Get in the Christmas Mood

by | Dec 3, 2019 | Asheville, Holidays, Lifestyle

Not in the mood for Christmas? No jingle in your bells? No jolly in your holly? No. . . . okay, okay . . . you get my (snow)drift. What you need is a Christmas mood enhancer. If it seems that you always get in the mood on the 24th of December, and then feel like you’ve missed out on the whole Christmas Spirit, start early this year. Here are a few tips to get into the spirit of the season.

Play Christmas songs at home. You can pick up a Christmas CD at a department store,  or visit your local library to find classical or modern Christmas music. Dancing to Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree, or swooning to Elvis’ Blue Christmas will surely lift your spirits.

Bake cookies. You can’t beat the smell of homemade cookies baking in the oven. Use those cookie cutters you have stuck in the back of the cupboard to make stars, trees, and gingerbread boys and girls. Use different colors of icing to decorate them, then sprinkle with edible glitter.

Make apple cider. Get some plain apple juice and pour it into a big pot. Add cinnamon sticks and cloves. Peel and slice an orange or two and float the slices in the top of the juice. Cook on low until heated thoroughly. Strain the cloves before serving. 

Buy tangerines. Purchase the very small, easy-to-peel kind. There is something about that juicy little citrus fruit that just makes you think “Christmas.” They’re also yummy and good for you. They look really nice in a bowl as a centerpiece, too.

Put up lights. It’s okay if you don’t have your tree yet. Wrap the little white twinkle lights around a baker’s rack or book stand. One of my favorite places for lights is the little space between the top of the kitchen cabinets and the ceiling.  It makes your kitchen look so cozy at night.

Watch Christmas movies. There are so many to choose from: Miracle on 34th Street, A Christmas Story, Winter Wonderland, It’s A Wonderful Life, Elf. Anything that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy will work. Just put on a pair of comfy, flannel pajamas, pop some popcorn, and settle in.

Buy a holiday decorative item. Just some little something to cozy up a corner.

Read Little Women. You can’t read about Jo cutting her hair and still feel Christmas-neutral.

Buy a gift for someone you love, or make a donation to your favorite charity in the name of someone you love.

If all this fails . . . get into your car and drive around. Other people have had their lights up since Halloween. Don’t forget to take your Christmas music with you.

The Pretty Poinsettia

The Pretty Poinsettia

by | Dec 3, 2019 | Asheville, Holidays, Lifestyle

Is there any other flower that says “Christmas” more than a poinsettia? I grew up in Florida and remember our poinsettia plant; it was at least five feet tall! My siblings and I picked the blooms with little care of the “milk” that leaked from the stems and ran down our arms. I was later told that the leaves and liquid are poisonous, but according to the National Poison Center in Atlanta, Georgia, that folklore is fortunately false. While the sticky liquid may cause skin irritation, and eating an abundance of the leaves can cause stomach irritation, the plant is not poisonous for humans or animals.

Here are a few true facts about the pretty red-leafed plant ~

Dr. Joel Roberts Poinsett, an amateur botanist and first United States ambassador to Mexico, discovered the dazzling red colored shrub and sent cuttings to his home in Greenville, South Carolina. December 12 is National Poinsettia Day in honor of Dr. Poinsett. He died on December 12, 1851.

The red we see is actually not the flower, but the leaves. The flower is the yellow cluster of buds in the center. When purchasing a poinsettia plant, look for clusters of buds that have not yet opened.

Red is the most popular color, but you can also find pink, white, apricot, salmon, yellow, variegated, speckled, or marbled varieties.

Red is also considered to be a symbol of purity. In Mexico, the red poinsettia is called the “Flower of the Holy Night.”

California is the top producer of the poinsettia plant, but North Carolina comes in at a close second.

In tropical climates, the poinsettia can grow to over 12 feet high, and leaves can measure six to eight inches across.

The red leaves can be used as a natural dye for fabric.

Poinsettias can be a bit persnickety requiring proper light, water, and temperatures. Avoid hot or cold drafts; keep the soil moist, but not soggy; keep the temperature around 60 to 70 degrees; and place your plant where it will get sufficient natural light.

Over 80% of poinsettias are purchased by women. Sounds like a good idea. I think I’ll go purchase a pretty pink poinsettia. 🙂

Celebrating Tradition

Celebrating Tradition

by | Dec 3, 2019 | Asheville, Family, Lifestyle

Traditions are actions we repeat yearly, monthly, or daily. They help to keep us grounded and connected to the past; they can be elaborate celebrations or simple endeavors. These customs enrich our lives and create lasting memories. They take an ordinary activity and turn it into something meaningful and special. Family traditions are especially important for children because they help to shape the child’s identity and belief system. When a tradition is connected to a family’s culture or history, the child grows up with a stronger image of who he or she is which leads to having higher confidence levels and feeling more secure.

Doing the same thing every night or every second Saturday of the month or every winter may at first glance seem monotonous or boring. However, if the action is intentional, meaningful, and dependable, the event can be comforting and reassuring. There are so many things in life you can’t count on; but something as simple as pizza every Friday night, or as special as a night out on your birthday or anniversary will give you something to look forward to.

Traditions are also important because they impart and perpetuate family values. When children are read a bedtime story each night, they learn that reading is delightful entertainment and education is important. When younger generations learn how to cook meals from their grandmother, they learn more than how not to burn the biscuits. They learn family customs and heritage, as well as how to connect the past to the present. Even chores can become a tradition. When families have “work day” on Saturday mornings, children learn to pick up after themselves and to be accountable. I remember sweeping the front porch with my grandmother every weekend. Now, when I sweep my porch, I remember our sweet time together. These seemingly small traditions strengthen family ties. Accidental events can also lead to beloved rituals. A young child may innocently change the words to a well-known song; adults may sing along until the “new words” become accepted as customary. Hardships can also lead to cherished memories and traditions. As a young wife and mother, there was not much money to spare in our household—especially during the Christmas holiday. There was however, a mountain full of pine trees on our property. Each Thanksgiving Day we trekked out to find a Christmas tree to cut down, bring inside, and decorate. What began as a way to save money became a fun outing each year. Our “Charlie Brown” trees were not impressive to others, but to our family, they were magnificent.

Christmas, Hanukkah, and the Winter Solstice are traditionally the perfect time to start and continue traditions. These cold-weather celebrations usually include some sort of fire (bonfires and candles), food (sugar cookies and turkey), songs (Jingle Bells and Greensleeves), and decorations (paper snowflakes and live poinsettias). Clothing is also used as a sign of celebration. My young children came up with their own scheme; each Christmas Eve they wore red and green pajamas. If one wore a red top and green bottoms, the other wore a green top with red bottoms. The sweet part of this tradition is that they came up with the idea on their own and kept it alive for many years.

Another meaningful tradition is to have a “releasing ceremony.” This is an intentional effort to release goals and dreams for the upcoming year, or to release regrets of the past year. It’s often accomplished by writing your intentions or regrets on a slip of paper or block of wood, and then burning it. The visual of watching the paper or wood burn as the smoke rises is a powerful image. It symbolically
releases the dream—or the burden—allowing you to begin the new year with clarity and resolve.

Traditions that have a purpose and are personal to your family make wonderful memories—whether they are simple or extravagant. This busy time of gathering and feasting is balanced with simple traditions of quietly watching sunsets and sipping hot chocolate. Whatever your traditions are and whatever new traditions you begin, I hope your holiday is merry!

Holiday Conversations Worth Having

Holiday Conversations Worth Having

by | Dec 3, 2019 | Asheville, Collaborative Learning, Conversation

By Cheri Torres

Holiday season brings joyful expectations. It is also often accompanied by stress and anxiety. Paying attention to your interactions and intentionally fostering a positive tone and direction can go a long way toward making sure your holidays stay fun and happy.

Watch that Non-Stop Inner Dialogue

This is a time of year to intentionally watch your conversations. Make sure they’re worth having. Begin with the conversations you’re having with yourself. Is your internal dialogue fueling stress and anxiety? If you’re fretting, worrying, imagining what might go wrong, the answer is yes. Those kinds of inner conversations heavily influence what actually happens. Here’s how: Biologically, these conversations trigger the release of “stress hormones”: Cortisol, norepinephrine, and testosterone are the three major ones. This biochemical soup preps our fight or flight response. The bigger the dose, the bigger the response. This, in turn:

•  Increases our heart rate

•  Increases our blood pressure

•  Suppresses our immune system

•  Decreases access to the brain’s prefrontal lobe and neocortex, which means limited access to emotional intelligence, creativity, and higher order thinking. It influences perception, even affecting our ability to hear and see accurately.

When we’re primed in this way, we often over-react, misjudge, misunderstand, respond aggressively, snap, and make bad decisions. Such stress leads to over-eating and drinking, which in turn, inhibits a good night’s sleep, adding to our stress. All our fears
and anxieties become self-fulfilling prophecies.

What to do?

Pay attention to those internal conversations.
Stop the inner critic and negative voice in three steps:
Pause, breathe, and get curious.

Pause. When you pause, you step back for a moment. In stepping back, you have the opportunity to recognize you are not your thoughts and inner comments. You are simply having them, which means you can choose to have different thoughts.

Breathe. Take a few deep belly breaths. This too gives you distance from the thoughts and it has a calming effect on the nervous system, giving you just enough space to ask a question.

Get Curious. This is how you begin to shift your thinking. Ask yourself a few generative questions, one’s that help you shift your thinking:

•  Am I tired? Hungry?
Overwhelmed? What do I need right now?

• What do I want to happen?

•  What assumptions am I making?

•  What can I do to influence what actually happens?

•  Are my beliefs about a situation true? Am I sure? Absolutely sure?

•  What’s really important right now?

•  Who might help? What might I ask for?

•  What might be going on for the other person? What else might explain their behavior?

Curiosity naturally shifts your brain chemistry. Just asking questions like these and sincerely entertaining them, will loosen the grip that stressful thinking has. Pay attention to the new thinking that emerges. Watch for opportunities to ask questions that create compelling positive images of what you would like to have happen, such as opportunities for real connection, a focus on love and care, or dinner conversations that inspire and connect everyone.

Conversations at Family Gatherings

Speaking of dinner conversations. Conflicting views on politics can turn an otherwise happy occasion into an acid stomach and a “Thank goodness that’s over for another year!” experience. This year try something different. Instead of attempting to make sure touchy topics don’t arise, pause, breathe and get curious. While everyone else is still holding their breath, turn that controversial comment into a conversation worth having by asking questions. Ask generative questions: questions that shift the way people think, deepen understanding and connection, and shine the light on the thinking and feeling behind the comment. Regardless of who says it or which side of the political arena they are on, you can invite them to go deeper. If someone offers a bold and profound statement about one party or the other, or some event, come from a place of genuine curiosity:

•  What makes you think that?

•  What do you think is really go on?

•  What do you think is in the best interests of our country?

•  What’s most important to you in all of this and why?

•  How might we find a pathway forward that unites us?

•  Where do you get your information and how do you fact check? How can we know if our fact checker is legit?

•   Underneath all of this, what are we really most afraid of or concerned about?

•  If you were in charge, what would you do?

Each of these questions might be answered by multiple people leading to a discussion that just might turn into a conversation worth having.

Alternatively, start your own conversations about what’s important at the local level. People might have controversial answers, but you can frame the conversations in ways that allow you to keep coming back to an outcome that works for everyone. When objections are raised, return to, “Yes, but what if we could . . .. Imagine that . . . How might we . . .”

May your holidays be filled with joy and opportunities to continuous move towards connections and
outcomes that work for all of us.

The Myth of Gluten Free

The Myth of Gluten Free

by | Dec 3, 2019 | Asheville, Food, Health

By Laurie Richardone

It’s easy for us to make a decision about something, before we’ve had an opportunity to experience it. Gluten Free cooking is a case in point. Many restaurants offer gluten free alternatives that are not prepared with the same love or attention as their other dishes. This only supports the myth that gluten free food is a lesser cuisine.

Gluten free is as ancient as the hills, a way of eating that is natural to the majority of world people. It’s not about taking something out, It’s about using different beneficial ingredients to create delicious food. There are so many flours utilized by experienced gluten free chefs to create flavors and textures that are scrumptious. I myself have experimented on countless recipes to transform many traditional gluten filled foods into dishes that are lower in carbs, easier to digest, and exquisitely flavorful. Whether gluten sensitive or not, eating a wheat free diet is beneficial. Be thankful to be forced into this gluten free world, your palate will be forever grateful.

Let me share my personal journey. Several years ago, I was experiencing chronic stomach pain and headaches. It was suggested  that I eliminate wheat from my diet. Having  grown up in a large Italian family enjoying wonderful traditional foods, like pasta, pastries, and of course great bread from Brooklyn bakeries, the thought of a gluten free existence was depressing. Fortunately my travels to Italy have taken me to many wonderful local markets, and as such I began to realize that flours like chestnut, garbanzo and almond have always been staples of Italian cooking: wheat is only one possibility. My newfound discoveries have led to my chronic stomach aches fading away. With this, my purpose became clear: I now happily teach seasonal, gluten, and grain-free cooking classes in an intimate setting at my home in Asheville. Someone once asked me what I do, I simply said “I help people feel their personal best through food, joy, and mindfulness.”

More people today are eager to live a healthy lifestyle. A big part of that is an awareness of the food we eat, where it comes from, and how it is grown. To have an understanding of the ingredients we consume is vitally important, as our health is directly related to the food we eat. Large conglomerates like Monsanto are no longer the only choice. I feel lucky to have found beautiful Asheville with its abundance of organic growers and ingredients. This bounty is my foundation to create delicious, gourmet, healthy food. The reward is sitting down with friends and family sharing a good meal.

Let’s raise our glasses to all the farmers, their labors of love, and the integrity to keep our land healthy.

To that end . . . prepare with pure fresh
ingredients, and let food be thy medicine.

Heeding The Call

Heeding The Call

by | Dec 3, 2019 | Asheville, Body Language, Feldenkrais Method

By Lavinia Plonka

A few days ago, a word popped into my head. Dithyramb. From nowhere. No NPR story. No romance novel. No scholarly treatise in recent memory had included that word. In fact, I had no idea what it meant, although at my age, that could simply mean I don’t remember. I shrugged and went on with my day. And then, every day, there it was, dithyramb. Like an earworm, you know, a song that goes on and on in your head and you can’t get rid of it. I recently battled Frank Sinatra’s anthem, “That’s Life” for a few days, thought I had conquered it, only to have my husband Ron sing it to me after the overloaded food processor spewed pureed beets all over my white linen shirt.

“Dithyramb,” said my brain as I dug up my bumper crop of Jerusalem artichoke. (Did you know Jerusalem artichokes are good for your gut bacteria? What to do with ten pounds of inulin rich tubers?) “Dithyramb,” it whispered as I attempted parallel parking on Haywood Rd. during rush hour. The multiple folds of my gray matter vibrated and echoed. Of course, lots of other words and ideas pop into our heads on a regular basis, like old songs, names of people I went to high school with, lists of various types of heirloom string beans. But they are polite, perhaps arriving unbidden, but leaving gracefully.

I could have just looked it up. But you know how it is. Like the friend you keep remembering you were supposed to call, except it’s 11PM, or you’re in the shower, or you misplaced your cell phone. And then you forget. So I would muse as I drove, or piloted my shopping cart through Trader Joe’s.  Was it some kind of ancient Greek musical instrument? Maybe a tool for divination? A mathematical term? Forget the why, at this point it was all about the what.

Finally I looked it up, slightly apprehensive that it might not even be a word. Or that it might be some inappropriate type of sex toy. Perhaps it was a word from another reality, another dimension,
and had no meaning here at all. But there it was. Dithyramb.

•  A wild choral hymn of ancient Greece, especially one dedicated to Dionysus.

•  A  passionate or inflated speech, poem, or other writing.

While I’ve done some wild dancing in my time, often influenced by the gifts of Dionysus, I have definitely never sung a wild choral hymn. Passionate or inflated speech however is another story. I have spent a good deal of my life either being told to shut up, or telling myself to button it. I even spent 25 years as a mime, perhaps because while expressing my passion usually ended up with my foot firmly in my mouth, the crafting of a mime piece actually required reasoned thought, choreography, and practice.

I worried that heeding the call of Dithyramb was the first symptom of “voices in my head.” What was my brain going to tell me next? And would it be Dithyrambic? “Go, Lavinia, stand in Pack Place and declaim your passion for the construction of a monorail above Merrimon Avenue!” “You must now invent a new recipe combining lichen and wild persimmon!” “This is the time to pull out those fishnet stockings from your 80’s punk period! Seize the moment!” Can you shut off your brain? Do Zen practitioners have dithyrambic interventions?

Every day, scientists are finding more stuff out about how our brains work. There is the brain’s glymphatic system flushing our brains every night. Glial cells, originally thought to be just “stuff” in our heads turn out to be key players in our neuronal health. They’ve even found the part of the brain responsible for earworms and that earworms can boost our mood, if they don’t drive us crazy.

What if the call to Dithyramb was some higher force trying to communicate with me, that I need to tune into some yet unidentified passion? How can I lean in, listen more deeply for what the ether is trying to tell me?  Or perhaps it’s simply that in my past life I was one of the mythical Eleusinian mimes (OK, a mime for all time!) who apparently were instrumental in these dithyrambic revels. For sure it’s a word that needs to re-enter our lexicon.
We need more wild choral hymns, more passionate speeches. Dionysus is calling.

Body language expert, Lavinia Plonka has taught The Feldenkrais Method for over 25 years. 

For more information, visit her at laviniaplonka.com

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