West Side Story...

We’re on the west coast of Australia now...it is HOT :O ...pheeeeeeeeeew...and a looooooong journey all the way over here – this continent is VAST...I spent most of the plane journey involved in mane management ;) Mr Monarch’s hair had become insanely knotted into dread-like masses and I eased it all out – now it looks beautiful again and we’re about to go on stage very shortly here in Perth to speak to a lovely audience above the ‘Alive Organics’ health food store, run by the delightful Jill and John. This shop is SO cool – run with masses of love, stocked with very carefully chosen raw, organic and other foods, with all kinds of kitchen appliances on display, free raw food info pamphlets, regular raw gatherings and classes in a space upstairs and so on – what an ASSET to any community... ;) They are extremely detail-orientated here about precisely which temperatures foods are processed at – they also grow a lot of their own food for the store, dehydrate fruits, soaked nuts, seeds and so on – there’s a LOT of love here...how blessed we are... :)

on January the 22nd I had:

1 quart water
1 quart watermelon juice
3 cups green smoothie: blueberries/mango/banana/sorrel/’tree spinach’, with goji berries, maca and cinnamon stirred in
3 cups water
1 pint radish/cabbage/sorrel/tree spinach/carrot/cucumber/ginger/apple juice
¾ avo mushed with salt, mixed sprouts, diced garlic and tomatoes
2 cups water
5 little egg fruits
3 cups water

Brian Johnson, the man behind incredible social entrepreneur website Zaadz (now called Gaia), has launched a FUN new site: ThinkArete.com. Here’s what he shares about this new playground:

“Emerson instructs us to "Make your own Bible. Select and collect all the words and sentences that in all your reading have been to you like the blast of triumph out of Shakespeare, Seneca, Moses, John and Paul." I like Emerson. So, I’ve followed his guidance. After selling my last business (Zaadz), I decided to go through all my favorite books and journals and notes from seminars and capture the “Big Ideas” I learned. My goal is to distill the essence of these lessons into fun, inspiring, practical bits of wisdom we can immediately apply to our lives.”

There’s some GREAT stuff on there – get into the ‘big ideas’ section and poke around a bit – I’m sure you’ll find smthg to inspire ;)

on January the 23rd I had:

1.5 quarts water
3 peaches
2 cups green smoothie: mango/banana/blueberry/lettuce/parsley/mizuna
3 cups water
¾ avo mushed with diced tomatoes and sea kelp and served in lettuce leaves
1.5 quarts water
1 mango
2 cups water
handful of raw chocolate coated brazil nuts and mulberries
3 cups water

Thank you for ALL your amazing emails and feedback about my recent silent meditation experience – it’s been lovely to hear all your different perspectives on it all ;) The lovely Zelia recently sent in a little account of HER Vipassana experience in Colombia and I asked her if I could share some of it with y’all here, as I think it’s great to hear different perspectives:

“I appreciated reading your truthful description of your Vipassana experience. I wanted to share a little of mine with you. I did my first 10 day retreat in July in Bogota, Colombia. 100% raw as well. The Colombians were very gracious in accommodating my diet- though the American teacher had a few issues with my having a different diet from the other students. That’s a whole other story though. What I found was that my mind didn’t actually start slowing down until the 4th day- that’s the day that they teach the actual method. The first 3 days are just focused on breathing- the intent being to slow the mind to prepare for learning the method. The actual method consists of scanning the body from head to feet and back up, using both hemispheres of the brain at one time- to me this makes a lot of sense physiologically in terms of creating more balance. The whole intent is learning to be ok with impermanence- at least that’s what I took from it. Learning to be ok with that helps one to let go of self-created suffering. They actually have a policy that people who are new to the method cant sit for less than 10 days the first time to ensure that people get the full experience. Goenke also speaks a few times about the importance of food in meditating. I felt like he was totally validating my raw diet- though he doesn’t specifically talk about raw food- just about eating lightly etc. Anyway, I just wanted to share that with you. I am hoping to sponsor a raw Vipassana retreat here in Cuenca, Ecuador in the coming year. We’ll see...”

Thanks Zelia ;)

One love,
Angela. xxx