A Voice For Peace: Martin Luther King Jr.'s words are forever

“The ultimate weakness of violence
is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks
to destroy. 

Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies
it. 

Through violence you may murder the liar, but you
cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth.
 
Through violence you murder the hater, but you do not
murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases
hate... 

Returning violence for violence multiples
violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already
devoid of stars. 

Darkness cannot drive out darkness;
only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out
hate: Only love can do that.”

~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

May we all foster the courage within to stand up for peace and justice as he did ... even until death.

Communication Issues: Breaking the lying cycle

As a 'people pleaser' I have always been one to bend over backward to accommodate other people's wishes. This has been part of my coping mechanism since I am also one who fears confrontation. At the same time I am one who does not like to go against my own will. These two issues have led me to a pattern of running away over and over again — the whole 'fight or flight' response thing, in which case I have always opted for the flight. Rather than saying, "I am not happy," or, "no I don't like that, please leave me alone," I would usually comply momentarily and then flee because the situation was too overwhelming for me. I would feel trapped and confused, wanting so bad to make everyone happy except myself and never understanding what the real issue was.

Today I have made a decision. I will not lie to make anyone happy. And I will not be afraid to tell the truth. Today I am breaking the lying cycle. I will be true to myself and to others.


Communication is so important in all of our relationships whether they be casual or intimate. What I realized was that when I lied to people to make them happy, I was betraying myself but more than that, I was keeping everyone at a distance, even my loved ones and friends. Nobody could get close to me because nobody could know me because I was never fully truthful about my opinions, wants or feelings. I was putting up a false front that was interchangeable depending on who I was hanging out with and what mood they were in.

I have, of course had several close friendships, but still without being fully truthful I have lost many chances to make those friendships even better and more intimate. I look forward to the opportunity to get to know myself and my friends more fully. I look forward to the new things I will discover about my own character, about my own passions and inspirations. I pray that I will have the courage to share those things with others and that they will have the courage to share their truth too.

May we all share our truth. Namaste.

Boost your immune system with homemade sauerkraut

Homemade sauerkraut is easy to make and is an excellent natural immune system booster. It may be eaten daily as a side dish or on its own as a supplement. I recommend making your own from locally-grown, organic ingredients and keeping several jars in the refrigerator at all times.

Captain James Cook was one of many sea men who always took sauerkraut on ocean voyages to help protect his crew from scurvy. Sauerkraut or some variation of it has been used widely by many different cultures throughout Europe and Asia for its amazing health benefits and long shelf-life.

When the naturally occurring sugars in the cabbage ferment they produce vitamin C, which helps prevent scurvy, and lactobacilli, a probiotic culture. Sauerkraut is very beneficial for digestion and has been known to help treat and cure many gastrointestinal conditions including diarrhea, constipation and ulcers.

Sauerkraut may also be used to treat flu and respiratory diseases such as bronchitis and asthma and has been found to have anti-cancer agents isothiocyanates and sulphoraphane. Mainly, the probiotic content in sauerkraut helps to build up the good bacteria in the gut and can really boost the immune system and help aid in digestion, especially when eating meat of any kind. The very first time I ate grass-fed beef after being vegetarian for 10+ years, I ate it with a side of homemade sauerkraut and was pleasantly surprised to have not suffered from indigestion.

This recipe for probiotic sauerkraut makes use of whatever locally-grown ingredients are available and uses natural sea salt (unrefined) and whey for the lacto-fermentation process. If you want a vegan alternative, more sea salt may be added instead. (I have never personally tried the whey-free version but I heard that it works.)

Whey is very easy to make and is a great tool for making many lacto-fermented, probiotic foods and drinks. If you get fresh milk from your own goats or cows simply let the milk sit at room temp for a day or two until the cream and water separate. The watery part is the whey.

For the rest of us, organic plain yogurt will have to suffice. Use a linen bag or cheese cloth rubberbanded over a jar, spoon in yogurt and let sit overnight to strain. I usually put it in the refrigerator just to make sure no bugs get it. When the yogurt is done straining, scoop out what is left from the cheese cloth. This strained yogurt is actually a great cream cheese with active cultures intact, so save it for later use. The liquid left in the jar is your whey.

This recipe only calls for a quarter cup. If you have extra you can either save it for up to two months for future use, or you can make a tonic with it by putting it into a jar with some chopped cabbage, sea salt and filtered water. Leave sealed jar at room temperature for three to four days and then put into the refrigerator. This tonic is great for helping populate your gut with good bacteria and helping your body get rid of toxins.

In this recipe I make use of fresh ginger which grows in abundance on Kauai but feel free to leave it out or add your own alternatives. Onions, garlic and carrots all make good additions. I recommend using what is available at your local farmer's market.

Resources: “Nourishing Traditions” by Sally Fallon, available at Borders and Amazon. Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sauerkraut. Happy Herbalist sells fermenting supplies such as reusable linen bags: happyherbalist.com.

Probiotic Sauerkraut

Makes about 2 jars

1 head of locally grown cabbage (any variety, washed and finely chopped)

1-3 tablespoons fresh locally grown ginger (finely chopped)

1-3 green onions (washed and finely chopped)

1/4 cup whey (see above for directions)

2-3 tablespoons unprocessed sea salt

1-3 teaspoons cayenne pepper

Wash cabbage thoroughly and chop up on a cutting board. Place chopped cabbage into large bowl as you go. Next add chopped ginger, green onions and whey. Make sure your hands are clean and toss ingredients together in the bowl adding the sea salt and cayenne pepper as you go. Rinse your hands. Using the bottom of a glass jar or sturdy plastic cup, begin pounding the ingredients in the bowl. Keep pounding until all the juices in the cabbage and ginger are released and ingredients look well combined and condensed. If you happen to have a meat pounder you could probably use that too.

Rinse your hands and then stuff the ingredients into large one-quart mason jars. This recipe will fill about two jars. Pour the remaining liquid equally into each jar and pack ingredients down until the liquid comes over the top. Add a little filtered water to submerge the ingredients when they are packed down. There should be at least a quarter inch space below the top of the jars. Wipe mouth of each jar and seal tight. Store in a dark warm place such as a kitchen cupboard for 3-5 days and then transfer to the refrigerator. The sauerkraut usually has the best taste after it has matured for a month or more. It will keep in the refrigerator for a very long time.

Many different combinations of ingredients may be added to change the flavor of your sauerkraut. This lacto-fermentation method works on almost any vegetable including carrots, peppers, ginger, garlic, onions, cucumbers and green beans. For a more traditional sauerkraut use just cabbage, mustard seed and fennel. Give it a try, experiment and have fun!

• Recipe adapted from the book, ‘Nourishing Traditions’ by Sally
Fallon.

The Unfastened Heart

This is a piece I just entered in a book cover contest for the reprinting of 'The Unfastened Heart' by Lane Von Herzen. The book is beautiful, a very heartening story and a good read.

My self portrait finally finished!

I hope to do more pictures in this style. Just wish I had someone interesting to draw besides myself;-)

Who is John Galt? The rationality of selfishness

This is an essay I wrote for the Atlas Shrugged Essay Contest recently. Although I didn't win I definitely enjoyed reading Atlas Shrugged, it is a very eye-opening book and expresses a lot of new ideas one may not have considered. The story is prophetic of what we are seeing today in the US. In saying this I must also make clear that I am neither liberal nor conservative in my views. There is much more to life than just two opposing political views so I opt out — until my vote actually counts and we can actually get some independent, thinking lawmakers in Washington that aren't bending over for whoever offers them the most money!!

Question: According to John Galt, selfishness is both moral and practical. Explain what he means by this and how events in the story illustrate and dramatize his point. (Atlas Shrugged, 50th anniversary, paperback edition, page numbers from excerpts are in parenthesis)

I asked my father what his definition of selfish was. He said it means to 'prefer one's own best interest above everybody else.' When asked if selfishness is good or bad, he described it as 'the root of all evil.' I asked my mother what it meant to be selfish. She said it was to put one's self 'above all other people and above God, to satisfy one's own desires at the expense of others.' I asked her if selfishness was bad. She said it was 'the source of all sin.' I was raised to believe in these same ideas and had I been asked a year ago if I believed that selfishness was immoral I probably would have answered yes. I no longer hold this opinion due to personal experience with the failure of these ideas.

In Atlas Shrugged, John Galt poses his philosophy that selfishness is not only moral and practical, but is the only way to hold true moral values. He explains that '... to live requires a sense of self-value ... that the first precondition to self-esteem is that radiant selfishness of soul that desires the best in all things, in values and matter and spirit, a soul that seeks above all else to achieve its own moral perfection ...' (934) According to Galt, 'man's life is the standard of morality' and 'one's own life is its purpose' (928) — not the servitude of others who are undeserving. In the simplest of terms, if one wishes to live on earth one must act in one's own self-interest to survive — that is, they must use their own ability to think and reason so they can feed and cloth themselves. If one fails, they alone must suffer the consequences — not blame someone else.

My parents hold that in no case is it okay to be selfish. There are many people who hold this opinion today, but why? The fact remains: I have had to act selfishly in order to preserve my own moral values, self-esteem and well-being on many occasions — as many people do. But there is often a sense of guilt that goes along with it — a cloudiness that doesn't let one feel good about acting selfishly but instead leaves a sense of fear — fear of punishment. This fear is the tool with which the looters and hooligans in Atlas Shrugged brought down the whole of existence. Instead of asking why all the factories where closing and violence was breaking out, they were asking, who. 'Who is going take the blame? Who can we enslave to our benefit? Who can we devour next?' This is a tactic that many individuals use on a more intimate level — in relationships. They try to force the mind of their victims by using verbal abuse and violence. In these dangerous situations the only way one can get out and break the destructive cycle is to say, 'No!' — an act of the most pure and righteous selfishness. Those in abusive relationships must choose their own best interests over those of whom wish to abuse and destroy them — by removing themselves — just as John Galt removed the men of the mind from the world. There is no 'unselfish' way to do this. One should not give their oppressors the tools (and the permission) with which to send them to slaughter. By doing this, one is forfeiting all the good that they could have contributed to the world.

In his radio address, Galt states: 'We are on strike against the dogma that the pursuit of one's happiness is evil. We are on strike against the doctrine that life is guilt.' (925) He is careful, however to state that, '... neither life nor happiness can be achieved by the pursuit of irrational whims.' (928) The key to true happiness, is the use of one's own moral reason. Atlas Shrugged illustrates the dire consequences of rejecting reason to the irrational whims of those in power and the dangers of going along with the majority even if that majority is propagating ideas which are causing destruction and chaos.

James Taggart  presents us with a good example. He is the president of Taggart Transcontinental Railroad, yet he never acts in his own interest to make his company successful, or even to keep his trains running safely. He wines and dines with his powerful friends in Washington and helps them to devise new rules and regulations to confine businesses — including his own. Taggart Transcontinental eventually becomes the last operating railroad in the country because all the others are forced to close down due to a government-ordered railroad consolidation plan giving Taggart the biggest portion of the profits because he owns the most tracks — even though most of them are non-operational. Because the railroads are not efficient, the remaining industries suffer and go bankrupt when they can't ship their goods or receive adequate supplies. It becomes obvious that Taggart Transcontinental will eventually go bankrupt as well for lack of industrial customers and factories left to make the steel and motors which the railroad so desperately needs to rebuild aging tracks and engines. Taggart and the men in Washington blame the business owners for every problem and eventually they are left with no working factories, no men to run them and no one to blame as the motor of their world eventually stops just as John Galt said it would. The true nature of James Taggart and his Washington pals is finally revealed when they attempt to force the mind of Galt himself, by manipulation, intimidation and finally electro-shock torture. We see that it was not greed or selfishness that was driving them, but hatred — a hatred more vile than any imaginable, a hatred for life and all those who try to live it.  They were at war against moral reason using the false pretense of brotherly love as their guise.

Francisco d'Anconia, while speaking to Hank Rearden, states that 'the worst guilt is to accept an undeserved guilt ... You have been paying blackmail not for your vices but for your virtues,' he says. (421) This undeserved guilt is the weapon which looters and abusers use against whomever is willing to accept it and take on the burdens, grievances and horrors of others — at the expense of their very life! And what is worse, this is what they want to present — as love. A world where no form of selfishness is accepted is a world where the undeserving, abusive and violent prosecute and punish the hard-working, talented and generous — not because of anything they have done wrong but because of all they do that is right! It was because of this undeserved guilt, that Rearden was made to feel badly for pursuing that which he knew to be right and just. Rearden Metal, was stronger, lighter and more efficient than regular steel, yet the government, media and even his own family made him feel as if he was guilty of some great treason for having achieved so much when others had achieved so little.

When the powerful men in Washington tried to seize Rearden's metal operation, along with all the other factories in the country, they were trying to capitalize on the inventions and labor of these men while simultaneously destroying everything they had worked to create for themselves.  But without the thinking, reasoning minds of these men to run the factories, they were made useless, and the world's motor continued to break down. Most people lost motivation after the government seized everything. Nobody wanted a 'thinking' job, no matter what the pay — it just wasn't worth the burden and the loss of free-will. Money itself was loosing its worth because there were no goods or services to back it up. Trains began to break down and there was no one to fix them. Factories stopped without warning, workers disappeared. Instead of a world of brotherly love, as had been promised by the all the leading men in Washington — it was quite the opposite. Deception was rewarded instead of honest work. Those who had abilities tried to hide them for fear they would be forced to work overtime for someone else's benefit. Most simply lost the will to live, for living freely was not allowed.

When we reject our own moral reason — selfish ambition — we throw ourselves on the irrational whims of whomever chooses to tell us what is right and wrong. We give them permission to hold power over us. We see in Atlas Shrugged that a world where men are not permitted to act in their own self-interest, to preserve their life, the way they see rightfully fit, is a world full of fear and loathing of one's neighbor — a world where everyone blames everyone else and no one is responsible, a world easily taken over by those with the most weapons and brute force, a world of terror.

A year of thanksgiving

Today is thanksgiving and looking back over the past year since, I have much to be thankful for.

It has now been one full year since I have had even a drop of alcohol — I feat I once feared was impossible. You see I used alcohol as my stress-reliever and although it did not interfere with my work or life in a conventional sense, it did interfere with my self esteem. I think on some level I felt out of control. I worked at a job that was unfulfilling, I was in an abusive relationship and I just felt powerless. Taking a stand for something was my first step to recovering a sense of control in my life.

By refusing alcohol I committed to find better, more productive ways to alleviate my stress. This led me to pick up on some old hobbies and new ones. It has also brought me back to my goal of completing my BFA degree in Illustration. The abusive relationship has dissolved and I feel a new sense of purpose and anticipation in my life.

I am so thankful for my life and the joy of being me and finding out daily what that means. I am thankful to my family and friends for sticking with me through the tough times. And I thank myself for finding the strength within to change for the better.