The Seven Best Things

There are many wondrous things to behold in this brief and brilliant life. But of all the ways the infinite universe baffles our senses, defies our explanations, and sustains our lives, these are the seven best things.

1. Freedom

Freedom is both a heartening gift and a terrifying responsibility. It comes in many forms – freedom of movement, freedom of conscience, freedom of speech. But behind every form of freedom is a single guiding principle – as rational human beings, each of us possesses the tools to best determine the course of our life. This optimistic assessment stands up to close scrutiny, which is not to say that everyone always makes the best decisions, whether for themselves or for the interests of the community. Still, our humanism demands it. It is a profoundly loving act to grant another their freedom. When we remove the hindrances to freedom we honor our highest calling and facilitate the fullest possible expression of our inherent greatness.

2. Love

In the game of life love trumps every other hand. Nothing matters more than the sustenance love offers. What is best in us grows strongest in its nurturing light. Each of us is called by our natures to both receive and offer this eternal spring. Love takes many forms and finds its way through innumerable channels, penetrating even the most hardened barriers. Yet in the end, love is just a word, a word we’ve chosen to signify the interconnective tissue of Being itself. Love is the name we’ve given to the nurturing energy of life – a name for the fundamentally nameless. Love informs our simple kindness and emboldens our struggle for justice. It is the yearning of the sapling for the sun, and the longing of an infant for her mother. We reach out for each other, sometimes skillfully, sometimes not, knowing instinctually that love is the food that sustains all of our souls.

3. Truth

Truth is a word we use for that which is ultimately real. Whenever the word “truth” is used the first question that pops up is, “Whose truth?” But here we are not using the word in such a pedestrian fashion, as if unlimited and transcendent Truth could be contained in any single proposition. Truth statements, bound as they are by language and thought, are necessarily partial and limited. This is not a debate. We are simply using the word truth to point to the ground of Being itself, beyond all thoughts and forms. In traditions willing to personify this ultimate reality we hear the many names of God. In traditions less interested in personification words like Brahman and Dao emerge. But beyond the names and forms lay a simple, universal source. Because of the limitations of human perception and cognition, we must make peace with the fact that our knowledge of truth remains a work in progress, comprised of little more than fleeting insights, partial glimmers, and a general sense of direction. A sailboat never moves in a straight line. It moves to and fro zigzagging across the moving surface of the water. So too we move dialectically across the landscape of our collective understandings, trusting the overall direction more than the momentary tack. Truth is the harbor calling us home.

4. Beauty

One of the great contributions of the Renaissance was its assertion that Beauty is Truth, and that God reveals His infinite perfection through the pleasing forms of this world, both natural and created. This revolutionary declaration simultaneously elevated the role of the artist in society and redeemed nature from the degraded state to which it had been assigned by the medieval church. Artists were no longer seen as decorative laborers or worse, liars, despite their crafty use of illusions and metaphors, but as geniuses whose vision and expertise opened up the gates of heaven. And celebrating natural beauty as a divine realm paved the way for the later Romantic and environmental movements. Beauty is a language to be read with the faculty of intuition. And intuition is that faculty of knowing best equipped to apprehend truth. Our love of art and our awe before nature enlivens and nourishes our moral sentiment, strengthening our courage to honor truth and embody love. Beauty is our source and our soul. Without it we would whither like flowers cut from the vine.

5. Grace

Grace is a word normally associated with Christianity. But when we lift it off the platform of a single faith-tradition we find a boundless, universal phenomenon that defies easy explanation. In personified theologies like Christianity grace is God’s way of supporting everything in creation. In the less centralized theology of India dharma expresses the sacred sustenance that upholds the fabric of reality. Even atheists and agnostics know that they live within a natural order whose interconnected and mutually supportive structures do more for us than we could ever do for ourselves. We do not make the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food that sustains our life, or the sun that grows our food. In every way we are supported by forces not of our own making, and by the work of thousands of people around us, most of whom we’ll never meet. Grace is a simple word for a beautiful and complicated thing. And without it, none of us would for one moment continue to exist.

6. Life

On our worst days we forget, but on our best days we remember. Life is a priceless gift. And like a birthday gift, its bounty is only revealed when we tear off the pretty packaging and dig deep into what’s inside. Being alive means feeling everything, the pain and the glory. Despite all our setbacks and suffering we know it’s all worth it. We would endure a thousand lonely, hollow days for that one golden moment, that single breakthrough, that shattering illumination. And when we grow a little older and settle down we learn to stop chasing those moments and realize that they come unbidden to those who know how to wait, grow still, and see the world anew with each breath. This is it. And we’re glad it is. A self-actualized life informed by freedom, love, truth, beauty, and grace is the Holy Grail, nirvana, and the Kingdom of Heaven. It is the treasure of the quest, the prize of the sages, the rapture of the saints, and the birthright of every beating heart.

7. You

None of the first six best things would have any power at all were it not for our ability to perceive and experience them. As your gratitude for these priceless jewels rises and informs your thoughts, your actions, your rituals, and your relationships, add yourself to the list of miraculous wonders. For some reason the universe decided to express itself as you, in this time and place, and imbue you with all its consciousness and creative capacity. The worst offense is to waste your life. Beginning now, vow to honor these seven gifts by removing for yourself and for as many others as possible any and all impediments to self-actualization. It is our birthright to be amazing. And it is our sacred responsibility to get out of our own way.

Ten Truths from the Kitchen

I’ve been studying cooking for a few years with Chef Bernard Guillas of the Marine Room in La Jolla, California.  When he isn’t running a group of top-tier restaurants, writing award winning cook books, flying off to New York for a Today Show appearance or Paris for induction into the prestigious Maître Cuisiniers de France (Master Chefs of France), he shares his boundless love of food in bi-weekly cooking classes at the Macy’s Home Store in San Diego.  Each class costs a whopping five dollars, every penny of which goes straight to the San Diego Food Bank and helps feed thousands of families in need.  My wife and I and a few friends have been attending regularly and it has really boosted the quality of our dinner gatherings, to say the least.  But something surprising and unexpected happened along the way.  Whether he intended to or not, while Chef Bernard was teaching us how to cook, he was teaching us how to live.
 

1.  If your process is chaotic, your results are chaotic.  Before you begin cooking, clean and organize your entire work space.  Gather all of the tools you will need.  Assemble and measure your ingredients.  That way, once you begin cooking nothing will interrupt your flow and you’ll be able to feel your way through the process without having to constantly stop and go looking for something.  And clean up as you go.  Your kitchen should start clean, stay clean and end clean.  The French phrase for this is mise en place.  It means “putting in place.”  How much easier would our work lives be, how much smoother would our homes function, and how much richer would our creative output be if we applied this principle to all the processes of our lives?

2.  Do one thing at a time.  When you are mincing shallots, mince shallots.  When you are filleting a salmon, fillet a salmon.  A divided mind is the enemy of awareness.  That’s when you burn the butter, drop a glass or cut your finger.  In every task we must be present and in a state of relaxed focus.  Only then do solutions and pathways appear.

3.  Keep it simple and let the ingredients speak for themselves.  As you create your own recipes or adapt the recipes of others, don’t over-think it.  Never let flash obscure substance.  When possible, eat in season, eat fresh, eat local, and let the natural flavors, scents, textures and colors of your ingredients suggest combinations and techniques that bring out their natural beauty.  And just because you have every ingredient in your pantry doesn’t mean you have to use them all.  Less really is more.  As in life, when in doubt, leave it out.

4.  You eat first with your eyes.  When you plate food, pay special attention to the way things look.  Every meal begins as a visual image, followed by aroma, then flavor.  But it all begins with the eyes.  So too in life, don’t discount appearances – of course inner beauty matters, but so does outer beauty.  Make your homes, offices, gardens, indeed your lives beautiful.  Follow and amplify the natural lines of your raw materials.  Celebrate the splendor of the visual dimension.  Take a tip from nature.  Look sharp.  Let your personal appearance be your primary art form.  Make it easier for others be drawn to the treasures within.

5.  Follow your senses.  We are cerebral creatures.  The name of our species, Homo sapiens, means “man the thinker.”  We are justifiably proud of our intellectual and rational accomplishments.  But we are still animals sensing our way through a world of bewildering sights, sounds, scents and textures.  As you assemble the earth’s bounties into dishes that feed and delight, allow the authority of your senses to speak.  And as you struggle through life’s challenges, let intellect guide your steps, but let your senses show you the path.

6.  Practice.  Cooking requires the mastery of a core set of techniques – knife handling, heat management, traditional prep processes, culturally specific ingredients and the regional methods that accompany them.  There is no short cut to mastery.  Simply begin cooking everything you can.  Then do it again, and again.  Eventually mistakes fall by the wayside, instincts sharpen and results improve.  So too in life, how can we demand mastery in any endeavor without a long and arduous apprenticeship littered with failure?

7.  Let the mystery be.  Food is energy embodied, made from the elemental substance of the earth just as we are.  When we eat, we commune directly with the mystery of existence and with our own deepest nature.  When we break bread together we enact a ritual that grounds us in the fundamental unity of all life beyond the veil of birth and death.  Don’t turn eating into an intellectual puzzle.  Embrace your animal nature.  All eating is killing, and as such, involves loss.  Eat mindfully, compassionately and reverently.  Honor the earth’s gifts.  And honor your heart.  Each of us must draw our own ethical lines and avoid imposing our views dogmatically on others, for in the end it is only a matter of degree between the omnivore and the vegan.  We vote with our forks and with our dollars.  Support growers, ranchers and fishermen who share your values and treat the earth with dignity.  Still, no matter where we draw the line, we all must participate in the sacrifice of life.  Trust your gut, and do what you feel is right.

8.  The process is the outcome.  Don’t put all your stock in the end result.  Make every step of the journey a destination in and of itself.  “Sometimes it’s better to travel than to arrive,” wrote Robert Pirsig in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and he’s right.  Sometimes the dish you slaved over all day doesn’t turn out right.  But you have most certainly not wasted your time.  There is joy in the stages of becoming that the end result doesn’t know anything about.  Let the path itself be your reward.

9.  Cultivate gratitude.  After your mise en place is complete and you’re ready to begin, check in with yourself.  Don’t touch anything until you have a grateful heart.  Respect the plants and animals who gave their lives for your table.  Work with them consciously and compassionately.  Respect the fishermen and farmers who dedicate their lives to bringing you the fruits of the earth from every corner and continent.  Feel their passion and their commitment to excellence.  A sacramental offering is placed before you on the altar of your kitchen counter.  Don’t poison it with resentment or self-pity.  Preparing food is not a burden – it is a sacred ritual.  Really see.  You are surrounded by miracles.  Let gratitude fill your heart and guide your hand.

10.  Let your work be play.  Cooking shouldn’t be a chore, it should be fun.  If you cannot cook with love and an open-hearted sense of wonder, step away from the stove.  Slap yourself in the face and get it together.  Your mom was wrong.  You should play with your food.  Get your friends involved.  Lead your kids into their own life-long love affair with food by your example.  Explore the myriad wonders of the earth together.  Food is communion that erases all boundaries.  A chef is a shaman, a priest, and an alchemist who uses fire to turn the base elements into the Elixir of Life.  Cooking and eating binds us to ourselves, to each other, and to the sacred source from which all things come.  Learning how to work with food teaches us how to work better with the whole world.  Who knew all of that could begin in the kitchen?