that glutton is still in suk wah

before hwubby going away for a week, i pack him up good, i mean, pack up a box of provisions and another of medicine. he's determined to keep doing what we have learned from vaidyagrama and, believe you me, we have been working hard since coming home to implement whatever we can.

well, sure, cut me some slack if you will. there are still some practices i have not put in place yet. like what? like applying warm oil all over and keep it for thirty minutes as early morning practice. really. this is not india and it's winter. what with all the food practices i have to get up at three and do things naked in the kitchen. sorry, call me weakling, whatever.

anyway this is not about me. back to hwubby. bless his heart. keep in mind he is staying with a friend. so, being considerate and sensitive as he is, he makes sure he gets everything done before the friend gets up. it means applying oil, making food including rolling chapati and preparing medicine. granted he says, my chapati is like rubber, you have to give me a chapati lesson. but he cooks mung bean, germ of wheat, quinoa.

then i see there're half of the medicine left. he says, yeah, breakfast i do great but then i just can't keep up with it in the evening. it's hard. either he's out there or he gets in late. since the meds are all liquid we need to get some tiny containers that don't leak so he can take them with him. anyhow he says, i just realize how much work it takes for you to keep both of us going day to day.

what is the hardest thing in keeping a satvic diet? hwubby says, not the diet itself, the hardest is what's going on around us, while in vaidyagram it's the mind that is rambling, but now back in the world triggers and temptations are in your face all the time. true. and it doesn't help he has a history of espresso, lox and bagel, pastries, salad, pastrami. on one hand his palate is fundamentally transformed. he basically doesn't want to have what's offered out there. on another hand, these are entrenched tendencies. there are residual conditioning and they can get at you hard, like the aroma of a fresh croissant and well-made latte.

hey, i am no saint either. i am fortunate. for the most part, i don't have to go to these events and functions. i barely go out at all. still i have weak spots all over the place. for instance, fresh chapati with almond butter and sprinkled sugar. i can hear the stomach say, hmmm, too heavy. but can i cut it out for good? i don't know. i look at that nice, fresh dough and i forget. what can i say. i am really happy with a bowl of congee, with milk or ghee, and veg. it's beautiful. it's deliiish. but...there's still that glutton in suk wah. i see that dough, almond butter and sugar and the mind is insanely overcome with the thought, i have to have it. hwubby is right. get that suk wah in a chinese restaurant she will go nuts. i know. i was talking to a chinese meditator. what were we talking about? comparing notes on traditional shanghainese food. perfectly stewed fiver flower belly. fried and braised eel. spicy beef.

hwubby asks dr harikrishnan, when will it go away? doctorji goes quiet, thinks deeply. in his signature quiet, steady and wise tone of voice, he says, eventually. then another pause before he says, after several courses of treatments. i guess this is kind of like cleaning a very dirty pot that has a lot of hard stains. i have to scrub very hard and i have to do it several rounds. and you know what. i keep at it. the pot is now shining.

life of minimals. life of abundance

hwubby goes to a sunday brunch event. he says, i want  some suji and chapati before leaving the house. i say, o, okay. later in the day i say, how did it go? of course he knows i mean the food situation. he says, there’s omelette, lox, cream cheese. i say, that sounds great. he says, i don’t really want to have any of it, well, a little of it, but... i say, a-huh, it’s not like you have to have a whole plate of it. he says, yeah. pause. he says, i have herbal tea in phil’s. that’s the coffee place he likes to go to. in fact, he has the pic to prove it.

wow. this is major, fundamental transformation. it means his palate has changed in a huge way. actually, mine too. we’ve been back almost three weeks. by and large we have been eating the way we were in vaidyagrama. okay, except almond butter and sprinkling sugar on chapati. just simple vegetarian food. i think i can safely say on behalf of hwubby as well that we don’t feel deprived in any way. in fact we have no desire to eat any other way. this is huge shift. keep in mind this is the chinese new year season. all kinds of yum yum things are calling me. it amazes me that i don’t really miss them. not that i don’t remember how deliiiish they are. i don’t even miss not using onion and garlic.  hwubby says, i was in the grocery store, i had to be on a long line, i watch what’s going on and i just think to myself, how is it that we need five thousand varieties of everything. i know. dr ramkumar says, living a life without excesses, a life of minimals, is a life of abundance. so true. and it’s not just some truth some expert says. it’s my experience. i live it. it’s a state of abundance when the mind is that much quieter and clearer.

salutations to chapati, my own chapati

miracle of miracles. i can eat chapati. it has to be my very own handcrafted chapati. but, the point is, i am free from this gluten-free restriction. how does it happen? i don’t know. since the only thing that has happened since my last chapati is....panchakarma i can only wildly guess that all that purging and oiling and baasti-ing have something to do with it. as i receive from my meditation today, i realize i am a great alchemist. there is this huge mystical world within me. so much alchemy that are beyond the radar screen of regular awareness is going on. i probably will never know the detailed biochemical action that is involved. but, who cares. i don’t have to know how electricity works to enjoy its benefits, right? i do know this, though. a big part of what they do in vaidyagrama is to get my digestive fire up. with so much toxins removed and i am striving to do the right things, like, not to drink cold things, particularly during meals, my digestive fire is not dampened the way it was used to. really, i had my days of downing icy coke while overeating. 

of course there is challenge down the line. for instance, does it mean i am never going to have ice cream again? what about my lovely ice cream maker? is it goodwill bound? and check this one out. when am i going to start churning butter?

to be continued. meanwhile i enjoy my hot off the stovetop chapati. generously dollop ghee - handcrafted by....me - and, this part is not to be revealed to my dr hari k, sprinkled with organice cane sugar and almond butter. it’s yummy breakfast with a cup of tea, i mean, that tea as made in vaidyagrama, aka, chai without black tea.


have i also mentioned it's thrilling to see the almost done chapati swell to this happy buddha belly? the earthy aroma is golden and tantalizing. i am mouthwatering and all fired up.

enough is my nature

here's what i've come to believe. when i sit down with the intention to meditate whatever happens is meditation. so it is when i sit through today's session with a foggy mind humming with fatigue i choose to take an inner stance of the highest and innermost self is looking at mental clouds coming and going over the vast sky of pure consciousness. i see how i got the mind into this state. i've been up since five working through a bunch of things in a hotel room, making ginger water, chapati, chai, packing a day's worth of food and snack for hwubby and a business meeting, all before meditation and on an empty stomach. i have to do better tomorrow. since i can't meditate until hwubby leaves i have to have breakfast around seven and figure out meditation later.

do i feel i have a 'good enough' meditation today? you bet i do. i am enough and good enough. enough is my very inherent nature.

triumphant return of chapati

after four weeks of liquid diet and another month of roasted sooji (wheat germ), all because of difficult healing after extensive gum surgery, hwubby says, can i have chapati? i say, you bet, how about with spiced milk? he says, sure. fresh chapati, which i like to refer to as indian matza, sprinkled with ajwain and cumin seeds and topped with home-made ghee, is truly a taste in heaven. a nurturing, invigorating aroma fills the entire being as well as the kitchen. hwubby says, what hwubby is so fortunate to have fresh chapati every morning but me? he's right. and what about the spiced milk? besides adding spices for various purposes it involves a cup of milk and four cups of water boiling down to one cup. turmeric and saffron turn it into gentle molten gold. hwubby always saves me a little of each and then laid them out on beautiful china for me. absolutely food fit for an empress.

i'm not self-congratulatory but i have to say, such bread and milk truly look deceptively simple, it takes subtle skills and sustained attention, it is yoga.

kneading chapati is revelatory

i don't eat wheat but i have to say, warm chapati coated with and dripping ghee, and by the way, i knead the dough and make my own ghee, is out of this world and beyond. satisfying yet light. the ghee is a bundle of yummy sunshine. hey, it takes one and a half hours to process three pounds of butter to get it crystal clear. the result? intoxicating sweetness that is subtle. worth all that one and a half hours watching over the boiling butter.

kneading chapati dough after coming out of meditation is such a nice way to transition from the inner world into the outer. feeling the flour and water coming together under the rhythmic motion of the fingers and palm makes me realize that the two worlds are not separate. one is in the other and vice versa. i watch a core miracle being created and i am a participant. two seemingly so different things merge into one thing, something that is like caterpillar turning into butterfly. alchemy happens beyond the physical eyes and the touch of hand. often i wonder what happens in meditation when the body and mind say, nothing's happening. as i press the ball of my palm into the dough that is now like earlobe i recognize that i don't see the subtle shifts in my awareness and understanding as they take place quietly but i do see the end result. i've been handling the tests presented to us beautifully. i'm schlepping a whole ayurveda kitchen across the country and work hard to make it work in other people's homes. i'm just days into this way of cooking. hwubby says, and you're doing it with such calm and ease, so flexible and resilient.

stay in the moment. listen.

there i am. for the first time meditating in the posture perfect for traveling. reclined pose. it works well. how can i tell? because in the midst of singing om i get this message from within. chapati. i know right away what it means. i didn't go to bed until 4 am. i decided to make chapati for hwubby in the morning instead of getting the dough ready at three thirty in the night after thirteen hours of traveling because of a plane delay. i end up sleeping in. so by the time i meditate hwubby is about to leave in an hour or so. it would not be the end of the world if i were to miss the timeline. as hwubby sweetly and kindly says, it's okay if i had it later or even miss it for a day. the point is the inner self is truly aware of all that's going on. the real message i am getting is this. stay in the moment. listen. thanks so much, inner self.