Healthy living and a couple recipes

This post is a bit different from most, its something that I have wanted to begin talking about off and on, and even though it may not seem like a spiritual thing I believe that it has a lot of spiritual aspects. I am going to share a couple of recipes that I really like that most people would run from :-) along with some information that I have come across. My wife and I have for some time now been actively interested in a healthier way of eating, mostly because of the mortality rate of the men in my family line :-(. In researching alot of this we found a common problem in diets of most people, especially the western countries. Food is not only devoid of life giving nutrients but they are added to with a host of deadly chemicals, altered genes, and a counter productive nature that strives against the natural healing properties so lovingly given to us by our God and Father. As soon as most people read something like this they think, "Oh man! Hear goes the health nuts telling us we have to eat yucky food to live!" Health nuts,,,,,,what an oxymoron LOL to say one is nuts for wanting to be healthy, granted alot of people do go to an extreme and become very legalistic about it (like the religious church organization can be). Anyway, I promise that this is not a rant against anything other than "health food" but rather information and observations gathered over a period of time and research. I myself hate yucky food :-) and have found that there are many things that I would not try because on their own they are yucky, or just because I already had my mind made up that it was yucky. Make sense? Well to shine a better light on it we will take cheese cake, obviously not a "healthy choice", but I always hated cheese cake because of the word "cheese" in it. I know, its cream cheese, but still.........., a couple of years ago my wife talked me into trying a bite of her cheesecake that she had ordered, the experience was euphoric LOL, now I love it, unfortunately its become a bit of a stumbling block to my health :-D. I also hated tofu, lets face it, tofu is nasty! The thing is, it is not only a known cancer fighter, rich in protein and calcium but it also takes on the flavor of what every it is combined with making it very versitile. I tried tofu finally in a smoothie first, not bad, then marinated and grilled, it was quite good. Lastly scrambled up with eggs, pepper and curry to make a spiced scramble, that one was very good, and very healthy. I say all of this to say, keep you mind open, there are alot of good foods out there that if prepared properly to taste, are a wonderful experience. The following recipies are "raw food" recipies, even though the one with tofu can't be legally classified as "raw" because anything that has ever been heated above 108 degrees can't be considered raw. I like raw food because that is the way we were made to eat, not being legalistic I know we have complete freedom but I do believe the freedom often has a price. My mom and dad always used to say, "as long as you bless it you won't choke" LOL or often indicated that blessing food would in fact negate the ill effect of toxic foods. Anyway, I did promise this wouldn't be a rant didn't I :-). I just wanted to point out the positives of raw food, the most important I will mention and that is that the valuable and incredibly important active enzymes are fully intact. Our body needs these because as life goes on we loose what we have and they are never replenished unless we replace them with either prebiotics and probiotics or a nice host of positive living foods, not to mention decreasing our intake of sugar, dairy, coffee (hard one for me an avid coffee drinker), and many other substances that kill everything good in our system. Hopefully this will all stimulate interesting conversation, don't be scared, lol, I'm not a health pharisee, just like to share what I have found and be of some help to any one who cares to hear. I am planning on doing a couple of additions to this post if anyone is interested giving more information that I reckon would be of great use to anyone, please let me know. :-)

Avocado Tofu Spread
Mash 1 ripe avocado with about 8 oz drained mashed tofu – about half and half if you are a beginner to tofu and are a bit scared you can use less tofu– and add 1 Tblsp of lemon juice, 1-2 Tblsp finely diced onions, 1-2 cloves of shredded garlic, 3 tsp of soy sauce, 1 finely diced jalapeño pepper, and season with chili pepper and ground cumin to taste.
Combine all of these very well.
My favorite thing to do with this is making a wrap of it, take a whole Romaine lettuce leaf and spread the avocado tofu mixture on it like a dressing, add a bed of alfalfa sprouts, a layer of chopped green onion, slices of cucumber, halved slices of tomato, and roll it up like a big green, raw burrito  very yummy and balanced.

Desert is......
Ron’s Raw Tart
Crust
1 cup of soaked almonds blended to a powder in a blender or processor (processor preferably as it will keep the almonds from heating and thus keeping the valuable enzymes intact.)
Pinch of salt
All of the contents of 2 whole vanilla bean pods (you can also use 1 tsp of vanilla extract; it’s just no longer considered “totally raw”.
1/8 cup of olive oil
2 tsp of agave nectar
Add the newly made almond flour to a bowl, with a pinch of salt and mix it. Add the vanilla bean and agave nectar to the olive oil and mix it well then add it to the almond flour/salt mixture and mix it well. It should be like stiff dough. Flatten the mixture out one a plate making a lip around the edge pretty much like a tart shell ( or as much as possible) and put it in the fridge until ready to put the filling in
Filling
Blend in a blender or processor
1 pitted mango
1 frozen banana
¼ cup of blue berries, fresh or frozen
½ tsp of flax oil
The smallest pinch of salt
Pour the mixture in the shell and put it in the freezer for a few to set a bit, slice it like a cheese cake and enjoy!! This is a wonderful tart, and completely raw with the enzymes intact, very health and delicious!

One strange dog....

I just had to share this picture of our Standard Poodle, Lilly, she is an expert at getting herself as comfortable as possible LOL!!!

Personality Types

My wife came across this about a year ago and we both found it to be extrodinarily accurate for us, it is a website that helps you to discover and understand different aspects of your personality and is based off of the psycological types theory by Jung. Just a couple weeks ago I happened on a file stored one of my backup DVD's that contained various documents inwhich I had placed information I was sure to forget, only makes sense that by and by I would eventually lose the DVD. Anyway, one of the things on it was a chart that you can create on the website after you take this personality types test charting the aspects of your personality. Out of curiosity I posted this to my friends in facebook to see if they found it as interesting as we did. As it turns out everyone that took the test was amazed at the results. Its really fun to share with one another the out come of this test. I believe that if there is an interest in understanding people, whether friends or family, it has to start with being able to relate with them on some level of thier personality, if not at least acknowledgment of their feelings (which is no small thing). So, if you feel complelled, check it out! It really is pretty cool, just be as completely honest as you can, and put down what you really feel and not what you think you should feel.
Both Anne and myself are personality types INFP "the Dreamer" (that is Introvert, iNtuition, Feeling, Perceiving).
I have put a badge of the ratios that show this measured on my blog page, unfortunatly I could only get it to fit at the bottom of my blog and had no time to fuss with it since it is 12:00 in the morning. If you click on it though it will take you to a large easier to read version of it. These can be made on the website along with the code to post if you so wish it.
click here for the Personality Types test they also have one called the multiple intelligences test which goes along quite well with the personality types test, I highly recommend it, have fun!

Light your Candle

I really love this song, always have, but I have never listened to it with the ears of grace until today. I love the part that says "frustrated brother see how he's tried to, light his own candle, some other way" and "See how your sister, she's been robbed and lied to, still holds a candle, without a flame". Those couple lines alone made me post this video to share with you, I know the times I have heard this before no matter where, it was always under the idea that holding our candle out was some form of work, outreach ministry, or an outward action that gave a visual to us being a Christian. I believe in action, doing for others, just not as a work to show or prove to myself or anyone else who I am in Christ, but rather out of the knowledge of the love, compassion, and understanding of Christ that He had/has for me. Out of that knowledge comes the same love, compassion, and understanding that is in Him working through me, for no gain, proof, or show of my own, for anyone. "Let me give you a new command: Love one another. In the same way I loved you, you love one another." (from the Message) I have always struggled with this! How can I love like He loved? But I reckon that I have always thought of it in the wrong way, I really think that understanding and compassion are the key to the love that Jesus is talking about. No one wants anything more than to be understood, and when understanding come from a heart of grace, compassion and love are right there. I have often heard it said, "you don't have to like someone or what they are doing to love them" and it always vexed me. I think I understand that better now, there are admittedly alot of people that I have a hard time with, but those are personality things, and compatability things. The heart of it is that they are suffering from a world of misleading lies, and the pain of a loneliness that I don't see because of the mask they are wearing, and the covers they are expending so much effort to throw on top of it so it is not seen, and hopefully not felt, at least for a moment. Anyway, there's how I feel about that :-) and here at long last is the song.......

Hmm, why does this somehow seem relevant and or familiar to me???

Riding the favorite alien wave :-)

Since some of the blogs I go to were posting their favorite Alien, I really liked Pug the dog from RJW :-) I thought I would post my favorite alien or aliens. My wife can't stand the borg, but I think they rule. Besides, they give such a good example of the church enviornments that I and my wife, have been apart of in a kind of extreme idealogical kind of way.