I arrived at my door at 8:30 this evening to the warm aroma of Sweet and Spicy Lentil Chili. Another delicious recipe from Robin Robertson’s Fresh from the Vegetarian Slow Cooker. I crossed two fingers when preparing this one and was pleased to find it a home-run hit, and super easy to make, just throw it all in the crockpot!

Ingredients

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 large sweet yellow onion, chopped
• 1 small red bell pepper, seeded and chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 tbsp chili powder or to taste
• 1 1/2 cups dried lentils, rinsed
• One 28oz can crushed tomatoes
• 1/3 cup dark unsulfured molasses
• 1/2 tsp ground allspice
• cayenne pepper to taste
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 2 cups water
• 1 cup apple juice

Saute the veggies with the oil in a pan over medium heat until soft and add the chili powder the last 30 seconds. Toss with the rest in the slower cooker and cook on Low for 8 hours.

Does it get any easier? If you’re really pressed for time you can forgo to pre-saute but I think it brings out the flavors.

The best part about this recipe, it’s totally vegan and gluten-free. I think it may be a little high on the glycemic index, so if you’re watching your blood-sugar, skip sweet and just go with the spicy. Maybe add a little curry powder or thyme instead.

Happy Cultivating!

I lay in bed last night, alone for a moment, in the dark, flat on my back, staring at the ceiling, and I took a deep breath, realizing that this was the first moment in my long day that I was alone. The idea troubled me. Of course there had to be at least one other time that I was all by myself. I was alone on my commute…no there were hundreds of other drivers around me. I was alone in the bathroom…no I took my phone with me and used the private moment to check my facebook. I did my yoga alone…close, but I used MyYogaOnline. See, the idea of being alone for me isn’t just being in a room by myself, but being completely free of outside influence and opinion. Television, the internet, books, movies, we can enjoy these things by ourselves but we’re still filtering in the points of view of others. Even in my bed at that moment I was feeling the weight of the sheets and my clothes in a bed all made by others. I pondered the idea that, energetically, it would seem, we are never, EVER, alone.

Finally after looking back I found that my shower was the closest thing to alone time I had in that whole 24 hours. Jeez, no wonder I take long showers. Then I realized how much deep thought takes place in there. I’ve often told people that the shower in my thinking place. How many times have you heard or said, “While I was thinking in the shower…” And it’s no wonder that we hear this so often, it’s the only place you can really get some real peace and quiet. A place where you can think for yourself and be who you really are, in all of your humanity. Just you and the water.

While I’m happy to have the shower, I’m not satisfied. After all, we can’t just stand in the shower all day long. What we can do is go out in search of another place, a place all our own, a place to think, and be, and forget all the rest. Imagine for one moment that it was just you… What would you do in that place? Prayer, meditate, draw, curse? You can do anything you want, it’s your special place.  It doesn’t have to be far away or difficult to reach. It can be in the corner of your kitchen, or in the middle of your yard. Lay down in the back seat of your car in your driveway. Climb a tree if you still can!  Where ever it is that you go, use the opportunity to explore the magnificence of your own thoughts and mind, to fall in-love with yourself and the brilliance that is you. We spend so much time looking up to others and basking in their wonderful ideas and spectacular innovations. We call on others to assist us and teach us and lead us and to follow. But what about the wonders of you and yourself and your place in this world. Our opinions and those of others are so often shared but do why do we have them in the first place? Is an opinion only had so that it can be shared, or is a thought born so that we can ponder it and learn and grow and go out and use what we’ve acquired.

My mother went on a silent retreat and she told me of all the wonderful things she began to experience when no longer allowed to speak. Her senses were heightened and she enjoyed everything around her a little differently. I imagined that her mind began to think without the intention of speech. Without the need to communicate, what would your mind create? Would we no longer hear our thoughts, but instead feel them, be them?

This morning as I took my shower, I smiled, and enjoyed the moment I had to myself. Hopefully I’ll find another opportunity during my day to close my eyes and be in the quiet of my own existence, if even for just a moment. I trust that finding this time will help me to grow closer to the one I know I’ll always be with, myself.

“What’s that candy wrapper doing there? Well don’t you see it? Well pick it up!”

I have a friend, she lives in Philadelphia, she’s the creator of the blog Simply Vegan, she’s studying to be a doctor, and she’s asked us to JOIN HER…

In order to modify negative conditions, collaborative and universal participation is vital! Every time I step outside my apartment in Philadelphia I notice the debris littered across the sidewalk and streets. It doesn’t matter if it’s deliberate or unconscious. This form of disrespect and lack of pride in our environment, residence, and our own being needs to stop. This is why I am asking for people to join me in cleaning up our neighborhood!

Tomorrow being Mother’s Day and all, it seems only appropriate to give a little extra love to that big mother we call Nature and help her to gain a little power back over her health.

So today, in an attempt to give a little back to the Earth that Mother Nature has so graciously adorn with beauty, we’re going to the streets…and picking up trash!

Ms. will be at Phillie’s City Center around 4pm EST. If you see her, lend a hand. I have a busy day of work and other commitments so I plan to carry a bag with me and pick up any garbage I see lying around. An on going through the day pick-up! I don’t care if people think I’m strange. If they ask me what I’m doing, I’ll tell them. Maybe we’ll start an epidemic. She’s already got 20 people on her nationwide team. That may sound small but can you imagine if twenty random people when out each day and picked up trash. Well what if we got thirty more… “Can imagine if fifty people a day, I said fifty people a day” going out and picking up trash. “Well friends they may think it’s a movement.” And that’s what this is! A movement to get out there and make the world a little cleaner.