Why do vegetables look so appealing when they are in the shop, and so dull once they are in my fridge? I get so excited by the sight and smells, and buy everything I see - basil, and baby spinach leaves, roquette and radishes, and dill and parsley and lettuce, and... stop me, somebody. Because I know only too well how it ends. It ends when I remove the lower drawer of the fridge, and tip the entire contents of it into the bin, and carry the bag out quickly, because if not, it'll leak. Why?
I guess it's because I grew up with vegetables being an afterthought. If at all. Proteins were a rare treat. We ate bread, and potatoes, and fish cans. You ate to feel full, not to be healthy. Health was an afterthought, too. Salads didn't exist for me when I was little. One of my aunts never sat down to diner without a plate of veg, and we looked at it as if it was some curiosity. She ate celery sticks, could you imagine? I remember staring at her open-mouthed. My mom lived her whole life (and still does!) on bread with jam. That's basically it. So the habit, written on the level of genes, of hundreds of generations of starved shtetl Jews, says, carbs first. Bread. And some more bread. Leaves are not filling. How many years will it take for me to re-program this? Because leaves are actually the most filling thing there is, nourishing body and soul, and giving me strength. When I manage to remember them.
It's a daily "doing teshuva". Daily reminder. Daily effort. We live in a different place and time. We don't get stuffed on potatoes, washing them down with tea, to keep warm. We are in the blessed Land, flowing with olive oil, date honey and pomegranate juice. I'm off... to invent another salad dressing, made of those ingredients. No more tipping the drawer in the bin. Celebrating the gifts of health that God gave us in every supermarket. Remind me I said this. ;)
Thursday 27 October 2016
Wednesday 26 October 2016
The mundane-NES of dreams
When you spend your summer writing a book, (or at least attempting such a feat), the blog just gets shoved aside, and stays close to the shore, away from the current of life, where we're all swimming, trying to duck waves and all the things they carry. Here a log, there a rock, here a job, there a jog, and before you know it, you're Old McDonald, counting your sheep sitting in the wheelchair in the old age home.
But what I really wanted to say is this: when you become religious, or maybe when you grow up in a community, one of the things you hear constantly is that material things cannot make you happy. And so children are taught to scoff at possessions, and make do with little, and share, and recycle and reuse, and to look forward and appreciate. All true and wonderful.
But, a rebel that I am, I've got to argue with that, too. And when I turn into Old McDonald, I won't be counting sheep, I'll be counting the times I escaped. (or my neighbour's sex toys)
I'd say, material possessions that bring you closer to your true self, do make you happy. Material possessions that serve a higher goal, that trampouline you to your higher self level, that enable you to achieve, give you an equisite, sparkling, glorious sense of joy.
And how do you know, which is which? How do you tell a simple desire for an object from a desire for a higher purpose? The urge you harbour feels exaclty the same in both cases, and you don't know until your wish has been fulfilled.
When your desire stems from the selfish, want-it-all-right-now part of you, you regret the purchase by the time you bring it home. You feel like your higher brain has been hijacked for a time - and it has been. Your conciousness lsitened to the simpler, more primitive part of you, the part that causes road rage, hate crimes, binge consumption, and impulsive behaviour. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amygdala_hijack) When your achievement makes you hate yourself, you know you've desired the wrong thing.
When you have a dream, (oh yeah, I Have a Dream), and then suddenly you find yourself living it, as real as could be, larger thsn life, and you ask yourself, why is it so mundane? Where are the fanfares, at least the mental ones? Why does it feel so... every day? So normal and "always been this way"?
I call this "the mundaneness of dreams". For me, that's a sign that I have been dreaming in the right direction. When the dream continues to walk in step with the drums of my soul, when I don't feel like vomiting it out the second I have it, I know that I've wanted right. And then I make sure to remind myself, that it's mundane-NES, the miracle that is hidden in every day, every move and every breath. And that's when the happiness comes - the sparkling, bubbling, colourful joy, the rainbow of song and the dance of the heart, sprinklers on the spring grass and the maroon-and -orange autumn sunset, all blended into one. I just hope I am never too old to dream, and to springboard myself in the right direction.
But what I really wanted to say is this: when you become religious, or maybe when you grow up in a community, one of the things you hear constantly is that material things cannot make you happy. And so children are taught to scoff at possessions, and make do with little, and share, and recycle and reuse, and to look forward and appreciate. All true and wonderful.
But, a rebel that I am, I've got to argue with that, too. And when I turn into Old McDonald, I won't be counting sheep, I'll be counting the times I escaped. (or my neighbour's sex toys)
I'd say, material possessions that bring you closer to your true self, do make you happy. Material possessions that serve a higher goal, that trampouline you to your higher self level, that enable you to achieve, give you an equisite, sparkling, glorious sense of joy.
And how do you know, which is which? How do you tell a simple desire for an object from a desire for a higher purpose? The urge you harbour feels exaclty the same in both cases, and you don't know until your wish has been fulfilled.
When your desire stems from the selfish, want-it-all-right-now part of you, you regret the purchase by the time you bring it home. You feel like your higher brain has been hijacked for a time - and it has been. Your conciousness lsitened to the simpler, more primitive part of you, the part that causes road rage, hate crimes, binge consumption, and impulsive behaviour. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amygdala_hijack) When your achievement makes you hate yourself, you know you've desired the wrong thing.
When you have a dream, (oh yeah, I Have a Dream), and then suddenly you find yourself living it, as real as could be, larger thsn life, and you ask yourself, why is it so mundane? Where are the fanfares, at least the mental ones? Why does it feel so... every day? So normal and "always been this way"?
I call this "the mundaneness of dreams". For me, that's a sign that I have been dreaming in the right direction. When the dream continues to walk in step with the drums of my soul, when I don't feel like vomiting it out the second I have it, I know that I've wanted right. And then I make sure to remind myself, that it's mundane-NES, the miracle that is hidden in every day, every move and every breath. And that's when the happiness comes - the sparkling, bubbling, colourful joy, the rainbow of song and the dance of the heart, sprinklers on the spring grass and the maroon-and -orange autumn sunset, all blended into one. I just hope I am never too old to dream, and to springboard myself in the right direction.
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