Thursday, January 26, 2012

Art: A giving thing!

An online artist friend of mine, Liz Rosky, is starting a charity to benefit the children of the Honduras where she lives.  She needs donations of art supplies and funds to buy them, in order to continue to provide lessons for these children.  Please visit her website and make a contribution to a very worth cause. http://colourachildsworld.weebly.com/index.html She will so appreciate it.

 Liz has inspired me to take another step forward with Whole-Hearted Art.  Plus, it's tax return time.  I always feel like I need business cards, although I know that is just a formality.  I have my eye on some space on our main street, although it's pricey, and I'll probably need to find something elsewhere.  I imagine people just dropping in to create art at all times of the day.  I want to make it a non-profit and write a grant.  I need help doing these things, as I have no experience.  I want to make art, and the healing it can help provide, available to everyone, regardless of their ability to pay.  It seems to me that often the ones who need it the most are not in a position to pay for supplies, much less my time. 

So, I have no idea what any of this needs to look like... I'm going to spend my heart-time imagining it all coming together perfectly, Divine Order in all things.

Master Cleanser Results - Biggest Loser Progress

I made it through 8 days!  Woo hoo!  I'm always amazed at how much energy I have!  By Sunday afternoon I just couldn't stand the lemonade any longer and knew it was time to get back to eating.  Instead of taking several days to come off it properly, drinking diluted orange juice one day, full strength and with pulp the next, and soup the next, I moved through all three days in about 2 hours!  It worked out fine though.  I was down four more pounds at weigh in, but my experience is a pound or two is gained back within a few days, and that's fine.  So... although I love the time not spent in food preparation and the whole eating thing, it's almost just too high a spiritual wavelength for me.  I missed the exercise, didn't have the oomph for it.  And, now I feel like moving on with other projects, complete with fairly clean pipes (digestive system)!

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

The Master Cleanser - Day 4

Well, I was right!  Love being right.  I feel so wonderful for doing this cleanse.  I can NOT say enough good about it.  Contrary to the opinion a coworker expressed that this CAN'T possibly be good for you, and many people think that, I KNOW it IS!  How do I know it is?  My stomach is resting, it is peaceful... it is grateful for the break.  I have more energy.  I feel better.  My mind is clearer, even my vision is better.  I believe that most of the time many of us, at least I can speak for me, walk around in a fog of too much of the time, from grains, sugars and overeating!  Well, my head has popped out of the fog and I love it! Day 3 was great after I got past the salt water in the morning, I think getting the bulk of that out was the corner turner for me.  Today the salt water was a piece of, oh, no, not going to even say that!  a piece of steak!  No, not that either!!!  Actually that is the food I think of when I get a little hungry, a nice big fat slice of prime rib, yum, must be needing protein.  But, as long as I keep the lemonade going I don't think about food much.  In this way, I know that I don't really need much.  Did you ever imagine you could go 3-4 days with absolutely no food?  If you've never tried the Master Cleanser, you will never really know you're own body.

I can give you the Master Cleanser in a nutshell (oh, no, the food analogy again!):  2 teaspoons of sea salt early in the morning in 32 oz. of very good warm water.  Drink that up quickly as possible, it'll probably take you 15 minutes at least.  It isn't pleasant.  It isn't horrible though.  No stomach cramping.  And, if you've eaten mostly fruits and veggies a couple of days prior, everything will move right on out.  And, don't eat too much or too late the night before because you're body will still be digesting and it'll just be more uncomfortable.   That's what I did wrong this time.  I cooked brussel sprouts, onion and portabella mushrooms the night before and they were so good I ate too many, and too late.  The only thing you will ingest during the day is your lemonade, made from real lemon juice, Grade B maple syrup (NOT IMITATION), with a pinch of cayenne to aid in draining mucus from your sinuses.  Sounds gross, but it really isn't.  Not nearly as gross as carrying all this stuff around in our bodies.  This is our Temple.  We really should keep it clean.  Would you rather live in a clean house or a dirty one?  Sounds like a no-brainer to me!

And the added bonus is that my scales were down five pounds since Friday, and this is only Wednesday.  I don't do it just for the weight loss though.  Now I feel really strongly about coming off this in a few days and eating much much less, and much much cleaner.  A friend of mine recommended Mark's Daily Apple, and that is pretty much the way I've felt better eating.  Check it out at www.marksdailyapple.com  It's kind of a caveman/woman diet! 

Friday, January 13, 2012

My Angel

I took this photo when I was in college just a few short years ago (really!) and it remains one of my favorites.  I've drawn her, too.  She was amazingly cathartic for me.  My first steps on my art journey, and somehow very fitting. 

Weigh In on Biggest Loser Contest!

The stakes were raised this week when one of the "bosses" announced he'd contribute an extra $100 on top of the "pot" (about $220) if any one of the (3) women from our company wins.  Another boss got caught up in the excitement and said he would give $100 if that person had kept if off six months later!  Do I work in a great place, or what?!  There is nothing like money to motivate me to do something I've been obsessing about doing in the first place!

So, the initial weigh in was on the Tuesday following New Years, then we weighed in again that Friday.  I had lost 1.5 pounds, not bad for a few days.  This week I eliminated 2.6!  And the funny thing is: I'd only changed a few things.  Granted, they were major things, but I still overate, had too many starches, and didn't exercise quite enough, so maybe next week I'll keep up the rate I've set for myself: 2.6 is a very decent weight loss per week. According to the experts.
37 here, 20 years ago.  Before baby and weight gain.  Actually I had just lost 40 pounds.  I had been running and lifting weights for a year.  They say it takes half the time to get back once you've gotten "there."  We'll see! 


What I did right?  I eliminated most sweets.  I had no candy, pop, cake, cookies, or crackers.  I've been finished eating for the day by 7:00 p.m., 7:30 at the latest on a couple of days.  I began a weight lifting routine on Saturday, every other day/upper body.  I'll start on the lower body soon.  Right now my lower body consists of my yoga.  I just couldn't shock my body any more! I was so sore I could not straighten my arms for several days!

What I did wrong?  I have had a very healthy portion of oatmeal for breakfast on a couple of days, complete with brown sugar, molasses, raisins, cinnamon and whole milk.   I didn't walk every day, too rainy and cold.

This week felt very natural, not too drastic, definitely a way I could live for the rest of my life, and that's what I'm shooting for.  I didn't count calories, like I said, I felt too full after more than one meal, so I know to eat less.  I'm eating protein and veggies with a small amount of fruit, more nonstarchy veggies than not, but some starchy... if I don't, I find myself craving them, so I figure my body knows what's best.

I re-learned that after a few days of saying NO to sugar, along with answered prayers, my desire for sugar has virtually disappeared.  This Saturday I will start the Master Cleanser with hopes of going ten days.  Yes, it is extreme, but I've done it many times in my life and always feel refreshed, revived, renewed... cleansed.  So, check it out (just net search master cleanser), I think you'll be glad you did.  One of my bosses was (actually) listening once when I talked about it and he started asking questions and acting like he wanted to try it, so I'm grateful to maybe have company doing it this time around.  It's already making for much more interesting conversation (for me) in the mornings at the office!

I'll end this blog with a quote from my son: "I love my life!"  Appreciate it.  It gets better.

Tuesday, January 3, 2012

The Encouragement of Light

Two blogs in a day, woo hoo!  I thought more about my resistance to New Year's Resolutions and wanted to elaborate on that.  I just overheard someone put it into the right words.  We are truly free to choose a new path in every moment, so why should the first day of another year matter.  It only matters in that it allows us an opportunity to support each other as a group, as a whole, as a unity!  We can all relate to each other's resolutions! 
As I review my day, my moment-by-moment experience, and judge that I have made a mistake, taken a wrong path, by how I'm feeling (am I happier?  If so, maybe that means I made a selfless choice!) and not by the responses of those around me (which may or may not be good feedback).  I am always free to choose again, by acknowledging my mistake to those it affected, and taking the feedback for what it is worth.  If it wasn't a selfless choice, then telling the truth about it to someone who cares, is an excellent way to feel more loved right where I am, in the middle of my mistake!
"How did the rose ever open its heart and give to this world all of its beauty?  It felt the encouragement of light against its being; otherwise, we all remain too frightened." - Hafiz
The encouragement of light.  Isn't that a sweet thought?  That is the gift we give each other, the encouragement of light.  As I make effort and fail, and you offer me encouragement, light dawns!  Understanding!
Feel free to share your "resolutions" or the ways you want to change, and then also, your successes and, especially, your failures, so I can love you right where you are.

The New Year - 2012

I guess I'll join everyone else blogging about the New Year, but I must tell you, my heart isn't in it all the way yet.  Time for truth-telling.

I'm beginning my 57th year here on this planet.  I've started many things and never finished.  I have a very blunt, critical mom who reminded me of that lately.  I appreciate her for that.  I could get lost in always beginning something new.  I've grieved the last few days over my apparent shortcomings and failures.  I think a dose of that periodically is healthy.  I love the little posts on facebook by my friends far and wide, little reminders of encouragement.  Every choice I have made in my life and for you, too, results in something else not chosen.  It is only in hindsight that we can see where one choice might have been better than another, for everything chosen, something else is left behind.  It really is much healthier to see the good that has come from each choice, as there is always good in it all.  I loved this blog:  http://www.marcandangel.com/2011/12/25/30-challenges-for-30-days-of-growth/   So, my first and foremost "resolution" is to finish as many projects as I can that I've begun and left sitting for way too long.  Thanks, mom! I have to admit to a bit of jealousy whenever I see my artist friends post about their recently acquired commissions.  As I thought of unfinished projects, I realized that I have 3 outstanding commissions!  Woo hoo!  And as I complete them, the portfolio I have committed to building will grow! 

We have also started a "Biggest Loser" competition in my office building today.  My weight has been one of those "if only"s for me for a very long time.  The last time I took off 30 pounds (and kept if off!) it was due to one of these competitions.  I didn't win in the basic sense, but in the big sense, I did.  I can say I weigh less than I did several years ago, and that IS something.  Now it's time to get another big chunk (and I mean that in every sense of the words) off.  I'm shooting for 30 pounds in 13 weeks.  I'll keep you posted, maybe even pics, ugh.  As I was cleaning and organizing my studio this weekend (in anticipation of all those wonderful new projects I can finish later!) I ran across a couple of things.  One was a note to myself in 2006: "my heaviest weight ever: 250 pounds."  And a picture one of my students had taken when I first started teaching in 2004.  I'm sure I was close to that weight then.  There are a couple of other pics, along with the ones taken today at the weigh in.  I'm not too proud, because I will also post a pic of me when I was 36 and had just lost 30 pounds after many months of running (a half marathon, one of my proudest moments) and weight training.... you can even see the cuts beginning in my abs.  I don't know what I'll look like at this age when everything seems to be sagging, drooping and wrinkling... I may be a bag of wrinkles, but I'll be firm and fit underneath it all!  And, that really is what I'm going for.  I want to feel good again, and not be held back by my lack of fitness, flexibility or energy.  Hm, sounds like a pretty good purpose to me.  Hope you find yours while you are doing your New Year's whatever you want to call-ems.