Spicy Nachos with Goat Cheese

Spicy nachos minus the avocado

Spicy Nachos with Goat Cheese

Serves 1

Ingredients

A couple handfuls of spicy tortilla chips 
     – i like Garden of Eatin spicy Red Hot Blues tortilla chips

A 1 1/2 x 2 inch chunk of hard goat cheese, chopped into little bits – gouda is a favorite 
     but any hard cheese such as cheddar or monterey jack is good

1/3 of a can of canned beans 
     – kidney beans, black bleans, pinto beans are favorite choices

3 medium lettuce leaves, chopped

5 cherry tomatoes

1/2 an avocado, scooped out and cut into rough bite-sized chunks

A  very small handful cilantro leaves, chopped

1/2 of a medium-thick onion slice, chopped

1 tsp olive oil

1-2 tsp apple cider vinegar 
A pinch of celtic sea salt (i just use this cause it still has minerals in it)

1/2 – 1 teaspoon nutritional yeast

All of these measurements are approximate i just threw it together

Instructions

Put the tortilla chips into an 8" x 8" baking dish. Spread the beans over them, then sprinkle the cheese over everything. Broil at 500 degrees for a few minutes until the cheese is melted – the edge chips might be a bit burnt but that's ok. Keep on eye on this, don't want anything to get too burnt! When the cheese is melted, take the baking dish out of the broiler.

To make the salad:

Put the lettuce, tomatoes, avocado, cilantro, and onion in a medium bowl. Add the oil, vinegar, salt, and nutritional yeast. Mix until the salad is coated.

Now put the whole thing together:

Use a spatula to transfer all the cheesy beansy tortilla chips to a dinner plate. Pour the whole salad over it, serve, and enjoy YUM

Blue Cookie Bar Blob

Blue Cookie Bar-Blob

Grape juice concentrate is what makes these delicious vegan and refined-sugar-free cookes blue!  Also, mashed banana is what holds them together it works pretty good.

The reason this is a bar-blob is because the finished product really has to set but it is really yummy so i didn't worry about it :-)

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups almond flour

1 cup oats (you can substitute 1 more cup almond flour instead of oats

                  to make this recipe entirely gluten free)

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 very large banana or 1 1/2 medium bananas

1/2 cup coconut oil

2 tablespoons ground decaf coffee

1/2 cup water

6 tablespoons grape juice concentrate

1/2 cup grain sweetened carob chips

1/2 cup raisins

Instructions

Boil the 1/2 cup of water and then dump the coffee into it and let it sit for a couple of minutes. Then either pour it all into a coffee filter in a single-cup plastic coffee thingy over a mug or else just use use a teeny little strainer over a mug like i did to make the finished cofee. Whisk the flour, oats, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a big bowl. In another bowl, mash the banana using a potato masher or if you don't have one then a fork. Add the mashed bananas, coconut oil, 2 tablespoons of the finished coffee, and the grape juice concentrate to the dry ingredients and mix until blended. Add the carob chips and the raisins and mix until blended. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Put a piece of parchment paper on a cookie sheet. Smush the mixture on to the cookie sheet, make a big blob about the thickness of a cookie. Bake for 13-15 minutes – they probably will still be quite gooey on top but as long as they get brown underneath that's fine, don't leave them in more than 16 minutes MAX. Take the out and let them cool. Actually the finished product seems to be best when refrigerated but if you don't mind if they tend to fall apart at room temperature, have them that way. :-) Cut into bars and serve. Yum!!!! :-) :-) :-)

God and Racism

http://overbear.wordpress.com/2013/07/14/i-killed-trayvon-martin/

This is very interesting to me because the guy is saying that although he does not wanting to be a racist he still is, meaning that when he sees a black guy in a dark alley he still has all the same emotions he has always had except now he stifles them and forces himself to smile.
 

The thing about fear and negative emotions is that i have never been able to just wish them away through the force of my own will.  (Similarly have never been able to lose weight using that method).  The only way that my fear or any negative emotion has ever been removed is by me saying, "Dear Lord, this person/situation looks just horrible to me and i want to see it how you see it" and then instead of simply substituting what I think is a "better" thought or emotion for the one i abhorred in myself, to be COMPLETELY OPEN to the Lord's way of looking at the person or situation.  This means not blaming myself for how i see it AND not blaming the other person for how they appear to me, which i have acknowledged to myself is is not the truth of who they are.  That is because the body's eyes see in duality ("it's either him or me") while the eyes of Spirit see only unity :-)

With this kind of practice, for me the only way to proceed has always been to start with the person in front of me.  If i have an obnoxious teenage girl standing in front of me and my buttons are being pushed, after years of practice i can see how ultimately working on this will at some point lead to being able to pass by a figure in a dark alley in a space of love. Do not know if i can do it today, but definitely see how the practice of focusing on love does not hurt!!! Anger is anger and fear is fear.  The more you practice seeing all things as not separate and equal in the eyes of the Lord, the more you will be able to relate to whoever is in front of you whether it is a just a dangerous-looking guy in the dark or a really dangerous-looking guy wearing a uniform with a gun.  Don't know if i would be at perfect peace with any of these situations today, but i do know i am more at peace with everybody i meet or know than i was 5, 10 or 20 years ago and that is enough motivation for me to keep going with the practice of seeing only love :-) :-) :-)

nuff said thanks for reading. :-)

Holistic Medicine

here is my stream of thought about this today
if you are going to try to step into the middle of a harrowing situation such as fleas and try to heal it holistically, forget it because as i heard secondhand from this holistic doctor who was associated with Kripalu, if you have hurt yourself using aleopathic means then you need to heal yourself using an aleopathic method.  Hence the neutron bomb. It seems to me that the best use of holistic methods is to strengthen health, not to try to defend against disease or pestilence or parasites.  Therefore it is infinitely preferable to build up a healthy system through nutrition taking into account maybe that certain things protect against fleas such as nutritional yeast and maybe garlic, without attempting to begin such a program in the middle of an onslaught of fleas or whatever else.

the other thing about the holistic approach is that in its mildest form it is not about killing fleas,  but simply about making it unpleasant for them to hang around.

one more el flako thing
another thing is that if my cat was a spiritual master and a flea went anywhere near her it would be blessed and probably leave immediately, or kill her and then she would resurrect herself.  Unfortunately she is not a master today however at some point she may well be.

A Course In Miracles, Text, Chapter 1, Section II, Paragraph 3-4

     "Awe should be reserved only for revelation, to which it is perfectly and correctly applicable.  It is not appropriate for miracles because a state of awe is worshipful, implying that one of a lesser order stands before his Creator.  You are a perfect creation, and should experience awe only in the presence of the Creator of perfection. The miracle is therefore a sign of love among equals.  Equals should not be in awe of one another because awe implies inequality.  It is therefore an inappropriate reaction to me.  An elder brother is entitled to respect for his greater experience, and obedience for his greater wisdom.  He is also entitled to love because he is a brother, and to devotion if he is devoted.  It is only my devotion that entitles me to yours.  There is nothing about me that you cannot attain.  I have nothing that does not come from God.  The difference between us now is that I have nothing else.  This leaves me in a state which is only potential in you.
     "No man cometh unto the Father but by me" does not mean that I am in any way separate or different from you except in time, and time does not really exist.  The statement is more meaningful in terms of a vertical rather than a horizontal axis.  You stand below me and I stand below God.  In the process of "rising up", I am higher because without me the distance between God and man would be too great for you to encompass.  I bridge the distance as an elder brother to you on the one hand, and as a Son of God on the other. My devotion to my brothers has placed me in charge of the Sonship, which I render complete because I share it.  This may appear to contradict the statement "I and my Father are one," but there are two parts to the statement in recognition that the Father is greater."

Deep Thoughts about Faith Healing, Reiki, Laying on of Hands, etc

I would like to preface the following by saying that I really have no idea how it all works or what it is exactly

Was just speaking with a friend on the subject of acupuncture and massage therapy -- he says that the basis for both is the light coming through the practitioner's hands -- I had always thought that the needles were the big part of acupuncture and that the deep working of the muscles was the point of massage therapy but he says that actually it is the healing quality of the practitioner's hands that brings the healing in both modalities -- someone he knows since forever does acupuncture and she does not even use needles, she uses light-emitting diodes.  -- ???


Interesting -- I met a man last week who says that he has been going for healing touch sessions at Albany Hospital (is this covered by insurance)?  Also I know a woman who is a chaplain at a local hospital -- she is a flaming Buddhist and I believe she visited the children on Christmas day -- In my recent acquaintance with her I have never heard her utter a word about ideology of any kind -- just wants to heal everybody as far as I can tell :-)


On the subject of the Hands of Light thing -- as far as I know, you can become purified in mind/body/spirit as you listen to your inner voice and do what is naturally healthiest for you emotionally, psychologically and every other way -- the more your mind body and spirit purify, the more you and your whole body become whole and therefore holy since the words "whole" and "holy" have the same root (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacred: The English word "holy" dates back to at least the 11th Century with the Old English word hālig, an adjective derived from hāl meaning "whole" and used to mean "uninjured, sound, healthy, entire, complete". The Scottish hale ("health, happiness and wholeness") is the most complete modern form of this Old English root. The modern word "health" is also derived from the Old English hal. As "wholeness", holiness may be taken to indicate a state of religious completeness or perfection. The word "holy" in its modern form appears in Wyclif's Bible of 1382.)  Anyway, as your body becomes purified, healthy, and whole, so does your blood, just like every other part of your body and I think  that your hands begin to transmit light all by themselves!   So when you hear that you have been "cleansed by the blood of Christ" you can interpret this to mean that someone who is really, really, really detached from ego crap such as alchohol, drugs, violence, sugar, wheat, smoking, sitting in one place watching TV all the time, etc etc etc has laid hands on you and given you some light in a way you can feel it! :-) :-) :-) Jesus did this when he healed the sick -- you do not have to beat yourself up and call yourself a sinner in order to experience this!  Nor do you have to engage in the symbolically cannabilistic imbibing of "His Blood" or "His Body!"  IMHO, the only way in which I can relate to Eating the Body of Christ is by realizing that he did not see himself as separate from the wheat or the grass or the trees or the flowers and so when I eat some bread I need to be aware that a part of the earth has given herself for me including the work that went into growing the wheat & making the bread on the part of human beings! :-)


The other thing I want to say about Jesus is that I believe that the nails through his hands on the cross were in some way preventing the energy from coming out of his hands -- something to do with the ends of the chakras or something  -- I really need to say that I do not know anything about this -- I experience my hands having some kind of transmission back and forth between me & animals & other people pretty often -- really have no idea what it's about exactly but it feels good :-)  I am not sure if this is the same thing that people have referred to as Guru Shakti however I imagine that Guru Shakti is the same only more so :-) :-) :-)


I think that's about it.
Thanks for reading & much love! :-) :-) :-)

Love Holds no Grievances :-) :-) :-) :-)

This is the thing about Jesus:

Jesus was not attached to himself as a body in any way, shape or form -- he was COMPLETELY identified with himself as Spirit.   This means that the entire world we see was basically as nothing to him his joy came completely from being in the not-knowing space of wanting to understand and perform God's will.  We can learn to identify ENTIRELY with Spirit just like he did/does by listening to the small, still voice within which is begun and continued by meditation and prayer.  I have heard many people say that prayer is talking to God, and meditation is listening to God.   In these times, it has become very difficult to hear anything but TV which is why it is very very helpful to sit in stillness & listen to the voice for love speak and speak with that voice to everyone :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) There are plenty of people who can teach you to meditate -- the Sri Cinmoy people taught me how in 1994 -- you don't have to get involved with their whole culture in order to get started -- a website to find out their teaching schedule is http://www.nycmeditation.org/sri-chinmoy.  The Tibetan Buddhist monks around here give classes on Friday evenings & Saturday & Sunday mornings I believe and here is their website: http://www.kagyu.org/ktd/schedule/ -- the last people I'm thinking of are the yoga people at Kripalu if anyone has the desire to be there for a whole cushy week and their website is http://www.kripalu.org/ :-) :-) :-)  You do not have to get into any of these peoples' culture in order to learn how to meditate from them and I really would like to say that there is A Course In Miracles -- There is so much to say about beliefs and spirituality that it is hard to get one's thoughts posted here & that's why there are A Course in Miracles groups! :-) :-) :-)  Anyway, as is said in Adult Children of Alcoholics Anonymous, Take What You Like and Leave the Rest!  :-) :-) :-)