My Teachers

My teachers include Paul Holmes, an educator and leader in Contextual Behavior Therapy, that supports people in building insight into the present moment to guide awareness of self and values, flexibility, and meaning making. This practice includes using metaphor to get curious with automatic beliefs and actions and I have found so many images and stories within ingredients and meal making to facilitate this exploration. One I learned from Paul is to think about yourself as your favorite cereal bowl–mine is a bright yellow fiestaware dish. Depending on the day, I am filling that bowl with cinnamon toast crunch, sliced fruit and berries, or chicken and rice soup. No matter what, I as the bowl do not change. This reminder of my steadfast connection to myself helps me weather storms of self doubt, low motivation, and uncertainty.

• What do you fill your bowl with?

• When is it difficult to distinguish yourself from your emotions (especially the painful ones) and limiting beliefs?

I am so grateful for the works of Michael Twitty, an African American, Jewish culinary writer and food historian. He shares ideas on the historical context of the foods we eat, focusing on the diaspora of African and Jewish peoples and their relationship with food as history, culture, and tradition. This is a vital reflection of food as nourishment and what we can learn from ancestral traditions when coming together around a table. I had the opportunity to meet Michael during the Chicago Humanities Festival and we discussed the symbolism of Jewish foods specifically challah as a representation of a mitzvah (good deed), love, and justice. Just like the strands being braiding together to form a loaf of bread to break with your loved ones.

• What do the foods you eat represent in your culture or family?

• How does that impact your experience of making and eating them?

• Where might you learn more about ancestral food traditions?

Carl and Natalie Rogers helped me understand cooking through the lens of creative and expressive art practices that are transformative in finding a balance between being and doing, engaging our senses, and building a container to find safety in our bodies during times of joy and despair. Cooking is an art practice that is nourishing, grounding, and playful and their research on humanism and art therapy have been integral in expanding my practice.

• What is your relationship with creativity?

• What makes it difficult to slow down into that practice?

Big thanks to Lindsay Clarke who wrote her dissertation on cooking as art while working in a shelter with homeless women. Her work demonstrates the power of community building and ethics of facilitation.

Lastly, holding space to honor my community. The people who have heard me talk about these ideas before I was ready to share them with the world. They are patient, encouraging, and creative and have guided me when my doubts clouded a path forward. I have learned how to ask for help, to fail, and to celebrate with them around my real and metaphorical table.