To provide sustenance
A nourishing image is a tool to have in times of stress so you know how to create calm and the feeling of being cared for. A nourishing image can set the stage to relax. Even in a very hard life there are small moments of nourishment such as a word someone says to you, a favorite song, a taste that recalls the sense of being nourished. Comfort food.
My mother was not a great cook but I didn’t know that until I married one. Growing up my mom cook every night having well balanced meal on the table for my sister, my dad and me. I knew our dinner was well balanced because we used those old fashion section plates and there was a vegetable, starch and meat in each of the three sections. Chicken and dumplings cooked in the pressure cooker was one of our favorite meals. I may have requested chix and dumpings, as my grand daughter now calls it, for every birthday dinner. I passed the tradition onto my own family and we figured out a way to make it vegetarian so Maura could enjoy the infamous dumpling dinner too.
What is your comfort food? How do you nourish your body, mind and spirit?
Tools and Light
Students write that when they are stressed music works for them, either making beats or listening to a favorite song brings calm or joy by recalling a better time. I still go back to my favorite college tunes, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, the Allman brothers, Marvin Gaye and recently adding some country western, the Zac Brown Band. We just went to hear ZBB, at Fenway. We had lived the song, Free, as ZZB sings 'Living out in our 'ol van, travel across this land just me and you.'
At the beginning of Covid shut down my husband and I learned no one could fly home so we couldn't meet the kids on the Cape. So we rented a van and headed west. Camping in state parks, since all the national parks were closed, was a new experience for us. Just learning how contagious and devastating Covid 19 could be I was worried about using the shower in the rest room or washing the dishes at the outside sink. But as it turned out no one else was out there. Once a big RV plugged in all the inhabitants were sequestered inside. It was just Mark and I and our black lab Brady in our camper van with 50 feet between us and the next site. We’d stop in a park for our picnic lunch and move on down the road to another for park for the night. We didn’t need to be on the main highway since we weren’t staying in motels or eating in restaurants so we took the side roads through old American towns that don’t get many visitors. In Cheyenne Wyoming we were tested before we ventured down into Denver to surprise our five year old Madelyn and seven year old Ryan. Our family created a pod so we could safely go between our son and daughter’s home. That trip nourished our body, mind and spirit for the whole year.
What nourishes you? What in the past has worked for you? What are you doing right now to feel cared for? What else would you like to do for yourself in the future?
Take a moment and think about that. Let’s make a plan, maybe write your plan down, maybe even let others know so they can support you in taking care of yourself. Everyone benefits.
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