I bet you've heard you can't eat salads or drink smoothies in postpartum. I bet they said the next 42 years of your life will hinge on whether or not you did, or something like that. I bet you read a list of foods you're not supposed to eat after birth. I bet you felt guilty for one thing or another in postpartum for not being ~perfect~ or whatever you've been told that means.
I believe in a joy-first path to life. I believe food has the ability to heal, but I also believe that rigidness, when it comes to food, can be detrimental to our wellbeing on a physical, mental, and emotional level. To be honest, there is no perfect. Nourishment is a multifaceted subject for someone like me. I think a good dance in your living room to a tune that makes you remember your pleasure is nourishment. I believe a slow-cooked organic bone broth with all the right herbs made in a stainless steel pot is nourishment, too. I believe that an ice cream cone at a time when it makes no logical sense to the science of Ayurveda or the wisdom of TCM, let's say in the middle of winter, postpartum, in a hot tub on a mountain in the wind, can be deeply nourishing as well.
I just think that life is to be lived in whatever individual way your heart is guiding you to live. I think our hearts can't do us wrong. Not when it is true. That leads me to my thoughts on building trust with our own inner wisdom. This isn't natural or easy to most of us (AS WOMEN) because we were told to shut it down, become successful the other way, and that our moods and emotions and intuition aren't valuable. It's something that I'm coming back to in this chapter of my life. It's something I knew and played with so much more when I was young (we hear this a lot from women). This can look like so many liberating moments in our daily, weekly, monthly, and seasonal lives. I believe freedom is one of the biggest markers of success (for me) so I'm taking myself on a journey of realizing more personal freedom. By the way, I'm a big fan of warm soups, stews, and traditionally crafted postpartum meals (I created a whole business about it) but I also am curious and my curiosities lead me to preaching nuance (hence, the name of this section of my digital journal). When we build our trust muscle and begin to follow those signs from within, life gets a whole lot more fun, pleasurable, nourishing, and meaningful. This is like any muscle, it needs attention daily. It also is so f'ing permissive and no longer can things on the internet scare you into feeling unworthy, like you have already failed, or that there is one way to do life, motherhood, eat, drink, play, speak, move, etc.
Here's how I'm starting to build evidence that I can be trusted with my own decisions, ideas, and feelings:
- MY NOTES APP: I keep lots of notes on my phone when I need to jot something down or when I'm building context for something greater that I want to return to. I started a page in my notes for "Moments I Followed My Intuition + It Worked" because like you, I also require proof that I'm to be trusted. I can't believe how many of these moments I forgot about and am so grateful I started tracking this because I feel like wonder woman. I've given you some of my list down below to get an idea of what I'm talking about.
- PROSPERITY JOURNAL: Similarly to above, I have made a section in my written journal for listing things that simply came to be with ease like amazing opportunities, a freakishly perfect parking spot, or that special email that graces my inbox with news of something amazing. I think the more we track the amazing moments in life, we can believe that life is truly amazing and we are part of that because our decisions, behaviors, and actions led us here.
- SANS GOOGLING: Okay, I use google for everything BUT when I find myself wanting to FIX myself or make sure I'm doing something right (typically health-wise) I can be a real google menace. I've simply made it non-negotiable to just not do that to myself. It always lands me in a pit of feeling so out of control (even though the very thing I was searching for was the guise that I had control). I just think instead of googling, let's turn to people we trust or HELLO our own inner knowing.
- BURNED THE TO DO LISTS: I have fully given up to-do lists and if you know me, you know that this is my mechanism for feeling successful, building my self-esteem, having a sense of control, and also feeling like shit when I inevitably do not cross all those items off the list. I think that to-do lists (for me) keep me from my intuition sometimes because I am already set on a track that I can't get off of without feeling neglectful or like a failure. Take for example the following scenario: I have organize the closets on my to-do list but really feel a tug to go to the local art store to create a case of watercolors to make an art journal. If I were to neglect the closets, I don't get the dopamine of closing the loop and crossing it off my list and therefor feel less than so I organize the closets and might even half-ass it. Whereas if I didn't have a to-do list, I could've followed my intuition to go to the art store (something I never do by the way) and a series of amazing events could have unfolded and put me at a net positive. I don't know, think about it for yourself and your own life.
- FOOD FREEDOM: I grew up (and still have) severe food allergies to dairy and peanuts. I grew out of my egg allergy (hallelujah) but still grapple with feeling unsafe at restaurants. It doesn't really matter because living with a chef and myself being so into food creation, we pretty much cook all day every day. This lack of safety in my childhood with food (lots of ER visits) left me feeling out of control and set me up for a VERY controlling relationship with food in my teens and early twenties. I have finally unrestricted nearly everything that feels good for me in my body at my 30th year here on planet earth. I think when we give ourselves freedom with food, we will find that when we really listen and pay attention to our body, we crave nourishing food, healthy food, and food that makes us feel joy. If this ins't where you're at yet with food, I totally get it. I'm still learning too.
If you feel at all inspired to bring more intuitive direction into your life, check out the list above and tune in! I believe that women are beyond powerful, mystical, amazing, wild, remarkable, and badass. I believe that our intuition in full force is what we have to thank for that. Our brains are special. Our bodies are cyclical. We are always in a rhythm.
As promised, here's a sample of MY NOTES APP INTUITION list:
- That one time I went rogue from the retreat I planned to join in Mallorca and followed every omen I came across only to have the best solo trip of my life and my most successful month of business
- That one time I knew that person on my team wasn't meant for my business but didn't follow my gut and ended in tears
- That one time I listened to my would-be husband's radio show on a solo trip to New Zealand when I was 19 and felt such a deep connection to his voice but had never known or met him only to meet him at my party he stumbled into uninvited on my 20th birthday
- That one time I knew and trusted my idea for Milky Oat and just kept following that inner voice every day even when it made no sense and I didn't have any reason to
- That one time I had a dream that my would-be husband was a little spider that crawled into a flap in my ankle to make his home inside me and I immediately moved from NY to Portland to try to do life with him
- That one time I watched Big Little Lies with him in Nebraska before a work-trade trip to Portugal together and knew we had to move to where they lived, Monterey Bay, so I had him apply for all the food jobs there and then he got the job and we moved to California for the first time and lived in a little Victorian house up the hill from Lovers Point where we ended up getting married
- That one time I knew he would be a private chef and told him and then I got a call out of nowhere from a billionaire in Carmel who had no reason to ask me if my husband was a private chef but did and I said yes and then he was and had the most successful career of probably any private chef ever before deciding to work for Milky Oat (he makes your food, you're lucky, we all are)
- That one time I felt a pit in my stomach about living in Fairfax and knew we had to move to a studio in Mill Valley and it came together in one day and now I reside in one of my favorite spaces I've ever lived in
- That one time when I was 23 that I thought to myself I wanted to have a women's magazine and then at 30 I started MAMAzine where I've had the pleasure of interviewing some of my most favorite women
In health,
Sydney
