Sonya's Patates Braavos: Edition #22 💌🥔

TLDR: health, spiritual enlightenment, camping

welcome 👋 

Hello, brave patates! 🥔 I'm emailing you live from Voyageur camping park! It's beautiful here! We've seen a parade of wild turkeys right behind our campsite, a woodpecker, a big deer munching on the leaves right on the road, many toads and frogs of all sizes, and the absolutely magical fireflies that come out at every dusk. A much-needed disconnect and getaway - this is the first time I picked up my phone all weekend and we still have one more night (perks of being fun-employed, I mean Self-employed…)

Instead of a metal fire pit, it's a stone one. We've been cooking every meal in a cast iron and it's been delicious. We even boiled water in it for coffee. We also made shashlik (traditionally lamb but now also commonly pork and beef kebabs from the Caucaus). The leftover marinade of tomato and onion looked too good to throw out. So we made bacon and in the leftover fat cooked the marinade. With the bits of leftover pork it was like a delicious ground sausage mix. We cracked eggs into it, making a shakshuka. We put it on soft white bread with cheese and bacon and it was an 11/10 sandwich. Don't tell my cholesterol.

I hope y’all are having a good July (how is it already July?!) and carving out time to enjoy the summer and hot Canadian weather.

• a story about the dentist: I have a wonderful dentist at Wellington Dental Care in Ottawa, who is gentle and compassionate. No dentist horror stories here! I had an inflamed gum and went to see them. Turns out, I’ve been brushing my teeth wrong, using the wrong toothbrush, and using the wrong toothpaste. You need to brush your teeth up and down, NOT side to side. And always away from the gums because they are sensitive. If your gum recedes, it will NEVER go back down. If it recedes a lot, you need gum graft surgery where they take tissue from the roof of your mouth… No thanks. Turns out, you only need a pea-sized amount of toothpaste - gum-safe Sensodyne for me - and an ultra-soft toothbrush. Not for everyone, obviously, but many of us brush our teeth too aggressively, damaging our enamel and scaring away our gums. Vinegar (my favourite!) is also bad for gums… I now use alcohol-free Listerine twice a day, floss daily, and in addition to everything above, my gums look like newborns - all healed and healthy! Moral of the story: find a good health provider, be open to knowing you’re doing something wrong, and even if you have bad genetics, do everything in your power to preserve your health with actions in your control. Also, they know I don’t have insurance (self-employed vibes) and gave me a discount on doing cleaning and x-rays together, so that was nice.

• I also went to see my family doctor (her proxy nurse practitioner Dawn at Byward Healthcare at uOttawa is absolutely amazing). I swear I’m not a hypochondriac, just wanna be on top of my health from a young age. You hear so many stories of doctors who just wave you off (especially common in women) and tell you that your pain is normal. I’m really grateful to have Dawn who listens intently, doesn’t rush me, addresses every concern, and validates me. A lot of our conversation was that everything is connected - if you put pressure on yourself mentally (with perfectionism, for example), that will result in physical tightness and tense muscles everywhere in your body… Sometimes, inflammation and tension are not because of an internal disease or something medical, but self-induced, psychosomatic, and resolvable through psychological self-work and relaxation techniques, such as yoga, meditation, and box breathing. I asked if more strenuous exercise is also helpful - at more intense cardio levels where you are out of breath, you generate more endorphins, which promote relaxation and calmness - and she said yes, recommending 20-30-minute workouts or running.

• exponential coaching: continuing the discussion from last time… there are 6 sub-personalities and 18 metaprograms, a few for each sub-personality. they perpetuate a vicious cycle and a self-fulfilling prophecy. for example, if you grew up in an unsafe environment without secure attachment, you will choose avoidant and emotionally unavailable partners because that is the only thing you know. what your brain considers familiar. because familiar is safe. this isn’t ground-breaking, but understanding that we often create the very reality we seek to destroy can be life-changing. awareness is the first step.

• Video: how repressed emotions make us sick.

• Reading: I just finished Brene Brown's Gifts of Imperfections - a gentle, warm read - and now I'm reading Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now. It's pretty gripping from the first few pages and aligns perfectly with everything I already know about meditation and the True Self. The author is on the recommended reading list of the coaching as well. In coaching our goal is to reach the Limitless Calm Mind, similar to the True Self, your Soul, or however else you like to call it. The goal is never to have zero thoughts - it's literally impossible for more than a few seconds - but to watch them pass by like the clouds in the sky, and not identify with them (back to subpersonalities lol). As always, everything is connected! If you've ever stepped foot onto a spiritual path, what's your journey been like? What do you do? What books can you recommend?

If you got this far, thanks for reading ❤️ cooked something yummy? lmk. went to a cool event or read a fun book? lmk. see you on the flip side 🥔