Forward
Who am I? And why Am I writing a cookbook?
It started with chronic pain from a tumor growing in the C7 of my spine.
Born blue in the face with my umbilical cord wrapped around my neck, my first experiences with life was a near-death experience. My first visual memory is of colorful Easter Eggs in the bright green grass of Rockford Illinois, to be more specific, a trailer park we lived in while I was a small boy, but don’t remember details of those younger years in the slightest. We moved into an a two bedroom apartment in Palatine IL, before I started kindergarten, and as a kid I thought nothing of the three beds, in one room, that me and my brother shared up till highschool. But it wasn’t until I had my own room that I started experiencing nightmares, and had intense issues with falling asleep. Part of the reason for this was because I couldn’t get questions like “what is nothing?” or “Why do I exist” out of my head, Question that didn’t arise till I started spending time completely alone.
Even tho I was raised kinda poor and in the middle of two brothers, I always felt like I had a huge family or community inside the religious world of Christian Church. I was well taken care of by the adults around me… as long as I followed certain righteous expectation that is. But it’s not totally their fault, they just made me believed everything I did and thought was judged by “God” himself… I didn’t actually know that religious brainwashing was just a giant load of ethical principles wrapped around and hidden inside of good intentioned stories and misinterpreted historical text meant to help me better understand the mystical world of spirituality and unified connectedness of all things on the planet and universe. But the church life and religious way of being is just what’s considered the norm at ground zero of the bible belt…. or at least so it was as far I knew and thought.
The community and social environment of church privileged me in a way I was ignorant of and oblivious to while growing up. Gathering around food with friends and family was a regular, almost forced at times, and my needs were met in abundance without knowing the opposite extreme for even a single day. This is my understanding of “white privilege in America” something I only fully understand now that I’m grown and can see the overwhelming dynamics in different cultures around the world, and even more so now today because I’ve traveled and now live in a city as diverse as San Francisco… diverse with culture, classes of finical wealth, and levels of consciousness.
The first time I slept on the street, or should I say the beach, was purely and experiment with friends while living in Honolulu Hawaii. I remember waking up with my face in the sand as a cockroach crawled inches from my eye. He was escaping the giant sand comber leveling out the beach for the tourist planning to bath in the sun that day.
My curiosity of homeless/nomadic lifestyles and new awareness of what it’s like to not have access to basic human necessities like warmth, clean water or food are a far cry from understanding survival as it is when ones is forced to experience the real thing. But I’m seeing now that it’s my personal curiosity about this question of “what is life” that makes me desire a better understand of what the human mind is and draws me to explore the different ways in which people choose, or feel forced to exist.
Today I realize, the true awareness I was looking for, comes from the answer to these questions, what does it mean to feel happy? and what is life? But personally, I was unable to arrive at these question because my mind was so preoccupied with thinking about taming my sinful nature and making sure I was on time for school and work. Having my “sinful nature” and “expectation of others” at the front of my mind, I came to realize, were roadblock in the mind when I started trying to find the simplest pleasures in life… especially the basic pleasure of happiness and peace.
My life altering awareness came when I was 22 I had a tumor removed from my spine or should I say a piece of my spine removed from my 7th vertibra that contained a bone growth causing me neck stiffness, limiting my mobility as well as causing me unbearable chronic pain that woke me in the night when the 900mg of anti-inflammatory meds before falling asleep wore off.
My mother, being the brilliant woman she is, wasn’t tricked by the new ideas of the 20th century. She was taking me into the chiropractor and feeding me homeopathic remedies when I was pounding and exercising my body in high school as a wrestler, hockey player, and gymnast.
“The chiropractor is a wellness doctor” she would say. “He helps you prevent your body from getting injured in the first place. It’s like eating super strong and healthy foods to prevent yourself from getting sick and not having to go see the emergency doctor.”
Without meaning to I learned that the hospital is a place for emergencies and not a place for healing, but what I’m realizing today, is that this isn’t the way most Americans see it. My mother interest and acceptance of homeopathic remedies and wellness made her an outlier in the world as big pharma ideas started to come around declaring scientific revelation and medical breakthrough and making sure the marketing of these breakthroughs founds it way into each and every possible home in America and if they had it their way around the world. Tho discoveries in health and science are an important thing they shouldn’t have ever been aloud to replace natural home remedies and preventative practices of wellbeing, because the natural remedies passed down from generation to generation have proven useful and effective for thousands of years. Yes hospitals save lives with new medical technologies, but people should be under the impression a hospital is where you go for general health, it’s were you go when preventative self care wasn’t considered and your body is beyond its own ability to fix its self.
I am extremely grateful for my mothers awareness and shared knowledge growing up. I want her to know that my physical health is a product of her example. But on the flip side my father smoked cigarettes…and so the fuck what, he worked extremely hard to provide for our family and his career in construction broke his back and took over his life. Today I see that he had no other way to put food on the table. Which means he carried about his family more then he did his own happiness, and for that I want to take a moment and acknowledge his unconditional love for us and hope he knows how grateful I am. From him I learned about choosing your career wisely because what you learn about will become your contribution to society. Privileged or not we are forced to learn so we can thrive and will put our knowledge to work all our lives, that is if we hope to keep enjoying more and more new experiences in life. He said “the trick is to not look for work to do, but instead figure out how to make your life about things you love doing, and simply learn to do that very thing super dooper well.” I seriously remember him saying the super dooper part!
But then the question arrises… if it’s that simple, then why isn’t everyone just doing what ever they want all the time?
I blame the propaganda and the American dream idea for much of the suffering in the world today. It is so much a lie… it is miserable to think about its impact on every family I grew up with and how fake all the faces had to be so they could feel content while continuing the lie they were living. I’m not saying people didn’t love each other or have happy lives living in homes raising families, I’m just saying there’s way more to life than this. Such as having multiple lovers. Physical and nonphysical lovers. Magnificent experience that can only come from having the freedom to be free and go out into the world and say yes to the random everythings, and just see what happens. No right or wrong tallies are being kept in the good book at the gates of heaven. In reality judgment exist inside of our own minds as rules we obey so we can conduct ourselves and create a peaceful society. But being happy and at peace is basic basic basic human nature and something we should have to work hard for or stress over. Yet still judgement exist and it causes us to compare ourselves to others, and inside of the comparison we start to find negative thoughts and manifest selfish actions as we work to find satisfaction and ultimately live a life of success.
Letting go of judgements allow for new types of experiences to be invented for the self, which can now happen to you because you let your being venture into an unknown without limitation or mental boundaries. What I’m saying is, don’t just buy a big home and fill it with “your stuff” like the big commercials businesses what you to. Yes invest your money wisely so it keeps it value but remember to keep your life simple so you can easily venture off into the unknown and have an experience with the natural flows of nature and time.
Adventure without feeling limited by others judgements is part of the basic desire inside of acting on your free will. Something that can creep us on a romantic couple turned married, or a college graduate turned employee. Our free will gets sucked into the ideas that slowing make their way into our minds over time as we trust the educational materials around us. But if you just ponder reality for a few moments you can see that history books are perspective based facts, nutrition is a perspective based fact, and time is only relevant if the origin of that moment in time is a shared truth. The moment is the only true reality and time is not a measurement of the rising and setting sun… because the sun is only rising beings we have a conscious perspective that puts mankind at the center of reality. If we move our perspective outside of planet earth the sun does not rise or set… it is planet earth that spins into darkness or lightness.
The idea of perception is a powerful thing to ponder and it fits right inside of the inevitable nature of reality and how things are alway changing. Time passes, we live and die, our bodies grow old and the heart stops beating without our permission. We start to see the lack of control we have over life and start to see how are time spent on the planet is just as meaningless as it can be meaningful, it’s all our perception of things that matters and how at peace we are with change because it is bound to come… even if we don’t want it to.
Change is inevitable and like change making money in society also feels like an obligation or necessary evil at times. But if it wasn’t money we were after, it would be some other type of value exchange and that exchange would come from doing work for someone else who has something of value that you desire. … yes the catalyst here is desire, but with so much glamor and epic lifestyles all around us in the media and on the billboards it’s hard not to imagine yourself existing in a “better” way then you do today. But the transfer of information from a billboard to your subconscious mind is not something that’s explained to us as kids. Or at least it wasn’t explained to me. Also left out of the conversation is that happiness and peace do not come from achieving epic lifestyles, or any of the stories big companies try to sell to us. Happiness and peace are the basic building block of human existence and are here now already, simply waiting inside of us, willingly eager to help us have the lives we dream of. It’s not the lifestyle you see on the billboard that will bring you happiness. It’s the act of controlling the thoughts of your mind and generating feeling that create vibrations in your body that makes all your cells and molecules hum with glee. Living a life of wealth makes it easier to relax and allows the self to sit in side the body for a longer period of time without having to consider thoughts of not being or having enough.
It took a tumor in my spine for me to start to consider this idea of where does happiness come from. But I’m super glad the consideration has risen up inside of me and can see clearly now what it actually means to live and exist as a human being. Because it doesn’t matter how big a house you have or legacy you leave behind, you’ll one day be old and die and non of the worries or successes will matter anymore. The crippled part of growing old, is a product of how you treat your body along the way, the at peace part, is a product of the company you keep, and the happiness part is a product of how you train your mind to think and see your personal internal existence.
My reason for sitting down and writing out my story is to share the changes I made in my life and mind so I could reinvent my personal internal awareness of existence and start creating the life I want for myself. A life of good company, happiness, all supported by a strong and capable body.
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The first thing I did after realizing my consciousness and that life was a timeline that I get to set the course for each and every day, was start to ask people who we’re living interesting and happy lives, radical questions. I hoped their answers would give me some new perspective on life… I was looking for anything different from the “do as you’re told” life style my religious and military up bringing, brainwashed me into thinking, was the way things should be.
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A tea bus was stopped at Occupy Oakland back in 2012, only months after I separated from the US Coast Guard. A military branch with a humorous nickname, Puddle Pirates. fitting for those like my self… lovers, not fighters, but that doesn’t mean it was good for everyone. I remembering hearing stories about chiefs hanging themselves in their living quarters. I remember learning that our boat was leaking more oil and causing more damage to the lakes and oceans then it was actually preventing through its responsibilities… but I’m sure the data collected by our officers and leaders would be sure to make sure I’m proven otherwise.
I remember eating eight eggs in the morning, adding all the vegetable and meat sides to my plate, all while forcing an additional bagel with peanut butter to fit on the side. Next to that was regular coffee with enough sugar to make it enjoyable and a few glasses of orange juice just to feel nourished. But I don’t think the there was any actual orange juice in that juice dispenser, just a orange flavored version of something that shared the consistency of juice.
I would finish eating and my day would start at 7 am on the dot. Anything but gloves on and boots strapped was unacceptable and out of the question.
Instead of sleep, I stood watch for 4 hours on the bridge after the work day. It was in that time when I was forced to be awake but was actually so exhausted that I would zone out and dive deep into my imagination, writing poetry and lyrics purely for sport without any regard for what would be the consequence if I wasn’t the first to spot the distant light on the horizon or miss a weather check and forgot to add it to the navigation log. We were floating out at sea having a “military presence” or something like that. My life had turned into a routine existence designed by someone that existed before me and was far from outside of myself. It was only the knowledge that the temporary nature of the moment applied to my six-year contract with the US government and because of this, I knew that soon I would be on track to start spending my GI Bill money and earn a college degree and move on with life. So I stayed away and alert filling out me logs every half hour just like I’m suppose to. But my poetry lived on and my lyrics became more a more refined. But before my time in the military came to an end, I fell in love with Leah, met one of my closest friends David, and stumbled upon the Creative Process while reading A.H. Maslos book The Farther Reaches of Human Nature. It was after this that I become aware of meditation and started living under the visions of my third eye and it’s spiritual connectedness to my higher conscious self.
I must admit, at this point I have only recently started intentionally self-manifesting things from my imagination. The idea of turning my imagination into thoughts, then carefully choosing words, which creates feelings in myself and others, which can then be observed if one steps back to watch the effects their words have on others and then refining those words and generating new thoughts inside those new realities around you manifesting more new realities that otherwise wouldn’t have never come into being in the first place if you hadn’t taken the time to relax and chosen to imagine those new thoughts.
The conscious self can watch and see the changes in reality caused by a well placed group of words. To express this point future, I’ve become a sovereign human with complete power over my free will and creative mind. Because we not only know our words are have power and manifest our realities, but the words of others are powerful and have their own impact our minds and shape our reality.
Definition of a Sovereign Human:
a sovereign human (or person) is defined as a human being that understands that they are governed over by natural universal cosmic forces and are in no way what so ever governed or ruled over by any human or artificial intelligence.
What I didn’t expect would happen when I let the words of the Coast Guard recruiter enter my mind, and plant a seed that would generate a massive number of new thoughts and ideas, ultimately re-shaping my reality and taking my control over my life away from me. Put me in a position where eating military quality food, and living the Coast Guard life, cripple my body in as little as 4 years. Permanently scaring me and subjecting me to the experience of a year’s worth of chronic pain, all before I turned 23 years of age. And just to put that in perspective I graduated bootcamp with the physical fitness award and never lost touch with my active life style or love for sports while in the coast guard. The cause of the tumor in my opinion, after much research on mental health and nutrition is not because of physical exercise but because of the lack of power over my own life and non awareness of trace chemicals in conventional processed foods.
The section of my bone that was removed from my spine, no matter how hard I tried, was not returned to me. It took me a few days to let that go but once I did I moved my mind onto bigger questions… like.
How did I have such heavy inflammation in my body at such a young age?
Why was I suffering when I maintained a regular life of healthy exploration and physical activity?
How do I figure this out and what changes do I have to make so I can live a long and pain free life?
My body was being crippled by something, but what?
I was depressed at times, and angry as fuck most morning when I work up at work. In the moment I couldn’t even see myself or what was happening to me. In the moment I was just looking forward to leaving the hell of being under the rule of superiors who went to the bar every night after work and complained about the family they chose for themselves, and insulted behind their backs. I laughed inside at them for being so negative and full of complaints but the truth was they were probably just sick of there job and not having free will over their life just like me.
Quickly I figured out superiors don’t have a clue what to do with those they rule over and are just as uninterested in being at work as you are. Like you, they are only there because they signed on the dotted line, get paid each week, and feel obligated to remain in this life because of the promised benefits, even if they hated it day in a day out like I did.
Today, I’ve realized its the thoughts of hate are what created the chemicals in the body that caused the inflammation, sickness, and imbalance in my body.
I write this cookbook knowing it’s the perfect tool for anyone who’s sick and tired of the lies advertisements and mainstream society as polluted their minds with. It’s perfect for anyone who was brought up thinking Jesus is the son of God and now knows he was just a man like you or me, and if anything, did a really good job being a positive human example of peace by traveling about teaching others how to be a good person through cleaver stories and playful kindness. He was an example of positivity and his positivity created positive thoughts and created positive chemicals. Because of his positivity, he was healthy and It didn’t matter how much or what he ate. He was healthy and happy because he controlled his mind and had only positive self-realized thoughts… and most people don’t know this fact about Jesus the man, but he spent some time in India and Tibet, and this is where he found enlightenment and learned to be a true spiritual teacher.
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Today I am a filmmaker who tells stories and a traveler who looks to live a life that’s worth sharing. I have sat in the silence for the time it takes to experience a moment of timelessness and the infinite unified connection we all share with each other here in this existence as conscious beings. I am a living cosmos made of conscious cells and chemical elements sometimes referred to as stardust that just so happens to make up my body for this temporary moment in time. My dust body is a living temple at the moment and as it’s conscious master I will exercise it and allow it to only feed on the highest quality of information, food, aromas, visuals, thoughts, and frequencies, available to my senses. I will live a life worth living be spending my time learning and expanding, mastering my body till time has run out for it. In time I will choose to let my heart stop and move my spirit into the next adventure of existence or involuntarily accept something else doing so ahead of my own ego’s schedule.
With the ego on the table, let us ask the most basic question.
Why do I choose to express myself through a cookbook?
Because… we are what we eat.
The material body eats what the master let it absorb and in turn what is absorbed is transformed into the energy of the body. The energy that is passed along from a carrot that once lived in the ground becomes color in our skin and energy in our veins. How’s it’s grown and the way it’s prepared matters. Food eaten raw is different then eaten after being steamed or pan-fried, the nutrition is different because heat changes the chemical make up and vibration of the thing.
I do things my way, which is often a different way then what is best for others… but that’s ok and actually how it should be. When it comes to the source of your food, and how close to nature it has foraged, we can all agree if it’s not grown by an organic farmer with love and in the most natural way, then we should look for a source that offers something as close to that as possible. Because as much as we would hope all farmers grow there food with love, logical sources and data are informing us the reality of mainstream conventional food is a much different reality.
