Musings From A Young Vegan Woman On A Cow Ranch

"...It was the first animal I'd ever seen killed before my eyes..."

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Much love,

Raederle

Send Fear Into Exile

This post has been updated, improved and edited, and it has also moved. Click here to see it on Raederle.com. All of my web content is slowly but surely being updated, edited, and moved to Raederle.com. ~ Raederle Phoenix (September 21st 2012)

Free Me From Fear

I am angry with you,
Because I'm afraid that you're right.
I am angry with you,
Because I'm afraid that you'll leave.
I am angry with you,
Because I'm afraid of myself.

I am feeling sad today,
Because I am afraid of tomorrow.
I am feeling sad today,
Because I am afraid of yesterday.
I am feeling sad today,
Because I'm afraid to fade away.

You are making me jealous,
Because I'm afraid you love her more than me.
You are making me jealous,
Because I'm afraid that she's prettier to see.
You are making me jealous,
Because I'm afraid that you'll set me free.

I have been struck sick,
Because I'm afraid about finances,
I have been struck sick,
Because I'm afraid of losing friends,
I have been struck sick,
Because I'm afraid.

You have forgiven me,
and I feel love.
You have given me truth,
and I feel love.
You have smiled with me,
and I feel love.

I accepted your forgiveness.
I have forgiven myself.
I accepted your truth.
I have found truth within myself.
I accepted your smile.
Now I smile for myself.

You showed me love,
and I freed myself from fear.
I am not afraid.
I live love.

~ Raederle Phoenix
January 2012

Inspired by the book "The Mastery of Love"

Break Your Life Into Pieces: Uncover Happiness & Banish Fear

"Your life has to crumble to pieces. It has to fall apart. Everything you are familiar with has to shatter... In order to make room for your new life. You can't have a new, inspiring life where you get what you want, accomplish your goals and have fantastic relationships... unless everything you currently have falls to pieces first." ~ Raederle

Them: Tell me it does not always have to be like that.

Me: It doesn't necessarily have to shatter all at once. Aspects of your life can break one at a time, and new wonderful things can enter you life one at a time. However, the more free and open your life is, the more open you are for possibility.

Everything falling apart is quite beautiful, if you have the right perspective. As long as you remember that you're making room for new and beautiful things, it actually is quite soothing to feel the familiar falling away.

It's been something I've been learning about these past few years -- which has been full of upheaval for me.

But each upheaval in my life has been a great door to improvements.
And I've recently read some great books that talk about the subject.

Them: Hmm. Upheavals. Like what? You seem to be living the great life fantastic. It is a sharp contrast to your old self.

Me: Well, there was moving to Cali where I took a plane and only took the possessions I could fit in a suitcase.

There was moving back here, which was full of diasaters, errors and difficulty.

There was the radical changes to my diet, and experimenting with fasting. The emotional stress of cravings, and the social stigmas of being set apart.

There has been a separating of me and old habits, old friends, and so forth.

Breaking traditions, including holiday traditions done in my family for several generations.

Throwing away or giving away all my polyester clothing, which included almost every dress I own.

Them: Okay, so lifestyle and culture. When I think of things 'falling apart' I think about personal tragedies.

Me: Well, there was the biggest upheaval in my life, which led to the greatest gift in my life...

When my ex and I broke up. That made room for the most wonderful husband I could ever imagine.

That break-up involved theft, breaking-and-entering, physical and verbal abuse... It was awful, and my entire life seemed ruined.

While that break-up was one of the worst things that ever happened to me, finding my husband was definitely the best thing that ever happened to me.

Them: That's a great point. Yet it does not always work that way. For most of us, bad times just follow bad times. They don't create new opportunities.

Me: Sometimes tragedy breaks people emotionally because they never forgive themselves or what they feel victim to.

In order to find success, people must find their inner truth, forgive themselves and everyone else, love themselves, and find beauty in the world. When these steps are complete, everything is easy. I'm still on a journey to loving, seeing beauty and forgiveness, but the closer I come, the better life gets.

It's explained brilliantly in The 'Mastery of Love' and also in 'The Art of Happiness', which are based on Toltec and Buddhism respectively.

Also, 'The Continuum Concept' can help anyone understand their own issues a lot better, and move forward.

The documentary 'The Secret' helps explain how to get what you want in life, which I recommend watching after reading the three books I just named.

Between those four sources, there is a life full of happiness and success to be discovered. And none of those are about food -- and food can change everything all by itself.

Speaking of food, I'm inventing a new kind of raspberry-cacao-carrot pie... Sounds crazy but the crust tastes amazing. I'm going to go make the filling now.

*hugs & happy new year*

Them: That sounds intereting. Happy new year to you too. Stay happy.

Me: Thanks!

---

You are very powerful when you are seemingly broken. Your entire world is full of possibility.

When you can no longer eat the same way, you must find something new to eat. That is what happened to me. I didn't discover raw vegan food one day and say "lets try this." I actually struggled through years of a limited diet because everything I was used to made me feel sick. That awful discovery that I could no longer eat the way I had always eaten opened me up to the powerful world of possibility.

When you have to leave an abusive relationship, and you have to struggle through it alone, and afraid... You become open to moving forward. You become available for healthy connections with other humans. It has happened to me.

When a friend "betrays" you, and that person leaves your life... You are sad, and lost, and wondering what to do with your Saturday nights when you used to go out and dance, or play games, drink together or bake cookies together... Then you become open to finding a new friend, one who is more honest, more in tune with your nature, one who can become a better influence on your life. I've been there, and I'm sure you have too.

When things are going wrong you are riding on the wheel of fortune and you are in control of where that wheel stops. Your head is whirling, and you feel pain, anger, betrayal, jealousy and hopelessness... All of these feelings are aspects of fear.

There is a cure to fear:

• Truth

You must know thy self. Knowledge comes from books. Wisdom comes from self knowledge; wisdom is knowing the truth about yourself.

• Forgiveness

Holding a grudge is like intentionally keeping the infection red hot within a wound. When you forgive, you clean the wounds and begin to heal. When you make yourself a victim, you create the trauma you experience. Forgiveness begins to heal that trauma. When you blame yourself, you hate yourself. You can not respect yourself if you hate yourself. When you don't respect yourself, nobody respects you. You must forgive yourself.

• Love

When you love yourself, you love others. When you love your body, you take good care of your body. When you love yourself, you respect yourself, and others respect you. When you love your life, great people want to be a part of your life. When you understand that the love in your heart if infinite, you do not starve for love just because one individual will not give you their love. You are wealthy with love in your heart when you love yourself. You are free to be yourself when you love yourself.

When you know the truth, and you've forgiven everyone and yourself, and you love yourself and the world... Then there is no fear. There is nothing to fear. You have truth and love in your heart, and thereby nothing is a threat to you.

Christmas Gift Bags

In gifts I gave this year, given in original bags, I placed the following note:

Happy Thanksgiving, Merry Christmas

Awesome New Year and Other Joyous Occasions

Greetings celebrant,

This quick note is about the bag your gift in is. I made gift bags this year for many reasons, which I'd like to tell you about, starting with how Christmas was for me growing up.

Yearly on Christmas day my family dug the car out of the snow at five o'clock in the morning. We made the two-hour drive out of the city to my Aunt's beautiful cottage.

My Aunt has a flair for decoration. Her house was immaculate, spotless and free of modern technology. It felt magical, out-of-time, and warm. Her living room sported an old-fashioned roaring fire place, a Christmas tree covered with hand-made bows, angels, ceramic balls, and other baubles.

My Aunt's table was set to perfection, with each piece of silverware “just so” and cloth napkins in decorative ceramic rings. Breakfast was served at exactly eleven o'clock, followed by coffee, tea, stockings, board games, lunch, presents, and then dinner. The tradition of it was wonderful.

The part I cherish most was the presentation of the presents. Each gift was a work of art. Perfect wrapping, shining cloth ribbons, hand-crafted bows, and so on. The tree would be absolutely buried in gifts, labored over through the season.

As a child, I recognized the beauty, the effort, the careful labor, the festive spirit, and the love that went into it all. Christmas has always been my favorite holiday.

Carefully wrapped, unique gifts is a tradition in my family.

Yet now, I'm faced with conflicting feelings. I no longer want to purchase “cute” gifts and wrapping papers from corporations that make irresponsible decisions. I don't want trees to be cut down to support wrapping gifts. At the same time, I remember the magic of the Christmas I grew up with, and that beautiful gifts were a large part of that.

And hence, I've decided I want to sew gift bags. Curtains, sheets, shirts – anything no longer in use can be sewn into a reusable festive bag. Also, if other people decided this was a cool idea and made bags of their own and sold them, it could create jobs here in America.

And thus, I found a happy place between my family traditions and my values.

These bags may be washed and dried on the gentle cycle. I have washed them after sewing them. However, a few of them came apart, so those ones needed mending. In other words, most of the bags I've made are for wrapping more than using.

I encourage you to pass this bag on to someone else next year with a gift inside.

If it strikes you as appropriate, you can even pass this little letter on so that the recipient knows the history behind the bag.

Much love and merry holidays.

~ Raederle Phoenix, Holiday Season of 2011

One Piece of a Giant Puzzle

There are a lot more factors at work than any one evil.

We can not point all our fingers at "capitalism" and make it go away, and expect everything to be fine and dandy. No more than we can blow up the credit card companies (like in the movie/book Fight Club), or like we can just burn all the places that chop down forests (like in the documentary If A Tree Falls -- one part of the true story of the Earth Liberation Movement).

Actions of violence, and destruction and "anti-_____" movements are overall, unsuccessful. Yes, sometimes they work. But it is when people fight for something that we see true progress.

There are motives behind motives behind motives when it comes to why catastrophes happen. Nobody wakes up one day and says "let's destroy an entire culture for the fun of it." They wake up one day with some brilliant plan to gain something in order to make up for what they feel they are lacking.

Today, people are all constantly suffering from feeling that they lack something in their life, and that feeling that there "isn't enough" is a big hurdle in accomplishing anything.

Regardless of what we feel we lack, and regardless of whether that lack is real, the feeling is highly detrimental. It promotes greed and desperation. It promotes illogical actions.

As soon as we go around saying, "X" is the source of all problems, they have caused a lack in this world... Then we are fear-mongering people to our cause, and at a high cost. Creating more paranoid individuals does not create a harmonious peaceful universe.

The feeling of lack is what causes people to do drugs, to rob others, to submit to jobs they hate, to waste their lives in relationships (either romantic, or as business partners, etc) that are toxic to them, and it is why we will eat toxic fast food but then buy an expensive large TV-screen.

If we can repair the hearts, bodies and minds of our fellow human beings, we can repair the world. All things negativity will fall away when we are loving and at peace in our own hearts.

A friend of mine at the potluck picnic today was saying, "I was really surprised by how much my attitude changed when I first entered a macrobiotic diet. I didn't experience many physical changes, but my attitude went from incredibly pessimistic to very optimistic in a short period of time. There was no other change in my life, just my diet. It was disconcerting. I didn't even recognize myself with my new outlook."

This is one piece of the puzzle. Our moods, motivations and outlook our affected dramatically by our pH. How many wars have started because one person had an acidic pH level in their bloodstream?

It's similar to the amount of suicide caused by vitamin-B deficiency. Instead of taking psychotropic drugs, just take a vitamin-B multi-vitamin complex. Watch your anxiety and depression just melt away. This is also effective treatment for schizophrenics in most cases.

If we fight for health, happiness, unity, clarity, sustainability, truth, accuracy, compassion, equality, and love... Then all the things we've been fighting against will fall away without resistance.