Feeling validated

[What I had for breakfast today: see below!]

Remember back when I wrote this post, about how despite popular counsel, white rice can be a valid part of a healthy diet? Here's an article sent to me by my good friend, design strategist Gale Peck, saying more or less the same thing, and referencing a 2014 study. 

My favorite quote from the article is this: "...what you eat with your rice is likely more important than the type of rice."  Which is a happy thing to keep in mind, when you're piling things on your rice like I do. 

Dressing to save the world

 [What I had for breakfast today: a sweet little pullet egg, jasmine rice, Adam's fabulous kimchi, and a bunch of mustard flowers I'd pulled off our greens in the hopes the plants won't bolt before we're ready to pick and pickle them.]

A while back, I wrote this post about dressing for healthy hedonism. In it, I explained how it's important to me that my apparel empowers me to interact with the world in a positive, effective way: my clothes have work to do. My clothing empowers me me earn the trust of my patients, squat down to examine the world of rocks and worms that Kamal might discover in the garden, squeeze in a quick Vinyasa practice or  set of pushups  between meetings, ride my bike and walk all over town, pull a bunch of weeds on my way to the chicken coop, and eat with unrestricted enthusiasm Adam's phenomenal cooking.  

 

Today I want to talk a little about flipping that philosophy around: you can use your clothing choices to empower the world, too. Just like switching to bar shampoo or practicing random generosity, being conscious about the clothes you buy is a small, straightforward change with tremendous, wide-reaching, exponential effects. 

If you buy your clothes secondhand, you're already effecting this change by helping to maximize the resources that go into the fabrication of the clothes and to minimize the amount of clothing waste that goes into landfills or fuel required to recycle textiles. For the new clothing you buy, though, think about how powerful your purchase can be. 

Think about all the people involved in producing the piece of clothing you're considering. Think about the people that farm the cotton or raise the sheep that make the fiber for the clothing. Does their work require exposure to pesticides? How are the sheep treated? Think about the people that weave the fibers into fabric, and the people that cut the fabric for the garment, and the people that actually sew it together. Where do they work? Is the environment safe? Are they respected, paid fair wages?  Think about the creative process involved in the design of the garment--was that designer recognized and compensated, or was he or she plagiarized by the company you'd be paying? Think about future generations living in the areas where the clothing and its elements are produced--are fabric dye and waste effluent being poured into the water supply? Will the chemicals used to grow the cotton poison the soil for other crops in years to come? 

Think about whether you are willing to support forced labor, human slavery and child abuse with your own income. Think about whether you are willing to assume responsibility for pouring lead and mercury into anybody's drinking water. Don't take part in the culture of passive denial just to take home a cheap and pretty blouse. If you wouldn't force a child to drop out of school in order to sew your clothing, if you wouldn't dose that child's breakfast with arsenic and cadmium, if you wouldn't fire a woman for being pregnant or shoot a man for asking for a living wage, then do not support the people who do.

Because of the internet, it's pretty easy to find companies that put ethics at the forefront of their practices. Besides secondhand clothes, I wear a lot of American Apparel and Icebreaker. 

 If a company doesn't have a clear message on their ethics on their website and I'm considering purchasing their clothes, I'll send them an email to ask about it. Usually it looks something like this: 

"Hi! I really like the clothes on your site. However, I can't find any information on how you source your fabrics, what your labor standards look like, or what your sustainability practices are. Before I make a purchase, I try to make sure that the clothes I buy are ethically produced. Could you reply with some of that information? Thanks so much." 

Sometimes nobody gets back to me, which says to me that the company knows they don't have anything to say I want to hear, and then I give up on that particular garment, no matter how lovely it might be. I'm hopeful that by sending the email, it at least lets the company know that some of their would-be customers prioritize the good health and happiness of all people, not just the ones in their own demographic. 

But yesterday I did get an email back from a company whose pieces I've been eyeing, and it made me feel good. Mary-Rose at Knixwear wrote: 

"Thanks for your interest in Knix Wear! I am proud to say that our underwear is ethically manufactured in Seoul, Korea. Seoul is a very busy industrious city in Asia and the factory we work with is quite advanced in their manufacturing abilities since we use a bonded process for underwear construction. I have seen photos of the factory and spoken with our suppliers personally and can confirm that everyone involved is treated well and paid fair wages. 

Our CEO and Production Manager travel to the factory over 5 times each year to check on production and to make sure everything is being done in a good, fair way. 

When we discontinue a product to create a new style or colour, we donate all of the left over stock to women's shelters." 

So that's a good start, and I'll make a purchase from them soon. 

I'd love to hear the small choices you make every day that resonate with wide and helpful results--for the planet, for other people, for your community. Every action we take has consequences. Let's engage, together, for the greater good. Let's collect enough small choices, enough happy consequences, to save the world.  
 

Seriously minimal hair care

 [What I had for breakfast today: chicken congee, beet greens, egg, crisped chicken skin, leftover roast chicken and Adam's fantastic kimchi.] 

Sometimes the tiniest adjustment can create massive change. For example, drinking more water or starting a gratitude practice can have an unbelievable impact on your physical and emotional well-being.  Donating a small amount to a worthy organization can literally save a life. And making a commitment, just for yourself, to generate less waste can benefit the planet and all of its inhabitants in countless ways.

One tiny change I've made towards generating less waste is switching to a bar shampoo and vinegar hair rinse. It seems pretty trivial, but when I think about the number of plastic shampoo and conditioner bottles I used to drop in the recycling bin compared to the zero I do now, it starts feeling less trivial. I also like feeling a little less responsible for the massive energy costs inherent to the production of plastic bottles. Moreover, my bar shampoo (J.R. Liggett's Coconut and Argan Oil, but there are lots of different shampoo bars out there worth checking out) has a limited ingredient list (olive, coconut, castor, sunflower, palm kernel and argan oils, plus vitamin E) and my conditioning rinse is just vinegar and water, so I know I'm not paying for the manufacture of awful chemicals nor sending awful chemicals out through my shower drain nor absorbing them into my scalp.

All I do is lather my hair up with the shampoo bar, rinse, and repeat. For the vinegar rinse, I bring a pint Mason jar into the shower with about an ounce of apple scrap vinegar in it. (Most people will tell you to use apple cider vinegar, but Adam made us about 20 gallons--not a typo!--of vinegar from the apple scraps leftover from pressing cider late last year, so I use that. Really you can use more or less any vinegar.) I fill up the jar with warm water in the shower, pour the diluted cider all over my head, let it sit for a bit, then rinse it out. 

It took a few weeks for my hair to adjust to the unbottled approach, but now that it has I'm actually happier with it than I was before the switch.

So I'm not telling you this whole long story in the hopes, necessarily, that you'll start buying bar shampoo instead of bottled. I mean I'd be tickled if you did, but it could be anything, any miniscule adjustment with big and happy consequences. I'm telling you this whole story because I hope that you'll try, if not this, some other small change that both benefits you and ripples outward a far-reaching positive impact. I'm hoping you'll search for the spaces in your life where you feel ready to stretch, even a tiny bit, towards your best intentions. Because I have this idea that if we amass enough of these little shifts towards the greater good, the reach of their collective effects will astound us all.  

Rant, written after seeing one too many commercials

[What I had for breakfast today, and second breakfast, and lunch: jasmine rice, beet greens, fresh eggs and sriracha.] 

There are three commandments in Healthy Hedonism: eat for pleasure, move for fun, and think for yourself. We've covered, briefly, eating for pleasure and moving for fun, and we'll talk more about those soon. But today, let's chat a little about thinking for yourself. 

A lot of the time, we let other people think for us. Even the most independent-minded among us let other people think for us. And, okay, here and there, it makes sense to delegate our thinking: for example, I don't hang a picture in my home or office (let alone buy furniture or choose paint colors!) without consulting my friend and interior designer Emily Lynch Kelman, because she does brilliant work and always, always comes up with the exact right spot. Delegating decisions to people who are experts in making those decisions is smart.

But delegating all your thinking to people who do not have your best interests at heart is not smart. It's harmful to you and to everyone. And those people, the ones that don't have your best interests at heart? They are everywhere. Everywhere! They're on your Facebook feed. They're in your car, in between Top 40 songs on the radio. They are shouting at you from your television set, nudging you at the edges of your Google searches, spreading across the highway on your commute. 

It's the ads. There are people whose entire job is to make you hate your hair. The people creating ads for styling products and shampoo are thinking for you, and those thoughts look like this: Your hair! It's so dull, or so frizzy, or so thin. Everyone who sees you figures you're dull, or have no control over your life, or are past your prime. You are undateable. You are not going to realize your potential in love, in work, in any way. This is tragic. It's too bad your hair doesn't look more like model hair. Oh, wait, though: if you just bought this one bottle of magic hair stuff, this beautiful man will love you forever, paint your toenails and propose with a giant diamond. 

Oh, and the diamond commercials! Here's how they are thinking for you: If your man really loved you, he'd buy you a giant diamond. If he cared at all about your future together, he'd want everyone to know, and you'd be wearing diamonds all the time because, duh, DIAMONDS=LOVE. No diamonds? You are unloved. Move on and find someone with deeper pockets who will listen to our ads and buy you this ring that looks like everyone else's ring. Everyone wearing this ring is cherished, obviously. 

There are commercials telling you that if you really love your child--or want your child to love you--you'll buy them some highly-engineered food product covered in way too much packaging and stick it in their lunch box. Your child is having a bad day? Don't think too much--just buy them some kind of shiny baggie with mush in it that they can squeeze directly into their mouths. That will fix it. All their friends will think, wow, that kid's mom is cool. Which will up your child's self-esteem, and then he'll get into a great college and your whole life will actually be worth something. 

Weight-loss commercials: You know what? I can't even get started on those. Let's come back to those. 

Car commercials: Your whole family will die in a fiery crash if you don't buy our safety-rated vehicle. Or: you could be picking up women at every red light, except you're not driving our slick coupe; in fact, you're the dork in the commercial that gets splashed with the puddle. Want to find love, scrub? Buy this one. Or: Your life is so boring; you never take road trips, but if you had this car you totally would, and your family would bond and everyone would turn off their cell phones and really listen to one another. Because you bought the right car. Good job, Mom. Your kids will remember this trip forever, and you could never have taken it in the car you already have. (Couldn't I?) You couldn't! Stop thinking and get the loan application started. 

Frozen-dinner commercials: This is basically the same thing as eating a meal prepared from scratch. See how we put whole vegetables and a tractor on a farm in our commercial? A lady in an apron smiling as she dices potatoes and kneads biscuit dough? Never mind that each of the frozen-dinner components was produced in a separate industrial facility, and that if a lady did help to prepare it she wasn't wearing an apron but was definitely wearing a hairnet and was probably not smiling, and this came nowhere near anybody's kitchen. Never mind that you have to open a cardboard box to eat your dinner. You don't have time to make real food, who does? This is the best you can do. This is the best anybody can do. You're welcome. Oh, your family will love you, too. Your kids will all come sit around the dinner table and look pleased and surprised that there is cheese product on their plate. Family bonding accomplished. 

Okay, back to weight loss commercials. If anybody, anywhere, called your kid fat, you would want to punch them in the face. Right? If someone called you fat, you'd be wounded. You'd feel insecure. You'd think, that's a mean person. And maybe you'd wonder if they're right. Somehow, when a commercial calls us fat, we think they are trying to help us. 

They're not. They're really not. They are trying to make us wonder if we are in fact less loveable than we could be if we fit into the dress the woman is wearing in the "after" picture. They are thinking for you, thoughts like: You are inadequate. You are wasting your life. You are not living at all until you're skinny. You cannot get to a healthy place on your own power. You need to purchase our coaching, our powdered beverages, our compartmentalized meal plans, and then you'll have the energy you need to devote to the people you love, and then, finally, they will love you back. Give it over--your money, your control, your sense of self. Give it up. Don't you want to be loved? You can't do it without us. 

They're insiduous. They are reaching up from gutters to sucker-punch us in our softest places, broadcasting images of our most encompassing wishes and our deepest fears. Don't let them. Don't be a part of it. Be an example of difference, strength, completion.

Here is the place I wish we were all starting from: I am loved. I love myself, exactly the way I am. When I buy stuff, I buy it because I want it, because it will serve me, not because it will make me complete. I'm already complete. If I decide to change the way I look, it'll be because it'll be fun and creatively satisfying to recreate the outward expression of my beautiful inner self. If I decide to change the way I eat, it'll be because I want to feel as strong and as healthy and as awake to the absolute glory of my life in every moment as I possibly can. I'm not making any changes that don't come from me, authentically. I'm not letting someone else create an imaginary need in my life. There is no hole, no deficiency, no inadequacy here that can be filled with a product. Nobody gets to think for me. I think for myself. 

Please, please, think for yourself. There's no one else who's as much on your side as you. Don't let big, impersonal companies who don't know one single thing about you tell you who you are or what you need. You need you. You already have that, and it's the best. 


 

On giving

[What I had for breakfast today: beet greens, jasmine rice, a fresh egg, a little roast chicken and sriracha, all tossed together in a Adam's grandmother's big cast-iron skillet.] 

This past Friday was an anniversary of sorts: At Kamal's request, I pulled from the freezer, and toasted, and buttered, the very last organic whole-grain muffin of the batch I'd made for Kamal's breakfast on November 17.  On November 17, after feeding him that first fresh muffin, I dropped him off at preschool and went to work, where I checked Facebook, became really angry, and wrote this post. 

And the response to that post showed me, to my relief and amazement, how many of us there are: all ready to give, wanting to help, believing in the sacred sameness of all people.  There aren't words for how moved I was by the messages I received and the sense of embrace that shone from so many different places. More than anything, I learned what defines my tribe: it's giving. Love, sure, and empathy, and activism: but across the board, people giving, asking how to give, finding ways to give creatively and gracefully.

The thing about giving is: it's not optional. Not if you want to be a happy, healthy person connected in any way with the larger world. I talk a lot about how everyone has their own individual path to health and happiness, and how no one else can prescribe it to you, but on this point I'm uncharacteristically inflexible.

Giving is not optional because the alternative is, well, hoarding. Not-giving is not a neutral state. Every one of your resources is either in your possession or it isn't. And not-giving, over time, hardens and calcifies into fear-based greed--and that's a really uncomfortable feeling.

Giving doesn't have to mean writing checks. There are countless ways to give. You have so many resources to share: your time. Your physical ability. Your kindness.

That guy that is always just waking up under the eaves of your office building when you get there early? Notice him. Say "good morning." Let him know he is seen. That is giving.

Your friend who just had a baby? Tiptoe up to her front door, leave her a sandwich or something else she can eat with one hand, and then tiptoe away again.  Don't ring the bell and wake the baby, don't go in and make her host you. Just give something that is needed, the gentlest and purest gesture. 

That person standing alone at the party, trying to look cavalier but plainly terrified? Swallow your own nerves and talk to him. Be easy and unscary. You can be a port in somebody's storm, and it won't cost you a thing but a little bit of comfort. 

Raise awareness for causes you believe in by writing, talking, singing, dancing, shouting. Gift beauty to the world by picking that piece of litter off the hiking trail. Gift a smidgen of confidence to a twelve-year-old girl by getting as excited as she is about her garage band. Gift your family your own most realized self by taking care of your health and taking responsibility for your own happiness.

Give. Give. Give. Give endlessly, in as many ways you can think of. The more you look for opportunities to give, the more you'll find them, and the richer you'll know you are. You can afford to give something, every day, and there is no better or surer path towards celebrating all the different kinds of wealth in your life. There is no faster vehicle towards your own happiest and healthiest existence than generosity to others. Give because it's good for you and good for everyone around you; give because your goodwill will ripple outward in unpredictable and joyful ways forever; give because it's never wrong. Give because you are grateful for what you have and because you know better than to hold it too tight. There is so much to share.

[Again, cash isn't the only way to give. But if it's a way that works for you, please consider giving to my friend Chris as he brings his considerable skills to Lesvos to assist Syrian refugees. Click right here to donate, or to read more about Chris and all the ways and reasons he's walking the walk here. ]

The Wayward Body

[What I had for breakfast today: rice. Egg. Beet greens. Kamal had the same thing!

But this past Tuesday, Kamal asked me to make him pancakes, and I made these, almost exactly according to the recipe. I used six ounces of whole-wheat flour and four ounces of white, as opposed to the ten ounces of white flour called for in the recipe; and instead of buttermilk and sour cream I used the kefir and yogurt Adam has been culturing at home. Kamal had two with butter and homemade jam. I had two, also, but they sandwiched an egg scrambled with salami and cheddar cheese. It was delicious.] 

As far as I know, which is not very far, the point of having a body is to experience everything beautiful the world has to offer it. And that is a lot. One of those countless beautiful things is the euphoria of exertion--the hard and fast heartbeat, the fierce ache in the muscles, the pores opening and letting go sweat and salt.  There is nothing else like it. Just like there is nothing else like pistachio ice cream or sleeping in on soft clean sheets or taking in a sunlit field of mustard flowers. It would be silly to deny your body any of these pleasures. 

Sometimes my body doesn't want to exert itself. Sometimes, despite my best intentions, my body goes all wayward and self-sabotage-y on me, and wants to lie down and eat french fries. (This is a completely justifiable desire, but this post is about exercise.) I love running, but I don't always love every second of running, or riding my bike, or even my brief daily yoga practice. But in those moments when I don't love all the panting and sweating and aching, I remember how I feel when I don't exercise at all, which is: crappy. When I feel crappy, I act like someone who feels crappy: grumpy, uninspired, unfun. Which is, let's face it, not fair to Kamal or to Adam, not fair to my patients or my friends, but mostly, so not fair to me. 

So, now I'm talking to you. Please exercise. You don't have to run, you don't have to bike. You don't have to wear spandex or belong to a gym. You can do it with other people or all alone. You can do it with music or you can do it with silence. You do have to find a thing you like doing, and the way I always suggest finding that thing is to think about the thing you most liked to do on the playground at recess. 

Remember that thing? Remember how you would just run around screaming, out of the sheer joy of being set free from the classroom? Remember how you'd always win at foursquare or tetherball? Remember hopscotch? Jump rope? Or what about the long, rambling bike rides with your friends after school, all the things you'd discover that you'd never have seen in a car? Did you ever once in your entire childhood turn down the chance to go for a swim? Did you and your friends choreograph busy, giggly numbers to Whitney Houston and M.C. Hammer? 

All of that also counts as grown-up exercise. All of that will make you sweaty and euphoric. And I want all of it for you, not because it's good for you, not because it's my job to recommend it to you--but because you deserve it. You deserve to feel strong and happy and at ease in your body. You deserve to let your body bring you every kind of pleasure, every joy. You deserve every benefit exercise brings--greater ease in your everyday movements, whether climbing stairs or carrying groceries; a more positive outlook, leading to better relationships and a happier home; and maybe even a longer life , which you're going to really want once you realize how beautiful and delicious every day in your body can be. 
 

The actual lesson from the bike crash

[What I had for breakfast today: jasmine rice, an egg, and beet greens. And I had the same thing yesterday--but I chased it with a DOUGHNUT, eaten with a good friend, and man did I enjoy that chocolate glazed.]

A couple of weeks ago, I crashed my bike while riding to work. I'm not sure what happened, and it wasn't really a big deal, but I bonked my head hard enough that it seemed wise to buy a new helmet, plus I got some intense road rash on my knee and shoulder. 

The scrape on my shoulder was particularly uncomfortable, enough that I had to curse a lot every time I got in the shower or changed my shirt for the first few days. Kamal winced when he saw it and insisted I wear sleeves--"I don't like seeing your boo-boo," he explained--and I couldn't blame him. It was pretty gross. 

Today, thanks to the remarkable ability of time to heal all wounds--along with a lot of antibiotic ointment and Vitamin E lotion--the road rash is almost entirely gone. But for those first few days, I was a terrible, terrible patient. I whined, I cringed, I felt sorry for myself. I thought about how to prevent road rash from happening again. 

"Maybe," I suggested to Adam, "I should start wearing more protective gear when I ride my bike. Like, maybe if I'd been wearing a jacket or something besides a sundress, I wouldn't have gotten so banged up."

Adam didn't even look up from the bread he was kneading. He scowled into the dough. "Come on," he scoffed. "You've been riding your bike forever, in far less appropriate outfits than that one. This is your first accident since you were a kid. Change what you wear on your bike if you want, but not because you fell off it this once."

Since it happened, I've been wondering what the lesson is for me in this accident. I've come up with some possibilities: maybe it's the universe reminding me why a helmet is important. Maybe it's telling me to be more careful. Maybe it's telling me to be less vain. Maybe it's telling me I shouldn't ride my bike anymore, or warning me against, God forbid, a bike accident while riding around with Kamal. All the lessons I thought up were grim warnings and grave reproaches. 

It took Adam frowning at his dough to make me realize: The lesson is just that accidents happen. The lesson is that one accident in a long history of safe bicycling is the norm, not the exception. The lesson is a big one for me and my anxiety. 

Because, yes, I struggle with anxiety. Since before I knew how to ride a bike, I've been an anxious person. I've collected a whole kit of tools for dealing with it, and I do a pretty good job most of the time, and have, in no small part as a direct result of coping with my own, been able to help a lot of patients deal with their anxiety. But when an accident happens, or when somebody under our roof is sick--when I'm not in control of my health or the health of my family--the anxiety starts digging in its cold little toes. 

And Adam, who is pretty much always right, is right again. Righter than he realized, maybe. Because managing anxiety isn't believing that the world is a safe place. It's acknowledging that the world is dangerous, that life is precarious, and moving forward anyway. It's finding the balance between being paralyzed by fear and deceiving ourselves into total passivity. It's remembering that the California sun on your shoulders feels good as you pedal yourself to work, and also that wearing a suit of armor makes for a slow and unpleasant bike ride. 

Vigilance is helpful; hypervigilance hinders. We try not to fall down, but we all do sometimes. We don't want to see the boo-boos, but we know they happen, and the great gift is that most of the time we know how to fix them. Every human is made of soft and vulnerable stuff and the world is hard and poky. 

When Kamal was born everything around me was lit by love. At the same time, the risks contained in the world multiplied by a thousand. The most illuminating love and the most crippling anxiety both arrived in my life along with my child. And this is the world we live in: equally full of catastrophes and miracles. At any moment we can fall head over heels in love or be struck by enormous loss. What anxiety makes us forget is that the loss and catastrophe are just as random as the love and the miracles. The bad stuff isn't aiming for anyone. The good stuff is all around. All we can do is roll around in it and take our lumps where they come, and then heal, over and over again. 

On being a loser, comfortably

[What I ate for breakfast today: an egg, jasmine rice, beet greens--and a little bit of crisp-fried chicken skin, which, you guys, is so underrated.]

Kamal has been really into winning races: to the car, to his bedroom, to the chicken coop. It's been fun, and we've maybe exploited it a little (OK, a lot) to get him to hustle while we're getting from point A to point B. But yesterday he cried when Adam's truck was in the driveway when we pulled in, because it meant Daddy had "won" and we'd "lost." And we reflected: maybe we don't want to reinforce this particular thing.

So last night, while he played in his bubble bath, I heard myself saying to Kamal: "You know, the way races work, there's always one winner. Everybody else who doesn't win loses the race. That means there's lots of losers, and just one winner. So it's okay to be a loser, because you'll have lots of company."

I stand by this--it is okay to lose, and it better be, because nobody wins every race--but it's not exactly the message I'm hoping to deliver. What I want Kamal to know is that in real life there are no races. There's no finish line, except death, which isn't a thing to rush towards. I want him to understand that real life is not binary--you don't win or lose. You don't succeed or fail. You don't get a happy ending or a sad ending, because there are no endings, not really. All we get is the moment we're in, and the only true competition is whether our best selves can make the best of this moment, over and over again. 

I want him to know this kind of continuum of happiness, that it's part and parcel of heartache, that it's not a cause nor an effect so much as a rich and subjective network. I want him to know money is a tool, not a goal. I want him to be happy, and even more essentially, I want him to know he's happy. 

And all the other big things parents want for their child: finding meaning, being present, being loved, building community, doing good work and good works--of course I want those for him. But I want them because they will inform his happiness. 

And you know, I think he already gets it, on some level. Because about a year ago, Adam and I figured we'd introduce him to the concept of money, and we offered him one shiny penny for every ten weeds he pulled in the garden. His face lit up at the word "shiny," and he toddled off and returned a few minutes later with a bunched handful of approximately ten plant fragments. As promised, he received a shiny penny for these efforts. 

"Now," we told him, "pull another ten weeds, and you'll get another! You can have as many pennies as you want--just keep up the good work."

Kamal considered. He beamed at his penny. Then he carefully stuck it in his pocket, said, "No thanks," and wandered off.  All he wanted was the single penny. Having got it, he was done working. (Not a capitalist, then, I figure.)

 I don't know what it all means for who he's going to grow up to be--maybe he'll be a marathon racer; maybe he'll be a labyrinth pacer. Maybe he'll reinvent astronomy or busk in a train station or vote for a Republican candidate. It's too soon to tell. What I do know is none of it matters more than whether or not he's happy.  And I feel like he will be, as long as somewhere in his adult self there remains that toddler that pockets his one shiny penny and then turns away into the sunshine, trusting in the sure and easy feeling of enough. 

Eating for Pleasure, in Real Life

 [What I had for breakfast today: so-so scrambled eggs and potatoes at a very early breakfast meeting. After which I felt...not ill, at all, but just not as great as I usually feel after breakfast. So after the meeting I came home and fixed--you guessed it--an egg and rice and beet greens. And then I ate it and felt MUCH, much better.]

When I tell patients my Healthy Hedonism philosophy, it usually begins with talking about food. I'll encourage the patient to eat exclusively for pleasure, and suggest they never eat anything unless it feels good. This is almost always met with incredulity: Just eat for pleasure? But...you mean, like, German chocolate cake? Baked brie on fresh sourdough? Holy smokes, biscuits and gravy?

Well, yeah. You should eat things you like. But (shoot, says the patient's expression here, I knew there'd be a "but") when I talk about pleasure and feeling good, I mean all over, and all day. German chocolate cake, for example--it brings my tastebuds pleasure. It zings little happy neurotransmitters all over my brain. But ten minutes after eating it, my brain gets sluggish and a little morose. My digestion slows down, which makes me feel bloated, which means I feel physically uncomfortable.  While eating the cake and for those first ten minutes, I felt good. Great, even. But after that short interval, I feel bad. I don't feel as glowy and healthy and happy as I'm accustomed to feeling. What I am feeling is definitely not pleasure. 

And after having eaten German chocolate cake several (*coughcoughHUNDRED*) times and consistently getting the same result, German chocolate cakes don't look as appealing to me as it used to. This isn't to say I'll never eat it again, because that sounds really sad. But I know it's not going to make me feel good, and I know it's not going to bring me pleasure beyond a tiny short-term fix, so it's not that hard to opt instead for things that will. 

The foods that do make you feel good don't have to be on anybody's list of "healthy" foods. I mean, white rice, along with a protein and a vegetable, is what makes me feel good. It's a refined grain and a simple carbohydrate, which from an objective nutritional standpoint is not so great--but I know I feel pleasure when I eat it, and I know I feel good all day when I eat it, so I keep eating it and feeling good.  (For a more in-depth defense of white rice, read my article here.)

Everyone's right foods are different, and nobody but you can tell you what yours are. I haven't met anyone who can honestly put German chocolate cake on their own list of right foods, but I wouldn't be terribly surprised to learn that such a person exists. Jealous, for sure, but not surprised. 

So here's how you can find your right foods: Pay attention. 

It really is that simple. Eat a thing. Notice how you feel while you're eating it. Are you feeling pleasure? Great. Check. You're halfway there. 

After eating the thing, notice how you feel. Do you feel content? Do you feel energetic? Could you go for a walk right now? Is your mind clear and focused? How do you feel about heading in to the rest of your day--are you looking forward to it? Or: Are you sleepy? Do you feel too full? Do you have a headache? Do you feel more overwhelmed about the rest of your to-do list for today?

Notice how you feel ten minutes after eating, then thirty minutes, then an hour, then a few hours, then the next day, even. Because you're going to be eating a bunch of different things over the course of 24 hours, you might not know which foods you ate the day before that cause you to feel good or not-so-good--so it's okay if this practice of noticing takes a while. It should take a while--but it could also be helpful to look back over your history and notice things that have never agreed with you. 

Lots of people come to see me saying "I know I'm supposed to eat salad, but every time I eat it I get indigestion." It's astounding, how many people eat salad even though it makes them feel bad, especially when there's a world of sauteed greens and vegetable stir-fries and all sorts of things as healthy as a salad that are much easier to digest. If something makes you feel bad, don't eat it.

And if something makes you feel good--and you're really honest with yourself about what "feels good" means, both in the short and long term--do eat it. 

And if you want to talk more about this, you know you can ask me anything. I love talking about what you eat, and what I eat, and how we can all feel way, way better, starting right now, by eating delicious things all the time. 

Three bizarrely simple things you can do to feel better quick

[What I had for breakfast today: again, beet greens, jasmine rice, an egg and sriracha. I'm still not sick of it, but I will admit to looking forward to the day the cabbage, mustard greens and broccoli that we planted this season are big enough to eat. A little vegetable variety might be welcome soon.]

Healthy choices aren't complicated, ever. You already know that you'll probably feel better if you opt for the oatmeal instead of the glazed donut, or the hike instead of the happy hour. Healthy choices are simple--but, well, they aren't necessarily easy. (Just typing "glazed donut" has me considering one, a little.) 

Here are three healthy choices that actually are really easy. They're not choosing one thing over another, they don't take a lot of time, and they don't disrupt your day. In fact, I recommend doing them every day. I promise that if you do each of these things every day, you'll feel noticeably better within a week. 

1. Stretch a little, first thing in the morning. Just for five minutes. Set a timer, if it helps, or create a routine for yourself. 

I have a short, Vinyasa-based yoga practice that I move through nearly every morning, for the last, oh, fifteen or twenty years. The days that I miss it I notice--I'm creakier, slower, and less focused. It's like my body still hasn't woken up yet. Moving my joints and muscles out of sleep in a gradual, encouraging way prepares me to stay connected to my physical body throughout the day--meaning it's easier for me to choose healthful exercise and food, quicker to bend down and peek under the couch to recover Kamal's toy racecars and Legos, and less likely to injure myself through inattention. 

2. Drink enough water. "Enough" means different things for different people. I'm a moderately active person, and I drink about a gallon of water per day. If that sounds like an obscene amount of water, try aiming for a half-gallon to start. That's just 64 ounces--you can do it!  

Your body getting enough water means you'll be far more energetic. Your joints will be healthier, your organs will function better, your skin will be lovelier, and your mind will be clearer. Yes, you'll have to pee all the time, but eventually your body adjusts so that you're running to the restroom less frequently. If water feels really boring to you, check out this post for ideas on how to make it more interesting. 

3. Practice gratitude. This one is really important. The definition of success, at least my definition, is wanting what you have. 

So every morning, before you've even gotten out of bed, think of three things that you are grateful for--things that exist in your life that help make it good. They can be the same things every day or different things; they can be huge or tiny, or both. For example, maybe you're grateful for that orchid you coaxed to rebloom against all odds, and for the fact that you haven't caught that cold that everyone you know seems to have, and for the presence in your life of your amazing child. 

Do each of these things every day. You'll feel better, happier, more present in your life--and the world will be better because of the gift of the happier, more present you.

New Old Planters

 [What I had for breakfast today: jasmine rice, an egg, sautéed beet greens and sriracha. Yes, again, and boy did I miss it yesterday. I don't think I'll ever get tired of this breakfast.]

Bermuda grass is always, increasingly, encroaching upon our vegetable garden. This year, we're fighting back by planting it all in tillage radish as a cover crop. The idea is that radishes grow faster than most weeds, and if you plant them close together, their broad leaves block sunshine to the ground, so new weed sprouts don't have much of a chance. It's organic weed management via strategic outcompetition.

This, however, leaves us limited room to grow our food--which in turn creates the opportunity for us to get a lot more comfortable with container gardening. We dug up our happy parsley plants from the garden and put them in our cheery new planters, which Adam made by covering five-gallon buckets with rice sacks we'd saved. The parsley seems seem pretty happy in its new home, right?   

Banana bread jones

[What I had for breakfast today: a delicious chicken tamale from a cart on Sebastopol Road]

Every so often I get fixated on banana bread and have to make it right away. 

I don't entirely understand why; banana bread is not something that would ever make it onto a list of my favorite foods. There's just some undefinable nostalgia attached to it, something linked to those very first few times I baked anything at all. I would have been in high school, probably, and I remember feeling giddy with the way I could turn flour and a few other things into something that would feed people and make them happy. (Baking things would also reliably get my high-school boyfriend to come over, and I would be a big liar if I told you that didn't result in my being a more practiced baker.)

Today I was jonesing for banana bread again. Kamal and I made banana nut muffins, following the recipe linked to in this article. I'm usually pretty loosey-goosey about following a recipe, but after reading about this one I didn't dare experiment--it sounded like messing with perfection. Other than using a muffin tin (it made twelve lovely muffins) instead of a loaf pan, which meant my baking time was more like 25 minutes instead of 65, I didn't change a thing. 

Kamal was a tremendous help, especially when it came to the important task of cleaning the mixer paddle.  

These hit the spot, absolutely. I would have taken a photo of them for you, but I was too excited to eat them. We shared them with friends and every banana-y bite is gone. 

The Healthiest Food You've Never Heard Of

[What I had for breakfast this morning: jasmine rice, an egg, sriracha, shoyu and bittermelon. What's bittermelon? Read up!] 

Isn't it pretty? 

Like a work of art, right? 

Bittermelon, a member of the cucumber family, is not very well known in the United States. But all over Asia, as well as South and Central America, it's a popular ingredient in stir-fries, soups, stews, curries and teas. 

The list of health benefits attributed to bittermelon is almost too long to type here. Probably the most researched benefit is the way that bittermelon can improve insulin resistance and thereby blood glucose levels, making it a terrific whole-food tool for people with diabetes. Other benefits include clearer skin, improved weight management (connected to that blood sugar balancing!), better digestion, and even fewer kidney stones. The only people that can't benefit from adding some bittermelon to their diets are pregnant women--bittermelon is contraindicated in pregnancy, as it can induce contractions. 

As its name indicates, it's incredibly bitter. More bitter, probably, than almost anything you've ever eaten. A lot of people don't like it for that reason--which is understandable. 

Consider, however, that in Chinese nutritional therapy and the Chinese culinary arts, each meal should present a balance of the five flavors: bland (or mildly sweet, as in rice or carrots), sour, salty, pungent, and bitter. The traditional Western diet features those first four flavors pretty regularly, but bitter? Not so much. 

We have coffee, and that's bitter. We have, well, bitters, and Campari, at every well-stocked bar. There's certainly a degree of bitterness in some dark leafy greens, like dandelion greens and older kale, but not a whole lot of it. 

What the bitter flavor does in a traditional Chinese medical context is tonify and clear heat from the heart and drain dampness from the entire system. The patient that would benefit from eating more bitter foods might manifest some of the following symptoms: anxiety, insomnia, hot flashes, trouble losing weight, a chronically stuffy or runny nose, and water retention.  Because of its strongly bitter flavor, bittermelon excels at treating all of those symptoms. 

So where can you get this miraculous food? Well, typically Asian markets will carry it year-round. Like cucumbers, bittermelons are harvested in the summer months, so if you have a local farm stand, you might want to ask in the early spring if the farmer could grow it. Or you could grow it yourself, if you have garden space for a vigorous, vining plant. I've had a hard time getting it started in the garden, but I know people who have grown it with no trouble at all.

The farmer that we buy our strawberries from in the summer grows bittermelon, so I buy a bunch in summer, pith and slice them, and freeze them in sealed packets to eat all year.  

Cooking bittermelon is a pretty simple process, very much like cooking a bell pepper: you slice the bittermelon in half lengthwise, scoop out the pith and seeds with a spoon, slice the remaining outer shell into lovely scalloped little half-moons, and sautee them till they're tender. I like to scramble them with eggs, soy sauce and sriracha. I've also appreciated them stuffed with pork and served in a gingery broth. 

Below is one of my favorite-ever bittermelon recipes. (Note for those of you who avoid gluten: If you make it with tamari instead of soy sauce, it's gluten-free.) I hope you enjoy it. 

3 large bittermelons
1.5 lbs eye of round beef steak, thinly sliced
5 cloves garlic, minced
2 small onions, sliced
1 to 2 tbsp, or to taste, soy sauce or tamari
2 tbsp coconut oil
3 nests mung bean threads (also called glass noodles or cellophane noodles)

Put the mung bean thread nests in a bowl of water to soak. 

Wash and slice the bitter melon in half lengthways. Scoop out all the seeds and membranes with a spoon and discard.

-(optional step: to draw out some of the bitterness, coat the hollowed-out bittermelon halves with salt. Leave for 15 minutes, then thoroughly rinse off salt. I do think removing some of the bitter flavor negatively impacts the medicinal value, so skip this step if the bitterness doesn't bother you.)

-Slice the bittermelon thinly and set aside.

-Heat a heavy pan or wok on high, then place 1 tbsp of oil in the wok. When the oil gets hot, add beef and saute for one minute--it should sizzle. Remove the beef from the hot pan and set aside.

-Add 1 more tbsp of oil in the wok and briefly fry the garlic and then add the onions and continue frying for about 2 minutes.

-Add the beef back in the wok. Keep stirring for 1 minute.

-Add the bitter melon, stir fry for 2 minutes, then add the tamari and stir.

-Add water from the to cover about half an inch up the pan (approx 1/3 cup depending on the size of the pan or wok).

-When the liquid is simmering, make a little well in the mixture. Remove the mung bean threads from the water they've been soaking in and add them to the pan. Cook, stirring continuously, till the threads are soft and translucent.

I like to add a dash of sesame oil to my own serving. This what I call comfort food.
 

Memory

[What I had for breakfast today: again, egg, rice, beet greens and a little leftover roast chicken.]

My mother used to take off one earring while she was working in her home office, so that it wouldn't click against the phone receiver as she made calls. Then she'd forget, and leave the house with only one earring on. 

Today I walked out of my office after returning a bunch of calls with just one earring on, too. It was nice to feel connected to her that way, one working mama to another, one of us ageless in memory, one of us aging busily and feeling blessed for it.

One kind of first step

[what i had for breakfast today: rice and a fresh egg cooked in homemade chicken stock]

(the following originally published at http://lorellesaxena.tumblr.com/)

I think we all secretly hope, when we meet a new healthcare practitioner or spiritual leader or life coach or whatever, that that person will be the person who will take us in, look us over and say: "Oh, look. I see you. You are a good person. You have good intentions, you are trying, and sometimes you fall short, but that's understandable because you're human, because you have your own specific wounds, and because sometimes you're just tired. It's okay. You are a chosen, golden, beautiful person, with gifts that only you have, many of which you haven't begun to realize. Whether or not you reach your fullest potential, regardless of your shortcomings and regrets, I see without a doubt that you are extraordinary."

So here's the thing. You can just be that person for yourself. Tell yourself. You know it's the truth.

Making water less boring

[what I had for breakfast today: jasmine rice, beet greens, scrambled egg, and leftover roast chicken]

I drink about a gallon of water each day, and I have for a long time--it makes me feel clearer-headed and less fatigued, it helps my skin stay bright and glowy, and it keeps my joints in better working order. 

I recommend aiming for half a gallon of water per day to patients who aren't in a water-drinking habit. Sometimes, though, patients will balk--"But water is so BORING!" they protest. 

Well, it doesn't have to be. And I don't think you should drink anything that bores you. Here are some ways to make water more interesting: 

-Bring water to a boil and pour it over your favorite fruits or spices, let steep for five to twenty minutes, remove fruits and drink when cool enough. As an example, think about putting half a sliced pear and a little bit of minced ginger in the bottom of a quart jar and then pouring hot water to fill the jar. Dried blueberries and orange peel could be another tasty option.    

-Bubbly water still counts as water! I put a teaspoon of apple cider vinegar and about a teaspoon of maple syrup in a pint jar and fill that with bubbly water. A little rice vinegar and a thinly-sliced cucumber would be delicious as well, as would balsamic vinegar and a couple of sliced strawberries.

-All kinds of herbal teas count towards your water intake--chrysanthemum, mint, rooibos, chamomile. One you may not have heard of before is barley tea, which is common in East Asian countries but not so much here. It's made by toasting raw barley in a heavy pan for just a couple of minutes till it's nuttily fragrant, then simmering it for ten to twenty minutes in water. I'd do maybe a heaping tablespoon of barley to a quart of water. 

86

[what I ate for breakfast today: one egg, beet greens, jasmine rice, sriracha...also known as "the usual."]

That's how many degrees it was today. Eighty-six degrees Fahrenheit! In the very middle of February.

We finished planting our earth boxes, shoveled some compost for our garlic beds, and let our chickens out to hunt bugs. They're ruthless predators, chickens. 

The mint figures it must be June and is growing up in every little patch of dirt it can claim. One of my favorite summer drinks is iced mint tea. Nothing is so straightforwardly refreshing after a long, hot day of gardening. Even if that day is February 15.

Here's the recipe. Couldn't be simpler! 

1) Get a great big stockpot. 

2) Pick and wash an armload of fresh mint.

3) Put your armload of mint in the stockpot and then fill it with water.

4) Bring the water to a boil, then reduce it to a simmer for about twenty minutes. You'll want to stir every few minutes and make sure all the mint stems and leaves are submerged. 

5) Add about a half cup of sugar or honey for a large stockpot. The tea should taste barely sweet.

6)  Turn off the heat. Strain out leaves. Chill and drink. 

Greens

 [what I had for breakfast today: jasmine rice, an egg scrambled with beet greens, sriracha, nutritional yeast]

We visited with good friends this morning, on this sunny Valentine's Day that feels like spring. 

Later we planted our EarthBoxes with mustard seedlings that I'd started from seed months ago. I realized the mustard leaves looked a lot like the leaves on the echinachea seedlings I'd been painstakingly transplanting into bushel baskets and nursery planters all winter. Ruh-roh. 

A Google image search revealed that the bushel baskets and nursery planters were, indeed, full of mustard greens. I must have mislabeled a planter or somehow mistaken one pile of beigeish teeny-tiny seeds for another pile of beigeish teeny-tiny seeds.

It's not a catastrophe. I love mustard greens, especially lactofermented, the way Adam preserves them. But I feel pretty silly. 

Need a little help falling asleep?

[what I had for breakfast today: a hard-boiled egg, jasmine rice, sauerkraut and nutritional yeast.]

Sometimes it's just really, really hard to turn your mind off and drift into a deep, restful sleep. Here are some easy-to-follow breathing and acupressure recommendations that I make to patients struggling with insomnia. 

First of all, you should do a breathing exercise while pressing these points. I'd suggest 4-7-8 breathing--inhaling for a count of 4, holding your breath for a count of 7, and exhaling for a count of 8. If this feels difficult, try speeding up the count. The speed isn't important; keeping the ratio of 4:7:8 is. If it's still difficult, switch to just inhaling for 4 and exhaling for 8, skipping holding your breath.

Hold each of these three points on each side of the body, in the order written here, for one to two minutes while doing the 4-7-8 breathing exercise. 

-Nei Guan: Make a fist and locate the two parallel tendons that pop up on the underside (palm side) of your wrist. Relax your hand, and locate the point between those two tendons, two fingers' width below the wrist crease. Here's an image. 

-San Yin Jiao: Find the tip of your ankle bone on the inside aspect of your leg. Locate the point three fingers' width above the tip of the ankle bone, just behind the tibia (shin bone). Here's an image. 

-Yong Quan: On the very bottom of your foot, this point is at the deepest point of the "cup" your foot makes when you point your toes. Here's an image. 

Now go to sleep, already.

Grounded

[what I had for breakfast today: a cup of miso soup, then jasmine rice, over-medium egg, a bit of fried chicken skin, and a pile of sauerkraut]

I've always preferred sitting on the floor to sitting in a chair. If it were socially acceptable, I'd probably eat all my meals, do all my consults and take all my meetings cross-legged on the ground. When I was in high school I briefly campaigned to be permitted to sit on the floor during classes, with unbrilliant arguments like, "Who does it hurt?" and "Look, you can't fall off the floor."

All I knew at the time was that I was more comfortable on the floor than in a chair. Nowadays, if you Google "healthy sitting" or "chairs and health" you'll find a multitude of reasons to park your booty on the baseboards every chance you get. (I wish I'd had them when I was making my case to my Modern European History teacher.) Here are just a few: it's better for your hips, your back, your neck, and your internal organs. Eating while sitting on the floor benefits your digestion. Working on the floor enhances your productivity. 

And it's a good practice if your goal is to maintain mobility over the long term: consider that (warning: rant impending!) chairs are basically a rest stop for your body halfway between standing up and sitting on the floor. They're there because we're too tired, or achy, or whatever, to get all the way down to the floor and then all the way back up. They should be reserved for people who actually cannot get up from the floor.  They inherently condone laziness. And believe me, I'm all for laziness here and there--but if I am trying to be lazy, I'm much happier lounging on the floor. 

Whenever I'm at the office and not consulting with a patient--doing administration stuff, checking emails, researching, writing--I take the opportunity to take the floor. This afternoon I was  doing some reading on Chinese herbal interactions before prescribing a formula to a patient, and it just made sense to spread out. Books, computer, coffee and me got cozy. I was definitely a lot more productive, and both my brain and body felt happy and healthy.