Within/Without

Peace Family, I am very excited. I just made raw almond butter... In my own Kitchen!!!! Let me ' splain .... I am very particular about what I eat and what touches me. My skin and stomach are very sensitive. If I can make a toiletry or a eating product, I will. Even if it costs more, it is my opinion that you are better off eating fresh rather than eating perservatives . In 2004 I embarked on my annual 21 day juice fast. At that time I had an ineffective juicer. So I juiced some and drank ready made juice. Well one evening I went to sleep without rinsing out the glasses. The next day I looked at the two glasses that were left in the sink. The glass that received the fresh juice had mold in it. The glass with the store bought juice had nothing in it. The small amount of juice that was left in the glass hadn't even evaporated! I vowed in that moment to be more mindful of what I put in my body. The mount of preservatives in store bought juice, is not only perserving the juice. ...

I have decided to try a fermented beverage. I know a lot of people that advocate kumbucha, but they never have been able to tell me why. I’ve witnessed Gods at rallies walking around showing off their bottles offering folks a sip. I did the knowledge on kumbucha and it is tea, sugar and a big nasty mushroom looking thing that mothers the fermentation process. I bought a $3 16oz bottle too… and I don’t get the hoop la. I understand that this is a very natural form of ingesting probiotics. Okay. But the sugar and caffeine concern me. There is kefir. But again the mother is store-bought, expensive and not easy to find. Also Kefir is milk based. Since I’m not on milk now a days, I’m thinking milk is a bad idea. Rejuvelac…..! Rejuvelac is supposed to be a good source of probiotics, enzymes, B vitamins, and most of all fermented beverages are supposed to be good for my eczema. I decided to make it myself because I like the idea that I have control over the process. All the ingredients are ea...

One of my New Year’s resolutions for 2010 was to not pay attention to my weight this year. Meaning…. No dieting for the entire year. Embracing the 6 sextillion tons that is the Earth Serenity. On face value that may seem like an easy goal; but I work my diets like part time jobs. And still I am not the weight the weight I’d like to be. Or at least think I would like to be. Frankly, at this juncture, I have no idea what weight I should be. And I know all that constant on and off dieting that I have done since I was 14 has screwed up my metabolism royally. So…. I have decided to be bold and grown enough to through off the shackles of ideal weight and just focus on health. Okay… Protocol having been established…. How is it working out for me? You would think I would happy as a pig in shit. I’m not. I have been paralyzed with fear and loathing since the beginning of the year. The last time I threw off all dieting shackles I gained so much weight and so quickly that when I got marr...

I just tightened uup my hair so nice I feel compelled to share! Me and my locs go through it. My biggest complaints with my locs is that they take too long to hold down at the root. I know that the hair at the root will never be completely locked but it needn't look like a loc attached to an afro-let. Another complaint I have is that my locs seemed to be thinning at the root. I did some research online an found that I may be tightening them too frequently. I was doing it every 2 weeks. Now I tighten every 2 months. That seems to be working because the loc stopped being thin... AND I haven't lost one yet, although two of them joined when I didn't want them to. My routine for tighening locs is to use LottaBody. Its a setting lotion. A kick ass setting lotion that I used to use when I was permed. And it held TIGHT. OK.... I wash and condition my hair (I always wash when tightening, no poo when washing without tightening) with whatever is cheap or whatever is on hand. I...

Every year I say that I should lose weight. I put in the work until the scale stops moving. Once that happens I'm back to my old ways. Which really aren't all that bad with the exception of I really prefer snacks over meals, and i like ramen noodles a little too much. Well this year is going to be different. This year I'm not going to make those promises. This year, the only weight-related promise I am going to make is that I am going to fast from diets. The inspiration comes from the shopping fast I went on starting September of 2008. I never thought that I could refrain from shopping for a year but I did. (Come to think of it, that's when my skin problems started a fresh. Hmmmmm...)I learned a lot about Serenity and why I obsessively shopped like I did. I really punish myself behind my weight and always always feel mad guilty. Doing something about it is easier said than done. I don't eat a lot. I fast a lot. I don't exercise and I am almost 100% vegan. I real...

I was looking at my reflection in the mirror this morning and was shocked at what I saw. I saw. It's not that what I saw was disturbing; what was disturbing is that I hadn't seen it earlier. Because I Know it didn't just happen over night. I have had company for the last fortnight and I haven't been paying attention to things as I should. I Know... "All the above is cause by..." What I saw on my face was patches of dry skin. Yuck. I looked like a cheetah. You Know I handled that, right? I get dry skin often. It's nothing new. I have eczema, though not on my face at this present writing. I just said that to let y'all Know that I'm sensitive like that. I am getting older and my skin doesn't turn over as fast as it did when I was in my 20's. In addition, I never had acne outside of monthly blemishes that came and went with my cycle. So I'm not blessed with an abundance of natural oil on my skin. And thirdly (is thirdly a word?) it...

Y'all that follow this blog Know that I have issues with soy. Soy over feminizes both boys and girls. I blame it for the lack of deep voices in new men, the frequent occurrence of men with hips, boobs and booties and blame it especially for little girls getting their cycles while they are still playing with dolls. Soy is also bad if you're trying to conceive. If soy can fool with the expression it can fool with the Building as well. Also if you do the Knowledge to food labels, you will find that soy is in everything! It is not easily avoidable. And soy is on the top 10 list of foods that cause allergies. But this Build is not about soy. It is about something far more imbedded in human culture. It's about wheat. Wheat is one of the 1st domesticated agricultural products. There is not a Culture on this planet that does not list bread as a staple. But the bread has been tampered with. Genetically modified. And now folks are getting sick from something that they depe...