending time alone, it helps to balance the noise and confusion that infiltrate much of our day. Dedicate some time every day for you to simply be; be it a 10 minute meditation, some gentle stretching, a warm bath, a nature walk before the world wakes up. You first, then everyone/everything else.
2. Imagine the people in your life as tiny infants and as one-hundred-year-old adults—This is a lovely practice to release feelings of irritation toward other people. Think of someone who truly irritates you, who makes you feel angry. Now, close your eyes and try to image this person as a tiny infant. Know that babies can’t help but make mistakes and each of us was, at one time, a little infant. Now, roll forward the clock one hundred years. See the same person as a very old person who is in their later years of their life. Look at their worn features and their soft smile, which suggests a bit of wisdom and the admissions of mistakes made. Know that each of us will be one hundred years old, alive or not, before too many decades go by. You can play with this technique as you wish. It almost always provides you with some needed perspective and compassion. If our goal is to become more peaceful and loving, we certainly don’t want to harbor negativity toward others.
3. Seek first to understand—Using this tragedy is a shortcut to becoming a more content person. This implies that you become more interested in understanding others and less in having other people understand you. It means mastering the idea that if you want quality, fulfilling communication that is nourishing to you and others, understanding others must come first. When you try to be understood before you understand, the effort you exert will be felt by you and the person, or people, you are trying to reach. communication may breakdown and you might end up with a battle of two egos. Seeking first to understand isn’t about who’s right or wrong; it is philosophy of effective communication. When you practice this method you’ll notice that the people you communicate with will eel listens to, heard, and understood.
4. Become a better listener—Effective listening is more than simply avoiding the bad habit of interrupting others while they are speaking or finishing their sentences. It’s being content to listen to the entire thought of someone rather than waiting impatiently for your chance to respond. The way we fail to listen is symbolic of the way we live. We often treat communication as if it were a race. it’s almost like our goal is to have no time gaps between the conclusion of the sentence of the person we are speaking with and the beginning of our own. Slowing down your responses and becoming a better listener aids you in becoming a more peaceful person. It takes pressure from you. You will feel more relaxed, and so will the people you are talking to. Not only will becoming a better listener make you a more patient person, it will also enhance the quality of your relationships. Everyone loves to talk to someone who truly listens to what they are saying.
5. Choose your battles wisely—Life is filled with opportunities to choose between making a big deal out of something or simply letting it go, realizing it doesn’t really matter. Certainly there will be times when you will want, or need, to argue, confront, or even fight for something you believe in. Many people, however, argue, confront, and fight over practically anything. The tiniest disagreement or glitch in your plans can be made into a big deal if your goal (conscious or unconscious) is to have everything work out in your favor. This is a prescription for unhappiness and frustration. The truth is, life is rarely exactly the way we want it to be, and other people often don’t act as we would like them to. There are always going to be people who disagree with you, people who do things differently, and things that don’t work out. If you fight against this principal in life, you will spend most of your life fighting battles. A more peaceful way to live is to decide consciously which battles are worth fighting and which are better left alone. Is it really important that you prove to your partner that you are right and they are wrong, or that you confront someone simply because it appears as though they have made a minor mistake? Does the fact that your neighbor won’t park his car on a different part of the street have to be discussed at your family dinner table? Take a look at your own list. Don’t sweat the small stuff. It is critical that you choose your battles wisely. If you do, there will come a day when you’ll rarely feel the need to do battle at all.
6. Become aware of your moods and don’t allow yourself to be fooled by the low ones—Your own moods can be extremely deceptive. They can, and probably do, trick you into believing your life is far worse than it really is. When you’re in a good mood, life looks great. When you’re in a bad mood, life looks unbearably serious and difficult. Here’s the catch: People don’t realize their moods are always on the run. In low moods we lose our perspective and everything seems urgent. We completely forget that when we are in a good mood, everything seems so much better. Life is almost near as bad as it seems when you’re in a low mood. Rather than staying stuck in a bad temper, convinced you are seeing life realistically, you can learn to question your judgement. Remind yourself, ‘Of course I’m feeling defensive (or angry, frustrated, stressed, depressed); I’m in a bad mood.” When you’re in an ill mood, learn to pass it of as simply that: an unavoidable human condition that will pass with time, if you leave it alone. A low mood is not the time to analyze your life. If you have a legitimate problem it will still be there when your state of mind improves. The trick is to be grateful for our good moods and graceful in our low moods—not taking them too seriously.
7. Practice random acts of kindness—Practicing random acts of kindness is an effective way to get in touch with the joy of giving without expecting anything in return. It is best practiced without letting anyone know what you are doing. This practice comes from the heart. Your gift may be to pick up litter in your neighborhood, save an animal or get a volunteer position feeding hungry people at a church, or shelter. Perhaps the greatest reason to practice random kindness is that it brings great contentment into your life. Each act of kindness rewards you with positive feelings and reminds you of the important aspects of life—service, kindness, and love. If we all do our own part, pretty soon we will live in a nicer world.
8. Look beyond behavior—Wouldn’t it be nice if we could try to extend this loving kindness toward everyone we meet? Have perspective; give others the benefit of the doubt. Know that when the postal clerk is moving slowly, they are probably having a bad day, or perhaps isn’t feeling well. When your partner, or close friend, snaps at you, try to understand that, beneath the isolated act, your loved one really wants to love you, and to feel loved by you. Looking beyond behavior is easier than you might think. Try it today, and you’ll see and feel some nice results.
9. See the innocence—For many people, one of the most frustrating aspects of life is not being able to understand other people’s behavior. We seem them as ‘guilty’ instead of ‘innocent’. It’s tempting to focus on people’s seemingly irrational behavior—their comments, actions, mean-spirited acts, selfish behavior—and get extremely frustrated. If we focus on behavior too much, it can seem like other people are making us miserable. Wayne Dyer sarcastically suggested in a lecture,’ Round up all the people who are making you miserable and bring them to me. I will treat them (as a counselor) and you’ll get better.’ Obviously this is absurd. It’s true that other people do weird things but we are the ones getting upset so we are the ones who need to change. I’m not talking about accepting, ignoring, or advocating violence or nay other deviant behavior. I’m merely talking about learning to be less bothered by the actions of people. Seeing the innocence is a powerful tool for transformation that means when someone is acting a way that we don’t like, the best stately for dealing with that person is to distance ourselves from the behavior; to look beyond it, so that we can see the innocence in where the behavior is coming from. Very often, this subtle shift in our thinking immediately puts us into a state of compassion. Underneath even the most annoying behavior is a frustrated person who is crying out for compassion. The next time when someone acts in a strange way, look for the innocence in their behavior. If you’re compassionate, it won’t be hard to see. When you see the innocence, the same things that have always frustrated you no longer do. And, when you’re not frustrated by the actions of others, it’s a lot easier to stay focused on the beauty of life.
10. Choose being kind over being right—You have many chances to point out to someone their mistakes, things they could or should have done differently, ways they can improve. You have chances to ‘correct’ people, privately as well as in front of others. What all these opportunities amount to are chances to makes someone else feel bad, and yourself feel bad in the process. The reason we are tempted to put others down, correct them, or show them how we’re right and they’re wrong is that our ego mistakenly believes that if we point out how someone else is wrong, we must be right, and therefore we will feel better. In actuality, however, if you pay attention to the way you feel after you put someone down, you’ll notice that you feel worse than before the put-down. Your heart, the compassionate part of you, knows that it’s impossible to feel better at the expense of someone else. Luckily the opposite is true—when your goal is to build people up, to make them feel better, to share in their joy, you too reap the requires of their positive feelings. The next time you have the chance to correct someone, even if their facts are a little off, resist the temptation. Instead, ask yourself, ‘What do I really want out of this interaction?” Chances are, what you want is a peaceful interaction where all parties leave feeling good. eAch time you resist ‘being right’ and instead choose kindness, you’ll notice a peaceful feeling within. In order to be a person filled with equanimity, you must choose kindness over being right, most of the time. The best place to start is with the next person you speak to.
Love and peace to you and yours,
Dove
Dove’s Yummy Porridge Bread
Ingredients
2 cups organic yogurt-CocoJune plain or another no sugar added plain plant based yogurt,
or sheep/goat yogurt
4 cups organic oats
2 cups organic nuts, seeds and dried fruits
*Prunes are amazing, sunflower seeds, dried apricots, raisins, pistachios, hazelnuts,
sunflowers etc. Go wild. I use Fruit Briss Fruit Medley
2 organic eggs
1 teaspoon baking soda
Big pinch of salt
A few splashes of plant-based milk no sugar added—I make my own
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350°
Add yogurt, oats, nuts, seeds and dried fruit into a big mixing bowl.
Then crack in two eggs, add baking soda and salt.
Give it a really good mix and add a splash or two of plant-based milk as you go.
Then line two small bread tins with baking parchment, fill with the mixture making sure
to press down and get rid of any air bubbles.
Then bake for 45 minutes until golden brown and toothpick comes out clean.
Remove from the oven and leave in the tins for 5 minutes, then remove from the tins and
leave to cool before slicing.
Keep in glass airtight container in fridge. You can freeze the spare loaf if you wish.
I slice and put in toaster and then smear on some yummy butter, maybe a drizzle of
honey, sometimes goat cheese and sliced apples, sometimes nut butter and honey,
sometimes avocado, tomato, red onion and cilantro sprouts, the options are endless.
Enjoy!
My Mama’s Yummy Nutty Milk
Ingredients
4 cups water
3 Tablespoons organic nut butter of your choice
I use a mix of different nut butters to give it an extra rich and creamy taste but you can
use one if you wish. Lately I am enjoying a mix of three different nut butters: pecan,
walnut, and a pistachio, macadamia nut blend.
*Optional
1 soft date (If not soft then soak in a few tablespoons of warm water for 10 minutes and
pour soaking water in too.)
¼ teaspoon organic vanilla
Pinch of Himalayan pink sea salt
Dash or two of cinnamon
Instructions
Blend well and store in glass containers in fridge.
Enjoy within 5 days…trust me it won’t last that long. ;)