Easing into the New Year

I’ve been trying something new this year. Instead of trying to be more productive or radically change [fill in the blank], I’m focusing more on FLOW and JOY. I wake up every morning and give myself a few minutes to transition from the world of dreams to the world of yoga stretches and the ritual of dressing for the day ahead. Cat cuddles are involved in the process. So is marinating on the night’s previous dreams as I snuggle in warm blankets. In a few minutes, I’m lured out of bed by the promise of coffee and whatever excites me for the day—time to write, family visits, a new lesson plan, a seed catalog to pour over, or just another morning full of possibility. 

It has taken me time to find my flow again in a post-pandemic world. It is time to feel excited to greet the day and time to get inspired for new adventures and experiences, even if they are just sacred simple pleasures, which are what I’ve been gravitating to more over Big Excitements.

“It is no small thing,” as Tolkien reminds us, “to celebrate a simple life.”

This feels especially true this year as we are grappling with so much politically and socially. It’s easy to get lost in the doom and gloom of the moment, but that doesn’t really do much to help things. Instead, I find hope in the people I collaborate with who make our communities more equitable. I find joy in seeing these same communities thrive despite the issues that might thwart our progress. And I find immense satisfaction in helping people forge connections in this world that so often seems divisive, fraught, and isolationist. That’s just all in a day’s work—and an integral part of magical living. 

Still, I wouldn’t be able to do all that without first filling my own cup. I’m reminded of the Star in the tarot. She is one of the radical self-care cards of the tarot deck. She asks you to nourish yourself first before giving out to others—and to be careful how much you give. I bask in this wisdom as I recover from pandemic-related burnout and the difficulties of working in higher ed, where over-work is glamourized. The Star offers us perspective—a bigger worldview and a reminder that things won’t always be this difficult. In fact, she is the card I drew in 2020 when we went into our first lockdown. Be gentle, be soft, go slow…that is her medicine.

And so I think of her again, now in a much better place than in 2020, and find gratitude in her wisdom. I’m learning how to flow and better listen to myself and my needs. I’m relishing the art of finding joy in the little things—and it is an art, as I literally rewire my default pandemic settings to look for the flaw, the potential problem, or, worse, echoes of past mistakes that I can’t do a thing about. Now? I do what the Star suggests and look at the Big Picture. Nothing’s perfect in the world, but that doesn’t mean life can’t be filled with wonder and connection. 

I even find medicine in the plot twists and setbacks. 

Take the first week of the spring term. My computer stopped working. Then, the office printer. Then my lamps. AND THEN my car died, thanks to record temperature lows. It would be easy to get frustrated at all these setbacks or wonder about Mercury in Retrograde. Instead, I used them as opportunities. I got to know my campus IT person better and had a chance to chat with my favorite colleagues when I moved to another place to print out my class handouts. I also expressed gratitude for the fact that I always prepare my lesson plans in advance just in case anything like this ever happens. Yay, for past Maria! So, really…there was nothing to stress about, and it's better that these issues got resolved now before the term got busier. Energetically?

It cleared out the last of the stagnant energy from the past few years. 

It was also a real gift that my car wouldn’t start on a day when I could work from home. No pressing meetings or in-person classes made it so that a really stressful situation ended up being a cozy day at home, drinking copious amounts of tea and working in my yoga pants until my car was ready for pickup. Now it drives like a dream, even through the snow we’ve been lucky enough to have these past few weeks. Lunch was a warm bowl of mushroom soup, and each completed task was punctuated by belly rubs (my familiars’, not mine). As for my lamps…well, I think I needed to shine a new light on my life. 

It’s all about perspective and I’ve been shifting mine to find the light in these difficult times. 

This is what FLOW is…leaning into daily life, with all its ups and downs, reading the signs and synchronicities, listening to your energy shifts so that you can cultivate a soul-nourishing life. As I finish writing this, I’m sitting in one of my favorite coffee shops, enjoying the cozy light as I watch snow fall outside. This, too, slows me down, and I’m grateful for the gentle hush that washes over our city and the way the world seems to soften against a backdrop of snow.

So this year, why not make FLOW and JOY your focus and see how your life unfolds. As I often say, the more we open ourselves to the magic all around us, the more we find. Isn’t that wonderful?

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational collection of musings touching on life’s simple pleasures, everyday fantasy, and absolutely delectable recipes that will guarantee to stir the kitchen witch in you.  If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is the everyday, subscribe here.

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To Allow

A noun. To give permission. To give the necessary time and opportunity for.

An ugly thing when we don’t give it to ourselves. A sweet thing, a chocolate truffle of a thing, when we sneak it between our lips to know how voluptuous life can be. And a daring thing when bestowed on another, like an offering or a promise to see what might unfold between willing hearts and an open road. Mostly though it is a thing just outside my grasp.

I can’t always tell what it is. I can only track it by its footprints.

Like when I banished the box of ghosts I’d hidden in my closet. It’s not my responsibility to carry them with me everywhere I go. I am allowed to move on from my past and the things from the beyond that are happiest when I’m in Purgatory. Or the time I jumped off the merry-go-round because I wanted to feel solid earth against the soles of my feet. I’m allowed to stop running in circles, going nowhere fast. I’m tired of being dizzy and clinging to toy chariots. I taste it in when I wrap my lips around the word “no” and feel the heady rush of the time I’ve freed up for myself, the obligations I’ve released in favor of protecting my solitude.

I’m beginning to figure out what it feels like to allow.

Sometimes I even find it in the things I’ve given away. The too-tight dress. The ugly thought. The buttoned-up book from the person who wished I were, well, a little more buttoned up. I’m allowed to be loud in who I am, even when my soul is found in the hush of a spring morning and the quiet of my garden, hair loose around my shoulders, feet bare, eager to kiss the soil with their heels and toes.

I’m allowed to feel joy even when the world isn’t always a joyful place. It has taken me so long to find the sunshine within my ribcage that I refuse to lose it now. It is my seed that I coaxed into blooming. And what wonderful flora it has made! What wonderful medicine it will become when the flowers fade and dry and are ready to be plucked and stored in one of my many bottles and pots. My home apothecary is made up of many a preserved feeling so that when it rains, I can dip into my jar of sunshine and remember that stormy weather is a fleeting thing.

Here’s what else I allow myself:

A quiet place. Space. A blank page to see what happens next.

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you. If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is in the everyday, subscribe to my newsletter below for regular doses of enchantment. Want even more inspiration? Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. Here’s to a magical life!

The Ghosts We Carry...& How to Banish Them

Have you ever noticed how in haunted house stories or an occult detective tale, there’s always an object that keeps a spirit anchored to a place? It could be a keepsake from when the ghost was a living being or a terrible artifact use to summon darker entities. Sometimes it’s a whole room or house, the energy of the people who have lived in it soaking into the very walls. Other times it’s the memory of a horrific incident that has bled into the earth.

In order to banish the ghost, of course, we have to destroy the object—set it on fire, break it, or, to be less dramatic, let it go or move on from it. Move out of the haunted house. Contain the dark occult artifact that can’t be destroyed so that no one will find it (until the inevitable sequel, of course….this is dramatic fiction after all!). These stories remind us, in one way or another, that the things we carry with us absorb the energy of our experiences. And that, sometimes, the only way we can move forward is to let those objects go. Otherwise, we keep that old energy—sometimes toxic energy—around and get stuck, finding ourselves in a time loop of the same draining experiences that first tainted the objects in question.

The Ghosts We Carry

Take, for instance, the story of The Sad Birthday Dress. It goes like this: There once was a woman who wanted to feel beautiful. All day long she was asked to be nothing but a talking head. But this woman knew she had a heart and hips and a juicy center. So she bought herself a dress to remind herself that she could be a whole person and not just a shriveled head sitting in someone’s cabinet of curiosities. And what a dress it was! It was stunning, with finely spun organic lilac cotton and loud bouncy yellow and white polka dots that told her that she was allowed to have color in her life—that she was allowed to be of color, no need to pass as another kind of pale specter. The skirt was flouncy and feminine and begged to be flipped up for illicit romance or at least a lively dance.

It was the perfect birthday dress. So she did what any woman who wanted to feel alive did—she wore it out and ate cake and drank champagne and danced until the weight of the pale city bore down on her and her loud pretty dress didn’t make her feel pretty anymore. Just sad. Unspeakably so. Because, she realized, this dress didn’t make her feel pretty. It only reminded her that she lived in a place that didn’t want her to be a flesh and blood woman. A city that was uncomfortable with her long wild hair and her rounded hips and the way the bodice of her dress clung to her breasts. She knew shame in that dress. And a sadness that welled up inside her until it became heartbreak. That heartbreak spread from her body and into the dress as surely as the bubbly drink had spread through her body only moments before.

The woman learned a hard lesson that night: A dress couldn’t fix a city that treated her like a brown stain on a white shirt. And cake couldn’t disguise the fact that there was no sweetness for her there. Only loneliness and a bone-deep cold. The solution was to leave in search of warmer hands and beating hearts.

Eventually, the dress came off. But the heartbreak stayed. And every time the woman tried to wear her I Am Beautiful Dress, she inevitably took it off and rehung in her closet, until one day she stopped trying to wear it all together. It moved to the back of her closet, limp and half-forgotten, like a mediocre date or half-baked wish. It was no longer her I Am Beautiful Dress. It was stained with the experience of that night, which is how it became The Sad Birthday Dress.

Years later, when the woman had figured how to be a breathing, living woman and not someone else’s curiosity, she pulled the dress from her closet and her heart broke all over again. She knew there was no reclaiming the original power of the beautiful bouncy fabric. Of cake and champagne and moonlight. In the dress, she saw the pain of her past welling up inside of her. Its presence was like a ghost reminding her of all the broken things she could never fix. Of the hopeless realization that the thing she wanted—thought she wanted—wasn’t for her and, in fact, had never existed at all. She had been chasing phantoms and, in the process, almost become one herself.

So she packed it up and gave it away in the hopes that it might become what it was meant to be—that I Am Beautiful Dress—for someone else who was ready to pay the price to reclaim that joy in the way she hadn’t been when she had first purchased it. The weight of that terrible time lifted from her shoulders and the energy in her home felt lighter.

Now the woman has a closet full of I Am Beautiful Dresses. They are loud. And they sparkle. And they have hems ready to be tossed above the knee for dancing and more dancing and things that would make you blush for me to write. And they all radiate joy. All because she let go of the thing that was holding her back. All because she chose to feel the pain of the past and let it go. All because she chose to be a loud woman with a beating heart in a sun-kissed land and not a phantom shade.

Banishing Ghosts

Lovely little story, isn’t it? And it’s all true. I once had an I Am Beautiful Dress that became The Sad Birthday Dress. And when I gave it away, I was giving myself permission to be more than that sad story. I could learn from my past and create space for joy in my present. The truth is, we all have a proverbial Sad Birthday Dress or something that was once a profound piece of armor in our lives that became stained by experience. Other times, we change—becoming someone that certain objects no longer feel attached to, can no longer nourish. And in order to keep growing, transforming, evolving, we must let them go. If we don’t, what once was beautiful or nourishing becomes toxic. The spirit that won’t move on becomes the ghost that terrorizes the living.

Having recently completed a massive house cleansing—saying goodbye to old ghosts and old selves—I found myself thinking about one of my pieces from Everyday Enchantments, “Letting Go of Past Lives, “ about the things you hold on to even when you are ready to let go of the person you used to be. It can be scary to let go of the past because, as stagnant as it can make us, it’s also familiar and comforting. That’s why we hold on to so much unnecessary stuff. It keeps us feeling safe—but it also keeps us stuck. In the end, it’s better to let go and know that you are creating space for new, positive vibes to enter your life (but not necessarily more stuff!).

The first part of banishing ghosts or old selves? Let go of the objects they are attached to. Say goodbye to things that don’t bring you joy or that you haven’t used in over a year. Be conscious of the energy you want in your home and life. Then be ruthless about protecting it—get rid of anything that doesn’t contribute to your overall sense of well-being. Ghosts hide behind sentiment and guilt to keep you trapped under their spell. Low-level spirits are a lot like low-level people: They want you to feel as trapped and miserable as they are, so they’ll do anything to stay in your life. Best to see them for what they are and move on.

The second part of ghostbusting? Let go of the troubling energy you’ve been holding onto psychically. That last one will take a little more time, but letting go of the object that keeps constellating that energy will go a long way to dispersing its psychic impact. Give yourself permission to heal and move on from sad or seemingly unfinished histories.

The rest will follow.

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you. If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is in the everyday, subscribe to my newsletter below for regular doses of enchantment. Want even more inspiration? Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. Here’s to a magical life!

Cultivating Routines as Rituals

I write a lot about the power of routine as ritual, or taking our day-in, day-out practices and turning them into meaningful, intentional activities that enhance the overall quality of our lives. But what does that really mean? And how to we turn these rote activities into sacred practices? First, we have to understand the difference between routine and ritual.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, routine is defined as “a sequence of actions regularly followed.”  Pretty straight forward.  It’s the stuff we do regularly without fail, whether they are good for us (waking up early to exercise before work) or bad (always hitting the vending machine at three in the afternoon).  Some are more mundane: pay the rent at the first of the month, take your six-month visit to the dentist, get an oil and lube for your car. 

We are so used to these things as basic parts of adult life that we never really think too hard about them, unless something is out of joint (not sure how you will pay your rent, a sketchy dentists, weird nosies coming from your car’s engine).  Hell, our routines are so ingrained, we often zone out while caring from them.  Have you ever driven home from work via the same rout you take every day and have no memory of the drive?  That’s you on autopilot.  Your routine is so second-nature you disconnect from the actual activity you’re doing.

The second definition  of routine is equally telling.  It defines it as “a set sequence in a performance such as a dance or comedy act.”  So routine is not just a basic repetitive schedule, but something we perform, consciously or unconsciously.  It’s all about how important we want people to see us.  Running from one thing to the next practically shouts that we are so busy, so interesting, so important!  It also broadcasts our values.  Do you value squeezing in one more thing at work over finishing a few minutes early and leisurely heading home to enjoy some self-care?  To you pack your weekends with activities and experiences, or do you create time to dally?  Each decision shapes how we see ourselves and how others see us. 

But these definitions of routine only take is so far.  Only far enough to get us thinking about how we see ourselves and how we want others to see us, in fact.  But what about what we want to feel, experience, and enjoy?

That’s where ritual comes it. 

Ritual is about consciously, mindfully tending to our daily tasks, taking comfort in the familiarity and pleasure in how they ground and nurture us.  We welcome in the healthy and the good and actively eliminate the life-diminishing and bad.  

In order to do that, however, we have to change how we look at our day-in, day-out.  It’s not a place we need to escape from (who hasn’t fantasized about running away to a distant land when life gets complicated or dreary?).  It’s not a collection of minutes that fills our head until the real fun—a weekend, celebration, or happy event—can happen.  It’s about finding joy in the life we create for ourselves one small, deliberate act at a time.  I’m reminded of the Ten of Cups in the tarot here—the homey gratitude card that asks you to step back and appreciate all the simple magic of your life that you’ve worked hard to create. 

The first step to unplugging from rote activities—aka mindless routine—is to find enjoyment in the things we often perceive as One More Thing To Do.  Celebrate chores, rather than dread them by turning them into rituals that help you unplug from your workday and reconnect with yourself.  So I have to turn my compost—good.  Dirt in my fingernails grounds me and feeding the worms connects me to nature.  So I don't know what to cook for dinner—I 'll start with sautéing an onion and let my farm fresh ingredients speak to me.  Taking the extra time to cook a healthy meal allows me to nourish my whole being and enjoy the sensuousness of sautéing vegetables.  It allows me to slow down and reconnect to the deliciousness that is life.  Throw in a jazz record and a glass of wine, and you've got the makings of a divine evening.  

Now, doesn’t that sound lovely?

Each and every task becomes a devotional act to the energy I want to welcome into my life and an expression for gratitude for the abundance I have painstakingly cultivated.  A celebration of my hard work and a deliberate conjuring of more good energy. 

What routines will you transform into sacred rituals?

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you. If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is in the everyday, subscribe to my newsletter below for regular doses of enchantment. Want even more inspiration? Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. Here’s to a magical life!

5 Things I Learned from the Center for the Contemplative Mind in Society Summer Session

I can’t believe it has been close to a month since I had the privilege of attending the Center for the Contemplative Mind in Society’s summer session on contemplative learning (special thanks to a friend from graduate school for recommending it to me—may she be showered with many karma points and synchronous wonders!). This center, C-Mind for short, is all about cultivating “an education that promotes the exploration of meaning, purpose and values and seeks to serve our common human future.” So what does this mean? It means developing contemplative practices that allow us to explore and find solutions to social and environmental justice issues, while also valuing our need as educators and students to lead a balanced life that celebrates not just intellectual or concrete accomplishments, but our emotional and physical wellbeing. Cool stuff!

At this point, you might be wondering what contemplative practice means. According to The Contemplative Mind in Society, contemplative practices “cultivate a critical, first-person focus, sometimes with direct experience as the object, while at other times concentrating on complex ideas or situations. Incorporated into daily life, they act as a reminder to connect to what we find most meaningful.”  This encompasses a whole bunch of experiences, from mediation and mindfulness to dancing and deep listening (check out their tree to see all the wonderful things that fall into the category of contemplative practice). It can include everyday rituals or simply making a point to be active and present while you make dinner. Sound familiar? It should.

Contemplative practices are easily another term for everyday magic!

It was clear the moment I set foot on Smith College, where the sessions were held, that these were my kind of people. There was seriously SO MUCH WISDOM I took in over that week, including the importance of collecting what I call soul seeds for future harvest. A fellow C-Minder who regularly attends this summer session described this week as gathering seeds that will sprout throughout the year. We were to gather them throughout this week and allow them to manifest in our lives in their own way and their own time over the coming year. All in all, I was able to narrow down what I learned from this magical week into five life lessons that I look forward to meditating on this coming year.

1. Contemplative practices are a natural part of daily life. When we think of this sort of practice, we can sometimes make it more complicated than it actually is—mediating two hours a day, learning complicated yoga poses, and going off in search of enlightenment all over the world. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with any of these things. I’ve certainly done all of them at one time or another! But it’s important to remember that we carry the tools for cultivating a more meaningful life within us and that we can connect to them in everything we do, however simple or routine. In fact, the routine of it—aka the intentional ritual—is where the magic happens.

   So many people discussed their contemplative practices in terms of things that helped them relax, focus, and otherwise tune into life. For many, those things were as simple as playing with their pets, taking a walk, or enjoying a cup of tea. I was surprised to learn, then, that so much of what I already do is, in fact, contemplative practice: cooking, dancing, playing with my new kitten, having meaningful conversations with others—and actively listening and being listened to in return. These simple activities have felt richer now that I appreciate them for the daily contemplative practices that they are.

2. There is no woke, only awakening. Okay, let’s be real—in the realm of academia and other liberal spaces, it can sometimes be tempting to prove how woke, or socially conscious, you are. Then comes the shaming of others who are not as woke as thee. I’m not talking about people who are intentionally prejudiced, but those who, for lack of knowledge or exposure to certain ideas or experiences, aren’t as aware of ways in which they can be more sensitive to themselves and others. Calling them out for their error only serves to perpetuate shame-based learning, instead of creating space to explore how we can all be more inclusive and celebrate what rich, diverse communities we occupy.

   Social and environmental justice is about more than just trying to prove how much we know or how woke we are compared to others—it’s about widening the conversation so that we can all learn from one another. And if it’s REAL real talk here, we all have to acknowledge that we’ve been on both sides of this: the woke and the less woke. I personally have appreciated when someone has kindly educated me about things I’ve needed to be more woke about. Plus, the dark side of feeling too secure in your wokeness is that you stop being open to learning new things, as you must always be the one who knows the most. I’d rather be in a constant state of awakening!

3. Contemplative practices are about hold space to grapple and engage with difficult issues so that we can find solutions. Like everyday magic, the contemplative mind doesn’t shy away from difficult topics or situations, but rather uses various practices to create space and explore these issues with the aim of finding a positive solution. And unlike the many stereotypes of mindfulness or yoga, where you simply bliss out and ignore important issues, contemplative practices encourage us to safely grapple with what we need to—personally and socially—so that we move forward in healthy, productive ways.

   This was a particularly important lesson to me because mainstream culture teaches us two ways of coping with difficult topics: denial or despair. There is no in-between. This can be difficult for people who do, in fact, think there are real, achievable solutions to various problems and aren’t afraid to do the messy work it requires to transform self and communities. Which leads me to number four…

4. Learning to fly is ugly, messy work, but flying is beautiful. I’m butchering the quote here but I think the essence of it remains intact. We thrive on success narratives, which isn’t a bad thing. It can become toxic, however, when we get nice, clean narratives about famous or high-achieving so-and-sos that make it seem like their professional journey was clearly paved road dotted by interesting anecdotes and one accomplishment after the other. Do you see the problem? It feels unrealistic. Intimidating, when it should be inspiring.

   This is because these narratives leave out all the ugly bits. Every failure. Every missed step. Every turn and twist in the road that upended The Plan. So when people inevitably confront these things in their own lives, they feel like they’re failing because it doesn’t match the tidy success narrative they’ve been taught. In reality, they aren’t failing. They’re just learning to fly. So enjoy the mess—it’s where the best stories come from after all. And when you do fly, enjoy the hard-earned beauty of it.

5. Receptivity is its own kind of power. This year as I explore the power of sacred simple pleasures, I find myself struggling to embrace more passive energy. It makes total sense now that I think about it. In order to establish myself professionally, I’ve had to focus on building a solid CV and go after concrete accomplishments. Nothing wrong with that. We all have to do that in one way or another to earn our bread and butter and continue growing in our fields. But when we become so conditioned to be extroverted achievers that we struggle with more passive ways of engaging with the world…then it becomes a problem.

   These summer sessions taught me the importance of openness, vulnerability, and receptivity, as well as ways to safely open yourself up to less goal-oriented forms of relating, thinking, or acting. The biggest thing I saw was how fruitful receptivity could be. Several times in our small group breakout sessions, we had a firm plan…that quickly went out the window as the agenda for the day developed organically out of our combined energies and discussions. If we hadn’t have been open to change, we wouldn’t have had such an important and impactful time together.

   I have A LOT of fire energy in me, so part of me thrives on my extroverted professional life (a pretty big part!). Yet this time away also taught me how much I can push for more and expect too much of myself because those old devils Impostor Syndrome and Presumed Incompetence, which push many minority high achievers to keep reaching for the next gold star just to prove their value. Toxic much? You bet. But when I let go of what I have come to call Gold Star Syndrome, I can appreciate all my hard work and accomplishments, while also allowing myself to explore more flexible, creative ways of engaging with the world both in and out of the classroom. I can also reframe what success looks like: a happy, healthy, whole person, not just an accomplished professional.

I hold these seeds, and many more, as I would the acorns scattered around Smith College (pictured below), and look forward to the future harvest of the magic they hold.

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you. If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is in the everyday, subscribe to my newsletter for regular doses of enchantment. Want even more inspiration? Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. Here’s to a magical life!

Cultivating the Joy of Sacred Simple Pleasures

This year's resolution was to indulge in more sacred simple pleasures, those things that make every day magical and remind us that pleasure is an integral part of life, love, and happiness.  Why? Because pleasure is significantly undervalued in our society. Because pleasure tells us a lot about ourselves--our values and priorities. Because it is okay to let go of toxic things in favor of radical joy.

Sounds delicious, right? And it is…when I have been able to celebrate this hedonism without censure or guilt. Or better still, when I can know what actually is pleasurable versus what I think should be pleasurable. Let’s just say I’ve learned a thing or two about my relationship to pleasure now that I’m roughly halfway through my year of focusing on it. You might think that because I write about everyday magic that I’ve got things all figured out. Well, I don’t! In fact never have I realized this more than in my efforts to cultivate sacred simple pleasures.

When I first started this exploration of sacred simple pleasure in January, I was coming off of a big year for me: my first book was published and had won the first of what would become many awards. I had won a major teaching award, too, and accomplished many other wonderful things in my career. All good things, but I found myself looking for balanced come the new year. All those accomplishments took serious fire energy, years of conjuring and concentration, before they came to fruition. I now needed to turn my time and attention to the gentler things in life: unstructured time, everyday joys, more passive experiences. In short, I needed to create space for possibility in my life.

It was hard at first. For as much as I write about the divine feminine and the softer energies in our lives, I realized just how much masculine energy I had. I was used to being assertive, aggressive in my pursuit of what I wanted. But the cultivation of sacred simple pleasures was entirely different. For one thing, the energy was much more passive than I was used too. I had to cultivate openness, receptivity which in itself felt intensely vulnerable. I was a novice in many respects here when I was used to being an expert. For another, I learned quickly that more people, more activities, more out-there energy didn’t necessarily invoke the sacredness of simple pleasures. In fact, it was the opposite: I was tired, anxious, and in need of some serious quiet time.

Through these two misconceptions about simple pleasures—that they are loud, performative things and that I can access with the same masculine energy I applied to my professional life—I quickly learned that I had to change my relationship to pleasure. Simple pleasures, for me, were found in quiet innocuous things: morning walks, sipping iced tea on my patio, a schedule-free Sunday, the magic of a good book.

They didn’t cost money or company to bring me pleasure.

A lot of different emotions have come up in the process—not all of them pleasant—as I come to terms with the fact that I have denied myself certain pleasures or suppressed parts of myself in order to fit into mainstream extroverted culture. There is joy in these epiphanies too, however bittersweet. They allow me to acknowledge past limitations so I can move forward unshackled.

I’ve been thinking a lot about that phrase too: to allow. It’s been popping up all over the place. What am I allowed energetically, emotionally, physically? Or put more accurately, what have I allowed myself to enjoy? The painful epiphany that emerged from these questions was that I haven’t allowed myself to enjoy certain things without even realizing that I’ve drawn a line in the sand. It’s a subtle thing—telling yourself you have to work instead of watching the sunset, letting stress taint your thoughts because you can’t possibly be this happy, being stingy with your fun because there’s so many other things you should be doing. Hell, I didn’t even know I was doing it half the time until I started making a conscious effort to create space for non-goal oriented pleasure this year.

Much of this comes from the cultural shame surrounding pleasure. If it feels good, mainstream religion tells us, it must be bad. Or think of the Puritanical roots of white American. If it’s enjoyable, it’s certainly the sowing seeds of sin. Worst of all, I’ve realized that the fear of pleasure is a fear of happiness. We spend so much time worrying about wether or not we will get our HEA (Happily Ever After) or finally Arrive that we never stop to think about how much those things terrify us. We wonder, secretly, if we are capable of holding so much joy.

So how do we tap into sacred simple pleasures with the myriad of feelings they unleash? Simple. Dive in. Without thought or questions. Unfettered by the fear of our own infinite potential for happiness. Be sinful. Shamelessly enjoy the small pleasures you have denied yourself in your own unconscious attempt to put a limit on happiness. Welcome in bigger pleasures too.

We’re allowed infinite pleasures, infinite happiness.

Find just one little thing you enjoy and revel in it. The magic will follow.

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you.  If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is in the everyday, subscribe to my newsletter for regular doses of enchantment.  Want even more inspiration?  Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter.  Here’s to a magical life! 

5 Things I Learned from My Year of Buying, Using, Wasting Less

My Year Long Journey to Be a More Conscious Consumer

Last year, I committed to a year of buying, using, and wasting less because of environmental concerns and an intrinsic desire to live more and more in union with nature.  I’ve been increasingly concerned about climate change, especially after the shocking reports that came out in the second half of 2018.  The reality is, we all over-consume and waste resources.  We’ve been conditioned as a society to value conspicuous consumption and retail therapy.  Big companies and countries certainly play a large role in climate change, and it is wonderful that the U.S. recently elected many government officials that care more about climate change than in previous elections—ones that will aggressively protect our planet.  It is essential that we hold big businesses and governments accountable for their part in the fight against climate change.  I am beyond excited to see the news stories about cities banning one-use items (including my hometown Albuquerque!), states building plans to go 100% sustainable, and lawmakers shutting down loop-holes for big businesses trying to get out of new green initiatives (I’m looking at you Exxon).

Living a Greener Lifestyle

I also think we, as individuals, need to hold ourselves accountable for our role in climate change.  After all, big businesses continue to produce one-use items and fast fashion because it is profitable.  Why?  Because we buy their products.  In that context, it becomes clear that the individual has a tremendous amount of power in healing the environment.  Our money—what we choose to spend it on and what we refuse to purchase—can shape the market and shift the economy away from disposable consumerism towards a sustainable future.  This requires us to be hyper-conscious about what we need and how we spend money.

So how to you unplug from mindless consumerism and live more consciously? 

It was an interesting journey.  First, I had to be completely honest with myself about what I purchase, use, and waste…and how to scale back.  That meant resisting the quick high of retail therapy, thinking about ways to repurpose household items, and taking an honest look at what I actually use each day and what quietly gathers dust on a forgotten shelf. 

Many people think that trying to live more sustainably makes your life more complicated and costly.  I found that it actually simplified my life and helped me save money.  Now that I’ve finished my year of using, buying, and wasting less, I plan to continue going more and more zero waste.  Frankly, we should all be aggressively moving towards greener living given our current environmental crisis. This decision has also transformed other areas of my life in ways that surprised me.  Using, buying, and wasting less meant I was taking better care of myself, saving money, and engaging with my local community in more meaningful ways.  Talk about conjuring positive energy!

5 Things I Learned from Living Sustainably

1. Sustainable living is a form of radical self-care.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, sustainability is a spiritual practice. Tuning into the needs of the earth helps me stay grounded and connected to myself.  It’s easy to start moving too fast and become disconnected from ourselves in this go-go-go world.  When I committed to a greener lifestyle, I had to slow down and consider what I really needed.  I found myself enjoying what I had more, skipping needless errands in favor of an afternoon walk, and happily rejecting impulse purchases in favor of money in the bank. Instead of indulging in retail therapy, I had to find other, healthier ways to destress.  I did yoga.  I meditated.  I read.  I knitted.  I no longer used shopping as a bandaid for coping with stress. Instead, I allowed myself to feel what I needed to feel and change what needed to be change for a better sense of wellness and balance in my life.  Plus I realized fairly quickly that if something wasn’t good for the earth it wasn’t good for me!

2. I don’t need as much as I think I do—so my life got a lot simpler.  This year, I decided to stop (okay, severely limit)  buying packaged goods, especially those items that came is wasteful plastic packaging.  It only takes one video of a helpless sea creature killed by eating discarded plastic to make you hate our wasteful culture. As a result, I stopped shopping at Trader Joe’s (except, real talk, for the occasional trip down the wine aisle).  Practically everything in the produce section there was  covered in wasteful packaging.  Suddenly, all the stuff I used to buy there made me think of polluted oceans…no thanks!  I got used to mainly shopping at my local co-op (the bulk section is my new BFF) and a few other stores where could get affordable, package-free goods. I ran less errands, bought less stuff, and generally saved money and time by nixing out anything that came in excessive packaging. 

I’ll admit that that didn’t work so well when I had to make online purchases.  One of the few new items I bought was tights for work after the ones I’d had for years ripped beyond repair.  The Amazon image showed me the tights I wanted and they seemed minimally packaged.  Then I got my order and found that each and every pair of tights in the set was double wrapped in non-recyclable plastic.  My worst nightmare!   So I learned my lesson.  I have have to actively seek out eco-conscious producers who make an effort to include limited packaging (PACT Apparel is a good start to this).  And, to make things even easier, I stick to my basic rule: I don’t buy wastefully packaged goods. Period. See? Simple!

3. It’s not as hard as I thought it would be. There’s a lot of panic around living a green lifestyle—it’s too expensive, too difficult, too time consuming to be practical. In truth, I’ve found the opposite to be true.  I got used to bringing my own reusable bags and jars to stores, buying less and using what I have. I fell into a routine and many of the changes I made were micro-adjustments that had a huge impact., like walking when I could instead of driving. The funny thing is, the more changes I made, the more I wanted to make. I’ve spent more than a few afternoons down a Pinterest rabbit hole, learning about how to go zero-waste. The real shocker? Much of the advice I found was pretty basic—use less, buy less, and be a more thoughtful consumer.

4. Other people are incredibly helpful…and curious about easy ways to be more sustainable. I can’t tell you how many times someone has stopped me in the grocery store to ask where I got my reusable produce bags or to tell me that using my own tupperware for my deli purchases is a good idea (I don’t eat a lot of meat but I like my cheese—just not the plastic wrap it comes in). The stores I shopped at were beyond kind when I brought my own items to fill. I even inspired a few people to make their own shopping routine less wasteful by bringing their own bags. I brought my own containers everywhere, from generic grocery stores like Smiths, to local markets like Keller’s and the co-op. I even brought them to The Herb Store (my all time favorite bulk store in Albuquerque) to stock up on my usual bulk herbs and spices. Each and every time, people were inquisitive, supportive, and excited to see someone shopping more mindfully. I’ve had more than one person tell me that I’d inspired them to start doing the same. Woohoo!

5. You learn to be honest with yourself about what is truly sustainable—in all meanings of the term. Going to three different grocery stores in one week to get everything you need without packaging (none of it available in one place) is not achievable.  Yup.  That was a lesson learned the hard way.   It’s the end of the week and you’re tired.  You finish work late or simply don’t feel like a string of errands at the end of the day.  Real talk: Not gonna happen.  No longer shopping at Trader Joe’s because everything is wrapped in packaging?  Totally achievable.   Never buying anything again ever? Nope. Investing in thoughtful purchases when needed? Yup. Saying no to one-use items? So easy to commit to. In short, to keep my greener lifestyle sustainable, I had to keep it simple, otherwise it was only a matter of time before I would backslide into old less environmentally friendly habits. I might not be able to make all my own goods and give up my car (my job is a twenty-minute drive away and the bus system here is pretty sketchy), but I can invest in quality products by ethical businesses and drive less.

Building a Better Future

The climate change news is pretty scary, no doubt about it. But I also believe that we got ourselves into this mess and we can get ourselves out of it. It’s easy to get disheartened with all the apocalypse-like stories flooding the media. Then I started reading more about people finding ways to clean the oceans and protect endangered species, countries banning one-use items and protecting vast amounts of natural spaces, and individuals lobbying for sustainable colleges and cities. Together, we can do so much. It starts with giving up one-use items and only grows from there.

I like knowing that I’m part of healing our planet and committing to a more thoughtful lifestyle. How do you plan to be part of the change?

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you. If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is in the everyday, subscribe to my newsletter below for regular doses of enchantment. Want even more inspiration? Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. Here’s to a magical life!