No Cell Signal & Boredom (the good kind)

I’ve been out in the van for the past several days and nights in a spot where there is no cell signal. To be candid, while the riding and hiking nearby is stellar, the absence of 📱 signal in this spot was the main feature I sought out. I know myself well enough to know that just picking up the phone to check a couple texts quickly degrades into checking emails, instagrams, andddddd down the rabbit hole. 🕳 Nothing can snap a person (me) out of zen wilderness headspace quicker or more abruptly than one negative email or comment on socials. 

So here I am in the space of no signal sitting and drinking my morning coffee and just relishing the quiet- the lack of things to “do,” and instead focusing on being. 

JUST. BEING. 

Having done a bit of journaling to start, I am in a headspace now to process and download some recent experiences and conversations. To ruminate and ponder them and extricate the lessons or the growth now that they’ve percolated; I am ready to see the teachings in them and to try in some respects to adopt them into my new and evolving mindset. 

That’s the thing with those magical pivotal moments/conversations/experiences. It takes some time to go back and review them in order to try and seal in their flavor for the long term if they are mindsets or patterns one wishes to adopt. I recently read somewhere the mind has decided on something up to 7 seconds ahead of us being aware of it. This is what makes reprogramming old patterns so incredibly difficult. Oh and also we’re often up against primal patterns ingrained in us on a cellular level passed down for many many years to help us stay alive. Yeah- competing with that hard wired biology can be tough. 

“Oh there’s that thing I do- what is that?,” I can ask with kind curiosity.

Here’s the thing... We all have trauma, pain, past experiences that we bring into our present and often times they are so ingrained into our neural patterns that they run us. Without us knowing. Without our permission. They lead to the same outcomes in conflict. The same breakdowns in partnerships. The same self loathing or self flagellation by our inner bullies. The cycles perpetuate.

Doing the same thing over and over but expecting different results is—as we all know— insane. 

Call it COVID slowing down the pace of life overall (and forcing the legal profession to change its approach/adopt virtual practices) + losing my dog and my grandmother during the holidays reminding me how short and precious life is + a very traumatic near death experience last October (a sobering reminder of how short MY life is and can be) + the van coming into my life unexpectedly and giving me this chance to explore and slow down in quiet sacred spaces like the one I’m presently in .... plus maybe the stage of life I’m in, not a mid-life crisis but more an arrival at “enoughness” and the privilege it’s affording me to be curious about what my life can mean and represent going forward. Call it whatever you like…

And, regardless, I know that I am exactly where I’m supposed to be 🙏🏼.

On this trip I had a couple guests joining me for the first two days and first night. It was fun to enjoy the van experience with cohorts out in the wild for the first time. Turns out I laugh a lot more when I’m not out here by myself ;) Laughter is sooo good for the soul.

We enjoyed wonderful bike rides, an incredible camp site dinner and breakfast, delicious van coffee (of course), ease in conversation & connection, and ample laughs. It was wonderful sharing this space with them. I was lonesome when they left. And now I am enjoying the quiet and solitude of being here alone. 

I loved having them here AND I love being here solo now. 

This is one of the biggest ah-has for me in the last year or so: using AND. My coach Shelley gets the biggest credit for teaching me this and really helping me rewrite my vernacular to use AND more and BUT less. (Read more about this concept HERE).

All this to say ... out here away from signals and socials, it’s a truly incredible space in which to look within, when the clutter and noise of normal daily life are stripped away and I’m left with a quiet van parked in the sun, a day without any agenda or schedule, when I am able to tap into the creativity that flows through me most strongly when I’m in Spartan-esque environments. 

Boredom begets creativity and brilliance IMHO. (And much smarter-than-me people agree). I think we don’t get nearly enough boredom-moments in normal life. I think clutter and distractions rob many of us of our truest brilliance because it (creativity) comes out only when we’re truly free to let the mind wander without being pulled multiple directions by life. 

“Exchange your cleverness for bewilderment.”

— Rumi

When is the last time your mind could truly and freely wander?

The book I’m reading on this trip is called The Minimalist Vegan.

There are so many compelling reasons to be animal product -free in both dietary decisions as well as lifestyle decisions. I won’t digress too much further into this topic in an already-too-long blog but the truth is that awareness in all areas of life demands that we be conscious consumers of everything that we eat and buy. Minimalism stands for only buying what we truly need and use and eliminating or not buying the rest. It stands also for less clutter and confusion - including in our socials, apps & emails, and items we own/insure/maintain. 

I have noticed a direct correlation for myself between the phases of life when I’m consuming (stuff, food, social media), and when I’m feeling most out of control in my life. 

When I’m seeking something to grab onto ... some guiding light or orientation- I often default to complication and more stuff. Anyone else?

The truth is that filling life with clutter & crap will never lead us to our truth, guiding light, intuition or knowingness. Nope... All we do is unconsciously distract ourselves right away from our inner voice of wisdom and from life’s most important things... love, health, being. 

Is your default, distraction? Mine can be. I’m working on that. 

Out here in the van I realize that I needed this reset - something deep inside me was drawn to take this trip because I knew I needed to be physically and mentally removed from the norm of day to day in order to hit that reset and get back to basics. Get back to what really makes me feel good & alive.... back to my knowingness.

Sending you love and light 💡 ☀️ from out here in no-signal-land nature and hoping you find some zen in your day or that can soon you escape to a place where it’s virtually guaranteed. 

Go... Find a place where you can be bored. ✨ 

This is the tea I keep in the van (shown in the top photo). I love it for the cool nights when it’s dark outside, but too early to go to sleep — it’s the perfect pairing to reading or journaling, and the detox-theme carries over to detox from noise, stimulation, social media, emails and junk food and goes within, thanks to the tea.

This is the wonderful book I reference above. You can order your copy on Amazon using this link:

*Reminder, I’m an Amazon Associate, I may earn commissions from purchases you make using my links to products above.

GF Carrot Cake Cupcakes w/Cashew frosting

I saw something the other day on instagram — it was a photo of a vegan carrot cake using real carrots and a bunch of other amazing ingredients. It planted a seed in my sugar-craving carrot cake loving brain 🥕 🍰 …. so today, once my work was done (and in light of the 25 degree temps and all-day snow we’ve had), I gave myself permission to play in the kitchen a bit. 👩‍🍳

I went looking for cupcakes, for easier freezing and sharing, and found THIS RECIPE.

I had all of the ingredients at home AND I’ve never made a frosting by blending nuts, so I thought- “ what the heck!” 😋 🥕

Whipped up the batter and mine was really dry/crumbly when all mixed together so I added more applesauce and a bit more olive oil. I am still using coconut flour in all of my baking experiments (and I think it does dry out the batter quite a bit). The only other modification I made was to reduce the sugar by about 1/2c., because — these things will also have frosting on them!

As has been the case with most items I’ve baked using coconut flour, out of the oven these muffins looked drier and crackier than a normal muffin would be BUT they tasted good! And mixing up the frosting was much easier than I expected. (I soaked the cashews for an hour as instructed and then added them + the other ingredients to my silver bullet mixer and gave it a whirl). It took a bit of coaxing, stirring, and starting again, but eventually I had frosting (ish -it still had some cashew chunks in it, but the bullet had had enough).

Once I popped them in the fridge for awhile and let them set up, I pulled one out for the final taste test. Honestly - as healthy as these are, they are REALLY good. Next time I’ll use a proper blender for the frosting.
And maybe grind up walnuts to sprinkle on the frosting. Overall though, highly recommend !

Butternut Squash & Bean Curry

YUM. I’ve been making this recipe for a few years now -it never fails to please the dinner guests, especially those who are vegan /dairy free / Gluten-free.

Plus it’s GORGEOUS with all of the pretty colors involved AND it freezes really well — I love enjoying the leftovers later!

RECIPE: https://www.lecreuset.co.za/recipes/butternut-squash-butter-bean-spinach-curry/

Notes:

I usually substitute a couple fresh jalapeños sliced finely for the “1 mild red chilli, seeds removed and chopped.”

I buy the squash precut from Sprouts (lazy, I know).

I add tomatoes because I like the POP of the color red in there.

Finally - I like serving this over rice; it feels more like a meal than simply soup, and it’s more filling (and lasts longer for leftovers, too!).

*Since we are currently dealing with shortages of many foods in stores, I was not able to buy Vegan broth this time so I used chicken broth - so if you’re serving vegans/vegetarians, you’ll obvi want to sub the broth for an animal-free option.

What’s leftover -What goes into the trash, what goes into recycle, and into compost? Well … I’ll tell you: 🗑 = the broth package since tetrapak isn’t recyclable. The Cans and plastic container go into ♻️ . Peels from onion and garlic go into compost bin 🌱!

Simple Pleasures: Hosting Friends for Dinner

I tell you what. I am absolutely in love with cooking for friends and getting people together at my house. And for those reading this who’ve always enjoyed it, let’s just say this is a somewhat recent revelation of mine.

I used to stress out about having people over and it felt like work. The house had to be spotless. The dishes and napkins had to be perfect and the menu complex and “amazing,” and so on. I made it harder than it needed to be and in so doing made it exhausting and therefore rarely hosted.

In recent years- probably a combo of quitting alcohol and eating out less; embracing a vegan and then plant-forward lifestyle, I started getting into meal prep using plant based menus and a few new utensils for my kitchen like the Le Cruset pan and rad food processor among other things. A new and proper knife set, some cloth napkins, a newfound appreciation for produce (especially locally grown produce!) and a desire to up my game of nourishing my body as well as possible — led to more and more cooking and learning in my home kitchen.
…with that came some confidence that I could serve these foods to friends with good results.

The setting down of perfection as the goal and the embracing of authenticity instead allowed me to move away from caring about my house not being “perfect or spotless” and towards embracing the chance to connect with my fellow humans over a meal.

My house isn’t dirty or cluttered. It’s lived in.
It doesn’t look like it came from a magazine and not everything matches or is trendy and that’s ok. True friends - the people we want to invest our time into- don’t care.

And candidly if the house really is a mess or the meal is gross, these are the people who would love me enough to simply say that.
How refreshing.

…last night I invited a few of my neighbors and a new guy over for dinner, and got them all together for a meal; it filled me with so much joy. True joy. True connection. True laughter. True community. It was wonderful.

It ended up being a very jalepeno- forward meal… along with jalepeno flavored chips, I made one of my fave dishes- a vegan curry using butternut squash (including jalepenos because I love to add them to this recipe), served over rice and then I also made veggie fajitas (including jalapeños) (with optional ground beef) as well as homemade salsa.
With you guessed it- jalepeno in it. Recipes below.

My neighbor Nancy made the gorgeous raspberry pie. Erica prepared the pretty appetizer tray.

…we had fun. We laughed. We learned about each other. It was fantastic.

Ages ranged from 4-70s or so.
How beautiful is that ?!

Cacao muffins - er, cookies...

My beloved next-door neighbors had to say goodbye to their VERY beloved 15-year old Golden Retriever, Gator, this weekend. We’ve known it was coming as his health declined, but it doesn’t make it any easier. I’m learning that I really love baking for others to show I love them and care about them and am thinking about them. As I’ve tested out my various cookie recipes on them, they’ve given me their candid feedback and no question they’ve tended to prefer the ones on the sweeter end of the spectrum as opposed to “sugar-free” ones ;)

So- I went in search of more superfoods in my cupboards combined with just-sweet-enough recipes to deliver them some feel-good foods in their time of heartbreak … . and VIOLA! I found this one that I liked: Cacao Muffins! In fact “they” say we should eat it every day!

What is so great about cacao (other than it’s been sold to us as the health sibling of milk chocolate which we all love!?!).

For starters, “Cocoa is one of the richest sources of polyphenols. It’s especially abundant in flavanols, which have potent antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects.” And my personal favorite perk: mood enhancer! “In addition to cocoa’s positive impact on age-related mental degeneration, its effect on the brain may also improve mood and symptoms of depression. The positive effects on mood may be due to cocoa’s flavanols, the conversion of tryptophan to the natural mood stabilizer serotonin, its caffeine content or simply the sensory pleasure of eating chocolate.” - Source HERE.

So-it tastes good, like chocolate in fact, helps my mood and contains antioxidants and offers anti-inflammatory effects. Yes HELL yes.

My Notes about the recipe linked above: I was all out of honey so I substituted a little bit of good ol’ basic sugar along with applesauce for honey, and I used coconut oil instead of butter. I also used Bob’s Red Mill Almond Flour.

In a nutshell …. these muffins did NOT work out, at all. They baked into crumbly crumbles… I am sure it was user error or perhaps I pushed the ingredient substitution too far. Either way- not successful here.

Rather than toss them out, since they were so full of good quality ingredients, I called an audible, emptied the muffin wrapper contents into glass/plastic containers, added some oats and will add almond milk and warm at the office this week for a delicious breakfast treat. Muffin fail. Nevertheless, she persisted.

Next- I switched to making cookies. Oats and cacao, please, google …

Recipe HERE.

Yes… much better. Cookies, flowers, and card — delivered to my wonderful neighbors tonight. And that’s a wrap of this weekend! Tomorrow is Monday, #letsdothis.

Quick run to the store for flowers. And TP. Just the essentials.

And a bonus squirrel sighting in my backyard today. ;)