Here are my personal musings on living. Let's have conversations about what it means to be beautiful beings on this planet. Maybe I'll talk about pop culture. Maybe I'll go on a rant about silly things. Mostly I talk about my experiences and subsequent thoughts about them. Either way, this is where I write and hopefully have something to say that is worth reading.
I've decided to start My Weekly Three.
Since I love music and promoting lesser known bands that speak to me, every week I will share three songs that I'm currently listening to. Enjoy.
The Oh Hello's, Cold Is The Night
Daughter, Youth
Lucy Rose, Night Bus
It's a tough business trying to get ideas off the ground. Especially trying to chart new territory. I find myself waxing and waning between moments of certainty and determination, and moments of hesitation and self-doubt.
It's infuriating.
Trying to stay in that space of hopeful presumption. Time for a conscious choice.
I'm choosing to let go and move forward from my negative thought patterns. I'm acknowledging them, honoring the place in me that they derived from, and visualizing them leaving. Out my window. Through the door. To the wind. Gone.
I don't need them any more.
I'm sure fear has its place. Warning of dark caves where literal hungry beasts could be hiding in the days of cavemen and hunters, a fearful pit in the stomach would be helpful. But this is not that. This isn't intuition's alarm bells, either. This is negative, critical self talk.
While I believe in independence, inner strength and a general "I don't care if you like it" attitude to doing your own thing and following your own bliss, it is massively helpful to be around encouraging souls.
Confidence is contagious.
So is fear.
Therefore, I'm making the choice. I will spend time talking to people who drive my ambitions not those who indulge my hesitation. I will listen to Abraham Hicks because it brings me joy and moves me into the vortex. And I will say words like "vortex" without irony or haughty derision because I genuinely talk like that.
Being in your twenties is universally hard. Or at least that has been my experience and the experience of my friends, family, pretty much anyone I talk to. There is typically an expectation now that one is an "adult" the previous self-discovery type quests and questions have been undertaken and answered. Nope. I'm still figuring it out. I'm fairly certain most of us are still figuring it. But I'm done comparing myself to others and questioning my desire to take the road less traveled.
I'm inspired by people who take different paths. I feel drawn to have an adventurous life. I don't think that is wrong. I think it will make me happy. And I believe that when someone is happy, everyone wins.
I have goals, aspirations and desires to live my life in a way that is true to myself.
Those of you who feel compelled to live a life that may be considered by some to be more radical, I hope you choose to be your most authentic self and listen to your inner cheerleader and not the inside (and outside) voices of doubt.
photo credits: Pinterest
I think I temporarily threw out my back yesterday. Sitting in a chair. WTF?!
I have a newfound respect for the power of a chair to destroy a person.
I was at the library. (Yes, I hurt my back at THE LIBRARY. Ok, seriously, how old AM I??) Sitting in a, yes, god awful wooden chair for a couple hours straight, but I am 27! And I take good care of my body! (At least I thought so. Maybe I need to get back into a regular yoga practice.)
I don't know what I did, but clearly I tweaked my back somehow sitting (in a definitively non-ergonomic chair) and abruptly my whole back was in pain. On top of that I was suddenly overcome with nausea. Not fun. I remedied the situation by crouching in a hip opener pose next to the evil chair for about five minutes until the nausea and pain subsided. I'm pretty sure the studious nerds at the table next to me were a little uneasy about the strange actions happening beside them. (And btw, I'm not judging their studious nerd-ness, as I am clearly one of them.)
So how did this happen? Well, for one, I did break my self-decree of getting up every half hour or so when studying, working on a computer etc and at least walking around for a bit or stretching. But that mandate easily applies when I'm at home. I was in a public place with stuff. Valuable stuff like a computer and phone. And while I probably could have trusted the people who were VOLUNTARILY AT THE LIBRARY in the middle of the day, the "never EVER leave your stuff unattended" mentality of a post 9/11 America trumped my sense of body awareness and I remained seated the entire time. Until the pain.
The funny thing is that as a nutrition professional, my mind went, "maybe it's because I haven't taken magnesium recently." Which, I still kind of stand by (or crouch by, as it were) since I have a well documented history of magnesium deficiency that is worsened when I'm stressed, (say studying for an exam) and I had forgotten to take my magnesium supplements. It feels a little fast acting for neglecting to take a supplement a mere couple days, but I don't know, maybe. Nausea and muscle cramping are symptoms of magnesium deficiency. Regardless, I seem to be okay today, having since taken magnesium, but I will certainly make a point of getting up and walking around regularly at work. I suppose the take away from this rather disconcerting ordeal is to always remember to pay attention to my body. Because I totally wanna be this lady when I'm 80:
photo credit: Pinterest
Yesterday I did something that I haven't done in a while. I gardened.
My mom is an avid gardener; in fact, she was the president of her local garden club the past two years. My Mom, unfortunately, took a spill the other day, thanks to our dog feeling a bit rambunctious, and hurt her hand. As a result, my Mom isn't really up to digging in the earth at the moment. Normally this would just require a gardening hiatus, but she had recently purchased some bulbs that needed to be planted ASAP. Enter me. I agreed to do the heavy digging.
Our sweet dog, Bonita, who swears she didn't mean to pull my Mom down.
There is something healing about working in the ground. Whether it is the transfer of electrons that many proponents of "grounding" or "earthing" speak to, or some other yet to be understood healing property of nature, touching earth feels good.
Our overly indoor existence is probably at least partially to blame for a lot of depression among us creatures of westernization. Realizing that I have been spending most of my time recently staring at computer screens, partially for this website, yes, but mainly due to studying (thank you electronic versions of books and study guides), I was excited at the prospect of feeling the land beneath my knees and hands.
A beautiful Crocus bloom about to open in our garden. The fruit of a past season's labor of love.
Where we live we have a substantial amount of clay in the ground, not to mention rocks and roots, so digging turns out to be a lot of work. It's that deeply satisfying kind of effort, though, that only comes from accomplishing something through sheer physical exertion. After a couple of hours of unearthing orange clay, silver rocks and a few pissed off worms via hand and spade, we successfully planted four different types of plants that will hopefully bloom in the spring.
We set aside the really large chunks of clay and replaced them with the most beautiful soil fresh from our home compost. What was once food scraps, fallen leaves and pulled up weeds has become the sweetest smelling pure, earthly soil. MMMM...Petrichor.
Fresh soil from our home compost
I highly recommend composting. Whether you can do the large scale outdoor-style bin that my parents do, or a mini indoor apartment-style bin, everyone can compost. Waste disposal is becoming a problem in this country. Landfills are filling up. Start a home compost and be a little bit of the solution.
And lest you fear that composting is complicated and hard, it's not. Really. There are plenty of ways to fancy up composting, your innovative urban farmers tend to have truly impressive systems, but it pretty much takes something brown and something green. That's the basic rule. Brown and green, then pile it up. Organic materials only, and no oils, meats, fish or dairy. If you are going to keep the bin inside or anywhere that is not literally outside on the ground, I would recommend buying a bin that is designed for composting. They are pretty easy to find at any garden supply store. They even sell cool outdoor composting containers that simplify the outdoor process too.
That's pure magic right there: My parent's compost pile. In the left bottom corner you can see some of the remaining wonderful soil that was created from a previous compost pile.
So that was yesterday. Today I am back to the decidedly ungrounded side of things, staring at computer screens and applying artificial tears to cure the subsequent dry eyes that come along with it. BTW: How rife for discourse is the notion of merchandizing artificial tears. Something about human artificiality and society being emotionally stunted. I feel there is such great social commentary in that. You know, if you ignore the boring germane purpose of easing eye discomfort. Alas, a conversation for another day. I must be off to work now. I hope you are having a wonderful day. Take a moment to touch the ground if you can.
(P.S. Here is an awesome infographic on treehugger.com about different types of composting.)
Sometimes I struggle with being in the present. I forget to appreciate the beauty of everyday pleasures. I don't just mean a divine cup of coffee or the birds melodically chirping outside, although those count. I find that I am actually better at noticing and appreciating tiny indulgences and nature's backdrop than I am at the bigger security net of my life.
I woke up today in a bed with a mattress, pillow, clean warm sheets, multiple fleecy blankets and a comforter. This bed is located inside of a house that has electricity, running water, an interior heating/cooling system and advanced fiber-optic technology courtesy of Verizon. Let's add to the picture the fact that I woke up in a place of safety, without fear of where my next meal would come from or if a militant mob would bust down the door guns blazing. That's not to say that there isn't plenty of propaganda out there assaulting my eyes and ears on a daily basis, warning me of larger than life dangers that threaten to collapse all that I have previously mentioned as complete anarchy envelopes this country, in what has become truly epic fear mongering brought to us through the relatively recent development of news as a commercial product streamed live into our set top boxes and mobile devices.
Alas, it seems quite logical then why I tend to forget from time to time just how good I've really got it. I'm constantly being shown images of those who supposedly have more than I do (and told that I should want it) while simultaneously being threatened with potential loss of all my "less than" current holdings. It's absurd.
I suppose I am having this mental dialogue 1. because it's something other than studying for my exam and 2. because I am thinking about traveling in the future where many of my current conveniences may not be available. I'm taking a moment and appreciating that on the road it is going to be different. Depending on where I'm at, life could be very different. Granted, I do not plan on venturing into the Congo- but seeing as how I plan on continuing this website throughout my adventures, I've been thinking about internet access. It may not be so easy to come by in some places.
And what about stuff? For anyone who has not seen George Carlin's hilarious bit about "Stuff" go watch it now.
As for Carlin's all-too-accurate description of our stuff versus other people's shit, we really do own a colossal amount of crap. In that vein, I actually am a big fan of living more simply, and am looking forward to forcibly owning less. That said, making sure to have everything I need, especially safety and health-wise will be a big deal. I also will truly not want to lose/have stolen anything important. I do believe that people are remarkably overzealous with their concern and fear about what can happen somewhere else, but it pays to be smart.
Of course, at this stage in the game, I don't even know where I will be going and under what circumstances. Will I be going into a country after already having procured employment? Will I just pack up and go and figure out income on the road?
All of these thoughts are dancing around my brain when I really should be studying. So very much on my mind these days. The joy of a quiet mind. What's that like?
photo credits: Pinterest and simpleijustdo.com
Today is this site's birthday.
I officially jumped in. The Hungry Gypsy is live. No longer just a trial site for my eyes only, these words can be accessed on the world wide web. Yikes.
You see, I actually wrote the previous posts while designing this site before it was truly viewable online. Now shit gets real.
My original plan was to start this post with a disclaimer. I'd talk about how this site is a work in progress, and how my tendency to get caught up in minutiae inspired me to avoid being trapped by my own detail-oriented self-spiral and just make the damn thing live already. (That and the web hosting site may or may not have forced my hand by expiring my trial and requiring me to woman-up to the real thing.)
Instead I'm gonna move past it and just make those changes as I go.
The latest with me is that I am still studying for my board exam, feeling all kinds of unprepared. It is NOT super fun to feel like after drowning in "learning" for the past two years, my actual retention of such classically favorite subjects as organic chemistry, biochemistry and physiology is less than stellar. The woes of overly-compressed learning and taxed adrenals.
This exam is going to be one of those fun "memorization-based" tests. In "real life" we do not need to have micronutrient fact sheets memorized. You just need to know where to look that information up. Real life has books. Exams do not. Granted, I'm not discounting the education portion- a layman may not only not know where to look this information up, but may not know what it meant even if he did. Owning a book and having truly studied a subject are not the same thing. I'm just saying that it is a pain in the tukkis to memorize so much information for such a comprehensive test. Basically I'm just bitching.
But on to happier things: The plan seems to be that after (hopefully) passing this exam in November, I will stay through the holidays and then start a year of adventure in the New Year. I'm so excited! Where should I go first??
photo credits: Pinterest
Update time: When I completed my master's degree I completed the first step in becoming a Certified Nutrition Specialist with the Certification Board for Nutrition Specialists (CBNS), which is a national organization that allows its members to be licensed nutritionists in all of the states that recognize it. If I want to act as a licensed nutritionist, which allows me to actually make nutritional diagnosis and allows my clients to seek insurance reimbursement if their insurance plan covers nutrition counseling, then being licensed is a good idea. Not to mention that it makes my knowledge more creditable. The next step in the certification process is passing the board exam. I originally thought that I would not be able to sit for the upcoming November exam since I would not have been able to get my application in before the September deadline. The CBNS apparently got a number of requests for application deadline extensions. They decided to extend the deadline, and now I can apply to take the exam in November.
So that is my new plan for the next month or so. Stay put and study my butt off to try and pass the Exam in November before high tailing it out of here. It's not a super fun plan, but it has the upside of feeling like the smart thing to do. Also, autumn is my favorite season in Maryland, so I suppose hanging out and watching the leaves change and the air grow crisp isn't a terrible fate.
photo credit: blogs.qut.edu.au
OK, truth time. I wrote that first post well over a month ago and I just now posted it. Man, am I victim of my own inner critic or what?! I literally said to myself WEEKS ago that my procrastinating was bullshit, and I kept procrastinating! So, here I am writing to say that as of this week, I’m done.
I thought about editing that last post to exclude the comments about graduation being a month-ish away, but that felt wrong. It felt like a cover up of my own lame continued procrastination and I didn’t want to do that. I want to be honest and say, yep, I talked a good talk there for a while and I still had nothing to show for it. But NOW that ends. I’m putting this together and I’m putting this out there despite the fact that I still feel remarkably unsure of myself. I have such dreams of grandeur for this site, and one day it will look like and be all that I’ve imagined, but for now it’s a work in progress that I’m OWNING right NOW.
This week has been hard. With the official completion of my Master's degree, I'm having one of those classic "...and now what?!" moments.
So, next step?
Ummm….keep applying to jobs? Save up some money? Get my ass on a plane?
That last one needs to happen. But exactly how? Should I get a "real" job and save up money for a bit and then hit the road (or air)? Or should I go ahead and jump on a plane to a low cost of living country and figure out a source of income on the fly? How about Peacecorps? Joining the Peacecorp has been an idea of mine for many many years, and I'm thinking that it may be an excellent way to see the world, be of service, and gain priceless life education. But it is a 27 month commitment. Is that what I want?
Time to do some soul searching and see what comes up.
photo credits: Pinterest
I have been putting off starting this site for a little while now. You see the grand plan for this site is to document my hungry travel adventures. Hunger both for food, yes, and the deeper soul hunger. I want to talk about healing, happiness and connection. A big part of that will be about food, but not all of it. Sounds great! (I say to myself) So what’s the problem?
The issue is that at the moment, I’m not actually traveling. I had it in my mind that I couldn’t possibly start this site until I was literally on the road, with travel stories to share and wondrous photos to post. And then I decided that was bullshit. That it was an excuse to not be doing what I want to be doing, which is kind of reminiscent of my life right now where I am not traveling instead of traveling.
So technically I am a wannabe, which even though I don’t honestly believe this, feels kind of like being a fraud. But that, once again, is the little critic in my head telling me lies. The truth (I imagine) is that the story of how I will get from here (not yet traveling) to there (actually traveling) is going to be an adventure all its own, and hopefully will make for a damn good story (or an introduction to my even larger story). After all, I am hardly the only twenty-something gal who wants to be traveling, but isn’t, so I figure maybe I can be a tad helpful to those of you out there who will be able to learn from my (sure to happen) trials and tribulations.
So here’s the run down on why I want to do this. I had the wonderful, amazing, fabulous, fantastic, stellar (insert additional positive adjectives here) experience of studying abroad in New Zealand during my undergrad. I spent approximately 6 months back packing around The Way Down Under, with a couple of short jaunts to Australia and Fiji thrown in for good measure. Ever since then I’ve had the travel bug and I’ve had it bad. And that was in….2007.
….Yea. So what on Earth happened between 2007 and now? Well, I returned to Los Angeles and completed my bachelor’s at USC. Then, I moved into my first big girl apartment in LA where I was actually responsible for rent and bills. (Although to be fair, my parents did help me out a couple of times with some fast cash when my rent check would have bounced….yikes. Those were bad times. I literally gave myself a stress rash two months in a row when rent was due. I’m not proud of those times.)
Then I managed to stabilize my income slightly and moved into my own 1 bedroom apartment, still in LA, and learned how much I crave and appreciate some alone time. GOOD LORD was it glorious to come home and have space all to myself! Unfortunately, I was also a highly unsatisfied waitress at the time. It was then that I discovered that I was a NERD for food documentaries, food/nutrition books, cooking, and EATING of course. I love how food connects all people and is the centerpiece of culture. I’ve always been an outdoorsy environmentalist, so I easily became entranced with knowing where our food comes from and the impact of various farming practices. So, this whole obsession with “food as medicine” and the idea of really wanting to help people and be of service resulted in me going back to school to get my Master’s Degree in Nutrition and Integrative Health. The catch? The program was back in Maryland, where I’m originally from, and I would be moving out of my solo haven back in with my parents…into my old high school room. Of course the original plan was to crash at my parents only for a few months until I got a full time job and moved into my own place.
HA. HA. Cut to nearly two years later and I am still living at my parents’ because grad school is hard (dammit!) and there are only 24 hours in a day, which means that being a full time student and working full time was crazy talk. Instead, I got a part time job that paid (sadly) far less than what I was making as a waitress in LA. Although, at least I’m no longer a fucking waitress. (Or “server” for you restaurant types. You restaurant types will also understand why I said the previous statement and why the language was 100% necessary.)
So here I am. Finishing up my M.S. and completing my clinical internship, while working part time in a wellness center and sleeping in my old twin-sized bed (I shit you not). I am staring down graduation in (hopefully) a month or so, assuming I can complete all of my clinical requirements that quickly, and I really don’t know what is next. I do know that I want to travel. Now I’ve got to figure out how to make that happen.
So I decided to take the plunge. If my dream is to one day (quite soon, hopefully) be on the road with a travel-food-community-wellness-soul centered website, then maybe I should start the damn website. So here it is, my new site dedicated to trying to live a life of adventure and following my bliss all starting while I’m still finishing up my Master’s Degree and crashing at my parents’ house. Let’s do this.
Photo credits: Pinterest
A personal, health, food and travel blog. Let's talk about food, nutrition, wellness and hungry adventures!
