joy5of32

I smiled a lot today.  Laughed a little.  Talked loud and don't have much to say today.  I will write on because I made a commitment to do so for the next 27 days anyway.  I am watching Private Practice and The Mentalist a girl just shouted "I want to die".  Makes me think about this goal of joy, being joy, spreading it, living inside the circle of love that is God and joy.  Some people struggle to live while others pray for death.  I mean eventually they get their wish but I wonder why some get joy and some don't.  Is it simply about intention and request?

I am more joyful or at least I think I am more joyful.  I am pushing through the resistances I feel throughout the day by completing unpleasant tasks that I'd like to avoid.  Telling myself that I will get a reward at the end, holding the carrot of the joy of relief I will feel from the my learning in uncomfortable tasks, or end results- more order in my life what have you.

Things that made me smile and laugh today
1. Watching my mother; she just makes me smile.  I'm a bit of a fan.
2.  Talking to my friend Felisha about juice and salad and soups and of course clothes
3. Receiving a text message from an ex
4.  Talking to my manager
5.  Seeing my God Father and God Brother outside my house blowing the snow away from our driveway.
6.  Talking to a strangers in the mall about nothing
7.  Talking to friends on the phone
simple huh?  Very simple.  Small things make me smile.  That's nice to know.  Makes me think I am not hard to please, small things make me happy so why spend time and energy with people that don't make me happy....unless they are family...really there is no need.

What made you smile today?

joy day 4of32

Good things happen when you are stuck in the house.  I stared out of the window and watched the snow fall as I talked to one of my dearest friends on the phone.  I mused at the sight and shared it and she said she was doing the EXACT same thing.  We laughed, caught up, gossiped, shared just like old friends do.  I kinda wanted her husband to say he would be over tomorrow to shovel me out...no such luck.  I guess friendships have their limits.  

When I finally got hungry after being on the phone 3 different times with the "representative" over the course of an hour and completing my one task of the day.  I ventured down to clean my juicer that I neglected to clean last night....DON'T try that at home.  Thank God it's not summer or there would have been heaps of fruit flies.  I made my Green lemonade (recipe on day 2 I believe) and sipped away and then pulled out Ms. Natalia Rose's book again and by golly that Power Soup was the BOMB DIGGITY!  My mother loved it so much that she licked not only her bowl but the lid of the food processor that I made it in. Okay it is a chilled soup and you know snowed in, winter you would think warm soup but I am doing this raw til dinner thing (sometimes)

I had joy mostly in eating it.  And watching my mother enjoy it and go on and on about it.
then a few hours later I hit the jack pot again with an amazing corn salad with marinated portobello mushrooms and a raw caesar dressing.  When I tell you I wanted to dance while eating I am NOT joking.  Joy Joy Joy!!!!!!

Now I will give you the recipe but remember, I don't really do EXACT measurements (sorry Julia) so each of these recipe's I tweeked a bit.  If you try it PLEASE let me know how you like it.

And while you are at it, if you are reading this from facebook, please click on the original post and if you like my blog click on the link that allows you to follow the blog.  It would be a great help to me!  Leave your comments there as well!!!!

Here's to joy!  Campai!

Power Soup
Natlaia says that it is ideal for weight loss and has a heap of enzymes and good stuff.  What I love about it is all of that and it is sooooooo refreshing!  I was transported to a tropical spa in Thailand.
1c alfalfa sprouts
3c strawberries
3tb raw honey
2-4 stevia packets (i didn't use this....stevia tastes like DEATH to me)
1 head of lettuce
1/4 med beet (optional) makes it pretty

Blend that sucker up with a few ice cubes.  Natalia says that it lasts 2 days but it was gone in about 10 minutes, so I don't know. I split the recipe in half because I had no clue how much I would like it.  I kinda wanna make some right now but I'll wait and have it for breakfast.

Taking care of yourself is fun, nurturing and good for the environment!

3of32 salt

 Well we are about to get a never before recorded in time record snow storm, again.  Snow, snow and more snow.  I really miss LA but I am here now on the east coast and it is all about the snow.  On the news, on the radio, conversations with people.  In LA my biggest concern was when to meet someone so I wouldn't get caught on the 405 during rush hour or smoke inhalation from the summer brush fires. Oh yeah and the earthquakes.  I guess no matter where you are in the world, mother nature rules.

Okay, so I remember somewhere in history class that wars have been fought over salt.  I ran out Sat. and felt compelled to have salt, we need salt, it was my mission to get salt today.  I met my friend Felisha for lunch today and was invited to do a quick drive by at Daffy's my FAVORITE place to shop.  Amazing deals by the way. And I declined, primarily because I needed to go to the grocery story to get my veggies so I can juice and make amazing salads and raw dressings while cooped up for the next few days, because I can't find my glasses and didn't want to get caught at night in the snow without them AND to get salt.  It's mid February and have used salt once but the news and the conversations have me convinced I need to get some salt. 

First stop, Wegmans, thought I could do one stop shopping but of course....no salt.  Down to Costco they have not to have it...boogie boards, goggles...no salt.  A hot dog later....ruined my raw day with that one.  I run in to Target...no salt.  In the car, tank on E across the street to Acme.  No salt but a smart ass clerk who smirks and says, "you want salt on the day of the storm?"  I laugh and pretend I don't want to pause and cuss his but out.  But I am working on being more loving and letting the things that don't matter, not matter so I pursue on, and he was kinda right.  It is dark now but not snowing and I know where I am going so I am not that concerned about my vision.  Maybe its all the carrot juice I have been drinking.    Back in the car, to a gas station, gas? nahhh...but they may have some salt...no such luck.

Phone rings, mom is worried about the power going out, I tell her to find her cell phone and charge it up.    On the phone with my dear friend in LA who is checking in.  LA has heard about the snow, maybe it really is gonna snow hard.  Okay so I go to CVS, Rite Aide, another gas station this time to get gas...NO SALT.  As I am waiting for the attendant to fill my tank one of the advantages of being in NJ, law to that I can't pump!!! I am thinking about what was the world like with no salt?  Who discovered salt?  How did it become something to fight over, why is salt retention thought by some to be the gene component that saved many a Africans life during the middle passage and why can't I find any when I really want some?  Maybe I will pour some table salt on the  driveway tomorrow.

I am around the corner from my house and there is a small conveney owned by some Eastern Indians that used to be a WaWa and I thought I'll try but they just can't have any but what the hey...Bingo!  $14.99....I laughed out loud and almost left it there but alas....I had the coveted salt.  And SCENE!

2of32/CARROTS

So I am reading this book The Raw Food Detox Diet by the beautiful Natalia Rose and in it she suggests that you make this green lemonade which is AMAZING by the way.  You take a lemon, 2 apples, 4 stalks of kale, a head of romaine and some ginger and juice it.  I add an orange and on a day like today when I didn't have anymore Romaine so I used cucumber.  Yum differ!  Now here comes my issue.

Waste.  It literally hurts my soul to take all the pulp and throw it away.  So in the middle of the juicing process I separate the kale and lettuce pulp throw it in the pan with some olive oil and sea salt and flash cook it for about a minute....DELICIOUS!!!!!  NOW I am not only juicing kale EVERY DAY I am eating it as well.  Great.  I have minimized my waste and my body is loving it.

Many times people ask me why I look so young and vibrant.  I can't say I am the HEALTHIEST person on the planet but I believe that food as God made it in its purest form is best for our bodies.  I love food, whole UNPROCESSED FOODS.  Many think I am a vegetarian, I AM NOT.  Many think I am a Raw Foodie, I AM NOT.  But I love pure food....simple.  So if you catch me with a rib in my mouth I don't want you to think me a hypocrite.  So I am setting the record straight.  I believe in balance and whole foods, as God intended.  AND I believe in GOOD TASTING foods.  I love cooking, and sharing    the gift of my understanding of flavors with others.  It is much like my love of performance, I see no difference in the two really.  I have a gift and I just love sharing it.  Only with food, I haven't gotten paid for it YET.  My friends, even my mother - who is the greatest benefactor of my food exploits now and the main inspiration- state, "You should open a restaurant!"  Lots of work, maybe when I retire..

So I am talking to my friend Felisha on the phone, trying to convince her to buy a juicer.  She is a vegan and I just want to make sure she gets all of her nutrients in.  Many times, vegans and vegetarians, because they don't eat from the full spectrum of foods, don't get all of the enzymes, vitamins and minerals that all foods provide.  She tells me about this amazing drink she had of carrot, apple and banana.  I am like, "Felisha, you can't juice a banana"  She explains that you you juice the juice then blend the banana.  I have a bag of organic carrots so after juicing my green lemonade I start in on the carrots.  I have a bag of pulp, orange bright, full of Vitamin A and Carotene (sort of the same thing).  "Make carrot bread, I know you can do a good job on that girl"  And there it was.....I don't wanna waste all those vitamins that God placed here for me, I don't wanna throw it in the trash.  oh!

So now I am surfing the web, looking for the best use of my carrot pulp.  Carrot cake, carrot bread, carrot marmalade, carrot soup, carrot bricks???  I am not sure what to do right now one lady suggested flattening it out and freezing it and then breaking off pieces to use in soups, I can dehydrate it in my dehydrator, maybe make carrot chips.  Or I could just throw it away and pray for forgiveness.  I could start a compost pile.  What should I do!!!!!!??????

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New Direction 1 of 32

So I am trying this 32 day process thing where I will blog everyday for 32 days.  Only thing I want to do is to unlink it from my facebook.  I kinda want these to be two separate entities but I am not sure how to do it.  I guess it shouldn't matter, but somehow it does.

Fear started to choke the life out of my blogging.  Fear of offending, fear of being to open and honest, fear of judgement, fear of limiting opportunities for career, love and joy.  The whole point of this blogging was to share and invoke joy.  I am a soul searching for heaven in the now.  Allowing the illusion of suffering to be lifted from my clouded eye is what I am about.  Being in joy.  Allowing the gifts of spirit to be seen.  Being able to see.  That is the direction I steer and even if I only say two words, if I can get to a computer for the next 32 days I will post.

I just saw most of JULIE/JULIA.  Obvious inspiration there.  I loved the joy of Julia Childs spirit.  It spoke to me.  Why are we here?  We come and we go.  I want to really be here, while I am here.  I want to be here so bad it makes me cry.  I am aching to really be here, to share my spirit, my gifts, my heart.  I am here!  I am here!

GratiTUDE

It's late, not gonna say much except that I got an attitude of gratitude. I performed in Witness Uganda again tonight at an off Broadway Theater and I just LOVE that I have an opportunity to be challenged to do more, push farther and share my gifts to others. It is such a blessing to be able to bless others....a perfect union of love amongst humanity. I pray for more opportunities to give in this way with more people. I also learned that my insights are different than others and the way I am is perceived differently by different people. My goal in this is to trust myself more and to have the personal integrity to trust that how I get things are worth sharing, imperative to share and a must.

So excited about the adventure of life and what is to come. So very excited and grateful.

Spoils from the Conquest at Barnes and Nobles

So I am on the Upper East Side of Manhattan reading THE FOUR AGREEMENTS BY DON MIGUEL RUIZ. Now I have read this book before, maybe twice. Once because Oprah said to, and you know Oprah used to have the power of the Wizard of Oz.....'The Color is Green! You don't want to be seen if you ain't in green' Another I think at the University of Santa Monica where I earned a MA in Spiritual Psychology and this time, because my dear friend and I were in the book store late last night and he kept asking me, "Matt what is a book I must read?" The adventure began...man I was like," Malcolm X, Souls of Black Folk, Man Child in the Promised Land, no no have you read The Alchemist!?" We were running through the bookstore like kids in a candy store. All of that information steaming up from those books for us to touch and take in its contents. I pulled Siddhartha, he pulled Uncle Tom's Cabin, I pulled Conversations with God, he pulled Oliver Twist. Roots or Malcolm X, Before the Mayflower or Seat of the Soul? The Four Agreements!! Before you know it I am grabbing books to! The fever has hit me and even though I read this book the soul readies itself to hear deeper and more and my soul leaped with joy and said yes! "This is it this is the one you must read!" He wasn't convinced and I think he was right, this was for me.

I had no idea the exhilarating, energizing feeling reading gave me. I was like, "ooooooo you gotta have some James Baldwin in your life! Oh wait, Zora......oooooooo no Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fannon!!! He discovered God in the dagon concentration camps!!! He found peace among the ruins of hate and mayhem........yeah you need that in your life" So many books so much information and God gifted insights and perspectives and journeys and adventures........whew! This was fun! A bookstore.....this much fun....really? Two friends sharing information/light.....an utter joy and gift.

Finally, we stood at the checkout line, perusing our remains of the day (not a bad movie), with a sober more practical knowing; we weren't going to impulse buy the 10 or so books we collectively held. Moving the books back and forth like they were playing cards and we making choices for the draft, we made our final selections as if this was it. And for this moment this was it. There will be more books and more times to read books just like there is a new draft each year but this was the selection for this moment, this season and it felt VERY important.

He settled for Malcolm X, Siddhartha, and The Art of War.....CLASSICS....MUST READS. I on Siddhartha (again), Seat of the Soul (again) and The Four Agreements (again).

Ahhhh let the insights begin...again....