Our story It began in a foreign country in Western Europe. It was the summer of 2018. We made a move and later, another decision that would change our lives f o r e v e r. The city was Berlin. The year was 2017, in the … Read more...
How to embrace the new year and set your goals?
Bye-bye 2020! You were a struggle, enjoyable, but still a struggle. We are really happy to greet the new 2021, and set our new goals!
We will leave the Covid-19 madness on the side and count our blessings for 2020. What a year it was – nice travels at the beginning of the year, moving back to Estonia from Germany, and then moving to Canada. Living with friends and looking feverishly for an apartment on our own. The pains of finding work and our own path. Constant food abundance, new awake open-minded people, lots of cycling, and good food. We are ever so grateful and we are ready for the new year with new goals!
If you still haven’t set your goals for the new year, it’s not too late!
There is every reason to feel excited about this year. A tiresome 2020 is past and we have at least in theory so much promise and potential for growth. The strength has to come within yourself to make things happen. The beginning of the year is the time to feel hyped and energized. You can only do this if you leave the previous year behind. Many things didn’t go the way you wanted. It is completely okay. Just set your new goals and move ahead!
Here are some recommendations for you to use this new year to start over and start fresh.
- Make amends and fix any misunderstandings you have with your dear ones
- Forget the past mistakes and focus on not repeating them
- Choose a mantra, which will describe the new year
- Set new goals
Make amends and fix any misunderstandings you have with your dear ones
This is pretty straightforward, but we can’t repeat enough that the people around us are the most important. Our closest ones. They support you, they help you, and are there when in need. We should be able to be on good terms with them and let our ego go and bend, apologize, and be vulnerable.
We need real, supportive, and loving people around us. Do not waste any time on people who you have to run after, who never call you back, pick up your call, or initiate something. You have better stuff to do than spend your energy on them. Remember always: quality over quantity.
Forget the past mistakes
Past is past. Mistakes we made then, will stay there. Though they may affect us even in the present day, the only thing we can do is let them go. We have to accept the mistakes and learn from them. The best way is to focus on not making the same mistakes this year.
Choose a mantra, which will describe the new year
We have been choosing one for the past three years. Epic, create, and action is the words that we chose to describe our new year. This time we agreed on action, as instead of just sitting, we act. We do not postpone things we want to do, we do them right away. It just felt right for us to go for this particular word/mantra. Your’s can be completely different. One tip, though. Choose the word which helps you to make your goals come through the best.
Set new goals
Perhaps the most interesting part is setting down new goals. Here are many things to keep in mind.
- Your goals should fit in with your purpose. Ask how these goals help you to make your vision come true. You should only concentrate on what really matters to you the most.
- Write down your new goals. Not because you may forget them. They are more effective when written down. Use a notebook or a notes app on your phone or laptop. We prefer the old-school pen and paper version.
- Revisit your goals as often as you can. For example, read them when you are waking up or going to bed. This will help you to influence all your actions toward the attainment of your goals. All as we say – let it out to the universe!
- Short list of goals works the best. I know it is very difficult to put down just a few important goals, but this helps you to be on track the best. We wrote down 7 and too many to count goals. So we had to revisit them and cut our list shorter. Now we are sure that we are focused and achieve more because we are not pressured to accomplish a lot.
Conclusion
We hope this short article helps you to set your new goals and makes you embrace the new year. Remember it will be mostly how you will make it. Some things just happen and then we have to deal with them. Follow your goals, remind yourself of them, and just do it!
Share your thoughts or tips on what else to try to do at the beginning of the year.
Happy New Year!
P.s. Make sure to check our last year’s recommendations for the new year as well.
Inspiration:
Don’t Buy Peanut Butter In A Plastic Container. Ever.
We do not buy much plastic, as we know about its health hazards. But this new discovery about peanut butter in plastic containers blew our minds!
It is only suitable that we address this critical subject in honour of plastic-free July. More people have to hear about plastic and its many bad sides. We are so used to it, that we do not even notice how it silently creeps into different areas of our lives: food, hygiene products, chemicals, toys, etc. come in plastic packaging.
I came across this recommendation when I was looking to find out if this particular peanut butter was in a glass or plastic container. It was very hard to figure this out, as most of the time it was simply called a jar. That could be either glass or plastic, right? Anyway, I landed on an informative website (source is at the bottom of this article), where I discovered the following:
Don’t buy any kind of peanut butter in PLASTIC containers
That includes even the organic kind. It is a recommendation also for any kind of nut or seed butter. Basically, avoid any kind of plastic containers! This knowledge is originally from a book written by Lee Hitchcox, D.C.
He states following:
- Most of the peanut butter on the grocery store shelves (even in many “natural foods” stores) already contain pesticide and/or fungicide residues, tons of sugar and a host of other additives
- Peanut butter has to be heated to be able to flow through the machinery for it to be quickly, easily and consistently poured into jars (plastic jars are also often then heat-sealed. The sealing of the combination foil-type/plastic barrier that is usually found under the lid for food safety reasons.)
- The concern is that the now hot oils/fats in the peanut butter help the plasticizers (in the plastic jars and lids) leach into the food, and along with all the other chemical residue and additives, make for an incredibly toxic product.
- The plasticizers bond to the oil in the peanut butter as a result of the packaging process.
- The consumer is then eating plastic… which is why peanut butter in plastic is one of the most toxic foods you can purchase.*
*Direct information from the original source.
It sounds awful, doesn’t it?
Where is the peanut butter in glass jars?
We really didn’t buy much peanut butter in plastic containers. But from now on we will never do that again. We hope that one day we can also start buying, when our budget allows, the organic kind in glass jars.
If you are in North America, you should probably stop buying your nut butter from Trader’s Joe’s and Costco. Because their organic peanut butter comes only in plastic jars.
Tamara was so kind to share a list with links on her post about few safer choices of peanut butter:
- Santa Cruz Organic (in glass)
- Organic Maranatha (in glass)
- Organic Once Again (in glass)
- Fixx & Fogg (in a glass jar)
You may also keep an eye on Nuts to You butters, as they offer organic and conventional nut and seed butter since 1989. This is an original Canadian full-range nut butter manufacturer. The nuts and seeds in their butter are dry roasted or raw and do not contain added salt, sugar, or saturated oils. Nuts to You nut butter are kosher, Non-GMO and dairy, soy, wheat, and gluten-free.
But even from a regular convenience store, you can find all-natural, peanut butter such as this one.
Basically whatever you buy, try to keep in mind that the fewer ingredients they contain, the healthier the product, and if possible choose a glass container. Besides, 100% peanut butter tastes so much better anyway! But if you are more interested in what kind of results Tamara Rubin got from the testing of XRF technology, click here to see the results of this testing!
Thank you so much Tamara for opening our eyes! Our search for the plastic container free peanut butter goes on. Though recently we have started thinking of making it on our own!
Source: Tamararubin.com
Normalizing fasting for better health
Fasting is as natural as breathing. Imagine how healthy our relationship with food would be if we didn’t give ourselves access 24/7?
From the moment we wake up, we use energy that we are not even aware of thinking of what we’ll eat and when. This time and energy we spend thinking about eating, preparing food, and eating can be used for something else! Perhaps it is time to try fasting?
Let’s first look at the amount of nutrition one needs to stay alive and healthy. Privileged people practice fasting (while many starve…), so there must be a hidden gem when it comes to giving ourselves a break from ALL things food. Give your hands a break from preparing food and your body a break from the hard work of breaking down the food you consume.
What is fasting?
Fasting is quite simply abstaining from eating any food for a period of time that can range from a few hours to a few months (under medical supervision!) The latter end of the range may be extreme. But we naturally fast for at least 8 hours every single day when we sleep. As we sleep, the body is focused on internal housekeeping and night-only repairs, since during the day, it is breaking down food for energy.
In the West where we have 24/7 access to food, we have become addicted to overfeeding ourselves. It’s recommended that we eat 3 square meals every day–breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The word breakfast literally means to break from the fast. We have been taught that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and yet this is the easiest time for some of us to continue fasting. Many people can skip breakfast, but to skip dinner is much harder since we naturally fast when we sleep and falling asleep on an empty tank is hard– again, acknowledge your privilege.
Snacking between meals
If we snack in between meals, we are loading our body with more food before it has the chance to digest our bigger meals ”square meals”. In doing so, we are sending the wrong information, which keeps our digestive systems working less than optimal.
It’s not a surprise that as society has become more consumerist, eating more during the day is encouraged and normalized. Snacking has become a serious business. There are many companies that make millions every year selling us snacks full of salt, sugar and saturated fats. What if we started eating our 3 meals a day and nothing else? Would we die of malnutrition? Of course not! Many people don’t know when their next meal is coming.
Why should I fast?
There are many benefits to fasting, both health and lifestyle-related.
- Gives your body a break so it can heal, repair, and discard defective cells.
- Get a mind vacation from thinking of food, grocery shopping, preparing and finally, eating.
- Food can be costly if you are “feed the beast” every few hours.
- The more you eat your feelings, the more you rely on food for emotional numbness over your plates.
- Time to explore other interests.
- It challenges you to meet your friends for something other than food. Your wallet will thank you because you can eat before meeting up.
- It can provide mental clarity and space to communicate with a higher power.
- Teaches you discipline, mind over matter.
- Lose weight.
- Appreciate the food you eat. When you don’t over-feed, you appreciate the food you eat more.
- It makes you a better person as you know what hunger pains feel like, so you’re more likely to help those who need it.
Vegans and fasting
Many people reduce veganism to JUST food. This is not accurate for many who enter this lifestyle out of compassion for animals, the environment, and health. While vegan food is great, if we eat mindlessness whenever we want, we step on our own toes. Avocados, for example, use a lot of energy to produce and yet they have become a defining point for online veganism. You can do something about this by not buying avocados because even the people whose native food it is can often not afford it because we are obsessed with it.
My fasting experience
I have done intermittent fasting for many years without knowing. The longest I have ever done so is 1 day, not including fasting during the night. It hasn’t been easy once my stomach starts rumbling and churning, but once I keep at it, it gets easier.
On Sunday night, we watched a documentary on fasting. It educated us on all types of fasting. Including intermittent fasting, water-only fasting, religious fasting, weight loss, chronic disease like cancer, hypertension, diabetes and more. The one that stood out to us was intermittent fasting because this is the one that is most common. Have you ever had to fast before doing bloodwork? This is intermittent fasting because you don’t eat after dinner, then go straight to the doctor when you wake up on an empty stomach. Water is the only permissible drink during such fast.
Giddily after our movie dinner and dessert, we jumped right in and fasted from 7 pm Sunday to 4 pm Monday. 2020 herald a 4 day work week for me, with Mondays off. We worked out for 1 hour 45 minutes including the walks to and from the park.
It was easier than we thought! We continued fasting during the week–after dinner at 7 or 8 pm until lunch between 1:30 to 2:30 pm. On Friday, I finally succumbed to the crepes that my wife had lovingly packed for me as an emergency lunch at work.
My Positive side effects of fasting
- Not thinking about food so much.
- Fewer cravings.
- Body positive – it helps that my stomach stays flat throughout the day as I work off my holiday food of yesteryear.
- Enjoying food more when I have it.
- Eating slower.
- Being satiated with one full serving instead of eating more and more, until I feel like I’m about to explode.
- Taking my 10k steps seriously and being overall more healthy
- Drinking more water and herbal teas to cleanse and feel less empty, especially teas in the morning which warms me.
With all the above benefits I have experienced, I will continue intermittent fasting for as long as it feels good for my body as I feel that normalizing fasting for better health is important.