SAVOR weekly digest

This week’s digest will be a little shorter because I’ve spent most of the past week watching sessions from the Embodied Social Justice Summit – there’s still time to purchase access to this amazing line-up of speakers and presentations. I look forward to re-watching some of my favorites when the collection is re-released on February 15th.

After this post, I’ll move to a condensed monthly digest as I dive back into the intensive growing season, which will also include a return to short psychoeducational webinars in the near future.

HEAL:

An article from Shine, about the importance of representation in mental health

A video about the importance of land acknowledgement – a topic that I am continuing to explore on both a personal and professional level

COVID-19 Stress Management Tools from the American Psychological Association

GROW:

February is Black History Month – although every day is an opportunity to tour Black excellence. As a white mother raising a Black daughter, I constantly challenge the centering of my own white narrative and actively create space to celebrate the many powerful Black female role models, past and present. Yesterday I explored with my daughter the history of the first Black woman elected to United States Congress, Shirley Chisholm, who recounted a story of Georgian legislators refusing to share a cafeteria table with her. Today we watched a video about the contributions of Leah Penniman at Soul Fire Farm.

Recently in our household, we’re experimenting with new ways to acknowledge our individual, intersectional identities, from my own working class, Ashkenazi Jewish roots to our daughter’s African heritage, and my white husband’s Southern and Irish history. Food continues to be the star of our multicultural celebrations and a way for each of us to cultivate a greater sense of connection.

This past week was the Jewish holiday of Tu B’Shevat, often referred to as the Jewish Earth Day or Birthday of the Trees. Although I’ve been busy working on soil management this past week and didn’t plant anything new (except another container of microgreens), I did order a dozen knishes from the oldest Knishery in the United States, Yonah Schimmel, from the Lower East Side, where my grandfather Nate was born and spent his earliest childhood. If you’re interested in learning more about the fascinating holiday of Tu B’Shevat, which has its roots in agriculture, check out this summary from Reform Judaism. In addition, you’ll find that a guest speaker discussed the holiday on a recent episode of the Cultivating Place podcast.

While seeking new ways to explicitly support diverse food writing voices, I became a member of the Museum of Food and Drink. In addition to a number of on-demand resources and family-friendly programming, the museum will be hosting events specifically focused upon Black culinary history all month.

Finally, I’ve written elsewhere about discovering psychologist, author, and trainer Dr. Leticia Nieto during the Embodied Social Justice Summit, and here’s a great presentation she gave at the 2015 Seattle Race Conference that is absolutely worth a watch. Dr. Nieto is a local resource here in the state of Washington, and I look forward to learning more from her in the future.

SAVOR:

I’m continuing to formally engage in savoring: the practice of pausing and receiving pleasurable experience, then letting go.

Highlights for this past week include:

• A delicious blueberry scone from The Station, a coffee house located down the street from us
• The sighting of several new birds at my backyard feeders, a Stellar Blue Jay and what I believe was an European Starling (I am still building bird identification skills)
• The sighting of buds and bulbs announcing their upcoming spring performance
• Touching soil. Smelling soil. Looking at soil. Learning about soil. Everything soil.

Food for Thought:

Take 10 minutes to free write about the concept of “presence,” defined as “the state or fact of existing.” How do you experience presence in your daily life and specifically, in your relationship with food? Is presence something that you are aware of, throughout your day? Is presence something that you’d like to intentionally cultivate, in some part of your life?