finding the happy in the everyday little things
A few weeks ago I lost my heart to Booja Booja.
A dear friend introduced me to their Hunky Punky Chocolate Ice Cream Alternative. My taste buds jumped for joy as I tucked into this heavenly bowl containing only four ingredients: water, agave syrup, cashews and cacao.
I’m not kidding when I say it tastes like a high quality Belgian chocolate ice-cream. Creamy deliciousness in every spoonful.
In fact, I would go as far to say this is one of the best ice-creams I have ever tasted: healthy or non-healthy. And I don’t usually go for chocolate ice-cream either!
I couldn’t wait to visit my local health food store and was over-the-moon to see they stocked it. But alas it’s a tad too pricey for my present budget.
So I had the great idea to try and make my own.
After lots of trawling online, I finally found a recipe that was right up my street. Most recipes use bananas as the base, my least favourite food in the whole wide world (the only exception I make is for Banana Bread, toasted with butter please. A staple treat for me when I lived in Sydney). Thankfully I found an alternative that uses cashews and coconut milk.
It’s so simple to make: pop some soaked cashews, coconut milk, vanilla essence and rice malt syrup (my choice of sweetener) into a blender and blend away.
But then comes the tricky part.
Pour into a shallow dish, cover well and freeze. Every 30 minutes, take out of the freezer and whisk with a small whisk or mix with a fork. For six hours. That’s twelve times. Twelve times! Then leave for a further eight hours and it’s ready to eat.
And you know what, it tastes mind-glowingly delicious.
I am so impressed with myself that I’ve actually made ice cream. By hand.
Even my mum is impressed. We sampled it this afternoon – although it hadn’t had its full proper freezing time, I mean who can wait overnight, seriously!
I added a scoop to my previously made Chocolate Cup Cakes (dairy, sugar and wheat-free too) and the ultimate afternoon snack was born.
Although, it’s pretty labour intensive and pretty expensive to make, there is a huge satisfaction of knowing I’ve made this bowl of deliciousness all by myself.
Booja Booja who?!
So with this in mind, my happy for today is being grateful for making raw vegan ice-cream.
Today it was time for a change of scenery. I needed to get out of the house. And thankfully I felt up for going on an Artist’s Date.
I’ve been taking myself on Artist’s Dates since first reading about them in Julia’s Cameron’s book The Artist’s Way, around ten years ago.
“Artist Dates are assigned play,” says Cameron. And the best thing is that you don’t have to be an artist to go on an Artist’s Date.
The idea is to take yourself on a date once per week to “fill the well” of creativity. There are the rules:
Of course, the nature of an Artist’s Date can be something different to everyone.
Amongst my favourites are: a long walk in the country or along the coastline; a visit to a Farmer’s Market; a nose around a photography exhibition; a visit to the cinema; a day trip to somewhere new; and a delicious brunch in a nice cafe.
Ever since discovering brunch culture when I spent time in the US and Canada, it’s become my absolute favourite meal to enjoy out. I love catching up with friends over brunch, and I also really love my solo dates.
Taking myself out for brunch provides a welcome break from my current mainly sedentary lifestyle. It feels like I’m living a normal life again. I try to go a couple of times a month, depending on health and wealth of course.
This morning, I went to my favourite brunch place Bill’s, and enjoyed Eggs Royale; a toasted English muffin topped with smoked salmon, poached eggs and Hollandaise sauce, and finished with a sprinkling of pumpkin seeds.
Yum. Yum. Yum.
Upon returning, I feel restored, refreshed and rejuvenated.
Hooray for Artist’s Dates. Hooray for yummy brunches.
So with this in mind, my happy for today is being grateful for my yummy brunch on my Artist’s Date.
Today I am grateful that I gave myself permission to have a few days off from writing this blog.
As much as I love writing about my ‘100 days of happy’ project, I realised I was putting too much pressure on myself to write the “perfect” posts (whatever the “perfect” post may look like!).
I was feeling incredibly overwhelmed.
And having chronic fatigue does not bode well with overwhelm.
I’m also a perfectionist.
And perfectionism is not a friend of chronic fatigue either.
So feeling overwhelmed with writing the perfect blog = crash, bang, wallop!
It was only a few weeks ago that I started easing myself back into writing, just for 20 minutes each day. But then decided to set myself this 100 day project, and write about it every day, and then turn it into a blog, and then tell all my friends what I was doing.
Yeah, I know.
I don’t do things by halves me! And it’s probably not the best idea when you need to be taking things slow and gentle.
While I really enjoyed writing it ‘off-line’, as soon as I set up the blog and put it out there, I fell to pieces. Knowing a handful of lovely people have kindly subscribed and are now getting my posts directly into their in-boxes, completely freaked me out.
Now my posts HAD to be good, I warned myself. I couldn’t post just any old crap.
I’d started writing it for me, but now I felt a responsibility to write something really fantastic and interesting every single day. Something others would enjoy reading. And keep reading.
It absolutely terrified me and I felt myself shut down.
I crumbled under the pressure.
And I know that I’m the one putting pressure on myself. No one else is doing that. I can do a perfectly good job of that all by very myself thank you very much.
When the fact is, I’ve been absolutely bowled over by all the kind lovely comments and support I’ve received so far. I really couldn’t have asked for a nicer bunch of readers.
I knew I needed to take a break from writing. I needed to gift myself with complete rest. The sky wasn’t going to fall in if I didn’t write for a few days.
I retreated back into my turtle shell, put my laptop away, and delved into my recovery tool kit. I did what I had to do to help myself recover.
I’m proud that every day, I continued to find my happy. But instead of writing about it in the blog, I wrote a short couple of lines in my gratitude journal.
As I tentatively started to emerge from my turtle shell, my thoughts slowly turned back towards my blog. I reminded myself of why I started it.
Thankfully I’ve put it all back into perspective and am feeling much better for it. For now. I realise this may crop up again, and if it does I’ll know what to do.
It’s ok that my writing isn’t perfect. It’s ok that it’s not for everyone. And it’s ok to not write for a day or so if I’m not feeling well enough.
I’m giving myself permission to be ok as I am: to be the best that I can be in this moment.
So with this in mind, my happy for today is being kind to myself by retreating into my shell.
My mum is such a superstar.
She is one of the most caring, thoughtful and all round loveliest people I know.
And she’s my mum. I know, what a lucky girl I am.
She’s always been there for me and we’ve always been close.
And I’ve come to appreciate her even more since I’ve been living back in the family home due to the ME/CFS.
I’ve found it incredibly hard giving up my independence and having to rely on mum to look after me. But she has made this transition much easier thanks to her kind, graceful nature.
And I appreciate that it can’t always be easy for her.
On bedrest days like today, she pops in to check on me, brings me cups of tea, and kindly prepares my meals. She has never once complained or made me feel like it’s too much.
I’m so grateful that she takes the time to understand my symptoms and triggers, and how she steps in to look after me when I’m not feeling well enough to look after myself.
She listens to me when I tell her how I’m feeling. She hugs me when I’m feeling down. She shields me from visitors when I’m too exhausted to be social.
She even helps me when I have to do something requiring some thought and my brain is too foggy.
She supports me no matter what, without judgement.
I tell her as often as possible how much I love her, how amazing she is and how grateful I am. And I do my best to help out whenever I am feeling well enough.
I hope she knows that I think she is simply the best. Because she is.
She’s my mum, my confidant, my best friend.
So with this in mind, my happy for today is being grateful for my lovely mum.
After overdoing it recently, my energy bucket is completely empty.
So today is a bedrest day.
I’m a big film fan and love going to the cinema as often as I can. As I’m not able to make it so much at the moment, I say a big thank goodness for Netflix and LoveFilm.
Subscriptions to these two beauties are my little treat to myself. Well, actually, they are a big part of my recovery tool box.
On days when I need bedrest, like today, watching films offers me complete rest. It helps give my monkey mind a break, as well as giving my body time to recover.
With LoveFilm, I can enjoy the more latest and greatest DVD releases and the discs are delivered directly to my door. Netflix offers online streaming and at the push of a button, or rather a click of a mouse, I can watch as many films as my heart desires.
And believe me, that’s a LOT of films when I’m needing a bedrest day or two or three.
I receive two DVDs at a time with LoveFilm and post them back once they’ve been watched. It’s always a surprise to see what they’ve selected from my eclectic rental list of over 100 titles: today it’s ‘Girls’ Season 1, and Tom Hardy in ‘The Drop’.
I find Netflix doesn’t have as many recent releases, but still has thousands of titles to choose from including some quality TV series ripe for binge-watching (I’ve just started on series one of five of the renowned Breaking Bad!).
Thankfully my watch list makes it so much easier to choose what to watch on days when my brain is too foggy to make a decision. As Netflix is streamed online, my sister has kindly lent me their Apple TV gadget, which means I can watch it on my big bedroom telly. Result!
I am so grateful for this form of pure escapism: it’s gets me through a lot of dark days like today. And after some good quality rest with some (usually) entertaining viewing, I am slowly ready to ease myself back into the wonderful world of real life once again.
So with this in mind, my happy for today is being grateful for my Netflix and LoveFilm subscriptions.
Two days a week, my three-year-old nephew Thomas is with us while my sister goes to work.
He’s our little ray of sunshine.
And as much as I would LOVE to be his full-on full-time playmate, sadly CFS has other ideas: I’m usually wiped out after only half an hour and have to head upstairs for some bedrest.
Recently, I’ve started making him healthy banana milkshakes, with two ingredients: frozen banana and whole milk. Nothing else.
And I’ve found that getting him involved in the making of it usually increases the odds of him drinking it.
Today, he very carefullly held the blender jug while I put the frozen banana in and then added the milk: great team work.
Thomas is quite a sensitive soul around noise and usually runs away and hides when I switch the blender on. But today, he wanted to press the button. And so he did. A few times in fact.
As the blender roared into action, I started singing ‘Banana Milkshake’ to distract him from the noise. He joined in the singing and started dancing around; I joined in the dancing.
And thus, our Banana Milkshake, or rather our ‘Nana Milkshake’ song and dance was born. (Lyrics by Auntie Helen, choreography by nephew Thomas)
We had so much fun singing and dancing our way around the house. A joy-filled precious moment to treasure, that’s for sure.
So with this in mind, my happy for today is being grateful for fun playtime with my nephew Thomas.
I am so excited. I’ve just attended my first yoga class in two years. Yay!
And it felt sooooooo good.
Sadly, I haven’t felt well enough since chronic fatigue set in. My beloved practice has been one of the biggest activities I’ve missed. I used to practice yoga most days either at home or at the fantastic yoga studio I was a member of in Sydney. It had the most incredible teachers and I used to go to three 90 minute yoga classes a week.
Over the last few months I’ve been slowly easing myself back into yoga by following a couple of gentle 20 minute DVD sessions at home.
While I enjoy home practice, I do like combining it with classes. It’s not a surprise that I find that teachers challenge me more than I’m prepared to challenge myself at home. I also appreciate the variety of asanas – poses – even those I’m not particularly fond of and tend to avoid at home. Teachers have told me it’s the ones we resist are the ones we need to focus on!! Hmmmm…
Recently I’ve been feeling ready to step up my practice by trying out a yoga class. After some searching, I’m grateful to have found one one really close to home. Like 5 mins away close. The only downside is that it’s in the evening, when my energy is usually waning, but I was keen to give it a try.
As the time for me to leave grew nearer, my trepidation increased: Would I find the venue ok? Would I manage the whole class? What if it was all too much? What if I felt unwell? What would teacher Hannah be like? What would the other yogini’s be like?
Ok, Helen, breathe deeply with me now….
Finally it was time to go.
Of course, I found the venue ok, the other yogini’s were lovely, and teacher Hannah was friendly and kind.
Happily I rolled out my mat and I felt I’d come home.
Starting in savasana – corpse pose – Hannah gently led us into mindful breathing and introduced this week’s theme, Satya, the commitment to Truthfulness.
Gently guiding us through an hour long class, she threw in a couple of the more challenging poses for good measure and to a few giggles. Just as I felt myself starting to flag and was preparing to rest in balasana – child’s pose – the class began to wind down and we were back in savasana. Sigh.
I left feeling stretched, calm, and happy in my mind, body and soul.
I am really also proud of myself for going as it was a big step in my recovery journey.
Roll on next Tuesday.
So with this in mind, my happy for today is being grateful for my first yoga class in two years.
I am on a shopping high.
I’ve just got back from visiting my favourite local-ish health food shop called ‘Out of this World’ (OOTW), and it really is!
I only discovered this little gem a few months ago: it was a joyous moment indeed. Up until then, I’d been ordering everything online from various places which, let’s face it, was a bit of pain.
OOTW is a 30 minute drive away, but it stocks everything I need. Now I visit every couple of months to stock up on my favourite goodies, all from under one roof:
Bread: It’s the only place I’ve found that sells a Spelt Sourdough loaf that actually resembles bread. Now, sliced and in the freezer.
Coconut heaven: They offer great value, quality Coconut Oil which I use a LOT of, and tinned Coconut Milk without all the crap. It’s also where I discovered CoYo yoghurt, heavenly creamy and dairy/sugar-free.
Choccies: Having ploughed through many raw chocolate bars since my return home, my firm favourite is ‘Dark Vanoffee’ by The Raw Chocolate Company. I find it doesn’t have the weird aftertaste I usually find with some of the ‘alternative’ sweeteners.
TREAT: OOTW has just earned itself a big hooray and gold star for selling my latest obsession, Booja Booja Alternative Ice Cream.
Plus, they have the most loveliest staff, so it makes the drive all worth it. And when I’m not feeling well enough to make the drive, they’ll deliver it all for a fiver.
How fabulous.
Today I took my sis along, who has become the Queen of Juicing since joining the juicing revolution a couple of months ago, and a convert to the wonders of Coconut Oil.
I love taking my time to peruse the shelves and feel like a kid in a sweetshop. I could spend a fortune in there, that’s for sure. I really have to hold myself back and stick to my list and tight budget.
I always leave feeling happy for my loot, excited to try new finds, and content that I have my healthy supplies for another few weeks. And I can’t wait to get stuck into my Booja Booja…
So with this in mind, my happy for today is being grateful for my local-ish health food shop.
I have a new friend.
Her name is Molly and she’s gorgeous. She has the cutest face, soulful brown eyes, shaggy black hair, oh and four legs and a wagging tail.
We met on my walking meditation yesterday. I’ve seen Molly and her owner (now known as Molly’s Mum) a few times and we’ve smiled. Today, they stopped to let me go by. I hesitated, and Molly’s Mum took that for me being weary.
Which as much I hate to admit it, I was a little.
I love dogs. I am definitely a dog girl. But I was chased a few times by neighbours dogs when I was a little girl. I remember one chasing me across the road, jumping up at me and ripping my favourite dress. I was devastated and terrified. As an adult I can now see it’s playtime for them, but as a small child, I thought they were aiming to bite me.
Add to the mix my auntie and uncle having two huge alsatians. Did I mention they were HUGE? Whenever we visited they used to snarl at me and bark violently (or so it seemed to my little scared self) through the living room window as I perched on the settee, absolutely terrified they’d get into the house and rip me to shreds!
It’s no wonder I grew up a tad afraid.
Over the years, various friends’ dogs have calmed my fear and released my deep love. My favourite being Angus, the gentle shiatsu/poodle of a dear friend in Australia. We hung out loads, shared oodles of joyous cuddles, and I even looked after him one weekend – all by myself; a big step for me.
I do still have a slight hesitation and weariness when I first meet a dog, until I know it’s friendly. Then I’m all cuddles and kisses and belly rubs.
When Molly’s Mum assured me Molly is friendly, I asked if I could give her a fuss. We shared a few lovely minutes together and it was love at first cuddle.
Today I went for my soul stroll a little later, and saw them walking back on the other side of the brook. I shouted over hello to Molly’s Mum and then to Molly. She bounded towards to me, straining her lead so much that Molly’s mum had to let go of it, and leapt over the narrow brook towards me, her tail joyfully wagging.
I couldn’t believe she remembered me. I responded by giving her lots of love and fuss, including Helen’s infamous belly rub, which Angus adored and would instantly roll onto his back at first sight of me.
I walked away feeling really happy and uplifted. There really is something therapeutic about stroking and cuddling a dog.
I’m already hoping to see my new friend on my next soul stroll.
So with this in mind, my happy for today is being grateful for my new 4-legged friend Molly.
