september 2019: what I’m learning and loving

I have learned tons this month, largely from the #septembernaturechallenge, but I’m going to save all of the nature-related stuff for its own post – so stay tuned!

What I’m loving

21st Century Tea. I bought this on a whim a few months ago because it was on sale, and I’m obsessed. I recently bought an entire pound of it. The description tells you why I got sucked in, but it is delicious and lives up to the hype too. Related: motivation to drink more tea.

Forest app. I am a broken record about trying to find new ways to be less addicted to my phone. I am doing better, but still have a long way to go. One thing that has helped me over the past few months, especially with bigger projects, is the Forest app. Basically, it is like a Pomodoro timer, but the app rewards you with planted trees the longer you stay off your phone. This app was basically built for me, but maybe it might help you too 🙂

Pax by Sara Pennypacker. The kids and I have been listening to this on audiobook for the past several weeks, and it is one of my favorite books ever. I don’t say that lightly. I plan on re-reading it many times, but enjoying it for the first time together with the kids will honestly be one of my favorite memories of this season. If you have kids, get a copy and read (or listen to it – the audiobook version is really good) it together. If you don’t have kids, who cares, go read this beautiful book.

#septembernaturechallenge. As I said above, I’ll write more about what I’ve learned over the last month of challenging myself to be outside more, but I have, most of all, just really enjoyed finding ways to get (and be) outside more throughout my day. I’ve always loved being outside, but this month, I’ve really been intentional about getting outside as much as possible. I’m hoping I’ve built a habit that will stick.

What I’m learning

Timing of eating might be more important than what you eat. I’ve experimented (and written about) with intermittent fasting since Jasper was born. Some seasons, my body reacts better than others, and I adjust accordingly. So I’m aware personally of how when I eat affects me, but I didn’t know (or honestly, had ever thought about) how each organ follows circadian rhythms too. For example, the pancreas (to really over-simplify things) produces insulin, which controls our blood sugar levels. The pancreas speeds up production during the day and slows down significantly at night, so, if we eat late at night, it might cause more of a blood sugar crash because our pancreas isn’t as online to help regulate it. This podcast episode and this article explain more.

(Another thing to file in the “n of one” folder!)

You should salt your beans! I borrowed Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat from the library, read it in a day, and immediately bought my own copy. I told Grant if anything ever happens to me and he needs to learn to cook in a hurry, to read SFAH and do everything Samin Nosrat, the author, says. So buy yourself a copy. It is so good and has tons of really practical and accessible information about how to take your cooking game to the next level. But the one thing that I put in place immediately is to salt your beans as you cook them. I read somewhere, at some point, that you shouldn’t salt your beans until after they’re cooked because it makes them too firm. Nosrat references this myth, so it is obviously widespread misinformation. We cook and eat a lot of beans, so this has already made a huge difference. The salt brings out the earthiness of the different beans, and I would have bought the book just for that little nugget, let alone all of the other good stuff I’ve gleaned from it.

Identify/find your skinny mirrors. The only tall mirror in our house is in our room, so the kids were constantly coming in our room to check themselves out in the mirror. This typically happened in that busy time of morning when Grant and I were trying to get ready too and in various stages on dress, so we often get annoyed about the kids being all up in our business. I was at the store picking up something else and saw those cheap dorm-style mirrors on sale, so I grabbed one and put it in the garage, thinking it would eliminate some of the in-and-out in our room. Okay, enough setup and background…

I typically work out in our garage, especially when it’s nice out. And I found myself checking my form in the new cheap mirror while I was lifting weights. I think, because of aforementioned cheapness, the mirror makes you look longer than you are, but whatever the case, I caught myself thinking, “you look strong today,” or other similar compliments that I realized I don’t normally catch myself saying when I catch a glimpse of myself in a mirror.

There is something about this mirror that made me see myself in a different light. In this case, the mirror was just about physical stuff, which is not really important. And obviously, I don’t even like calling it the “skinny mirror” because that implies that skinny is better (which it is assuredly not), but you’re probably catching onto my analogy much sooner by me calling it “skinny mirror” versus “positive-perspective-shifting mirror, right?

Regardless, the mirror situation made me think about what other areas in my life that my personal perspective is a little off, a little too negative, slightly too critical.

I have radically shifted how I talk about myself (as previously written), but this mirror-related self-talk made me realize that, while I’m much better at not talking about myself negatively, it still feels weird to talk to myself really kindly. It made me think about who and what I am surrounding myself with: people who think the best in me, see the best in me, even when I can’t see it in myself. Or people who do the opposite: assume the worst, point out my flaws excessively, are overly critical. It also made me think about the situations, practices, and places where I put my energy: which ones are building me up and which ones are taking me down?

It made me sit down and identify my own “skinny mirrors.” It isn’t that the skinny mirror isn’t telling the truth: it is a mirror after all, it is reflecting me back to it. It is just projecting back to me a more positive version than what I’m typically willing to see. I want to be a skinny mirror to other people, especially the people closest to me, helping to open their eyes to how wonderful, creative, fun, and beautiful they are. And I also want to surround myself with more of those types of people and experiences. Who and where are your skinny mirrors? Do you maybe need to find some more?

Ok, your turn: what are YOU learning and loving lately?!