“It advocated cooking with gusto not only for vanquishing hardship with pleasure but for ‘weeding out what you yourself like best to do, so that you can live most agreeably in a world full of an increasing number of disagreeable surprises.’” Tamar Adler referencing "How to Cook a Wolf by M.F.K. Fisher"

 

An Everlasting Meal: Cooking with Economy and Grace 

 

 I follow Tamar E. Adler on Twitter, and awhile back she tweeted about accidentally pouring something from an unlabeled container that she thought was milk onto her child’s cereal that was definitely not milk.

It reminded me that even further back I had read one of her books,  An Everlasting Meal-where she writes about having a refrigerator, freezer and pantry— full of mostly unlabeled odds and ends.

I, too, have a preference for not labeling. I have continuing delusions that I will of course remember the contents and I end up with a combination of delightful surprises and mysterious science projects all the time.

“An Everlasting Meal” is about eating affordably, responsibly, and well, the book is mostly about cooking.  Ms. Adler details how to create a meal that is “everlasting” wherein the cook takes the tail end of one meal and turns those remains into the beginning of the next meal.  It is a frugal, economical way to cook and often results in simple, inventive dishes.

During the writing of An Everlasting Meal, Ms. Adler was inspired by and has thoughts about a book published in 1942—“How to Cook a Wolf” by the late great English cookbook author— M.F.K. Fisher—who penned her book during the mess of war, rationed food and often bare pantries.

Above all,  she writes that Ms. Fisher’s book was about living well in spite of lack and the New York Times called this book “devoted to food and its preparation” written during a time of deprivation “spiritually restorative”. I hope to hunt this book down at some point, I’m sure it is out in the Amazon jungle somewhere. And indeed it is: How to Cook a Wolf

I have a little pink sticky tab on the very first page of Ms. Adler’s book, “sticky tabs” have saved my life—as they helped me get over the delusion, that of course, I will remember that quote or reference or page number—and of course I do not.

This particular sticky tab marks the following sentence in which Ms. Adler refers to “How to Cook a Wolf”:

“It advocated cooking with gusto not only for vanquishing hardship with pleasure but for ‘weeding out what you yourself like best to do, so that you can live most agreeably in a world full of an increasing number of disagreeable surprises.’”

That sentence resonated with me on so many levels. It nestles in with a lot of other snippets of wisdom I have stuck with sticky tabs during the course of my recent reading.

For example, in Hardwiring Happiness by Rick Hanson, MD, he outlines a meditation practice based on what he terms cultivating the garden of the mind—a practice of pulling out the weeds (bad) and planting flowers (good) in their place.

For myself, I will always have a soft spot for botanical weeds particularly roadside flowers.  I sometimes feel quite guilty while weeding and pruning my garden a fact that more than likely accounts for its jungle-like jumbled appearance.

My exception is the morning glory vine—and these vines precisely prove my point—my mother deliberately plants them in her garden but in mine they are an invasive, life choking nuisance.

When it comes to weeding and pruning in my mind garden I believe that Dr. Hanson does have a point, but I still maintain that weeding remains a subjective experience regardless of the inner or outer location—and it is certainly true that my mind has had more than its fair share of morning glory vines.

I certainly agree with Dr. Hanson that our minds are like velcro when it comes to bad—human minds often seem hardwired to a negative approach. It is also true that our minds are like teflon when it comes to the good-the good stuff never clings to the “pan”. He does have a way with “sticky” words.

Personally, I have spent a lifetime wondering why my brain seems to absolutely hate me, seemingly intent on keeping me miserable. It is only through some recent reading that I am developing the terminology, the understanding and the methodology to work through my “mind garden”.

Dr. Rick Hanson taught me why human brains are so negative in Hardwiring Happiness, all in the name of keeping the body safe from often nonexistent harm.

Sarah Perry (https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2015/01/08/ritual-and-the-consciousness-monoculture/#more-4854) clued me in about the “watcher at the gates of the mind”. This censorial watcher is theorized to live in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex which has the “brain job” of closely examining your ideas so as to better crush out spontaneity, originality and fun. This topic needs more research on my part but I imagine still all in the name of keeping the body safe from mostly nonexistent harm.

Kathleen Norris and her book Acedia & me got the ball rolling for a current major research project of mine. Acedia is a demon that plagued the minds of the early Christian monks. The book ended up being too religious for my inner empirical skeptic, but I do firmly believe that this “demon” is an universal element of the human brain—and is one that certainly lives in my head.

Ms. Norris quotes that according to these ancient monks, the demon of Acedia--also called the noonday demon--is the one that causes the most trouble of all...he strikes during the heat of the day, you are hungry and fatigued, and open to the suggestion that commitment to work, your dream, your passion, your meditation is not worth the effort. Nothing is worth the effort and the demon laughs and mocks you for ever thinking anything ever was. You lay down and struggle to get back up.

Dr. Daniel Siegel and his book Aware jump started my education about the Default Mode Network. The DMN is a fairly recent concept and the details are still being ironed out. The theory is that the DMN consists of a network of interacting brain regions that pretty much run down the “midline” of your frontal cortex.

This section of your brain is more active when a person is awake but not paying attention to the outside world, when a person is “just thinking”—daydreaming along a default stream of memories, forecasts for the future, reimagining the past, worries, regrets, anxieties, and concerns about the intentions of others. In other words the most common culprits of mental unrest.

This section of the brain is less active when a person is “paying attention” and the brain is engaged in a particular task.

Matthew MacKinnon, MD (https://www.mindfulnessmd.com/2014/07/08/neuroscience-of-mindfulness-default-mode-network-meditation-mindfulness/) for bringing my awareness to the TPN (Task Positive Network) which directs conscious attention towards the outside environment and the five senses, or towards internal body status or towards the willful execution of physical and mental actions.

Dr. MacKinnon explains that a well-balanced DMN helps us plan tasks, review past actions to improve future behavior and to remember pertinent life details. But, he says, with the expansion of the brain’s intellect this network has gained too much control resulting in negative mood states, anguish, depression and anxiety.

Conversely, he explains that the TPN is involved in present moment awareness, here & now actions, physical exertion, intent mental activity such as meditation, endurance running, walking, yoga, writing—indeed any activity that engages your five outgoing senses and or deep focal awareness.

A fully engaged TPN totally involved in a “here and now” type action is a place where suffering cannot survive.

“Now…we come to a critical point regarding their relationship: they are mutually exclusive. The activation of the DMN inhibits the TPN and vice versa. In fact, no study has demonstrated the simultaneous activation of the two networks. The relationship between the DMN and the TPN is analogous to the relationship between inhalation and exhalation: despite their intimate nature, the two cannot exist simultaneously.” Matthew MacKinnon, MD

That is right. The TPN and the DMN are mutually exclusive— you don’t have to overcome the DMN’s negative thoughts you just need to activate your TPN. The neuroscience hidden behind the wisdom, the “right knowledge” of the Yoga Sutras all along.

Understanding and gaining a neurological basis for what seems to being going on “in there” in my head has been key.  I am slowly gaining abilities and gathering tools so that my life can stop being shaped by these weeds, censorious watchers, gatekeepers, default modes and demons in my brain.

I cannot understate the importance— the absolute value of being able to call out these “weeds” by name has brought to my daily life. Often the simple action of “naming” my thoughts strips them of their power.

For all that we humans are highly evolved creatures with brains capable of astonishing intelligence—we seem woefully unaware of how to use our own operating systems in particular how to use our own natural physiology to our advantage.

Bodies of course, do not come with instruction manuals, which might be why I feel like my brain is running on a bunch of different competing operating systems and I am trying run the show using obsolete programming instructions that don’t even make sense.

If that seems confusing—welcome to my brain. Don’t mind me I’m over in the corner trying to program my DVR with the instruction manual from my old VCR.

While the details are still being ironed out, the existence of these actual operating systems in the human brain are well established and accepted in the scientific community. I’m happy to be finally meeting mine and establishing better healthier relationships with all of them.

This brain related research all seems to point in the same direction, they all point towards activities that engage one into a flow state: rhythm, ritual, full physical engagement of the senses, yoga, walking, cooking, writing, mindfulness, and meditation.

So as Ms. Fisher advised at the beginning of this essay— by “working with gusto” you can tease out your flowers from your weeds and choose to cultivate what remains in a way that allows you to live most agreeably in a world full of often disagreeable surprises.

The Yoga Sutras have attempted to spread this wisdom about meditation for thousands of years—the mind is full of vrttis (mind stuff)—and the right knowledge is to stop letting it yank you around with detrimental brain chatter.

SUTRA 1.2  YOGAS CITTA-VRTTI-NIRODHAH

“Yoga is the stilling of the changing states of the mind.”

 

SUTRA 1:5 VRTTAYAH PANCATAYYAH KLISTAKLISTAH

“There are five kinds of changing states of the mind, and they are either detrimental or non detrimental [to the practice of yoga]”

 

SUTRA 1:39 YATHABHIMATA DHYANAD VA

“Or [steadiness of the mind is attained] from meditation upon anything of one’s inclination.”

 

All Sutras and translations are courtesy of The Yoga Sutras of Patañjali: A New Edition, Translation, and Commentary by Edwin F. Bryant.

Yoga and meditation have been instrumental in untangling a lot of the strangling morning glory vines that have had my mind tied up into self-defeating knots for the vast majority of my life.

I started my weeding process with a mind that was often embroiled in conflict—if not the “very mess of war”, my shelves often barren and what was “edible” was barely “rationed”.

Fortunately, these practices are helping me craft a life and hopefully a mind that lives well in spite of what others may view as lack. It is a work in progress…

So of course, as I was writing this essay I caught myself forecasting doom and gloom about my finances the other day in the shower—I am a small business owner after all—I walk a tight line. I am not sure what it is about taking a shower that brings out my worst thoughts, but it does so I’m going to see if listening to music helps.

Just my inner demons hard at work, I suppose, keeping me in check and safe from non-existent imaginary harm. Run, hide, worry…rinse…repeat.

I found myself in my kitchen after that demoralizing shower— industrially and inventively putting together a salad out of what was left— my last bit of lettuce, the remaining strips of bacon, the end of a piece of cheddar cheese, a stray breaded chicken breast, and the dregs of salad dressing in the bottom of the jar.

It was delicious and more than enough for a satisfying meal. I continued on by grabbing a couple of unlabeled containers out of my freezer which turned out to hold some fantastic surprises—de-boned cooked chicken and the remains of a very lovely beef stew I made this winter as part of my Gourmappetit project.

After lunch, I took a long walk, and as I strolled, I heard this inner voice pointing out to me that while the shower angst was unfortunate—what I chose to do afterwards was not only the perfect cure for getting out of the DMN zone but made wonderful fodder for rounding out what I wanted to express in this essay.

After that shower I had subconsciously found a way to place myself in the TPN zone by cooking with gusto, preparing a tasty satisfying meal cobbled out of the remains in my refrigerator—my version of an Everlasting Meal.

Instead of looking into my mind focused on woes about the theoretical potential for the hardships of deprivation— I looked out and into my refrigerator with my mind focused on making a whole lot of something out of the “little” that was actually there on my shelves.

The demons of the DMN can be quite disagreeable— they don’t even take the time to get their facts straight. Turns out they were wrong about my bank account as well— another problem easily solved simply by looking at what was actually there—instead of all that angst of inward worry before I even checked my numbers.

 

“IPSA SCIENTIA POTESTAS EST.”  ~Sir Francis Bacon

 

Knowledge itself is power.