Courage: to tell the story of who you are with your whole heart

This TED talk was sent my way this week and I have been resonating with some of its messages this morning:

I love what she says about courage:

Have the courage to be imperfect

When we recognize and accept and are okay our own imperfections, and are kind to ourselves, it opens us up to be kind and compassionate to others and to have connection. The only way to truly have connection is to believe that we are worthy of that kind of love and connection and to accept vulnerability as a beautiful part of life. Man oh man. Her ending thoughts are slowly becoming my new mantra on living.

• let ourselves be seen - deeply seen, vulnerably seen.
• love with our whole hearts even through there is no guarantee
• practice gratitude and joy - to be vulnerable means i’m alive
• believe that i am enough

Doesn't this just seem like such a healthy and happy way to live?

Bucket List

I have been doing a little life coaching as of late - being coached that is, rather than doing the coaching. So far it has been an interesting process. One of my first 'homework' assignments was to watch the movie The Bucket List and then write my own bucket list. Hokey? Maybe a little. But it was actually quite a fun little exercise in putting pen to paper and formulating some ideas about what life may look like if it were entirely up to me. I thought it would be fun to share what's on my list. (Its kinda long, apparently I'm a bit ambitious):

In No Particular Order....

Active Type Buckets:

• purchase a road bike
• do a triathlon
• ride in a century bike race (100 miler)
• climb american fork and little cottonwood canyons
• canyoneer - somewhere awesome
• learn to sail, and sail the Mediterranean
• travel to australia and dive the great barrier reef
• ski dive somewhere really really beautiful
• visit olympus national park
• visit all the national parks in the united states
• hike half dome
• lead a multi pitch climb - sleep in a bivvy on the wall
• get good at slack-lining
• see the northern lights (I might have stolen this one from Nicki)
• visit the fjords (okay truth be told, this one too...)

Educational Buckets:

• learn the 10 sessions
• become a yoga instructor
• get a masters degree
• become proficient in cranial sacral massage
• learn lymphatic drainage massage
• learn thai massage in thailand
• proficiency in essential oils
• learn a second language

Family/Service Oriented Buckets:

• get married
• have a bunch of kids
• have a house with a wrap around porch, sustainable garden (compost, rotate crops, organic fertilizer etc.), fruit trees, barn, and horses near a lake
• perform some kind of humanitarian aid in africa and/or south america
• be a temple worker
• go on a mission with my husband
• leave a legacy of service and love
• become proficient in the scriptures
• learn a second instrument along with one of my children
• earn my young women's medallion with my first daughter
• peace core
• live abroad for a year
• live close to family - be close so that our kids can be friends

Other Kinds of Buckets:

• purchase a SLR camera - and get really really good at taking pictures
• play in a band
• teach piano lessons
• write a book - massage? health/nutrition? family history?
• dissect a cadaver
• own a jeep wrangler or land rover
• coach a volleyball team
• sew a quilt - a really good looking one
• live abroad for a year

Go on now, write you're own bucket list. You know you want to...

Idaho Idaho

Idaho feels strangely like home to me lately. Who would have thought that the day would come that I would know my way entirely around not only Rexburg (not really a difficult task given its eentsy size) but also a good portion of Idaho Falls.

A few weeks ago, Melissa was on spring break from school and instead of spending the week in Portlandia alone(ish), she ventured out to Rexburg for the week to spend it with Marilyn and ME for the weekend that I was able to make it up there. At first I was sad that Dad ended up having to work that weekend (and sadly was stuck somewhere in the middle of no-man's-land Arizona for most of the weekend), but it ended up being way way fun to have a girls weekend: We told stories, we watched the news and the movie Leap Year, we talked about healthy eating and raw foods, we went to the bead store and as always spent more than intended, I taught Melissa how to make earrings, we went to the Bodies exhibit in Idaho Falls, tried some new recipes for Raw food that I had been wanting to try, and altogether just had a really relaxing, enjoyable time together.


One thing you need to know about me, if you didn't already know it, is that I absolutely love Anatomy. Its sickening really. It fascinates me. So when I saw a billboard for the bodies exhibit in Idaho Falls on my drive up to Rexburg, I. Was. Pumped. And I knew Melissa would be too, so I called her up and quick as that it was on our must-do list. We spent 2-3 hours in that museum gazing in awe at all there was to learn and relearn and discover about our beautiful bodies. We probably would have stayed longer, had hunger not been setting in and making us tired and cranky. Some people think its weird to look at a body that has been preserved in this way (or a cadaver), but I just always come away from such experiences with even more respect and reverence for the amazing intricacies and wonder of these bodies that our Heavenly Father created for us and gave us stewardship over.

Here are the beautifully delicious raw recipes we tried. Both came from this recipebook a friend sent me (everything I have tried from it since has been equally delightful):

The first is called Good Heart Sundried Tomato Sauce over zucchini and cucumber "pasta". (which is really just thinly sliced, raw zucchini and cucumbers). We were a bit leery of whether this would actually be tasty without cooking - but we thought we would try it. It was seriously so good! I was eating the sauce by the spoonful long before it even had a chance to go on the plate. It was more of a salad type dish, than a pasta dish, but tasty nonetheless.

The real gem of the evening was the Apple Pie. Dates are my new friends. They are like this secret little weapon in making delicious desserts without adding refined sugar. This crust was made from pecans, dates, and coconut. The filling was mostly apples, some more dates and a cinnamon etc. The best part about this pie? You could eat an entire HUGE slice and not go into instant sugar coma after or develop a case of food guilt because of eating something bad for you. (You don't get food guilt? That must be nice...)

Inspiration

I had multiple opportunities to be annoyed at having to wait on other people who had messed up my schedule. Instead of getting annoyed (okay, truth be told fighting and barely winning the urge to get annoyed would be more accurate), I took the opportunity to read and watch a few things that I have been meaning to. I was inspired by these 2 things today and felt to share them:

The first is a clip that a friend of mine share with me a couple days ago and I had yet to watch. It is Will Smith talking about positivity and focus and being successful. I love it. I totally needed to hear this today. I watched it twice, and will probably watch it again and take notes. Enjoy:

Secondly, I was listening to the Avett Brothers "Head Full of Doubt" while driving home from climbing this afternoon with Nicki. I have listened to this song dozens of times, but today this line especially struck me:

Decide what to be, and go be it.

I suppose the question now is, what do I want to be?

Loving this weather

Tonight it was dumping rain and all I wanted to do was put on my galoshes and rain jacket and go walking in it.... but I got lazy and decided blogging about wanting to walk in the rain was an acceptable alternative (that decision may also have been swayed by the fact that it stopped raining by the time Nicki and I were ready to go out in it.)

Where have all the recipes gone?

Remember how I use to post recipes that I've been making? I remember that. Well, I haven't been 'cooking' as much lately. At least not in the way that most of you would be interested in. I've been doing a cleanse sort of diet for the past 3 weeks - now don't get all freaked out thinking I'm crazy (I might be, but this is not the reason). The cleanse was not super extreme, I cut out red meat, dairy, wheat, and sugar. And ate the rest of my food in as close to raw form as possible so as to get the most nutrients and enzymes available from them... I guess that sounds extreme. Anyhow as crazy as it all sounds - I've felt amazing! So much more energy, less sluggish feeling, mental clarity, happy - how can you argue with that?

The cleanse was supposed to last 21 days and be strictly juices in the mornings and at night and then normal meals and snacks during the day, but I cheated a bit and sometimes ate normal food at night too. (And let's be honest, my social life revolves around food and I may have cheated an intsy bit every now and then, but whenever I was making food for myself, I stuck to the 'rules').

Now, the truth is in the aftermath. This last week I have been eating more 'normal' foods - as in breads and a bit of dairy and sugar (still less than before). And I've felt gross. Sluggish. Tired. Bloated... Sick (as in gross, not as in literally sick). Proof enough for me. I'm going back to my old (new) ways. I'd trade a few slices of bread and cheese for feeling this great anyday.

Another interesting side effect of eating really healthy, is that you start to understand and feel what your body actually needs - instead of what convenience or circumstance or social norms 'tell' you that it needs. I find that the healthier I eat, the more aware I am of when I am full and when I am actually hungry and what I am actually hungry for. No more wandering the fridge/pantry trying to figure out what I'm feeling like eating. Cravings are nearly gone. I use to crave chocolate and sugar all the time. No joke, all the time. And now I almost never crave those things. Or bread for that matter. Or cheese. This new way of living is quite liberating really when you think about it in that sense.

I think being aware of our bodies is essential, and its something that I would wager to guess the majority of the population is not very aware of. You would be surprised how many times I ask people for feedback about how a muscle in their body is feeling and they say something to the effect of "I don't know. You're the expert, you tell me." Really? Now how am I supposed to know what your body feels like? After all, perception is in the mind of the receiver, not the giver. I can tell you what the muscles feel like, but I have no idea whether that translates into pain or discomfort in the body of the receiver. Beware of forthcoming shameless business plug: this is one of the many benefits of getting massage regularly - you become more in tune and aware of your body.

Whoa, tangential sidenote flew in out of nowhere... The point is, I'm back to eating healthy again. I got lazy for a while there and started feeling the effects, but I'm glad to be back to the unprocessed, mostly meatless, full of fruits and vegetables and whole grains way of life that I've lived by before and that is just happy. Maybe one of these days I'll post some recipes of things I've been eating on the regular lately. The end.

Kamas Cabin Adventuring

President's Day Weekend I had the pleasure of heading out into the beauty of Kamas to stay in the Evan's Cabin for a few days with an entirely wonderful group of friends. (Unfortunately Nicki woke up sick the morning of and decided to opt out of coming - smart, but extremely sad and she was missed by all).

Friday night I carpooled up to the cabin with my new friend Dusty (who introduced me to the mildly funny podcast on the way initiating the following podcast post). We arrived at the parking lot just as Sven was about to take off with the snowmobile back to the cabin. Perfect timing. I hopped on the back while Dusty grabbed a tow rope and snowboarded behind - wakeboard style. I may or may not have been really sad to have not brought my snowboard at this point... Along the 5 mile trek to the cabin, we came across friends who were snowshoeing or cross country skiing into the cabin. By the time we reached the cabin we had 3 of us on the snowmobile and 2 on tow ropes behind. Awesome? Duh. I only wish we had photographically captured the moment.

Saturday consisted of the following activities:

• doing early morning yoga with K-pax and Annie whilst everyone else slept in
• eating tasty food
• playing heaps of speed scrabble
• snowshoeing to the nearby waterfall with the girls (and Ian) while the guys went backcountry skiing

Katie, Me, Annie, Ian, Stucki, Ali, Brenna, Rachel, and Lauren

on the bridge at the waterfall

• building igloos

Brenna and the Igloo that survived

• becoming trapped in a freak igloo collapse accident*
• going inside to warm up after getting soaked to the bone under 5 feet of snow
• becoming sad at missing out on the fun while everyone else created a sweet tunnel to sled through down the hill (making the most of the igloo collapse)
  

• returning outside to join the sledding adventure (meanwhile bashing my head on the side of the tunnel - sans beanie because it had frozen in the igloo - and cutting my eyebrow... it was a rough, but really fun, afternoon).
  

• trying the sledding tunnel one more time in hopes of a better outcome:

Good thing this video is sideways....

• eating more delicious food
• taking 2nd place in my first game of squints (this game involves small objects - in this case a jenga piece - that you hold between your bum-cheeks whilst navigating through an obstacle course created by the other players. intense? awkward? hilarious? yes, yes, and yes!), and unfortunately relinquishing the twister champion title to josh. (fair is fair).
• spending oodles of quality time with people that I adore

*Igloo Collapse Story: You know how they say that snow is heavy? Really really heavy? Well they weren't lying - or even kidding. Not even a little bit. Its really heavy. So there we were, making an igloo to win the competition. We were digging a tunnel into our igloo from the hill on the side of the yard and meanwhile also digging out the inside of the tunnel. We had piled up snow about 8 feet high and about 9 feet across and packed it down as we went (obviously not well enough though). Lauren and I were inside the igloo digging away, in a down dog (yoga) sort of position throwing snow out between our legs, when suddenly the igloo collapsed, trapping us under 4-5 feet of snow. It instantly went dark and I found myself forced onto my hands and knees with a small pocket of air underneath me (luckily - Lauren ended up flat on her stomach with little air). I pushed back against the snow to absolutely no avail. I knew my friends were on the outside and would get us out, but it. was. scary. I don't know that I could have gotten myself out of that by my own strength. I had nothing against that snow - and it was only a few feet deep. (Possibly had I known no one was outside to dig me out, I maybe could have gotten out... maybe). No more than 45 seconds after the igloo collapsed, I felt someone grab my back and yank me out of the snow. Hallelujah. I hate to imagine what could have happened had either of us been laying on our backs or any other strange position when it happened. It could have been really bad. Fortunately, we were both fine no harm was done. Lesson learned though - snow is heavy and dangerous. No more casually building igloos for me, thank you.

*This post has been entirely too long in the writing... This past month has been kinda crazy in many beautiful and heinous and wonderful and unexpected ways. I'll be doing some more catching up over the coming days. Stay tuned!