My Personal Development for 2009

I am welcoming the new year by working on some personal development - mental and physical. I want to share my experiences, not only for my readers, but also so that I can examine my progress.


Juice Feasting
To start the New Year in great health, I am juice feasting. I don't usually set a specific time frame in which to do this. Rather, I listen to my body and I'm finished when I'm finished. I have experienced a lot of physical changes over the last 1-2 years, and every so often, the time comes for me to let my body rest by not feeding it anything more it has to digest. By juicing, I am still getting all of the nutrients I need without the fiber to digest and breakdown. I have been feeling slightly tired and run down lately - most likely a result of my desire to hibernate all winter and the stress of finishing school and running my own business.

I feel great so far. I had a large salad and an apple right before midnight last night and have not eaten since. I had some citrus juice this morning made of grapefruit, orange, lemon, and lime. I have also had some Holy Basil tea. I plan on having a large green juice for dinner with celery, cucumber, parsley, cilantro, and mint. Most likely, more tea tonight too.

Creative Expression
I love expressing myself creatively, whether painting, writing, or making delicous and original raw food. Building my raw food business brought me back in touch with my creative self. It helped me to realize that I am creating in everything I do, and that art is not limited to one agreed upon definition. My food is my art, as is my love of sharing health and wellness.

My goal for this year is to express myself creatively in a myraid of ways. I love to write, which is a verbal expression of myself. I love to paint, which is a visual expression of myself. I love to share yoga, which is a physical and spiritual expression of myself. And, I love to make raw food and help people find their way back to health and happiness, which is an expression of my love. Through these acts, and many more, I hope to be creating most of the day and night, as I sleep.

I plan to paint everyday, if only for a little while. Painting helps me to focus my creativity, and calms my mind. It is as if I go into a trance and am allowing this expression of beauty to flow through me. For me, painting has similar emotional effects as seated meditation.

Meditation
I plan to meditate everyday, even if only for a short period of time. I meditate quite often, most days in fact, but usually only for a short time. Even ten minutes gives me a sense of calm and wellbeing. Often, my mind is awhirl, thoughts of everything I need to get done in the next week and ideas for new recipes and paintings fight for my attention.

This morning as soon as I woke up, I meditated for maybe fifteen minutes. I would have gone longer, but was very excited to begin juicing and just could not clear my head. Oh well, this is why I will practice seated meditation everyday.

Goal Setting
I have always been a goal setter. I find that things I put into writing often happen much faster than things which I do not put into writing. All of the leaders in the field of personal development talk about the importance of goal setting and writing things down. By writing something, it is as if you are affirming it, rather than allowing to to exist only as a fleeting thought.

I have a Vision Book, in which I write goals and dreams, paste pictures of places I want to visit, and write mantras and inspirational quotes. For a while, I was writing in this book daily, and I would love to get back into that habit. I accomplish more if I write out clear goals and ideas, and then record the steps necessary reach each one.

Gardening
My resolution for this year is to eat as much LOCAL organic produce as possible. This means that in addition to frequenting farmers markets every week, I am going to have to plant quite a large garden this year. I had only a few heirloom tomato plants last year, but they produced enough fruit that I had garden fresh tomatoes all summer long. I also had pepper plants which produced so much that I am still eating dried cayennes and jalepenos in January! I enjoyed gardening so immensely that I plan to at least triple the size of my garden this year.

Gardening is yet form of creation, except rather than working alone, one works harmoniously with Mother Nature to produce new life and nourishment. I feel more at peace when interacting with nature. Gardening is a way of helping the Earth do what she was meant to do - give life. By caring for seedlings which later become fruiting plants, we are giving love, and then receiving love in the form of fruits and flowers, vegetables, and more seeds.

I have already begun planning my spring garden. I am carefully choosing the heirloom variety seeds which I will plant with love and intention. I am also designing a small greenhouse to go up as soon as possible so that my seedlings will be ready to plant at the first possible date.


I will continue to post on my progress in all of these areas in the days and weeks to come.