If you open your eyes (and your mind), it’s easy to see how our everyday habits become a metaphor for life. For me, this past week….habits, coffee cups, healing.
Habits, Coffee Cups, Healing
When I cut back on coffee, I simply changed the coffee cup I was using each day in order to feel like I was still drinking the same amount when I knew I wasn’t. I went from the standard large coffee cup to our classy, Apilco Beaded Hemstitch Porcelain Cups from Williams-Sonoma (which actually could be more of an Espresso cup).
We got this dish set for our wedding, but like my desire to cling to the “newness” of traditional towels, I was too scared to use the cups for a very long time.
I pulled them out this past year and began using them daily. They are lined up, stacked 2 high in my shabby chic cabinet. There are 12 of them, but each morning I use the same cup (or nearly each morning). The reason is because after final use of it the day before, I wash it then leave it out to dry on our drying rack. I don’t know why, but I never seem to put my coffee cup away. Instead, I leave it there for the next morning, when I can do it all over again.
That was until very recently.
I began to notice that that one cup is starting to get a little discolored (you know, like how your teeth do after years of drinking coffee).
It happened fairly quickly, relatively speaking, because I use it every single day, and fill the cup 2-3 times with fresh, super dark coffee.
I realized what a creature of habit I am. And then I realized how this is both okay and then again not okay.
Healing
Simultaneously, I began realizing how much better I felt when I ate a little of many things vs. a few things many times. Did you know that by eating a particular food over-and-over again you can become intolerant to it?
For so many years I was afraid of food. Subsequently, I stuck with eating approximately 10 different things, and ultimately many of those things I became intolerant to for a very long time.
Upon truly feeling the pinch of the situation from my coffee cup experience, I began buying a little of many things. My trips to the grocery store and Farmer’s Market look so much different these days. Additionally, I subscribed to a Farm Fresh to You box every other week.
At any given moment, you will find a wide variety of all food groups in our kitchen. I still won’t do gluten and rarely ever dairy, but everything else is fair game, even if it’s just once in awhile. (p.s. I still believe in the early days of healing, you must adhere to everything I teach via The Gutsy Girl’s Bible, but those teachings should not last for life.)
“Taco Bowls”
For dinner on Saturday night, we had ‘Taco Bowls.” Romaine lettuce, onion, Heirloom tomatoes, red pepper, ground beef, cilantro, parsley, basil, avocado and a Cilantro dressing. This, of course, meant I had nightshades, high FODMAP foods, vegetables, meat and more. But I had a little of many things vs. bowls and bowls of the same thing.
I woke up on Sunday morning feeling fantastic.
I grabbed my coffee cup (not one I had used during the previous week), poured a cup of coffee, added coconut milk and honey, then headed outside to the porch to enjoy the peace, quiet, and stillness of the morning.
Through coffee cups and healing, I am learning so much more about habits and about life.
Xox,
SKH
You will heal. I will help.
I joke all the time about how much I love my coffee – – and I do :-)—but I recently did the same and it’s been perfect. I swear my old cup was like a tureen where is this one feels like a thimble. Or felt. Now it feels perfect even though it is perfectly tiny.
Ah…coffee:)