At the end of the week, I felt better in my head in that I was eating veggies. I also found that my bowl movements were more regular — maybe TMI, but for many people, this is a great improvement!

On to week two!

I was content

Within the confines of my new found freedom

To be strong

To move forward

To take care of everything.

Then the shell cracked.

I had grown beyond the walls that held me,

These walls of freedom.

I wanted more.

A warm wind woke desire.

A soft light beckoned through the cracks.

Intrigued, I struggled

And sought my escape.

You did not reach back for me,

You did not crack the shell and peel the pieces back.

You did not wipe the slime from my eyes

Nor knock the remnants off my skin.

You did so much more.

You cheered each struggle,

You showed me where pieces clung to my back,

You pointed to the way of escape.

Always letting me fight my way.

I emerged

Unfurling the wings of my beauty,

My true freedom.

Bathing in your light.

You are my sunshine.

Absolutely, we don’t want to go around telling people everything we think of them. But when a group of people allow one individual to be so unhappy, so miserable, so stuck in a hole, never saying anything…that is wrong.

In my new family, there is one woman who has the potential to be a very strong person. Yet, everyone around her allows her to be unhappy and manipulative. In her unhappiness, she manipulates those around her with her anger, sadness, and psychological weaknesses. She often uses those who care for her like tools for her own benefit, rarely saying thank you or appreciating what they do. Instead, she will often make a snide comment about what they have done, or point out how it could have helped her better. She rarely takes on the responsibility of her children, calling on others to help her. Yet, she will turn around and use her children like tools in a game with those who care about them.

So, anyone who knows me knows that I am all about women. My politics is feminism. I’m not right or left, I’m feminist. I work to empower women to be the strongest, most capable person they can.

I saw what this woman was doing, and it made me so frustrated to see how everyone around her allowed her to stay unhappy and weak. I refused. At one point, she tried her manipulation on me, and I countered.

I told her that everyone around her allowed her to be unhappy and manipulative. I said that I could help her find the happiness within herself, but that I would not take her BS. I told her that she could be happy, but that she had to decide that. I never used an angry tone, but voiced this out of compassion.

Of course, she hasn’t appreciated yet what I’ve said, but a couple of people she forwarded the information to told me that they were glad that someone stood up and said something to her. I also spent a long time chanting for her true happiness, and I plan on continuing to work to encourage her to become happy.

So my point is, how many of you let women (or others) around you be unhappy because you’re scared to say something or don’t want to make waves? How many of us let people sit in a pit of darkness because we don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings? Are you really helping or keeping them sitting in a life of hell?

Love has to come from love of self before we can truly love others. Love is freedom and happiness–our own freedom from the external influences around us, and the freedom to allow those we love to be who they are. Love is working to pull forth our own happiness from within and the desire that the other person becomes even happier than we are. Love of self comes from a strong sense of who we are, that we are awesome just the way we are.

If we are being influenced into being unhappy or angry by others, or those we “love,” then it is a sure sign that we do not really believe we are awesome (Buddhas), but that we are looking for validation from others, often through the “proof” that someone loves us. We can only develop a strong identity of self through our thoughts, words and actions each day.

When we work to develop our inner potential, then we realize our self worth. If we waste our days away doing nothing of real value, or succumbing to the negative influences of the world around us, we buy in to what others say or do, allowing “them” to influence our identity of self worth.

Each of us are awesome just as we are. We are Buddhas, just as we are. There is room for improvement, for pulling from within our highest potential, but we are wondrous beings in this moment.

Live in this moment. It is all there is.

4 cans (10oz ea) chicken broth

1 roasted chicken whole

2 tbsps. olive oil

2 tbsps. minced garlic

1 yellow onion diced by hand into 1 inch pieces

1 can whole kernel corn

2  12oz. bags of microwavable mixed vegetables (Birds Eye Steamfresh: broccoli, carrots, sugar snap peas and water chestnuts mix)

1 tsp. salt

1 tbsp. oregano

1 tbsp. thyme

1 tsp. pepper

4 cups water

Directions 

Put one cup water in to a large crock pot and turn on to high. Shred roasted chicken into the crock pot. I tend to use a pre-roasted chicken from the store as I usually make this when I’m sick with the flu. You can also roast your own chicken. Be sure to use good seasonings when roasting the chicken. Do not put the skin in the soup pot.

Heat the four cans of chicken broth in a pan to boiling. Pour over the chicken in the crock pot. This helps to speed up the cooking process.  Cover and let sit as you prepare the veggies.

Pour two tablespoons of olive oil into a large skillet. Sauté garlic and onion for about 5 minutes. Add in corn and simmer for 2 minutes. Add in oregano, thyme, salt and pepper.  Crumble the oregano and thyme as you put it in to release the flavor if using dried seasonings, which is what I use for soups. Stir until well incorporated.  Add in frozen vegetables and stir well. Cover and let simmer for about 5 minutes until veggies are heated.  Pour veggie mixture into chicken mixture in the crock pot. Heat the remaining water until it is boiling. Add the water in until the crock pot is full.  Let cook for 2 to 4 hours.  Ladle over rice or dip fresh sour dough bread into a hot steaming bowl.

To release the healing magic of the chicken soup, it must be made at least in part by one other than who is sick. It is best if prepared and given in bed to the ill person.  It’s all about the magic!

**If you do not have a crock pot, you can do all the above in a large pot set on low/simmer.

2 cups spelt flour
¼ cup quinoa flour
¼ cup oat flour
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. baking powder
½ tsp. sea salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
½ cup flax seed meal
½ cup warm water
1 cup Smart Balance
2/3 cup organic dark brown sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup mashed ripe bananas
½ to 1 cup of soy milk

Combine flours and sift. Add in baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Mix and set aside. Add the warm water to the flax seed meal in a small bowl or coffee cup. Stir after 30 seconds, then let sit for 2 or 3 minutes (this is your egg replacement). Warm Smart Balance (I use the microwave) until just starting to melt. Add in the brown sugar and mix (I mix by hand with a large wooden spoon). Add in the vanilla and flax seed meal goop, then mix. Add in the bananas and mix. Add in 1/3 of the flour mixture and mix well. Then add in ¼ to ½ cup of soy milk. Do this until the flour mixture is all added in and the batter is thick but pourable. This depends on how much bananas you used and your flax seed mixture.

Your batter should be thick enough to hold in place for a few seconds when moved with the spoon, but not stay there permanently.

Pour into an oiled loaf pan. Cook at 375 F. 45 to 60 minutes (when a sharp knife comes out clean when stuck in the middle of the loaf).

Jocelyn Parkhurst, Ph.D. -- President and Executive Director of Changing Tides

I received my Ph.D. in Political Science at Washington State University in 2004. After teaching for 2 years at Soka University in Orange County, California, and then 1 year at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington, in 2006, I began a five year full time faculty run at Lewis-Clark State College in Idaho. Currently, while still teaching numerous online courses at a variety of online and ground based institutions, I am the President and Executive Director of a non-profit organization, Changing Tides, Inc., that seeks to connect at risk groups to education.

I have been lucky and privilged to find a wonderful husband, and we work to blend our two families into one. Much of what you will see on these pages reflects this effort and the positive outcomes, and struggles, that we experience.

I hope you enjoy!

At the very basic level, Buddhist philosophy is about how to become happy. Most religions out there are based on this same idea. Deep in our hearts, we want to be happy, we want our families to be happy, and we would like to see a world around us that shines in happiness. Ok, so a few people just turned to the side and made pukey sounds, and certainly there are deranged people out there that seem to thrive in anger and violence, but I think that’s more because they don’t believe in happiness rather than they don’t want it. The belief that you cannot attain a happy state makes you take actions to insure the next best thing: power.

But I digress (I’ll get back to power and happiness another time). This is about the basics of Buddhist belief, and as I said, it’s about being happy. Now, you can’t really be happy if you think happiness in only based on the stuff you get in life: cars, women, men, houses, food, etc. This kind of happiness is only short lived, about as long as the newness of these “things” lasts (like a second in some cases). Before you know it, the car is broke, the woman or man is bugging the shit out of you, the roof needs fixing and the food has gotten cold. This kind of happiness relies on external influences in your life. Anything external to you is not going to last, because external stuff comes and goes. The only way you can truly be happy in your life is to find happiness within yourself.

Well, no shit you say, I’ve heard that one a million times. Yeah, I know. The real key is finding this happiness. Over the thousands of years humans have been around on this planet, different enlightened people have been able to develop this state of happiness in their lives. Yet the vast majority of us have not. It’s not because we’re deficient or lacking in any way, it’s just because it’s hard to do.

This state of happiness is our most pure aspect of ourselves, our most compassionate self, our “Buddha” self. Our state of enlightenment. When we live in a world filled with anger, greed, and ignorance (stupidity some say), these influences cloud our pure state of happiness. We can’t really see happiness in our lives, which means we can’t see it in the world around us either. Somehow, we have to find a way to uncover this pure state of happiness that is deep within ourselves.

Different Buddhist beliefs use different techniques to try and find this pure self. Some believe that eliminating all thoughts will get you there, or living on an isolated mountain, or a deep meditative state. What I do is an active meditation that allows me to first feel my pure, happy, compassionate self, and then to keep it as best as I can as I go about my daily life. Am I perfect at being happy? Ha! Of course not. I can actually be quite emotional at times. I’m a regular, normal person with ups and downs. But when I chant (the active meditation), I can handle the daily struggles I go through better, and I have less of a roller coaster ride each day. Strength, happiness, and compassion emerge, and are reflected in the world around me. I can enjoy a state of happiness regardless of what issues I have to face that day. Indeed, the chanting, or active meditation, makes me handle daily problems in a more constructive way, in ways that create a positive outcome for everyone around me.

Happiness isn’t an endpoint; happiness is part of the path we travel on every day.

When we look at the reasons why people join extremist groups, there is no one clear answer. While almost all extremists have an ideological or belief system that guides their actions, from political to religious, ideology cannot explain motivation. Psychologically, people want to be part of a group, use groups to create identity or family, often an identity lost to war, oppression, or social upheaval.  Economically, people either see value enhancement in joining an extremist group or a desire to obtain their share of the pie. Politically, extremists may desire the political freedom to develop the social, political, economic and religious world they believe is best, or are responding to policy that has taken away their way of life.  These are just a few reasons why people become terrorists.

If we are going to combat terrorism, we must change the approach states have taken thus far. Policy actions towards terrorism have produced a net gain in terrorists and terrorist actions in the last decade, not decreased them.  In order to eliminate any problem, it must first be addressed at causation, or it is simply a band aid that will never be able to hold back the tide of blood.