My Chicken Soup Recipe!
I made this chicken soup to offer my neighbors for our outdoor showing of the Barbie movie. I am still getting compliments on it from people and one of my neighbors wanted the recipe.
How to Create Conditions for Forgiveness
When I endeavored to write this post I was trying to come up with some sort of tidy protocol for developing a more compassionate lifestyle but it doesn't feel like a protocol, it is more of a way of life and a lens with which to view the world.
If you know JC Mayer or anyone who works in programming at Sirius FM please send this open letter along to them!
In our society we give a lot of undeserved "status*" to people based on their jobs. (As a former attorney allow me to assure you there are plenty of idiots and bigots that can pass exams in all fields, including law and medicine. They don't deserve your money.)
I Wanna Talk about Riot Grrrl Legend Kathleen Hanna!
Kathleen Hanna is many things including the lead singer of Bikini Kill, one of the primary bands associated with the Riot Grrrl movement in the 90s. In addition to the punk rock shows they played, they distributed a lot of zines so folks could take them home and share ideas.
Simple Self Care: Spiritual Hygeine
Energy affects us so much and 99% of us are not taught how to manage our energy and cleanse our energy. In these bonkers times if I were to tell you ONE spiritual practice to start is is my very simple spiritual hygiene meditation. It's free.
The Relationship Great Glass Elevator
I was a Roald Dahl girlie growing up so understanding archetypes based in those narratives makes sense to me. I came up with this idea about the Relationship Great Glass Elevator that helps me understand how I want to love and be loved for however long I get on this floating rock in space this lifetime.
You gotta put yourself out there in order to have the intimacy you crave with community or friendships or relationships. And a pop-up witch dance is such a low stakes way to experience folks you might have FUN with and life is supposed to be FUN and NOT TOIL!!!
My Crush on a Radio Station: CBC Music Radio
I think CBC Music Radio will be a good influence on you! Day after day I would turn on the radio for Biscuit Reynolds and enjoy what was playing. Started listening to it on my own. Realizing that they play exactly the right thing at the right time of day. Incredibly genre diverse!
My Mom’s Enchiladas Recipe
Recipe first story later.
My Mom’s Enchiladas Recipe
Ingredients
- 1.3 pounds grass fed hamburger
- 24 oz jack and cheddar cheeses (more or less, depending on preference)
- 2.25 oz chopped olives
- 3 cans enchilada sauce my mom likes the old el paso brand because she needs it to be less spicy so it's more of a crowd pleaser
- 1 dozen corn tortillas
- Vegetable oil for frying tortillas (or your frying oil of choice)
Instructions
- Fry hamburger with some garlic, onion and chili powder (like taco seasoning)
- Scoop hamburger out with a slotted spoon so the grease drains off, put cooked hamburger in a bowl.
- Add about 2/3 of the cheese (16oz) and the olives to the cooked hamburger and mix them.
- Add 1/3 of a can of enchilada sauce to the hamburger cheese mixture.
- Lightly fry the corn tortillas in vegetable oil or your frying oil of choice.
- Rest fried corn tortillas on paper towels (create layers) to drain the oil.
- Time to assemble the enchiladas! In the baking dish you're going to bake in, pour enchilada sauce on the floor of the pan. Then take the tortilla, slap it into the bottom of the pan and flip over (mom says "You're gonna get gooky"). Put a a couple dollops of the hamburger mixture in the middle of the tortilla, enough to fill the enchilada to an inch from the end. 2.5 tablespoons or so? You'll figure out what fits well when you roll the first couple up. Keep adding sauce as you go along because the tortillas gobble up the sauce.
- Roll up the enchiladas so the tortilla edge part is on the bottom of the pan. a 9×13 pan will hold a dozen. 8 down one side and 4 going the opposite direction.
- Cover the enchiladas with the rest of the cheese. If you're not baking tiil the next day don't put the rest of the sauce on it til the next day. If you're transporting it before cooking bring the sauce with you and pour it on right before it goes in the oven.
- Bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes.
My mom made this recipe on special occasions when she needed to feed a crowd. A crowd pleaser and total labor of love. I didn’t even try to guess the time on prep for this recipe but last time mom made 12 for just her, me and Pat (her spouse) she said the prep clocked in at 3 hours.
Here’s the pic of the before baked product–seriously if you love enchiladas this will be a delight. I’ve had many in my lifetime but nothing touches my mom’s!
A goal of mine with this blog is to help anyone out there who doesn’t have family resources get a leg up on life. My life has improved immeasurably from the wisdom passed to me by my queer family.
My mom is super generous with her recipes and for those out there who don’t have family recipes for whatever reason, we are passing this along to you!
Check out my recipe tag for other recipes and poke around the search function to find other topics I might have shared about in the past sixteen (!!) years this blog has existed.
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Are You As High as You Want to Be?
It’s 4/20 somewhere and this weekend we are having it on a Saturday! I wanted to share with you a wise question to ask that is both FUN life of the party vibes AND a good reminder to check in with yourself and regulate your consumption!
I’m posting this on 4/19, Bicycle Day, and this question is as much for psychedelics as for cannabis!
I started saying this at Glowing Goddess Getaway events when I would be stationed at the Glow Bar helping goddesses decide how they wanted to consume cannabis. Being a loud gal, I hollered out “Are you as high as you want to be?” as an enthusiastic way to remind folks they came to unwind.
But it’s also a good reminder for yourself to actually set an intention for how high you want to be BEFORE you consume. You can always get more high, it’s really hard to get less high!
I have been a “more is more” consumer, and as someone with an addictive personality I am always checking in with my relationship with cannabis as medicine and as stress relief. Sometimes it makes me more anxious than I want to be! Sometimes I can’t afford to be incapacitated, or I have responsibilities that need my attention (either later that day or the next day when I don’t want to be hazy).
What’s magical about setting aside time for relaxation and celebration is getting to be in a safe environment and let plant medicine mellow you out and inspire revelations.
I like shouting “Are you as high as you wanna be?!” to raise the vibe on a celebration. I like asking it peacefully as I pass someone a joint and ask if they want it. It’s charming and a good question.
If you do get more high than you want to be here are my tips:
*EAT. Drink water. Eat some more. It helps metabolize the cannabis.
*LAY DOWN: Go find your bed and get under the covers hopefully it’s really nearby. (My fav part of camping with friends is my bed is really nearby and I can nap and come back to the gathering.)
*BREATHE: Soothing breaths are in through the nose filling the belly and a longer exhale through the mouth. Three breaths like this are something I use all the time.
*Charcoal pills! These are great to have on hand! Activated charcoal is useful for so many natural remedies and helping you digest cannabis is one of them! Here’s a link to one brand, if you buy anything from Amazon after using my link (not just what I link to) I get a 3% bonus from Amazon’s profits. Of course I hope you shop small and local first but if you were gonna support Amazon anyway, thanks for using my link!
I’ve been smoking way less the last six months because it turns out smoking hurts my throat and I want to be able to teach aerobics for the rest of my life! But I still love the medicine and use non psychoactive ingestion to prevent Covid-19 and other harm reduced ways of consuming.
Sitting by a fire with friends, enjoying a joint and looking at the hummingbirds is a deep occasional pleasure for me and I hope you get out and enjoy nature and cannabis together if you can!
If you find value in this blog, please consider supporting!
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My Federalist Papers: Mycelial Economic Solutions
“I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.”–James Baldwin
American democracy is getting it wrong. It represents corporations and highest bidders, ignores the will of the people. I’m writing a series of Federalist Papers to share how I hope we can shift things to create the world of our dreams.
This is the way I choose to see my own participation in economy in order to make change in the world.
The three main resources all of us have available to us are our time, treasure and talent.
Much like our beloved mushroom friends function as an underground network of mycelium, I try to move my resources and nutrients very intentionally between places that matter to me.
The mushrooms, by the way, are the fruit of the mycelium, and are typically less than 20% of the overall mycelium. It’s incredible the way they communicate with one another and act as a conduit of nutrients and information between trees!
I really think mushrooms are teachers for us showing us the way we can heal the planet from extracting corporate oligarchs!
When I spend money I prioritize first putting money in the hands of another person I know, I’m in community with or that I value.
I do this because the “nutrients” from the money I use are far more impactful the more locally I can spend the money.
I still consider money “local” if it’s within a community I’m part of, even if that community is worldwide as many of my communities are in these internet Age of Aquarius times!
When a community gathers around common values this as a mindful way to spend money. Plus, I want my communities to thrive and when I spend money with vendors within the community I’m voting for them to win.
In some ways intra community spending feels like we pass “the same $20” around but it’s actually pretty powerful and I hope it will eventually be the “same $1,000” we pass around.
My second priority is putting the money in the hands of another individual or family. It feels great that the money I spend at a family owned restaurant is going right to keeping the lights on at the house of the family who owns it.
Or having a hair dresser who is independent versus working for a big corporation where they are just getting paid hourly.
I spend with cash when I am able because credit card processing is expensive for small businesses and puts some of the transaction money into the hands of corporations. No thanks!
I then prioritize local worker-owned businesses (some of these are not family owned). In Port Townsend we have a worker-owned food co-op and I do 75% of my grocery shopping there. The other 25% is at a local family owned franchise of Grocery Outlet (wow do I love discount snacks).
I learned that the cure for our current “greedflation” we are experiencing with groceries is prioritizing spending grocery money with stores that are on the same supply chain as Grocery Outlet, Dollar Stores, Trader Joe’s, etc… We speak to corporations with our money and when we prioritize spending with the companies that are not price gauging it’s very loud to them!
Next I’m going to prioritize shopping at a privately held corporation. (You’d need to do some research to figure out whether a company is traded on a stock market or is privately held, but it’s pretty easy to figure out.) I also take a look at the values that the corporation walks out.
For example, I’ve never eating at chik-fil-a because they support gay hating initiatives that really don’t align with their stated values. But they are privately held and will continue to be. (I truly don’t understand Christian hegemony that doesn’t align with the teachings of Jesus the Christ but that’s a different article for a different day!)
Why private companies? Because I don’t want to make faceless shareholders wealthy with my money. The more we divest from big corporations the more power our money has. The more we empower people in our communities with our money the better we support the folks we want to win!
I also think about hedge fund bros making millions off of moving money around. Money is really just an idea (read the Soul of Money–life changing).
If I had $20 to spend on a meal out I’d rather give that money to a mom and pop mexican place than Chipotle (owned in part by McDonald’s corporation, currently subject to boycott).
Before I’ll shop at Amazon I’ll shop at a big box store that has a local store that employs my neighbors. The goal is to keep the money circulating locally as much as possible.
Amazon, by the way, is not a great place for their workers, not actually creating happiness or smiles even though they have the resources to do it! (I kind of see the vans they have as Death Eaters with their smoke steaming around my neighborhood a la Harry Potter movies).
I have a friend who prioritizes shopping from Amazon online because they are the only company using electric vehicles around here, which is a fair point. Everyone has different values that matter to them!
I also post links to Amazon from time to time on my blog (and include a link in every blog post so if you ARE shopping from Amazon I get a 3% commission at no cost to you that cuts into Bezos’ profits). I do this because it’s a great way for me to not have to give cash to Amazon when I do because they pay me in gift cards. I would much rather you support an indie bookseller but if you’re gonna use Amazon, I appreciate the circulation of energy coming my way!
A reminder to tip lavishly in cash whenever you are able to and always when receiving a service not from the owner of the business!
You can apply the same kind of prioritization to your time (which is also your attention). There’s a reason all these apps and streaming services are vying for your attention. It’s a commodity to them!
Your talent are the things you’re good at. Consider who you could be helping with what you’re good at. Something that is very simple to you is very meaningful to someone else!
We are systematically disempowered in our society. Whenever I feel bad about myself I consider “who profits off my self loathing” and choose new thoughts.
We think we can’t fix the big problems ourselves so we don’t do these small things that actually help.
The big changes that come from below are because lots of people are making little decisions to help a bigger issue. Most people just give up rather than try, but we make big changes by each of us being willing to be a little uncomfortable or inconvenienced to make a difference.
The current boycott of Starbucks has reduced their company’s net worth by $4 Billion and counting. That’s a bunch of people deciding collectively to simply change their coffee shop. Small decisions by a lot of people make a huge impact.
This soap box moment isn’t to say you have to do things my way or you’re a bad person. I don’t think that at all–I believe everyone is doing the best they can with the tools they have at the time. My point in this article is to help you understand the way I think about resources in hopes that you will take what you like and leave the rest.
I try to be a river not a reservoir in life and get intentional about where I flow my resources. Yeah, it’s more of a hassle to figure out where to get my audiobooks since Amazon gobbled up audible. It’s more of a hassle to shop locally than buy from Bezos. But I want to make a difference in my tiny corner of the world, and support my communities. That matters more to me than a small inconvenience.
Further reading: What if Tipping Revolutionized the World?
Follow Focused on Infinity on Instagram, and Patreon for further tips on prepping and mobilizing in these times. I’m really appreciating Logan’s leadership and empowerment in these continually unprecedented times.
P.S. This post is an adaptation of an article published in issue 2 of the Goddess Quarterly, a zine for Goddesses who heal with plant medicine.
If you find value in this blog, please consider supporting! It costs hundreds per year to maintain the archives and I want it to be a resource for anyone who needs it!
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Email list: http://eepurl.com/dyX3db
Buy anything on Amazon using this link to go to their website and I make a 3% commission on anything you buy! Costs nothing extra to you and cuts into that “astronaut’s” profits just a lil bit. https://amzn.to/2PQ52A9
Threads, Tik Tok, Twitter: @bevinsparty
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Like/subscribe/review/send a link to a friend! It all helps!