love – The Abysmal Witch

Food Happies

I know I’m sporadic about postings these days. Trying to do too many things and something languishes. Which is here and the podcast. However, something is also fermenting in the background. That’s right, my thoughts don’t sprout and grow, they putrefy or ferment. Muwhahahaha.

I go through quiet stages when I’m evolving. I like to think that’s what we’re all doing, or trying to do. Not just exist, not just live, but evolve. Become more. Expand to the very edges of our skins and revel in our uniqueness and in love.

Universal love, baby. It is where it’s at. In all its nasty, decaying, looming, laughing, sparkling, dancing glory. Because love has never been just Valentine’s love. It’s always been cleaning dirty diaper love, on babies and on parents because that’s love. Or should be love, but that’s an entirely different digression I choose not to make today.

Love has always been messy and painful, uplifting and clarifying. It’s always been the worst torture and the only reason for existence.

Evolve.

To become One with Universe. To be the Embodiment of Love. To just get something done freakingly awesomely well.

Because that is all it takes. Embrace the things that make you feel grand, completed, living a real and connected life in this crazy, fucked up world. Do what you love and do it again and again and again and watch yourself getting better at that! Revel in that. It’s never been about where you get to, though that’s good too, it’s always been about how you get there. In your time. On the path that you need to take. That leads you in a direction that refines you into Love.

So tonight’s meal is brought to you by sliding into the Land of Capable After All, past the City of And You Thought Living Like This Was Too Much Work and settling into the County of Being Really Connected To What I Do Makes Me Feel Great and Damn It’s Tasty Too. It is a lot of work. You have to love the results, desire, craze, long for the results. Otherwise you’re only bothering because someone else told you it was good for you. And even here Fake It Till You Make it works. And so does accidentally trying new things until you find yourself in the position you never really considered yourself either capable of or simply not one of those people who did those kind of things. I feel a bit like I’ve arrived and it’s good.

What I did is really no big deal for most people. I made soup from scratch, shredded chicken and sprouted rice with quinoa soup (using homemade chicken stock) and desert is lemon blackberry jam swirled cheesecake on cocoa cookie crust. Yes, I’d made the cookies previously too.

And that’s what makes this so amazing. I was a lousy or lazy or just non-existent cook growing up. My tendencies combined with other cooking siblings and a family that at the time was not overly insistent about food in any extravagant way, made for one insipid avoidant cook. Food was not inspiring to me growing up. I had favourites but I felt no call to cook.

This means that I’d never made chicken stock before. Hel, I roasted my first chicken less than 6 months ago. And yes, the chicken stock was made from another chicken I roasted (because it really was pretty damn easy and sooooooooo tasty and I could buy a chicken that was free range, organic, etc). And now I’ve made chicken and rice soup from it. Even the rice wasn’t just rice! It’s TruRoots sprouted rice and quinoia blend. As to how have I never made even chicken noodle soup before? Well, not big on soups and didn’t grow up with it all the time (sometimes we had homemade, many times we had Lipton) and well, I just didn’t see it on my list of easy capabilities or something. I don’t know, k, it’s just weird.

This was, however, not my first cheesecake (I’m braver with baking than cooking, but not my all that much). It was, however, the first one where my cookies became the crust. They were really good cookies too, with extra cocoa, semi-sweet chocolate chips and white chocolate chips, that were super soft and crumbly. So I embraced the crumbly. And the jam? Well, that I didn’t make, but my friends did. Lemon Blackberry jam and don’t doubt for a second that they picked every one of those blackberries.

This was a full wholesome meal, made frame scratch. With scratches in the scratch! And I think it’s the scratches in the scratches that are making me feel pretty damn proud. The realness of it all makes me feel connected and healthy. And the gift from friends? That just makes me feel loved.

Love to you All, too.

~The Abysmal Witch

p.s. I only cut my finger once and I’m so much faster at bandaging these days. 😀

p.p.s. While starting to clean up from dinner I then have this absolutely happy moment and yes, I feel like I’m bragging, I’m just so damn happy about it! And yeah, kinda proud too.

FB moment: “That moment when you look at your wall of mead and think “shit, I’m going to have to start drinking some of this, I’m out of space and there’s almost no more storage in the closet”. And then you stop. Realize what you’ve just said to yourself. “Holy Fuck, I have a FULL WALL of MEAD!” That’s a good moment.

(To be fair, though, only 4 rows of shelves are mead, the other 3 are my magical library so it’s not as much mead as it may sound like. Oh, still a lot, just not *that* a lot. Which actually makes it harder, not many bottles left of any individual mead, so I can’t just drink them *casually*. Snort. I’m a hoarder, and in this instance I’m almost okay with it.)”

Wanna see? Well, for now you get a Samhaine picture of it with poor lighting, an unsteady hand (it was really low light! lol) and angle to really showcase it because the only other pic of it I have handy would be incriminating for friends of mine. In appearance, only, mind. 😉 Someday I will have a better picture, but that! That is NOT THIS DAY! Happy trials!

(My) Eight Blisses of Yule: #3, Receiving

It is good to enjoy receiving gifts.

It is great to enjoy receiving gifts without any emotional baggage. As in your own emotional baggage, not the gift’s.

To think, someone cared for you emotional state enough to get you something they thought you would enjoy.

And yes, again I am getting away from the requisite giving that is so typified in the media and our culture (and even more so in other cultures judging by recent conversations). This isn’t the required polite receiving of some polite gift that was given because it was expected and received with a polite smile because the amount of emotion on the receiving end equalled that of the giving end.

I’m talking about having a gift in your hands that as you look upon it your heart glows. It makes you laugh. Or it fulfills a need. Or it satisfies an itch you didn’t even know you had. It speaks to you. And it’s FOR YOU.

I’ve long believed that we experience love through attention. When we are on the receiving end of positive attention, we feel loved (having your birthday remembered, receiving a gift you really wanted and so clearly the other person had paid attention to you, being asked about your day and the examples could continue forever).

Receiving a gift is taking in love.

Without commitment or expectation.

NO STRINGS ATTACHED.

If there was a string attached then it wasn’t a fucking gift and it doesn’t belong in this conversation.

Wow, taking in love.

As I type, I think “hey, this is why Santa is such a strong, beloved archetype!”

What is this lunatic talking about?

Think about it. Santa is the ultimate gift giver, right? He gives to all he loves (generally portrayed as all who are “good”), freely, without any expectation of return, no strings at all.

Which means that when you receive a gift from Santa, all you have to do, ALL you have to do is receive it. Take it in. Take that freely given love into your heart. You get to enjoy the gift without any guilt or need to reciprocate. Something I think many people have a hard time doing when the gift is from someone known. But Santa? His gifts are safe to receive.

I received gifts this yule. And each one was unexpected and appreciated. And ZERO fretting over anyone who didn’t give a gift. Because there was no need for gifts to be given. No need = no requirement = no guilt. Gods, I love things that come without guilt.

This receiving isn’t the greedy grasping of a selfish child. This is the glorious receiving of the open and essentially hopeful child.

This Yule I let myself take in the gifts of my friends, from the physical to the spiritual, the joy of their company to their funny stories.

Yes, gifts range far beyond the physical, and many of them arrive when we’re not paying attention.

Time to wake up and take it in. Let it all in. Receive the gifts that are waiting for your hands to open to take them in.

~Abysmal Witch

A Little Love Dissection

Unconditional love. It sounds like such a wonderful thing, instinctually we know we want to stretch out and bask in it, but what actually is it?

Well, unconditional tells me that it can’t have any conditions on it. Ergo, no limitations, no boundaries.

What if I and my loved one are separated by distance? Doesn’t matter, says unconditional love.

What if I and my loved one are separated by time? That we haven’t seen the other for many years or more? Doesn’t matter, says unconditional love.

What if my loved one hurt me? Doesn’t matter, says unconditional love.

What if my loved one is lost to me? Doesn’t matter, says unconditional love.

Unconditional love does not contain the other types of love, though they may often be present at the same time. Unconditional love transcends the other types of love. It is cosmic. It encompasses all. It knows no boundaries, no rules, no exceptions.

All other loves have their own edges. Times when they are present and reasons when they are not. They are not and never will be unconditional. And this is good. One is not better than the other. They are different and they serve different needs.

When other loves are present, the potential for unconditional love exists. Whether it will manifest is dependent on too many factors to predict.

~Abysmal Witch

Society Encourages the ‘Me’-A Spiritual Christmas?

Okay, so a couple of days I got a tad tipsy, saw an ad that was for some high ticket item. It was definitely a Christmas ad, but it was promoting that we buy the item for ourselves, not for others. This led to something of a rant.

I’ve hopefully cleaned it up enough that you can garner some smidge of a booze-addled insight from my rantings. Feel free to correct me.

(Of course, it’s always possible that the commentary is also completely obvious, but letting it out made me feel good.)

Christmas ads are apparently now about getting stuff for yourself, before christmas. Giving license to all of us to be self-interested at this time of year. Oh yeah, don’t forget to get something for the people you care about, but don’t you also care about yourself? If you did, you would buy that fabulously priced 60″ lcd tv now to save yourself stress and money. Waiting for Boxing Day and using only those funds left after christmas that you can afford? That’s just silly talk.

We’re saying it’s okay to put yourself first.

Do you remember when Christmas was about giving to other people and yes, also about getting, but it was about what other people gave you. It wasn’t about what you could get for yourself. When did it stop being a social, community, all about each other event and become all about the Me?

The Me? What’s that? You know, the individual, the I I I me me me that wants to come first. Like when we were five and didn’t really get why we had to share our toys. Mine first, you can have it later if I decide to give it to you. All about me.

And here we are, 17 days to Christmas and the ads are telling us to go out and buy this cool ‘x’ for ourselves.

Commercialism is clearly driving our society. It is the driver of the chariot of our social opinions. It gets money by getting us to spend. We’re letting it tell us that it’s time to let go of the spiritual meanings in our lives in pursuit of getting the next cool thing.

It makes me ill. It’s hard enough holding onto, finding, and/or drinking in our spiritual experiences. It’s just that much harder when we are being slapped at every turn with instructions on how to be a more selfish, self-interested, self-involved individual.

Show your love this season by showing that you care. Which does not mean buying the biggest thing you possible can….for yourself.

Okay, I admit, I should stop watching tv again.

Happy holidays!

Spirit and Body-Part 2

How do we reconcile the two viewpoints of:

1) I need to learn to accept and love my body as it is

and

2) I want my body to be healthier, fitter and, let’s face it, thinner than it is now?

I believe it can be done.

For any craft that we do, from writing to witchcraft or knitting or biking or whatever hobby or activity you want to insert here, we always have our current state of competence or being and our desired goal of competence or being.

When I did pottery I was ecstatic when I finally made a bowl that was recognizably a bowl. I was very happy with it. Just because I was happy with it didn’t mean that I wanted to stop learning and becoming better as a potter. When I made my first big bowl, it was a huge deal and I was thrilled. But it didn’t stop me from wanting to do more.

Each level of skill attained made me happy and I was pleased with where I was but I also wanted to improve myself.

The same applies to our bodies.

We can love our bodies for where they are now. And honestly, dammit we should. Without them there wouldn’t be flavours, touch, dancing or any incarnate experience.

And while we love them as they are now, we are welcome to seek improvement.

But it is improvement we need to seek! And where improvement is becoming healthier.

If we recognize and accept that the ultimate goal is to be healthy *and none of the other measurements matter* then it is very easy to reconcile the two statements. Because we are simply loving who we are now and working to improve, make healthier, our bodies.

And the best part about this reconciliation?

We can ask our bodies to help us with it.

That’s right. It is no longer a war with our bodies, a constant battle to transform them into some intellectual (and sadly probably culturally determined) ideal. It is a union, a partnership towards a shared goal.

Gods, what a wondrous feeling, to work with my body (who utterly adores me, btw, irrespective of how horribly I treat her sometimes) and spirit together to become the healthiest me I can be.

Let me reiterate this point. When you love your body (who also loves you) and you accept that you can love your body as it is now then TOGETHER you can work towards becoming healthier in the future.

It’s not a constant battle of the mind thinking chocolate is bad and the body craving it or the body wanting to sleep in and you forcing it to go for a walk.

Instead, it is a recognition that the body has its things that it desires that isn’t good for it, but if you accept that and work with the body, it can release most times those desires and work with you on those things that make you both healthier.

This is not a master/slave relationship. This is a partnership built on love and hopefully eventually trust.

The mind isn’t always right so as part of that partnership it needs to listen to the body. Sometimes the body really does need that sleep or that chocolate, in order to be healthy (and happy).

Invite your body to work with you on becoming more healthy. That’s what I’m going to do.

I don’t know yet how this will turn out. But I do know one thing, I will be a much happier person now that I can go around not hating myself (after all, we are who we are and my body needs all of my love just as it gives me all of its) and still work towards improving myself but where improvement is in my health, not in my looks.

Being healthy is so much better and frankly easier of a goal than being thin. Now getting healthier may result in some weight loss. But as soon as the goal becomes weight loss, you run the high risk of re-entering that unhealthy mental zone that pits you against your own body and creates a warfield within yourself (and it ignores all the hidden issues that the body holds for us but that’s a topic for another day). Yuck.

Health. Isn’t that a great goal? Attainable, realistic, in many ways measurable.

If a genie came up and offered you a choice: “You can be healthy or you can be thin, choose now!” What would you choose?

~the Abysmal Witch