What does it mean to be present? Not just physically but mentally? Spiritually? It doesn’t just mean being in a particular place, like during roll call at school. For yourself in your own life, no one’s checking off an attendance list.
We owe it to ourselves to stay present and keep ourselves aware of just who, what, and where we are if we want to live not just good lives but deliberate ones.
Hello everyone! Thanks for your patience with the delays in blog posts as of late. I signed on with my new job just at the start of the busy season and it’s been more than a little exhausting the last few weeks trying to cover all my bases AND get up to speed.
It’s a new job, learning new recipes with new challenges and trying to contribute as much as I can. No time to indulge in “FNG Status” here- I need to lean into what I know to learn and improve on what I don’t.
It’s probably that newness- the “breath of fresh air” that feels more like a storm gale pounding you in the face that made something finally click for me last week about a change I need to make in my personal life.
CW for talk about weight loss, obesity, and diet.
Learning to let go is one of those skills that no really thinks of “mastering” until it occurs to them that they need to.
Depending on the circumstances, people can let go of things very easily. When whatever we are dwelling on feels inconsequential or already impermanent, we probably don’t care that much when we lose it or let it slip.
Other stuff, though- the important stuff, the intangible things- can keep us hung up for years as we learn that they were just as impermanent as everything else. Maybe we know that “this too shall pass,” but were hoping to get lucky in a macabre way- thinking we’d never get to see their end and thus it can feel eternal.
All things end, though. It’s the price we pay for getting to experience them at all, and it gives them their worth and rarity. Learning to let go with compassion and grace is vital to emotional wellbeing– and that can include letting go of goals and dreams as well. Giving up on an old dream can set you free to find a new one.
Has it ever occurred to you that there is a opposite version of triggers?
By “triggers” I mean the actual psychological definition of the word, by the way. It’s not a synonym for “offended” or “thing that makes me angry.” Triggers in psychology are the things that cause negative reactions and flashbacks in people who have experienced trauma– not unlike why veterans with PTSD might get uneasy at the sound of gunshots or fireworks. If you insist on using the word with a sneer at people whose politics you don’t like or as a joke, you might want to consider the life-altering magic of growing up and having empathy.
Little things that pop up unexpectedly that cause feelings of safety, warmth, and joy on the other hand are apparently called “glimmers”- and I’ve been doing my best to recognize them in my life. The last few days have been full of them, and I wanna tell you about it.
Early in my culinary career, I wrote a lot about learning to stay in “the eye of the storm.”
While the frenetic choreography of a working kitchen spun around them, I admired the chefs I saw on TV who seemed to be standing at the center. Iron-spined, stoic, even serenely directing the motion about them to lead their teams through a successful service. I admired the ones who didn’t scream or berate their staff (even then, I knew it was impossible to manage others if you couldn’t manage yourself.)
At the time, I described it as a lot of things. I called it wei wu wei, dignity, patience, and simply confidence in themselves and their team. Years later, I learned with was all those things, and it was something one could learn and train themselves in– equanimity.
The Black Hat Baker 