Selena Faulkner: January 2011

Monday, January 24, 2011

MC Yogi - Shanti (Peace Out)

This song has been keeping me marvelously mellow and flowing since Friday evening when I first heard it played in a Vinyasa + Kundalini donation class I attended at Yoga Yoga.

Recipe for bliss:

1.) Turn on this song
2.) Sit in easy pose (Sukhasana)
3.) Take some cleansing breaths, relax the body and ground down into the earth
3.) Put your hand in Lotus Mudra (Padma Mudra)

*After five minutes of uninterrupted bliss, rinse and repeat as often as necessary.

PS: It doesn't appear that this video is the complete song. You can find it here on Amazon.com or through iTunes for a mere $0.99.

Posted via email from Singingcello

"You nourish the body, and then the body fixes it" -FOODMATTERS®

via foodmatters.tv

Far from a piece that simply spends endless amounts of time railing again big pharma, this documentary hits several key points and provides examples of nutritional therapy that have long been proven to aid in some of society's most chronic and debilitating ailments. Long a proponent of nutritional therapy myself, I was glad to see a documentary that supported whole nutrition and also provided me with tidbits of info I hadn't yet heard of (Niacin for depression? Intravenous Vitamin C therapy to treat cancer? amazing!).

No matter your standpoint regarding the drug industry, the major point that this film makes is hard to dispute: chronic illness in our society is directly linked to our mineral and vitamin deficient diets, and thus we should let food be our medicine, and medicine our food, just as Hippocrates said long ago.

Posted via email from Singingcello

Saturday, January 15, 2011

2012 World Choir Games in Cincinnati

via youtube.com

This is freaking awwwwwwsome and I absolutely cannot wait! Some of you are aware that I was a music major in college (my principle instrument was voice, secondary was cello), so you understand my enthusiasm with regards to the prospect of The World Choir Games coming to Cincinnati. my home town. Choral music was near and dear to my heart long before I went off to college and joined my first traveling choir, The Evangelistic Singers, and has remained there well after my last choral performance some ten years ago. Speaking of my old choir, I need to contact my old music friends and see if they'd like to join me for this awesome event in 2012. I know, I'm not even back in Cincinnati yet, but a girl can dream. :-)

There are some really great things happening in Cincinnati in the next year or two; I only hope that I can have a part in some of those great things to come. Hold on for the ride of your life...

Posted via email from Singingcello

Friday, January 14, 2011

For the Love of Sugar Scrubs...Ahhhh!

I finally decided to get off of my tookus today and try my hand at making a homemade sugar scrub. I didn't figure that it would be too complicated (and it wasn't), but my desire to mix up a batch for myself was born out of that icky, dragging, worn out and dull feeling that's all too common when dealing with a nasty cold. I'll be honest; it's been a couple of days since I've seen the inside of a shower, so I wanted to make today's showering experience as pleasant and beneficial as possible.

Over the last few years, I've become very sensitive to chemicals, fragrances and dyes of various kinds. I purchased a body scrub from Bath & Body Works a few months back and even though I loved how it made my skin feel, it was somewhat irritating to it as well. I had no idea what I might have been reacting to with the Bath & Body Works stuff, as the ingredients were numerous. So, I decided that once I finished that jar, I would make my own sugar scrub and would know exactly what went into it; All of the benefits and none of the question marks.

So, since I did this on a whim today, I simply used what I had on hand. I decided not to use any of the essential oils I have in my closet for two reasons 1.) They weren't my preferred fragrances for a body scrub 2.) They might be irritating to my skin. So, I went down to the kitchen and looked around. I had several bottles of pure vanilla extract. Yeah, I could use that, but I'm not really a vanilla kind of gal (sometimes the smell of vanilla nauseates me as well), and I wasn't too keen on smelling like baked goods - at least not today. Almond extract? No. Butter flavor? No. Cherry extract? Yes! It was also important for me to use things that would be food grade since my sweet dog Belle ravenously consumes anything that even resembles food if she gets the chance. I lost a dollop or two of the sugar, EVOO & cherry mix while blending and she gulped it up without hesitation, just as I had suspected she would.

Now, it would have delighted me more if I still had my jar of maraschino cherries in the fridge so that I could have just poured a bit of juice from there, but all I had was the imitation cherry extract stuff, which I figured was better than my other options of smelling like nuts or cupcakes. Sure, I could have left out my quest for a fragrance all together, but since I was using the ever so pungent EVOO I thought a nice pleasant fragrance of some sort would help mellow it out a bit.

You can find the article that inspired me, complete with recipes, here.

Here are the ingredients I ended up using:

Cane Sugar - 3/4 cup (I have several bags of organic, unbleached cane sugar, but I've read several places that organic cane sugar is *not* recommended for body scrubs. Not sure why, so I'll research that more later)
Extra Virgin Olive Oil- 3 to 4 Tablespoons
Fair Trade Shea Butter & Neem Oil Body Wash (3 half pumps after everything else was incorporated)
Cherry Extract - About a tablespoon

I save a lot of glass containers and happened to have a cute little one from some apples slices Wesley purchased a couple of years back. It was the perfect size for my little concoction! I filled the container 3/4 of the way with the cane sugar and then poured the EVOO on top in what I guess to be about 3-4 tablespoon size increments (letting settle a bit in between tablespoons) until I felt that most of the sugar was moist with EVOO. I folded the sugar and oil and added the cherry extract so that I could incorporate it along the way. After those three items were mixed to my satisfaction, I decided to add a bit of body wash to give it some sudsing action and the nice smooth texture that I was looking for. After letting the body wash soak down for a minute or two, I gave it one final sitr. Voilà!

The ultimate test came moments later when I tried my brand new product in the shower. There was just the right amount of sugar for a complete scrubbing experience. The smell of cherries was light and not overpowering, the body wash gave it the smooth sudsing action I was looking for and the EVOO left my skin feeling lightly moisturized after my shower (but not greasy). I was terribly happy with my homemade scrub and can't wait to experiment with some other fragrances, oils and sugars!

Ciao my little kittehs! Until we meet again...

Posted via email from Singingcello

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Yoga = Heroin | elephant journal

A Very powerful article about how addictions of any kind can become a barrier to us uniting with our true, higher selves.

via elephantjournal.com

Posted via email from Singingcello

IBM's Watson supercomputer destroys all humans in Jeopardy practice round (video!) -- Engadget

via engadget.com

Oddly enough, I find myself rooting for Watson! Go Watson go!

Posted via email from Singingcello

Yes!!! Double Dream Hands!

via youtube.com

Who wants to join me to practice? Can we flash mob this shit? Hells yeah!

Posted via email from Singingcello

Captivating! Photo by Vivian Maier

via 3.bp.blogspot.com

The moment that I saw this photo displayed on the blog that is posting much of her work, I knew I had to have it. Oh how I would love to have this photo enlarged so that I could hang it on my wall. It's simply brilliant and touching!

Posted via email from Singingcello

"Finding Vivian Maier" - a feature length documentary film

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Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Back to Basics: A Complete Guide to Traditional Skills

via amazon.com

For Christmas, my mother purchased a copy of this book for my brother and I. For the last few years my mother, brother and I have shared in conversations about getting back to a traditional means of living wherein we would be able to sustain ourselves with very little reliance on the outside world. It isn't that we wish to disconnect from others, but to create a place where people can escape from this fast and furious society and remember the basics. It's a dream that, fortunately, my immediate family shares. We often verbalize our visions of buying a large parcel of land and how all of our family build on and work the land. It would be hard work, we know that for sure, but there's something to be said for the serenity that comes with being self-sufficient. I want my children to know what it feels like to run through the forest and the fields, to pick their own food from the vine and to have the satisfaction of knowing that they can accommodate all of their needs with the works of their very own hands.

Someday, I hope to make that dream become a reality. I have no idea where the land will be or how many family members and friends will join me on a journey of sweet self sufficiency. I do know, however, that it will be a glorious day and that even if I don't make it to this mystical place I envision anytime soon, my dreams of this paradise will bring me peace along my journey.

Namaste

Posted via email from Singingcello