Tag: self improvement

Cut off

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It’s that time of year again.  I dread this time, but I am simultaneously looking forward to changing my ways.  Every year I do a 30 day paleo challenge- a time when I have to drastically change my lifestyle and eating habits for the better.  This year, I really need it.  I have really gone off the rails in terms of using red wine as a source of stress reliever and personal reward.  I have been taking most of my meals out of the fryer, I have been ordering food on my weekends, too lazy to grocery shop,to  cook, and to clean.  Lately I have trimmed my meals down to once a day because I don’t even want to take the time to chew.  I am not mad at myself, I am not disappointed in my past behavior, but it is time to act mature about the things I put in my body.  This is the time to concentrate on everything that I put in my mouth.  No more comfort eating, no more boredom snaking, no more stress french fries.

So, the next 30 days will focus on vegetables and fresh food.  It will focus on water and self-improvement.  Aside from the diet goals, I have to do a full body overhaul.  I have to stretch, exercise, write, read, photograph, and create art.  I have to stop so much focus on work, and focus on my physical and artistic self.

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Gigantic

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How can you have goals if you achieve all of them?  If you reach the moon, then you should have been shooting for Mars.  Goals and dreams, by nature and by definition, are unachievable attainments.

Surround yourself with stars as your backdrop, find serenity with background pars for living.  Seek eagerly for new planetary grounds for possible human colonization but simultaneously be comfortable with what you have glowing all around.

 

January 1

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Starting off the new year with that classic resolution stuff, the inclination to make myself a better person and a happier girl.  I want to feel good about myself, I don’t want to get caught up in my own hang ups about wanting to be more, wanting to be different, making goals and not reaching them.  I don’t want to keep thinking about self improvement, I want it to actually happen.  I don’t want to hide from what scares me through a mask of food or alcohol abuse.  I don’t want to do things out of boredom.  I want to find inspiration in the ordinary, I want to find happiness on my own terms.

Like always, to ring in the new year, for the first month I am treating myself properly by following the right diet.  You are what you eat, I preach it all the time, and it is time to follow my own advice.  Eating properly is the first and most important step for self respect.  This means eating nutritionally dense food that has minimal processing.  Respecting the vegetable, avoiding the sugar.

It is not a diet, it is pressing the reset button, rebooting my appetite, focusing on putting my health before fun, reestablishing a system of rewards that is not based on cookies and bourbon, but based instead on inner happiness and finding peace with reality.

 

A Blazing New Year

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The hustle before the storm, getting ready to party out all the bad decisions of the year before the great January purge.  Dance it out, shake yourself clean, shuffle off regret.  Take a deep breathe to relax your stressed out spirit, for tomorrow is more than a new day, it symbolizes a whole new start.  Bubble your way in a new direction, sparkle your soul, glitter your spirit, confetti your smile.  Most importantly, find the music in your fingers, the beat in your toes, the rhythm in your perception.

Tableside Effigy

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I want to burn away the passing of the year with tableside fire.  Whatever will be served for dessert, it will be covered in flames.  I want this elemental act to physically change the dessert, to morph it into something different.  The symbolism of the effigy cleanse is translated into a better version of what was originally presented.  The dish can still subsist without the flame, just as we can subsist the way we are now, but we want to reach for something better, an updated version of ourselves.  In order to promote a better inner version, outside forces must be considered.  You influence the world and soak up what the effects have to offer.

The beginnings of the concept: fire sugar cubes over magic shell with something that will melt on the inside. I am thinking about chocolate ganache or caramel.  Cake underneath to catch the oozing filling inside the magic shell.   This dish is also preview for El Che, the new restaurant, where I really want to focus on elemental impacts in dishes.  Since the restaurant will focus largely on fire, this will be the showpiece.

Light a booze soaked marshmallow? Sugar in the raw cube?

Cherries jubilee- cherries soaked in brandy, lite that shit up.  Could be underneath like a glowing fire.

Bananas foster, think about that and rum.  The caramelized bananas are soaking in rum.

I like the idea of having a strong caramel presence to highlight the effects of high heat.  There must be chocolate, because how can you celebrate without this magical ingredient?

Actions are louder than Moments

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Messing up, having bad ideas, going the wrong way on a one way street.  Making concise failures, having the abstract not the concerte, admitting the foolish thoughts.

Having the most humiliating moments in your life, thoset “I wish nobody saw that but everyone did” moments force you to remember that yes people do and will forget.  At some point, they will forget the worst thing you ever made, just like how people forget the worst pimple you ever had.  Because everyone makes mistakes.  If you are not making mistakes then you are not trying hard enough.  If you capture the stars on the first round, then maybe you should aim for the moon, or mars, whatever is your ambition.  I am from the moon, so I aim for Saturn’s rings.  Although I am terrible at basketball, why did I ever pop that shot?

Point being, people remember your spirit, not your actions.  Impression is made with invisible sounds, not always with physical acts.

Talents is louder than words, actions are louder than moments.

The Poor Man’s Slow Hustle #3

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I feel free again, already, knowing that my week will not be dominated by the demands of the man.

Relaxed, like I can breath.  That pressure bubble of time has lifted, and I can think about doing things for myself again.  I can continue to answer my endless list of questions, I can make long lists written in pencil and actually cross out completed missions.

Time can slow down again, and time can relax into a flexible scheme instead of a tightly run plan.

I am no longer fully dominated by work, saving that precious feeling of freedom solely for myself, locked in my own mind just to make sure that I give myself enough attention.

Scrambled Eggs

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It’s not that I am dyslectic

It’s that I get excited and jump ahead.

I don’t care about the exact order right now.

It’s not like I don’t understand the analytics of phonetic jig

I just don’t really care.

Does dyslectic entail being too concerned with the entire parade instead of those tiny details of tiny letters?

How did the Egyptians do it with the superbly detailed drawn language?

Cursive, the lazy man’s scribble,

is seriously a lot of work.

Grand Central Station Style

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Seriously why do so many emails even exist?  It’s not ok, not possible… why?  It’s so much worse than junk mail.  Worse than all those endless bills and reminders of bills that have now gone paperless.  Worse than the stacks of bed, bath, and beyond coupons.  Worse than flyers filled with pages of information about nothing.

Even with spam filter, my inbox is out of control like my curls on a humid day.  Why do I have over 1000 emails? Its ridiculous.  Stop. Sending. Them. It. Is. Not. Working.  Not you, real people, I am talking to auto emails.  Just stop.  Nobody is reading them.  Not today, not ever.

Try Mr. Postman again if you want to get a real message.  The press and send button is not cutting any diamonds my friends.

-Marigold.

Basic Instincts

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Basically I am trying hard to not think too far ahead.  It’s not that I don’t have a plan, well it’s more like a scheme.  A loose draft, if you will.  But the details, the accents, the exact colors, I am not sure.

Basically I am making the rest up as I trod along my flowered path.  I plant a seed and watch it grow up.  Sometimes is it an orchid, sometimes it is crabgrass.

You make your own choices.  You draw the outlines, document the blueprints.  The coloring comes with the wind, the fluidity travels in the motion of today.