The Rich Roll Podcast - How To Maintain Healthy Nutrition & Optimal Physical, Emotional & Spiritual Health During The Holidays

Episode Date: November 11, 2013

I've got news for you people. Like it or not, the holiday season is upon us. That special time of year when we tend to overeat, overspend and simply overindulge in everything across the board, all in the name of celebratory merriment. When we're not charging it on the card or spread paper thin desperately trying to fulfill all the expectations presented, we find ourselves weathering an unnatural battery of social engagements, not to mention the myriad of emotionally hyper-charged landmines presented by extended family get togethers. The result? A massive and unnatural outpouring of energy that leaves us utterly depleted — spit out the other side physically and emotionally exhausted to the core, all too often overweight and riddled with unnecessary debt. What if we could approach and experience the holiday season differently? What if we could revel in the pure joy of the season and emerge in January not just intact but truly enriched — optimistic, feeling great and energized for all the challenges and adventures presented with the birth of a new year? Today on the show, Julie and I sit down to hash out all things holiday season with a focus on providing helpful, experience-based strategies to assist in managing the financial pitfalls, dietary challenges, precarious social environments and heightened emotional states presented by this unique time of year. In my experience, these are issues common to us all. And yet issues we go to great lengths to avoid dealing with internally, let alone discussing outwardly — typically out of fear, shame or simply a profound need to keep up appearances — all of which ultimately leaves us feeling alone and isolated in what for many can become a state of true emotional crisis. In truth, the exact opposite of what the holidays should be all about. So rather than deny or repress, let's talk about it. Get it all out in the open. And work on a strategy for a different, positive and uplifting experience. On today's agenda: * How to avoid spending money you don't have; * How to maintain a healthy PlantPowered Diet throughout the season; * How to experience gift giving with children in a different way; * How to navigate and avoid emotional landmines with extended family; * How to say “No” to certain social obligations; and * How to nuture and preserve your physical, emotional & spiritual well being under pressure. Enjoy the show! Rich

Welcome to episode 60 of the Rich Roll podcast with Julie Pyatt. Hey everybody, welcome to the show. I'm Rich Roll. This is the Rich Roll Podcast. Hello, Julie Pyatt. Hi, Rich Roll. It's been about eight episodes since you've been my co-host. Has it really been that long? I think it was episode 51. You have such a good memory. I have no idea what episode it was. I checked.

Well, this is awesome. We're back in the garage studio. We're not in the formal fancy new studio. So it might be a little echoey because we cleared the garage out for our haunted house over Halloween. So there's a little bit of bouncy noise here. But I thought we could talk. Well, first, let me introduce the show. What do we do here? What do we do?

What do we do? We talk about wellness. That's great. We talk about health. We talk about nutrition. We don't have any specific proper agenda. All we care about is having an interesting, open-ended, long-form conversation about all things health, fitness, and wellness. And along those lines, I've had all kinds of guests on the show from world-class athletes to doctors to nutritionists to entrepreneurs,

all of which are here with the specific purpose of trying to provide you guys with the best information so you can take what resonates with you discard the rest and hopefully implement it into your life on your journey towards unlocking and unleashing your best most authentic self which is that's the goal right that's right and in a way why is that an important goal why is, that's the goal, right? That's right. And in a way... Why is that an important goal? Why is it important? Yeah.

Because it gives life meaning. Why should you care? Well, you should care because if you're not going to know who you are, no one else is. Why is self-knowledge so important? It just is. It is because it allows you to live a meaningful life and be connected and contribute and share with others and live a life of meaning and connection. Yeah, I think that—

Or you could just pass. It's also an option. You can pass. You can. You can just sit on the couch. It's okay. Yeah, well, it's sort of like the matrix, right? No judgment. are connected with your self if you have a greater understanding of what makes you tick and you get to a place where you're comfortable expressing more of that in your life that you will be a happier person and you will be of greater service to other people and the world will thus thusly be more enriched by you treading, you know, on the earth.

Well, your presence will be a gift to everyone around you by living your unique divine design. Yeah. So it's, you know, for us, it starts with food, but food is not the be all end all. Remember what John Joseph said on that podcast? What did he say? Well, if it starts and ends with food, then you're an asshole. Food's the beginning, but food is not the end i mean you can get you know you can dial in your nutrition perfectly but if you're disconnected from who you are or the rest of your life is a mess then how healthy are you well the thing is we're we're much more than a physical body

so it's body mind and spirit body, and spirit is true health and true wellness. Food is the beginning, I think, of sort of connecting those dots. At least it was for me. I'll try to just share from my own personal experience. Yeah, I think it was for you, definitely. What about you? No. No?

No. Food came after. Food came after. But no, food provided, well, an illness provided a deepening of that. But I say that I came in wanting to know the question, the answer to the question, what happens when you die, and really, who are we? Who am I? So I was seeking in the crib.

You were seeking? Yeah. am I? So I was seeking in the crib. Yeah, I had a, I had lunch with a friend the other day and we were talking about, um, death and how our culture kind of tiptoes around the issue. And we all kind of live our lives pretending like it's not going to happen. And of course, we all experience it, you know, not just with ourselves, but with our loved ones and, and how, you know, the kind of sort of discomfort and all of the, you know, weird emotions that kind of come up when a loved one is in the process of passing. And how our kind of culture is set up to put the blinders on and not really deal with it until we have to. In contrast to something like Buddhism, where the entire religion basically is constructed around the idea of preparing to die. Yeah, well, the second you're born, it would be good to start figuring out how to die. Well, so explain that, though, a little

bit more. Well, I mean, if you live your life with that awareness, if you, if you have the gift of having that awareness of just how precious this life is and how, I mean, it's a great, great blessing and honor to have a human body. So it's that in and of itself. Like I always say, if anybody ever denied, ever doubted the existence of a God or creation, just look inside the human body. It's an absolute miracle. And when you gain the awareness of how sort of non-permanent, the impermanence of the world, this world, the physical body, and how everything goes through its process, that doesn't have to be, I'm not, I don't live a depressing life. I live a very connected, meaningful life because I'm very, very aware of its impermanence and of the power of the present moment.

Right. Well, I mean, I think it's essentially what you're saying is the more in touch you are with the reality of death or the more you can kind of embrace that reality. the reality of death or the more you can kind of embrace that reality and not to say welcome it but just to be in appreciation of the inevitability of that then the more I think you value your moments well it gives your life great meaning you know really deep meaning and then you start asking yourself the question you know one of my favorites is, if I only had four months to live, what would I be spending my time doing? And how are my choices in alignment with that? Or what am I doing that's completely irrelevant to what I want to express or experience in my life? And a lot of times for me, I think it's really powerful to identify the emotions that you want to experience in your life rather than the actual event. Because, you know, from where we sit, you know, you may not have the expanded perspective of your soul or a greater consciousness.

So, you know, I always call in the things like I wish to experience grace and joy and creativity and peace and health and connectedness, these type of emotions. And then that seems to work in a more powerful way. Right. But that can also be really amorphous, like to say, I want to, you know, my priority is to experience joy, more joy in my life. Like, well, how do you get from A to B on that? Well, you don't need to you know it's kind of two things i mean yes i understand what you're saying but just you know just be open and expanded about this word because um if you get too specific like if you decide in your mind that you know x is going to give you joy i mean how many stories you hear of people that

planned their ascent you know on a certain and when they got there, they discovered that it wasn't what they were looking for. So I'm just presenting that possibly and most likely your soul knows better than your personality knows. So yes, you do everything else, and you vision, and you create, and you take action, but always with the awareness that there's something greater so if you get out of the specifics of a certain see the specifics of something can also be a prison if you're too tight with it so in my meditation that i offer that's our jai release meditation

there's a section in it where it calls in the experience you would like to have in your life and that works also well as part of the meditation because I can't know all the people that are downloading it and what their plan is. Right. I think it's also a question of who you choose to spend that time with. So you want to experience these emotions, but also who are you choosing to share that journey with?

Well, yeah. And I mean, the other thing is, there are spiritual teachings around who you spend your, what company you keep. So there is vibration and there are healing things about certain energies that could be supportive to a certain person. And then there are very destructive energies

that are not supportive at all to a certain person. Neither good nor bad, just different. So if you are clear about your mission and where you're going, it will support you to find like-minded people to gather with that will support you. And hopefully this podcast is providing at least a few breadcrumbs

for people out there who are trying to identify what that is for themselves. But I think it's profound, and I think that we actually weren't going to talk about death, but it's so great that you brought it up. No, we made a list of all the things we were going to talk about, and we're immediately talking about something else. Death was not on the list. Well, I know, but this is the beauty of the podcast. Absolutely. But I really think that that's amazing. And,

and, um, I think that, uh, I know that there is a lot of, um, would be a lot of gifts and comforts out of actually discussing and expressing this openly. I mean, I've had experiences with close loved ones in my life that have died. And, you know, for the most part, no one, no one knows what to do. They don't even know what to say. And it's kind of, it's really sort of the surreal, ridiculous situation because one thing is certain, we, we all will die, all of us at some point in the journey. So I think the more that we get comfortable with it and get familiar with it and are able to support, and because, you know, the death of a loved one is very traumatic, you know, most often. And, you know, the death of yourself could most often be, you know, kind of a big deal.

I would qualify that as profound. As profound. In my life experience no yeah you know the thing is is it's like um in some of my travels of studying spirituality um you know it's explained to me like okay so imagine you're gonna die okay so you're you're gonna die which you can't imagine that you can't you should well that's the point like i don't think about it that much yeah i think about it all the time every time i say goodbye to you i am aware of that every single time um continue but anyway um uh what was i saying i can't remember being aware of being profoundly aware of the the reality of that you will be

that you oh right okay so if you want it okay so let's just say like you're, okay, so you're my teammate, you're my partner, right? And let's say I'm going to die. I'm going to die, right? Which is, let's just compare it to like becoming a birdman and jumping off the side of, you know, Chamonix in one of those suits or something, which would be very scary to me, although exhilarating. So if you start to view death as that sort of a jump,

like you're jumping into another experience, right? So I don't want my wingman or my partner going like, oh shit, you know, like in a panic. Like I need you to be solid for me and I need you to be seeing the best outcome and sending me positive energy and saying you know that's why a lot of people say loved ones will hang on until they're given permission like you know because they're waiting for the ones that are here to not be traumatized

so i think that i know that if we use that energy and of course you know grief is is an actual physical thing and you know I have experience with it. And it can't really be avoided and shouldn't be. But in those times, like at least right around when the body is dropping and the soul is going, if we send that soul with grace and blessing and good thoughts, and almost like they're going on an expedition somewhere. That's more supportive. Right, but our fear culture tends to approach these things differently. And whether somebody's on the precipice of passing away

or they've contracted a serious illness, leukemia or something like that, people have a whole panoply of different reactions to that that generally come from a place of fear. Like, for example, you know, people that have cancer will say a lot of their friends avoid them because they don't know what to say. It's not because it's not malicious or anything like that. It just, it freaks people out so much that they can't really deal. And so they'd rather just not pick up the phone or not visit or whatever and pretend it's not happening or just don't really know quite how to act. Right. Yes, it's true.

And also probably the real underlying fear in there is that it's contagious in some way. Yeah, maybe, possibly. But, you know, it's a profound thing and it's a part of life and you know there's birth and there's death and you know both both are are passageways and um we could all benefit by having this discussion together and and um you know being more open about it and sharing and it's extremely painful and profound and traumatic you know, it brings you to your knees. I mean, but it's a sacred opportunity to deepen your awareness of life and to really cherish what you're doing.

Yeah, I get that. The irony being, of course, that I'm looking at you across the table and behind you, the entire wall is sprayed with like red blood paint from our Halloween party. Yeah, so I'm looking at this sort of gruesome depiction on the wall behind you, which leads me to the next thing I wanted to talk about, which is kind of recapping our plant powered Halloween party that we had here. I talked about it a little bit the other day on the podcast, but I think it's worth kind of

hearing your perspective on, I mean, it was your idea to do this. You birthed it. And we had this amazing experience of trying to do something different that cuts across the grain of most people's idea of the Halloween tradition, while still trying to stay true to what Halloween is and should be about and make it fun for kids, to what Halloween is and should be about and make it fun for kids, but do it in a way that is more, I guess, enriching or on a higher vibration. Right.

With the exception of the blood splattered all over the wall behind you. You got to deliver. You got to have that. We couldn't not have that. Anyway, that was Tyler's love offering. But let me just tell you, I'm not going that way. So don't worry about that blood thing.

It's not my thing. Well well I did that with I did that with the girls no so anyway well you know it first of all it was it was an amazing experience I'm very it was very very um well explain the idea behind what you wanted to do well you know it's just this thing you know I get this kind of inspiration and it seems so natural to me and so easy to me and I just think that everybody's going to jump on board with me that's my that's my naivete of my perspective because I don't really see um that much separation between me and really almost anyone and so I'm just looking at what we're what we've been doing as parents okay so we have Halloween and parents are getting more and more conscious about all the candy and the waste and the plastic and the paper. And, you know, we go from house to house, and there's lots of plastic and lots of, you know, store-bought plastic costumes and this kind of stuff.

And most parents are trying to either bribe their children's candy away from them or, you know, say that the candy fairy will bring a gift and they'll take it back. But a lot of people don't want their kids eating that kind of candy. Right. And at the same time, we all love Halloween. It's a great holiday. We want to enjoy it. And it's an amazing time for a parent to kind of bond with your child. You know what I mean? To create the costume together. What's the plan? What are we going to do? How are we going to put this together? And then going from house to house and trick-or-treating, especially when the kids are real little and they're not sure, you know, do they have the self-confidence to go knock on a door? And all

of these sorts of things are built into it that make it so magical. Yeah, it's so sweet. I mean, it's great being out in the night air and being out with friends. And you know, so I think for a couple years, I've been going to Whole Foods or going to natural markets looking for candy that I could have or that I could give out or that I could insert into the process. And then you're the creepy, weird mom with who's handing out apples and is like a big bummer. No, the house that gives the toothbrush. We're like, yes. We're like, yes. And the kids are like, oh, this sucks. There's always a dentist.

Yeah, you knock on the dentist's house and he's handing out like... They're like, look, mom, I got a toothbrush. And you're like, thank God he got a toothbrush. No, but so anyway, I just had this idea. We have this amazing sacred place where we have our beautiful home. And it's a beautiful

community space and um you know there's no lights around here we don't have any convenience stores or anything so it's very very very dark and we're not we're not on a trick-or-treating route yeah no one would knock on our door to go trick-or-treating we around where we live we have to go to a neighborhood where the you know like sort of the streets are kind of to crash somebody else's kind of on a highway. Yeah, but so anyway, I just had this idea that we could just get together and we could have a plant-powered Halloween and make good treats. A party. A party that were sweetened with maple syrup or dates or raw honey

and actually get involved in actually creating these treats that would be individually packaged in parchment or tissue paper or something that wasn't plastic throwaway. We wanted it to be a no trash event. And we wanted each family to bring something to contribute. So you would bring a pop up table and come and set up your own station so that we could sort of mimic the stations and the kids could go from place to place and still feel like they had a little of the trigger treat experience and then even more than that or along with that would be we supported making handmade costumes that the kids liked and I think part of that is, you know, parents are busy. It's so easy to just go to target and like pick out the whatever, you know, and you're done, you know, and it's like

when you're busy and you, you know, and the stuff's so cheap now, it's like, it becomes almost difficult to not do that. And yet, you know, cause the idea of actually making a costume is hard. Like I'm not somebody who knows how to do that. But to actually do it and show up for that and do that with your child is an incredible experience to have. It's very meaningful. Right. Well, and it's not like, you know, hey, there weren't rules. It doesn't mean that you couldn't use a mask and then make something else.

But it's just like just don't go to buy the whole plastic thing. Go. Here you are. Like, you know, put some thought and some energy into it. So we had two workshops here prior to Halloween. To help design. And just help other people. Like, let's say there's somebody who doesn't really know what to do,

you know, just to get the community together. And, you know, somebody else might have a good idea that could support another child or parent or family. So anyway, it was, it was really amazing. And it was also I definitely got pushback, definitely felt how did it how did it go down? Well, it was, it's like that thing, like the people that you think are going to be there are not the people that actually came, you know, like there are certain people, families, I was like, Oh, absolutely, like, they're going to be there. And then it didn't work out that way. And

so, you know, we put the energy out. And again, it wasn't a public event, it was a private event, just to, you know, keep things secure, and, you know, make sure that, yeah, just, it's not really a public event, make sure it's a community event, but anyway, it was, you know, I just, I felt the pushback, I felt some of the frustration of the parents for two reasons. And I thought it was interesting. One of the reasons why we had like five families kind of blow up right at the end and pull out and say they're not coming and they were coming originally. And part of that was because in some situations that they had like a revolt in the family,

like some members of the family were just like, that's it. I'm not doing that. Like I'm, I'm going on the trick-or-treat route. Well, you can see a kid saying, look, I want to go with my friends from school and this is what they're doing and I want to go to this neighborhood. Of course.

So it's hard. Totally. Totally understand. And then the other reason was I had some families not come because they couldn't figure out what to bring, which I find kind of more interesting. But again, it's like, you know, when you haven't made something yet

or you haven't prepared using these other ingredients, it can just be overwhelming. And I would never have said that someone couldn't come if they didn't have something. We would have made it work. Right, we had tons of stuff. Of course. But anyway, all in all, we had like 50 or 60 amazing people here.

Someone came as a gypsy and did tarot cards. And someone else, my friend Michelle, brought the real meaning of Halloween and brought the history and everything else and made like, you know, brought the history and everything else and made these little cakes called soul cakes. And we had another family that came and had all pumpkins and we had, you know, kind of rice crispy treat things, homemade chocolates, homemade fudge, caramel apples. Right. So it wasn't, you still had sweets for the kids and all that kind

of stuff, but just not really, you know, not the Snickers bars and all that kind of stuff. And our friend Ron, he probably had the best costume he made. What did he call himself? I mean, he made a mask out of a real pumpkin that he put over his head and he had it, he had the inside lined. It was so good. And then he had these gloves that he attached carrots to the ends of it like he was a walking, you know, creepy jack-o'-lantern. It was pretty amazing. Yeah, he was great. He was really great.

So anyway, it was really fun and the kids had a blast and I don't feel like any of the kids, and it was a wide age range of children, felt like they missed out on anything. I mean, they had a blast and they were running around, you know, playing games and playing hide and seek out in the yard until late. And everybody left kind of enriched and excited and thinking, you know, oh, next year we'll do this. And, you know, we can do this. And so it was the beginning of what we hope to be a tradition. And the reason that we want to share about it on the podcast is because we want to really support

other families out there that are interested in looking for another kind of healthier option to Halloween. And we did it as an experiment and we didn't do it perfectly and not everything worked out the way that we wanted to. And I think it's a testament to how difficult it can be when you decide you're going to do something that cuts across a grain that is very entrenched in our culture and tyler and trapper our son spent two days and they created they made it a haunted house and and i think that really maybe that was the first time they ever worked solidly solidly for two full days straight creating something totally on their own and they did it for the party and for the children they did an amazing job it

was really good it was cool yeah our whole garage we they took everything out and created this amazing haunted house and it was really it was pretty pretty cool it was quite something i'm i felt very you know very fulfilled and very connected and i think that families that came felt the same way and we had a wide age range, like you said. We had a lot of babies, which was great, you know, because those are the up-and-comings, all the way to age 18, because Tyler was the oldest. And then they played hide-and-seek in the dark until really late and didn't want to leave.

And I think they all had a great Halloween. Yeah. Yeah. My only misgiving is that I could have dialed up my costume a little bit better. I missed the mark a little bit. I was trying to go as Warhol when I saw you. Everybody thought I was Warhol. I was trying to go, I was trying to go as Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks guy. Which was actually epic. And I was wearing all the clothes he wears and, and I just couldn't find quite find the right wig. I should have just dyed my own hair white. It would have looked more apropos, but it's still kind of an obscure.

There's always next year. Yeah. Well, I already know what I'm going is next year. Okay. So, but my thing is I never, I don't tell anybody. He just shows up. Right. That's so good. So we got through Halloween. Um, but now we're officially into the real holiday season. And on tap, we have on tap, we've got Thanksgiving right around the corner. And before you know it, it's Christmas, New Year's, Hanukkah, Hanukkah. Yeah, like everything is coming up now. And everybody's gearing up for the holidays. And we thought it was an appropriate time to kind of get into how to best navigate um a period of time that can be tricky for a lot of people uh dietarily nutritionally but also uh relationship wise with stuff that you know comes up with families and

we didn't want to do it like the day before Thanksgiving. Like we have a little bit of time we can talk about this kind of stuff. And we wanted to share some nutrition tips and recipes and some things like that to help people kind of stay on track with their plant-powered diets throughout the holidays. And strategies for kind of navigating the holiday parties and friends and family and pressures and all that kind of stuff. Right? Yeah. So I guess we would say, before we get into it, we do have our cookbook, Chai Seed, which has got a bunch of recipes in it.

And we have our online MindBodyGreen course at MindBodyGreen.com, The Ultimate Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition. have our online MindBodyGreen course at MindBodyGreen.com, The Ultimate Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition. And we do talk about holiday stuff in there and kind of how you navigate tricky social situations and parties and travel and all that. So if you haven't checked out that, you might want to go there and have a look at that. But we'll talk more about that stuff today, right?

Yeah, and I mean, in Jai Seed, we've got a good core of holiday recipes in that cookbook. So you definitely can use that as a jumping off point. But I also have some new things that I'm going to share with you. I'll include a few recipes with this podcast. We're brought to you today by recovery.com. I've been in recovery for a long time. It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe everything good in my life to sobriety.

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So holidays, recipes, what are we talking about? Well, I um so um just to get into the food a little bit is and to empower all of you to you know just be free to create some new recipes of your own so if you start to think about the holidays and what are the flavors that remind you of that you know special warm and fuzzy place called home that you used to think was associated with a turkey a sad turkey that gave his life for your pleasure. No, I'm kidding. I'm just joking. Sad, really fat. Very sad. Well, if you killed it yourself, then I have a little bit more, you know, I come from a hunting family, so I can, I can give you that one. but I know your dad used to hunt the family turkey

but one but one time uh I mean I can it's really bizarre but I swear to god he used to kill um pheasants so for people that might be new to the show explain a little bit sorry I come from Alaska and my dad is a hunter and so I'm a yogi and he's a hunter so we have this very extreme existence and we um he's still married to my mother he's my father and uh he's awesome right and he's just very different than i am so he's a fisherman yeah amazing amazing outdoorsman and a card carrying member proud card carrying member of the nra who moved your family from colorado up to alaska when you were young. And he has lived the life of Indiana Jones in many ways. The adventures that that guy has lived through are extraordinary.

And he met your mother while he was mapping the jungles in Chile. That's right. And he's crashed his plane on sand dunes off Ecuador or Nicaragua, right? This is true. And circled by sharks and jumped onto low-flying helicopters I mean the guy's like he's a pretty incredible guy he is very resourceful amazing person that's right he just turned 90 this year and I actually am going uh we are going to go up and and be with them with my other brothers and sisters and I'm going to be cooking plant powered actually he's asked me

already so it's a new experience for us which is gonna be great this is yeah this is an amazing thing because this is a guy who you know is is very particular about his meals and his game meat and you know what he puts on his plate and has lived his life in a certain way and the fact that he is open to the idea of Julie preparing the holiday meal, a plant-based meal, is quite extraordinary. Not only that, but he really wants you to give your speech about your book. I know. So we're going up to Alaska over Christmas. So he's trying to get me a book.

So if anybody's listening out there who lives in Alaska, if there are any groups up there that are interested in kind of hosting some kind of an event for me to come and speak, you know, send me an email through the website. That would be great. Thanks, you guys. So anyway, so getting back to, so it's really the flavors. If you think about, you know, what, you know, what kind of spices and what kind of flavors make you feel like it's the holiday meal. And those tend to be herbs like rosemary, sage, thyme, pumpkin pie spice, or nutmeg, cinnamon, cranberries always make me feel like it's a holiday meal. I can't do it without cranberries.

Gravy? Absolutely gravy. Gravy is a big one. And probably if you're really going for classic, you'd need a mashed potato. I mean, there's other potatoes you could sub, but you're going to want a mashed potato on Thanksgiving or holiday meal, right? And then the other thing would be stuffing. And, you know, some pie options.

And by that time, you're pretty much bloated and laying on the couch. Watching the Detroit Lions. So how can we get all these wonderful holiday spices and flavors into our meals and still eat healthy? So we're not bloated lying on the couch. So I mean, think of preparing the things that you normally would prepare. And think of using those type of spices that flavor things that make a difference. So for instance, like I'm creating a gluten-free stuffing. I'm going to talk about that right now.

I haven't achieved it yet, so hopefully I will have achieved it in two or three days by the time this goes up. But so what I'm feeling is that I could do it two ways. I might do a polenta, which is like a cornmeal that you can bake and then cut into squares, you know, so that it's sort of like a bread, bread stuffing. And I could also just get a really good quality gluten-free bread, you know, like Rudy's or something. And from the freezer case, it's sometimes in the freezer case. So what I would do is I would cube that, dry that bread out a little bit and then cube it up. And then I would start preparing to add

my other spices to it. Can you get a GMO free polenta? Organic? See, that's the thing. And that's the reason why I'm not sure if I'm going to do a polenta or not. I don't, I don't know. I have not seen one. Corn is increasingly scary. It is kind of scary. Let's forget the polenta. Just do it with it. Yeah, that's good. That's really important. So I'm going to do a gluten-free bread and I'm going to season it and I'm going to add some dried seaweed. I know it sounds like a little scary, but when you think you want to get some salt into it, right? So rather than load the bread with salt on the front end, I'm going to get some dried seaweed, toasted seaweed, organic.

Like nori, you mean? It can be nori or it could be some other varieties. You just have to use your intuition, you know. But in some of them you would soak first. But maybe not a nori because it might be too papery. I might use something a little bit more of sea vegetable, vegetable like, but not a whole lot, like just maybe in a whole pan of stuffing, like, you know, a quarter cup of some dried seaweed. Okay. I'm just going to start to try to flavor the breadcrumbs up a little bit. So I'm going to put that in there. I don't usually

cook with garlic, but since it's the holidays, I might go ahead and put some garlic in, either chop it up and grind it, or I could roast it and add it to, you know, afterwards. I'm going to put some celery in because celery always feels like Thanksgiving or a holiday meal. So I'm going to chop some celery, and then I'm going to go to the farmer's market, and I'm going to get the best wild assortment of mushrooms, so a mix, like a box of a mix of mushrooms. And I'll probably put in maybe two cups of mushrooms

that I saute first and season with lemon and a little namashiri. I'll write all this up for you guys so you don't have to be taking notes. Right, I'll put the recipe up in the show notes. Right, so I'm going to sort of combine all this together. I'm going to take the drippings from the mushroom, which is going to start to soften the bread and sort of how stuffing kind of sticks together a little bit.

So you're crumbling up the bread, right? Well, it's already crumbled. You just can kind of cube it and have it in a pan pan and then you start to add the seasonings to it then you saute the celery and then add it to it and then you're going to saute the mushrooms and then add it to it keeping the liquid it needs some liquid um and then you know we already have a little bit of seaweed in there so we're going to check the salt and see how it is. And we may need to sprinkle some sea salt in there. And then I'm going to see kind of how that looks. Um, if you're a person that likes, uh, apples in your stuffing, then you could, you know, chop some apples and put those in. If you're a person that likes pecans in your stuffing,

you could add that in at that point or walnuts, Either, walnuts or pecans. I have a son who doesn't like fruit in straight-ahead food, so I have a restriction there. I can't do that. So that would start to sort of show you how you could do a stuffing without turkey fat and without any. My family used to put like all the guts and everything else in there. Right, yeah. You need all that.

So you don't really need all that, and you can get the flavor with the with the seaweed and then and the mushroom sauteing the mushrooms will give it enough sort of uh moisture to give it like that sort of um i don't know so it's not like a dry yeah so that it's and and and keep in mind if it's dry you can always just add a little filtered water. You don't have to go to the fat. You can just add a little filtered water, check it out, and then season as you go. And you're going to be serving it next to your mashed potatoes that I'm going to tell you about. And then also you're going to be serving it with a great mushroom gravy that you can pour over the top of it. So, you know, that's just an idea of how you can start to do that. And of course, you could add all kinds of other things that you like or you crave.

But that's sort of like a good base to start with for a stuffing. Base stuffing. That's right. Okay. So that, is that clear? So that's stuffing. Yeah. Okay, good.

And then of course, you're going to want a mashed potato. And we have a great mashed potato recipe in Jai Seed. It is, it is made with veg, with veai Seed. It is made with Vegenaise. It's not low-fat. So don't think that if you're eating these potatoes every day and you want to lose weight that that's a good thing. So therefore, if you're training a lot or if you eat a really clean diet and you're going to have it occasionally, it's not to have every single single night but since it's thanksgiving it's in there and it's amazing

right and and uh vegenaise there's a couple different kinds that are made with different kinds of oils we usually use the one that's made with grape seed oil in it and there's a new product that just came out uh called uh just mayo yeah that's made by um a new company that's behind beyond eggs and it's called it's josh tetrick's company what is it called something farms um we'll get it forgetting it right now but anyway it's a new company um that is you know one of the one of the many new companies that are coming out that are making very interesting meat and egg and cheese and dairy analogs. And that is not to say that it is a whole food or your best option, but for people that are transitioning

and just feel like they need something that tastes like eggs or meat or dairy or whatever, they're great to kind of help ease that transition, I suppose. And I'm going to try that new mayo product this time and see how it goes. Is there a way to make mashed potatoes without the Vegenaise? It's for people that want to do a truly like sort of no oil, low fat version. Well, you know what I would do? I would do a combination of um of cauliflower and potato and that way um you could you know it's it's all a matter of creamy you could try

it that way and add some nutritional yeast um you know add some garlic some sea salt and that might be a really great option especially if you're going to do it if you're going to serve it with mushroom gravy that would be a much cleaner way to do it. Yeah, that would be good. Definitely. Um, and then the other thing is cranberries. So, all right. So do we give people how to make these mashed potatoes though? Or how do we, well, I mean, that one's in Jai Seed cookbook, so I don't, and we have, uh, so I think I'm going to, I'm going to share some of the other ones that are more, I mean, unless you want me to go through. Basically, you just boil the potatoes. I like using red potatoes.

And I don't like anything that's time intensive. So the reason I like red potatoes, organic. I use everything organic. So I'm advocating that. If you have that ability, please, you know, I recommend it. I think it makes a big difference. So red potatoes. Red potatoes, you're going to boil them in a big difference. So red potatoes, red potatoes,

you're going to boil them in a big pot on the stove with the skins on. And then I leave the skins on. I don't take them off, but if you wanted to, after they were cooked, you could kind of rub the edge under cold water and the skins just come off. And then you'd have to spend hours peeling little potatoes. So I usually leave the skins on. I simply drain them, put them back in the original pan that I had them in. And then I use a little olive oil, a little Earth Balance, and a lot of Vegemase, honestly. I mean, it depends on how creamy or how thick you want them. All right, so if you want that whipped, like the kind of whipped vibe,

you would use a lot of Vegemase. But if you said, you know what, I need to go no oil, no Vegemase, you still have these boiled potatoes, and you can mash them up and use maybe a little sea salt and B12, or I'm sorry, nutritional yeast. That would work better if you added the cauliflower in. But if you add the cauliflower in, how are you doing that? You're chopping it up and then just mixing it up? You would steam it until it's really, really, really, really soft,

and then add it in and then mix it in with the potatoes. I see, and that gives it more of a creamy... Yeah, and you could also process it. You could beat it with a beater at that point. If I was going to really mash them, them though i would take the skins off but i i sort of cut mine with a knife and they're sort of chunky style right so those are the two variations right like chunky peanut butter absolutely like there all right okay so then getting to cranberries so cranberries are really tricky because cranberries are really super tart and if you're making them the traditional

way they require a lot of sugar so what i discovered was i think not to interrupt but uh when people buy cranberry so like canned cranberry sauce at the store yeah i think people have no idea how much sugar is in that stuff i mean it's almost entirely sugar because they are so incredibly bitter tart yeah yeah they are so um but what you can do is you should cook them in on the stove in water and you know the more water you get the runny the runnier they're going to be so not that much water because as they start to cook they release water so i would do you know depending on how many cranberries you have in there like half as much water like don't cover the cranberries with water.

And put it on high and just start cooking it. And let them break down. Let them break down, break down, break down. When they get more broken down, then I would suggest adding soaked dates. So you're going to add anywhere from probably five to seven or eight dates. And just add them in and then go ahead and cook them a little bit more. And you could transfer them to a processor or a Vitamix and actually whip them and incorporate the dates in. The dates and the cranberries together or the dates separately?

No, no, no, together, like into the cranberries. So the dates are going to sweeten the cranberries together or the dates separately? No, no, no, together, like into the cranberries. So the dates are going to sweeten the cranberry. Okay. So then at this point, now, if you do that, it's going to be a very fine, it's going to be a very fine cranberry sauce. Another way you could do it is just chop the dates kind of thick and then add them, of course, take the pits out, add them to the cranberries and continue to cook them as they start to reduce down. out, add them to the cranberries and continue to cook them as they start to reduce down. And then you're going to have to taste it and see at the end, you may add some, uh, organic maple syrup. If it's not, if it's still too tart, or you could choose preferably when it's just warm, not hot, you could add some raw honey and actually incorporate that in. And that is

going to give you, um, a cranberry sauce that has no refined sugar. And I don't think cranberry sauce is really supposed to be super duper sweet. No, but you want it sweet, but you're not, it's not like a dessert. No, it's a, it's like a chutney. Yeah. Yeah, it's like a side. And for, you know, lots of people don't like to use honey, so maple syrup or dates would be fine. Would be fine, yeah. And then, of course, you can add cinnamon if you prefer, or some people like to add orange or any nuts. You know, I just kind of like mine just blank, just straight ahead.

All right, so we got the mashed potatoes. We have the cranberry sauce. We have the stuffing and mushroom gravy. Let's go to mushroom gravy, yeah. So again, you're going to have gone to, it's so worth it to go to a farmer's market and just find some really good mushrooms. It could be any kind, but of course, the darker they are

and if they're varied, they add more flavor. You also could use a mixture of dried mushrooms because dried mushrooms you can soak and then that water gets really kind of brown and mushroomy and then you can use that to season. So what I do is in a saucepan over a flame, I'm going to saute the mushrooms in a little bit of olive oil. When I saute in olive oil, I'm talking maybe a tablespoon. That's all I put in, maybe even less. Just enough because I really don't like things oily. It's just enough to put that little film on the bottom of the pan so that it doesn't stick. Yeah, and it doesn't even go everywhere.

It'll get spread around, but just really, really look at the oil quantity you're using and see if you can cut it in half because see how much excess just out of habit. You know, we think that it, that everything needs so much. So you're going to put the mushrooms in and you're going to saute the mushrooms. Um, let me back up. Could you use coconut oil instead of olive oil? No, I wouldn't for this because you're going for this specific kind of, it's kind of like, it's a specific taste and the coconut oil, even though it's some heat, it kind of gets neutral. It's still going to have that kind of island thing and I wouldn't do it in this case. So then if you're going to use olive oil,

you need to make sure you're not overheating. You don't want your flame on high heat. You want to keep it at a very low simmer. Yeah, it should be lower, definitely. Or you could use grapeseed oil or you could use macadamia nut oil would be the best because it won't have the coconut and the nutty flavor

would actually assist in this. You could also use a truffle oil too. So anyway, I'm going to back up a step. If you, I'm not a huge onion advocate, but is the one recipe one of a couple recipes that I will use a little onion in so if you get a shallot which is like a small kind of onion it's a shallot it's not an onion but a small shallot or about a quarter of an onion or even an eighth of an onion and fine chop it put that in the oil first just enough to get it going and when it starts to sort of brown then add the mushrooms and you've washed the mushrooms and de-stem them and you put them there mushrooms have a lot of water in them so you'll start to saute that and then when they get nice and brown get a half of a lemon and squeeze a lemon over the top of them.

At this point, you're going to transfer them into a Vitamix. Do you have a question? No. Okay. You're going to transfer them into a Vitamix, and you're going to puree them. Can you use a food processor, Julie Piot? You could. It'll have more of a grainy.

What if you don't have a Vitamix? You just have a regular blender? You could do it in a blender. You could do it in a regular blender. You could do it in a processor. So you're sautéing them. They're hot. You're putting this hot mixture into the Vitamix.

Yeah, you just turn it off and then just spoon them in. But that's hot mixture into the Vitamix yeah I just turn it off and then just spoon them in but that's the beauty of the Vitamix it really does completely liquefy it into like a real gravy that's right and so but what you're going to do is you're you're going to need to add some fluid so I would start with you're going to get something called arrowroot and arrowroot is a powder it's white and you can find it in your baking section and it's a thickener. So it actually helps things set up. Um, you could also use something called agar flakes, um, or you could use something called Irish, Irish moss. Um, but I use arrowroot for this. So it's like cornstarch. So if you put it in water and you don't like, let's just say you dumped it in and you

didn't blend it it gets clots in it like these you know chunks of of uh powder so you want to put it in a cup of water and beat it with a whisk so it's all blended and then um i missed a step okay go back we're gonna put, just go ahead and put some filtered water in the Vitamix and turn the Vitamix on and get that going and see what the consistency. With the mushrooms. With the mushrooms. All right.

And see the consistency that it is. Then you're going to taste it and see how it is. If it needs more salt, you're either going to add sea salt. You could add a handful of olives, Kalamata olives, and blend that and when I get it kind of the right

flavoring I'm going to transfer that mixture back into that saucepan that I sauteed the mushrooms and now I'm going to take the arrowroot that's been dissolved in the water and while I'm whisking I'm going to whisk it into the mushroom

what is arrowroot? it's a root I don't know whisking, I'm going to whisk it into the mushroom. Okay. And that will thicken it up. What is it? What is arrowroot? It's a, it's a root. It's a powder that they, it's in a, in it's a thickener. It's natural. And I don't know, I, I really don't know that much more about it, but I know it's a great thing. So you're, you, you, you've take what you've Vitamix and you put it back in the sauce pan and you turn the heat on low again. And then you add this, this sort of arrowroot that you've Vitamix and you put it back in the saucepan and you turn the heat on low again, and then you add this, this sort of arrowroot that you've already whisked. Right. And if you, and then you add it to desired thickness, right? Right. And if you were a gravy maker, if you ever made gravy in your life, it's the same process that you do with like the pan drippings. You, you have to add flour into it

or, and you, you beat it in. So it's the same gravy protocol. You're just using a different thing. Okay. So, and then at that point, it depends on how thick you want it. You know, if it's too thick, you're going to add more fluid and, um, you know, hopefully it's not going to be too thin or probably not ever be too thin. Right. And, uh, I can attest to the deliciousness of this gravy. We use it all the time, and it really is quite tasty. And I don't think about regular gravy at all, and I don't crave it anymore because this stuff completely hits the spot.

And if you put this on your mashed potatoes or your stuffing, you will definitely be having your holiday meal experience. I mean, it's just as satisfying and dairy-free, meat-free. So there you go. So that's three recipes, four recipes. I think that's four. there you go so that's three recipes four recipes i think that's four um but it's still we still have the the elephant in the room which is like what are you gonna do if you don't have turkey what are you gonna eat what are you gonna do well okay um i actually have the big ham the big ham

um well what we would do is um i've actually created a series of um vegan meatloaf recipes and i actually developed this when we were living on Kauai in the yurts. It was one of our great joys. It was cooking over there all the time. So I make a tempeh meatloaf that has a lot of ingredients in it. So I don't know that I'm—do you want me to do it right now? Well, no, because it'll take like 25 minutes to explain. So, um, I don't know that I, that I'm, she want me to do it right now. No, cause it'll take like 25 minutes to explain. Right, exactly. So, um, what we're going to have to give it to them or that's not going to be cool. They're going to be thought they're turkey. Yeah. All right. Well,

I'll just do it real quick. We'll just do it real, just go over the basics of it and I'll put the recipe in the show notes. So you're going to have to go to richroll.com to get the instructions. Okay, that sounds good. Okay, so the vegan meatloaf is basically tempeh. And you crumble it up, and you're going to mix it with a bunch of different herbs and spices. And then I make this roasted tomato sauce that we add in. And you shape it into a loaf, bake it in the oven. And it's awesome. It's a really hearty, really filling. And it has, you know, veggies in it,

but really a great flavor. So next to the mashed potatoes, the stuffing, the cranberry sauce, the mushroom gravy. You're sort of there. I mean, we just need to do dessert. So what you need to do, it's Saturday. Now we're going to put this podcast up on Monday. Can you write a blog post with all of these recipes out? And do we have any photos that we could include as to what all this stuff looks like? My plan is, um, yes, I would say the answer to that is yes. Um, cause I'm'm going to do kind of a spread on Sunday. So I hope you're hungry. Oh, good.

So we'll photograph that. Yeah. And get it up. Actually, no, I want to mention our Twitter friend, actually, who's coming over. Oh, that's right. Yeah. So I have the great pleasure of cooking for a guy named Al. Is it Surgel?

Al Surgel. Or Surgel. And he is a… He's the jazz chaplain. He's the jazzy chaplain no jazz chaplain yeah and he as a somebody that we've met on social media and just one of those dear people i mean just bless this medium of of communication that we have but one of those people that for some reason connected with us and and uh we've met by posting on each other's you know instagram instagrams and twitters

and uh he's a he's a beautiful family and just adopted a new little baby boy and anyway so he's in town now so um he uh he tweeted me and and uh and i said why don't you come up and we'll we'll have a spread with our families so And we're looking forward to seeing Al. Yeah, so we're going to meet him and his family. We're going to cook up a holiday meal. We're going to photograph it. Maybe play some music. Play some music and we'll document it.

He's a rock drummer. That's right. That's right. And we'll get that blog post up when the podcast goes up with the recipes for everybody. That would be great. So the last thing is the pumpkin pie. Oh, right. So I'm going to put in there.

It's nothing without dessert. Yeah, you've got to have pumpkin pie. So there's a pumpkin pie in the Jai Seed cookbook, but I have a new evolution of pies that I'm doing that are mostly raw. So the way that I'm going to do this pie is I'm going to cook a real pumpkin in the oven and I'm going to take the mash out and I'm going to combine it with coconut. Well, I said almost raw. Okay. I'm going to come on except the part that you're cooking the pumpkin. Yeah, but it's different because it's Matt though. No, but usually honey, when you make a pumpkin pie, you're taking it out of a can. Like that's

the standard. So yeah, you, the pumpkin's too hard you can't you know you couldn't eat it so i'm cooking the mash myself so that's fret you know very fresh organic and then i'm going to mix it with um coconut meat um and some other ingredients and it's going to go into a pecan date crust right Right. The crust is raw. And there's no grain in the crust, right? It's just nuts and dates. Just nuts and dates. And then that's going to be frozen.

So it's actually a frozen pumpkin pie. Right. These pies are insane. Like after you have these pies, you can't imagine going back and eating a normal pie. They're so good. It's so good. And your stomach feels good. Why would you need dairy and eggs in a pie anyway?

You know, you don't. Like these pies are so good and they're so fresh. But you don't, after you, whoops, I just spilled. After you eat it, you don't have that crazy like sort of food coma where you feel like you've got to lie on the couch and watch football for three hours. No, so hopefully all this food will be that for you. But the one thing that we want to just mention again, as we always advocate, and that is that before you embark on your holiday journeys, wherever they may take you, and you're going to friends for different meals or families or preparing your own, please do start your journey off with a large blend of greens.

I made one today for Rich and for me, and it was with Italian black plums, black grapes, cranberries, and hemp seeds. Mint. Mint. Fresh mint that you picked from the garden. Exactly. And anyway, so it's always good to start with that so that you get your nutrients and you're energized and your body is fed. And so you're not going into these situations starving. I mean, that's my rule wherever I go, holiday or otherwise.

If I'm going to go over to somebody's house to eat or I'm going to a restaurant that I've never been to or, you know, a work-related food occasion or something like that, I always drink a Vitamix before I go. So at least my body has been nourished before I go. And then if it so happens that there aren't that many things that I can really eat and feel good about, then at least I'm okay and i can sort of pick around or whatever um it's just like a safety you definitely eat less and it just it's just a much better experience all the way around you don't walk in starving and craving some and then end up eating like the thing that you promised yourself you weren't going to eat exactly exactly so this is we've covered like the food part of the holiday equation, which is really just the beginning. And also before we go, I just want to mention, so MindBodyGreen program, which Rich and I have available, has actually a demo of me making the pie crust, one of the pie crusts, right, and processes. Right, there's a video on YouTube.

And then understand that if you, the Jai Seed Cookbook is part of, it comes with the program. So if you feel inclined to do that. Right, if you get the Ultimate Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition at mindbodygreen.com, you get the cookbook along with that. Right. So anyway, so check that out. And we have lots of tips and information. And all of this is about kind of seeing our process and looking at the recipes and using them as a base point and then of course adapting them to your own family's

traditions and your own way and your own creative expression yeah it's not like this is the only way to do it this is just a few things that we've done that we found to be helpful and you may have you can you know take some of this information and expand on it. Hopefully you will. Yeah. And then share it with us. So, you know, yeah, this is all fine if you're going to make some stuff at home and have some people over, but that's not always the case.

You're going to get on an airplane and go to your aunt's house or you're going to go drive across down to your brother-in-law's house or someplace where you don't have this kind of control over the food that's going to be going on. And then, and also, um, and this is the other kind of side of it is, you know, walking into potentially emotionally charged environments. This is kind of what holidays can be about for a lot of people that trigger them into unhealthy behavior patterns, you know, and I see this, um I see this, being a recovering alcoholic, the holiday times can be triggers for a lot of people,

and there's always a lot of discussion about how to navigate these treacherous waters with your head held high and making sure that you know, making sure that you're walking the path that you want to walk. And, you know, these relationships can be emotional minefields and you get triggered. And then before you know it, you're eating something you don't want to eat, or you're saying something that you didn't want to come out of your mouth. And then you're in a fight and, you know, like everything devolves and then you're like, I hate the holidays. And, you know, and then you go home and eat a pint of Ben and Jerry's ice cream and drop into a shame spiral. So how can we, how can we, how can we, how can we do it differently? Well, let's see. I mean, first of all, from,

from my perspective, um, I've always wondered, I've had a big, there's, I feel like there's a big inconsistency with the natural rhythm of the planet and what's happening. So if you look at the seasons and what is happening, like what happens on the 21st of December on the solstice, it's like it's the cycle, it's the year and the cycle of nature and everything is dying up into that point. point. So for me, I feel a tremendous amount of violence and disconnect between what's going on in my external world and what is happening within myself. And this often can really make, you know, can lead to depression and to, it's, it doesn't feel right. It's like, I'm supposed to be really happy. I'm supposed to be celebrating and wanting to spend a lot of money, a lot of like outward energy. I'm supposed to, you know, want to be around a lot of people and a lot of

parties. And really the only thing that I want to do is really go crawl, you know, in a comfy blanket and turn the fire on and have a cup of tea, you know? So, right. And part of that is because it's dark, you know, so much early, like for me, I'm very sensitive to the light. Like I do not like this time of year where it gets dark at four 35 o'clock. Like I really, it's not like the, the one holiday experience that we had that was different was when we went to Chile, South America, where it was summer there and it was like light out until 10 p.m., and I was like, we should come here every year for the winter. There's something about that shortened day that really hits me hard and definitely affects my mood profoundly. Right, and so, I mean, I just wonder, and of course, you know,

we're speaking to the northern hemisphere, I guess we should say, because this podcast goes all around because you probably have a different experience. But for us here in this hemisphere, this is what it feels like. And so why are there so many suicides around this time of year? Why is there so much depression and so many people that are lonely and don't have families and feel forsaken? And, you know, I tease with, you know, my own family that, you know, I think Christmas is great, or I think gift giving is great. And I love it. I'm all for it. But could we just please do it in the spring? Could we please do this in May? You know, and don't be afraid, because I'm not going to advocate that because I'm sure that would be way too much

of a push. No one would no one would do it. But I do have some ideas about, you know, how to navigate through the holidays in a sustainable way where you can make sure that you self-nurture, you take care of yourself. So you have a consistency, you have a balance. And I think it comes with really identifying what is really at play here and, you know, the role of consumerism and how this whole thing gets sort of implanted and placed on everybody that, you know, we have to. These expectations are created that we have to live up to. And for a lot of people, it's too much. And we've been in that situation where we, you know, didn't have two dimes to rub together and we're going into the holidays and, you know, it's like, how are we going to get through this? And, you know,

here we are, you know, a couple of days after Halloween and you go down to that commons, which is a little outdoor kind of village mall in our town. Don't tell me they have the bell on. And they have, well, the bell has started, you know, the Christmas chimes and the, you know, the red ribbons on all the light posts are already up. And, you know, it's like, we just started November. Like, it's begun. And it seems like every year it starts earlier and earlier and earlier. And it wears you down.

Yeah. And then by the time the day's here, anyway, everybody's just stressed out. It's like, I've had enough. You know, I can't live up to that. I can't, you to that I can't you know I can't deliver and you know the kids are all swept up in it as well and it's um I really I really feel like it really is a violence and it's a setup and sadly many of us because we've equated you know how much you love your child and what kind of gift you give them or can you deliver and come through for your baby.

Sadly, many of us either are or have in the past just charge it, charge these expenditures on a credit card. Right, deal with it later. And then you feel really good for a minute until, you know, that thing that you've suppressed comes up and you hit January. And it's like everything is really out of balance. If you really look at the amount of stress that that puts on your system, your family, it's really not sustainable. And it's a big yo-yo. You know, it's a big, you know, high for a big low.

And I think there's other ways that we can start to shift the way that we interact with these holidays. All right. So what do we do? What do we do? Well, first of all, just realize what's going on and realize that the natural cycle of life is maybe a little different than what is going on at the mall. And I think that... What is going on at the mall. And, um, I think that, um, what is going on at the mall? I don't know. Thank God. No.

Um, it's just, um, I would advocate, and I know in our own experience and times, one of the great blessings that we had of having tough times is is um you know we have done things like we've created a creative contest you know where we took teams and each team had to come up with a present that had a ceiling it had a cap on how much you could spend on it and there were certain parameters around you know the event and then we went away with our perspective teams and we made these gifts. And then on Christmas or whatever holiday you celebrate, we presented these to each other. And it was actually really funny and really fun and really maybe more about what the holidays should be about. And that took time that we spent with each other, creating something,

doing something, making something. And there's no doubt the kids will remember those experiences more than, oh, I got the new Kindle or whatever. You know what I mean? I remember one year we were hurting pretty bad and I was trying to come up with something creative to do with the kids for gifts. And Mathis and I went to Target and we bought like an eight-pack of white T-shirts, Hanes undershirts or whatever, for like $5 or whatever it was.

And then we bought some sponges and some paints, and then we painted all the T-shirts. We painted a different T-shirt for everybody in the family with different colors. That's right. I love that t-shirt yeah and then we just gave them and it was cool because like math has got to paint you know have a creative expression of painting these shirts and creating something and then that creates an emotional connection to the gift that you're giving like you really you know she painted it and she really wanted to see what tyler or trapper how that how her brother was going to react when he opened that up because there's a pride of creation that goes along with that. That's right. And I remember Trapper and I made a short film. Trapper wrote and starred in a short film. I think we talked

about it on the podcast before, but we could have, did you ever put the link up to it? Cause it's Trapper ultimately wanted me to take it down. YouTube. Oh, he didn't want you to have it. Yeah, he got embarrassed. But he made this awesome video that we put on YouTube. It was called The Journey. Yeah, it was called The Journey. And he did impersonations of all of my spiritual teachers that I had played with. Yeah, he dressed up in costumes and imitated all these different,

sort of like it's expanded consciousness personalities. And then mocked like the kind of couch potato dad who was watching football on the couch yelling for him. It was really funny, actually. It was set to music and we had a friend. And you were so surprised. No, I did. It was awesome. Yeah, it was my gift.

And you were so surprised. It was great. And we're still talking about it. And if he had just given me like a shirt or something, I wouldn't even remember now like what he did. Right. So, you know, you could do something like that. And again, or you could do a hybrid. You know, you could just designate like, okay, this is the allocation of what everybody's going to get.

So Santa's bringing X. And then after that, everything else is homemade. You know, it's the same thing with a Christmas tree or in this kind of process. You could find a tree in your yard and put lights on it, or you could find a tree out on the street and put lights on it and see if you get away with it. And you can also— Don't go crazy now.

You could go crazy. No, I just saw— You're telling people not to go get a Christmas tree. I know, but I just saw— So you're getting fr Christmas tree. I know what I just saw. You're getting fringy. I know. And you guys fight with me every year. So I'm just putting it out there again because I would like to be able to do that. They always outvote me. Then they go get the tree. Well, not everybody has a tree in their yard too. What if you live in an apartment? We have a tree in our yard right there. I know we do, but I'm saying if people who are listening live in an

apartment. It's a suggestion, right? So people could decide if they want to do it or not so the other thing that i've done over the years i've done different kind of theme um christmas trees like one time i did i just took all the toys from my children's room and i decorated the tree with all of their toys right you know so we do a. Did we do a Dr. Seuss tree one year? Yeah, I did a Dr. Seuss tree with a pink wig at the top. And that was a whack. That was totally whack. That was, you know.

It was really fun. Like rather than unpacking all the, you know, boxes of ornaments, we do kind of a different theme for the tree every year and do something different. And it could just be, you know, homemade cookies. It could be, you know homemade cookies it could be you know old school popcorn or it could be you know gardening tools or just something really innovative i'm sure you know everyone could come up with some really amazing creative stuff um so that's another way to sort of not buy into more plaque more plastic and how do you how do you do that when your kids are like have an expectation that it's going to go a certain way

or you've been doing it, like let's say somebody's listening in and like, well, for the last 10 years, we've done it this way. My kids are expecting that, you know, they're going to get X, Y, and Z. You have a family meeting. And like I'm starting to freak out.

You have to have a family meeting. And I mean, the thing is, you have to be realistic too. I mean, life is not, you know, I have a dear friend of mine right now who's going through what I call the dismantling. And, uh, you know, for the first time, you know, she, uh, you know, really, really down to, you know, hardly any flow. And she, you know, was going to have to tell her daughter that, you know, she couldn't buy her certain, certain clothes or a certain meal, you know, this week. And week and you know this is part of

the gift of these experiences you know life is not about always getting what you want that's not necessarily the meaningful experience and kids are resilient and they're expanded souls that have lived thousands of lifetimes and they're it's not like they can't handle it. Nine times out of ten, they can handle it way better than we can. So in our case, you know, and my style is to, you know, treat them with respect. And, you know, we communicated really very openly with them about our choices and why we made the choices we made and what we were exploring and what we were endeavoring to create. And that wasn't to create. And that

wasn't always easy. And they share. That way they have a really good idea of how to recite it to their therapist when they're 20. Well, whatever. That's a joke. I know. Maybe not. No, I mean, I think just being honest is, you know, really the best policy in in my in my experience i think i think the most important thing is that the kids know that they're loved and that you have their best interest at heart and and uh everything else after that falls into place and so whether you can go out and buy a ton of gifts or you're in a year where that's not going to be possible if the kids know that they're loved and respected then everything's going to be possible, if the kids know that they're loved and respected, then everything's going to be fine. Well, also, they can participate in creating a new way.

Yeah, it's an opportunity. You have to look at it not as a sacrifice or something negative, but as an opportunity to have a different experience and express something differently. And I think that, you know, the kids can relish that opportunity. And the pressure really is felt by the parents, not the kids. It's the parents who are desperately feeling the pressure, the social pressure from family and friends and projected onto themselves from their imagination that they have to live up

to X, Y, and Z or Christmas or the holidays or Hanukkah or whatever it is, is going to be a failure. And, um, and I think sort of releasing yourself from that pressure and just trying to, you know, do what is, what is sort of within your means is much, you know, and, and being okay with that. Being sustainable. And there's also a very much larger conversation that's right at hand that's affecting all of us. And that's the, you know, the consequences to the planet and what is going on in a greater playing field. And, you know, do they want to have a part in changing the course of the future? You know, it's just, we're just not in the age of, you know, where consumption is what it's all about. You know, we're all learning how to simplify. We're all learning how to connect in a deeper way. Right. I mean, the holidays are

really, you know, the heart behind these holidays is really rooted in service and like, you know, sort of, you know, serving mankind on a higher plane, right? So it's not about getting a bunch of gifts that are made in China that you have to jackhammer open in plastic containers that are impossible to open without some kind of high-powered scissor machine. You know what I mean? And that the kid is going to look at it

and enjoy for five minutes and then discard because everything suddenly is free compared to what it used to be like when we were kids, essentially. Instant gratification. Yeah, there's this instant gratification kind of thing that goes along with the holidays, and we've really lost our way with that, you know, and it really should be about service. So whether that, you know, that can take the form of a formal, you know, like, oh, we go to the soup kitchen, the form of a formal, you know, like, oh, we go to the soup kitchen or it can be something simple, you know, and, and, you know, not like sort of attention grabbing at all, just a gesture here,

or, you know, anything like that, or just sort of carrying that consciousness, that higher consciousness of like, how can I be helpful to somebody else in need today is really what the holidays should be about. Absolutely. You know, and there's another way you can always share food too. You can share good, healthy, vibrant food that comes with love that you prepare, that's from organic sources, pure sources. And you can pass the gift along to someone else and just introduce them, make them a great dish and show up with it. You know, that could be the beginning of a major shift in their lives. How about the dealing with the emotional sort of component of

the holidays and sort of, you know, the travel to the relative's house, or we have to go see this person that I have a history with and how's it going to go like all that kind of highly sort of charged not baggage is the wrong word but like you know when you have to go you know what i'm saying like i'm not articulating it very well yeah you go you you know the holidays inevitably involve kind of being in social environments that maybe you wouldn't choose to be in, but are sort of, uh, compelled to attend out of familial obligation or otherwise. Right. And so, and this causes a lot of people, a lot of distress. Yeah. And this is because, you know, we come into these families, um, you know, many times for the purposes of healing. So that's why if you're sitting there scratching your head going, why did I end up in this family, you know, where I don't relate to anybody

or there's such a wide range? It's because there's a lot of transformation available when there's healing that can happen, when both sides can kind of transform and sort of overcome. And that being said, it's the most charged and the most difficult, you know, like, you know, they say that it's easier to go meditate in a cave, you know, in the Himalayas than it is to go home for the holidays. Yeah, there's no question about that.

So if you think you're enlightened, go spend two weeks with your relatives and see how that's going. But what I would say, and something that I've learned over the years, it's been a valuable tool to me, and there is a very strong aspect of it in the Jai Release Meditation. There's a second component of it, which is a visualization, a third, I think it's the third component. It's a visualization of sealing yourself in your own field.

And again, I talk about this kind of frequently, but I really feel strongly from my experience this is one of the greatest thing you can do for yourself to connect you with your soul mission and also make sure that you are not absorbing other people's energies that are not your own. let's say you have a charge with somebody that's just so it's so hot that you couldn't even bring it up with them or you know you just can feel the imbalance bubbling right there that there would just be a huge fight or a huge issue well you have one option and and one really great option to not having a physical confrontation with them, like in a real person. So if you just could imagine and just, um, entertain that thoughts are things and emotions are things. And so you can feel them in your body. And even though they don't have a physical, um, form in front of you, they do have an effect. Um if, if I had one of these supercharged situations,

I would choose not to have the confrontation in the real physical, because the thing that you want to avoid is any explosions or any imbalance where you're in extreme anger or, you know, screaming or all this kind of stuff.'s extremely detrimental to your health it's detrimental to really everybody it affects everything when you enter those spaces so if you could sit down quietly in a place alone first see yourself sealed in your own container you know like a bubble of light to be very basic. And in my meditation, there's something much more developed. But if you saw yourself sealed in this bubble of light, and then you ask the higher form

of the person that you have the charge with to come forward, and you are going to have a conversation with them. This is a visualization type of thing. It's a visualization type thing. And I would say an imaginary conversation, but it's not really. It's a real conversation. I would suggest that you speak out loud to them. So you're going to call them in front of you,

and then you're going to have this time to say everything you need to say. You can say why you're mad at know, why you're mad at them, why you're sad about them, why you're hurt, what you thought was, you know, what you're holding on to, what you're resentful for, what you wish they had done differently. You go through all of it and just say it, like, right to them, like as if they were standing there.

And then, after you've done that, you're going to ask your higher self and that person's higher self to disconnect any courting between the two of you. So thoughts are things. So just imagine that from this experience, there's a charge, right? That you're feeling in your body. So there is a charge. It's existing somewhere. You may even feel it in your body. You may say, oh, it's in my heart. Or when I sit there, I can feel it in my right shoulder. Or it's down my spine. Or it's in my head. So as you identify it, please ask that any connection be removed from you and that this connection be moved away, right? So again, you're

clearing the field, you're keeping your own field, and you're giving the field back to the other person that you have the charge with. So are you with me? Yeah, I'm with you. Okay. So then at that point, you should ask that the qualities of unconditional forgiveness and unconditional forgetfulness be activated in the experience. And then you will be able to thank this person for this exchange, because everybody is our teacher,

even if it hurts or doesn't feel good, it's still your teacher. And from that point, and feel good it's still your teacher and from that point okay then you close you you can say you know this is ending and i'm i am claiming my own power and my own will in this moment when you go into the real life situation with this person see if you can maintain a neutrality neutral loving compassion so no one is any better than you are and no one is any worse than you are they have their right to their own experience and their right to their own choices just like you have a right to your own experience and you have a right to your own choices, and you have a right to your own choices. And you can just let it be. And I would stay very neutral, and in my experience going into situations,

this has been invaluable, an invaluable healing for really everybody. And I'm not saying that you can't predict. I'm not saying you're going know, you can't predict. I'm not saying, you know, you're going to end up being best friends or, or, you know, I can't say what's going to happen. All I can say is that this is going to clear the charge so that when you walk in that room, that pain body is not looking for yours. Right. I think the thing, yeah, it's about trying to train yourself to be in a neutral place so that when you walk into that environment and that person predictably says, you know, X, Y, or Z, usually that thing that is always going to get under your skin, that it's, you know, it's water off your back. And it doesn't, it doesn't like provoke you in the way it historically has.

Well, and by communicating and by taking care of your part because the reason it's provoking you is because you have a charge so if you deal with the charge that's in your own field and you've actually done a service by assisting them to deal with their own i mean at least by removing the the tangled energy right? I mean, they haven't... The polarization of the charge. Yeah, they haven't been able to talk to you about how they feel about you because you can't do that for them.

But at least you've removed yourself out of the tangled situation. You have a much better chance of there being a healing or maybe they'll just naturally move away a little bit and it'll be okay. And not everything can be dealt with, you know, in this moment in person at every point, you know. Right. I mean, I think one of the kind of primary tenets of recovery is that the recovering alcoholic does not have the luxury of justifiable anger or resentment. Like even if you're angry at somebody and it's completely justifiable because you've been wronged, you do not have the luxury of cultivating that emotion because that is the thing that creates your own suffering

and will inevitably lead to your relapse. So the idea is how do you, you know, this resentment that you carry towards, you know, into a scenario and that you direct at a certain individual, how do you overcome that? And really the only way of doing that, and not to be glib because it's very difficult to do it, is to essentially you can pray for that person or you send them goodwill or you forgive them for whatever transgression it is. And that is truly the only way that you can free yourself from that charge and that pain that it

causes you. And that way you're shifting the dynamic. So they tell people like, oh, if somebody's wrong to you and you can't stand them or whatever it is, you know, just send them goodwill every day or pray, you know, pray for them or meditate on good things happening for that person. And over time, that resentment will dissipate and eventually go away. And that doesn't mean at some point you may not have to have a conversation with that person. And it doesn't mean that you don't create a healthy boundary for yourself. And when it's right right you exempt yourself from a social environment where that person is there's all these other things that surround that but ultimately the principle is that really you're the only victim when you resent somebody or you have anger towards them you're the one who is

you're creating your own suffering over that. Yeah, I agree. I have a little distinction that I would shift slightly. And that is that I would say one of the most powerful principles, or, you know, if you want to call the Christ, what a Christ, what an actual Christ principle would be, it would be seeing somebody in their highest divine light and holding that vision for them. Yeah. I mean, it's essentially you're saying the same thing. Well, it's a little different, and I just want to offer, because I think it's a little trap, because your ego can get trapped in this. When you say pray for somebody or send them good thoughts, your ego can attach onto that

as if you are superior to them. Like, oh, that poor fool, you know? And it's, it's, it's a trap. Yeah, I see that. But it's also like, I can't stand that guy. So I'm just, all I'm going to do is focus on, on, on trying to have good things come into his life. But can you really authentically do that? No, it doesn't. It doesn't matter because if you act as if long enough, you can get to that place. I would say just do the healing and remove the thing and deal with it and say what you need to say and then see them in the highest light. And then you're free because you're not really involved in their evolution. They're involved in their own evolution.

The point is to get out, to get out of the triangle. But also you have to free yourself from that. Like if I'm walking around all day long obsessed with a resentment that I have towards somebody, how do I free myself from that pain? You need to go in where it's in your body, go into meditation, and remove it from yourself. Right, but how do you remove it? and remove it from yourself. Right, but how do you remove it?

So what I'm saying is the way that has been helpful to me in removing it is by what I just said. Yeah, but my question to you is, are you successful in being able to send somebody good thoughts when you're feeling resentful about them? That I find, I would wonder that. Well, no, you have to. That's where the act as if thing comes. I see.

And then over time, when you're acting as if, that resentment will begin to dissipate until you wake up one day and you actually truly do wish them well. And it's a miraculous experience when that happens because you can't believe that you actually are feeling good things towards a person that used to make you insane. Wow. Okay. Different perspective. So not that different. It's really not that different. I don't think. I'll have to meditate on that one. All right.

Do what you want. But I mean, I think, you know, I think also mean i think you know i think also um you know we're talking about the holidays and visiting relatives or having to go to social situations that maybe ordinarily you would choose to avoid but you feel some obligation towards showing up showing up at and i think at times it's okay to say i'm'm not going to go, you know, to, you know, what is in, maybe it's not in everyone's best interest for you to show up at the thing where you're expected to show up. Maybe it's okay for you to create a healthy boundary for yourself and say, you know what, I'm just, I'm not going to do that thing that I do every year that doesn't end well. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you have to make those own choices definitely. And there's

definitely the, you know, um, there's a lot of self-responsibility and, and, you know, there are going to be changes as you evolve and change in your life where there are circumstances that you may not be around the people that you always were your whole life. And it's not always painless. It's often painful. And it's hard for us to even understand. In my experience, it just naturally will fall that way, you know, after some time. And there's, the more you resist, the more suffering you experience. So in just going with the flow and not resisting it, and chances are things will just align where you won't find yourself in the same area

of certain individuals after a time, and you just have to let it be. Does that make sense? Yeah, I think so. I feel like we're presupp, this, like we're, we're presupposing that holidays are a big downer because they're not, I actually, you know, I enjoy the holidays. I, I'm not a big fan of going to lots of parties. Like I just don't, that's not in my nature really anymore. So I don't like super relish that aspect of it, but I enjoy the holidays and

I'm looking forward to them. So I don't want it to come off like, oh no, you know, the holidays are coming, everybody battened down the hatches, you know, like, and a lot of people absolutely love it and have completely healthy, productive relationships with all of their extended family members. I don't know, maybe, you know, do you know any of those people? No, I think I know a few, I don't know. You know, Do you know any of those people? No. I think I know a few. I don't know.

You know, I think the holidays are a great time, and it's lovely to spend time with family. I think we're just sharing ways to help maintain the balance and to try to experience a more sustainable, more self-nurturing holiday experience. Yeah, I think it's difficult to talk about these things. I think there's a lot of people that maybe not dread the holidays, but there are moments that come up during the course of the next eight weeks that can be uncomfortable and cause consternation and confusion about how to best navigate in a healthy way for all parties involved. And so I think it's just good to talk about, to sort of, you know, like release the pressure of talking about that and say that it's okay. And maybe here are a few things that might, might make it a little bit easier for you if you happen to be in that scenario.

Yeah, absolutely. I think a lot of people are, I mean, it's, you know, it's, it's a highly charged time of year, so it's not, you know, you know, there is a correlation between, you know. I mean, it would be highly charged just the family part of it, but then you add on like the pressure to buy all these gifts for everybody and do all this other stuff. It's like the volume's turned up to 11, and then everyone's eating terrible foods and feeling horrible. They're out of balance.

They get sick. Well, really, I mean, it's really. And it's dark out. It's excessive. It's excessive, it's excessive and it's, um, it's not natural and it's, and, uh, and we have a, uh, an opportunity to take back some of the sanity and to, to make it a really deep experience, but feel free to say no to some of those scheduled things, you know, choose to, you know, not drink yourself into, you know, oblivion and, you know, choose to eat healthy food and keep your body fortified

so that you don't end up sick, you know, for weeks at a time. Yeah. And, and so you're on the, you get to the other side of the holidays and you go, wow, that was really fun and awesome. As opposed to that sense of exhaustion and relief that you just survived it. That's right. And, you know, you can always go for a hike and be outside or, you know, go skiing or, you know, have a snowball fight or just do something new and original and different that you've never done. I'm all for tradition, but I'm, I'm more for evolution, you know, like if you, if we've done something, well, we've done it. So we've done that, so let's do something else.

But that's, yeah, that's me. What else? What else? Yeah, I mean, how do you, you know, what about the person who does sort of suffer that, like post-holiday depression? I mean, it's so, you have this highly charged period of time and then it's over and then a lot of people are like, you know, it's so, you have this highly charged period of time and then it's over.

And then a lot of people are like, you know, they go into like that, it's really that depressing. It's a really depressing time in my, I mean, I think of the year it's December is the, is the darkest month for me. Just, I feel that's how I feel. And it's not, it's because that's the time of the season that it is. And, you know, January, there's not much happening either, you know, like, like the beginning weeks of January are sort of, you know, not that exciting as well. So I don't know. I mean, I think that taking care of yourself, making sure that you're, you know, well nourished, that you're paying attention to your emotions, how you feel, what do you need for yourself, that you don't overextend yourself, that you don't get caught in this debt trap and charge all these things and then, you

know, be strapped for, you know, I think there was like a study that they said that there was some high percentage of families in the U.S. that they spent most of the year paying off the debt they incurred around Christmas. So I really don't think we're out of line with like talking about this. I think it's actually verified. So the point is, is that it's not going to, it doesn't have to be a bummer if you don't have money or if you choose to have a different experience, you can just create it and you, you'll have some pushback. I mean, my kids this year on halloween they were like you know does it have to be on halloween and i said yeah you know what it does and why why because we're creating a new way because we love our planet and we love humanity and we're going to

try a different way so that's why so is that a good enough reason i don't know so i hope it is okay mom well they did it and they had a blast and they're excited for next year and we already have people donating stuff and my big you know hope is that other people

will join maybe we'll start a whole internet infrastructure and we'll take over the world with a plant parent Halloween

yeah well it would be great it would be great if like other other families wanted to start doing it and they would start popping up

in different towns that would be that's the idea really that's right and I mean all of our the only thing that our kids i mean our beautiful boys who they are they were so supportive of us and so such champions for us during this whole process and you know they're they just have a great sense of themselves and they're very grateful and they don't need much. Don't get us wrong. I love money.

I love certain comforts, and I like having really nice things. It's not like we live in poverty. We live in an amazing place. But we've been through our moments and yeah i think these experiences shape us and they they bring out the best in us so you know don't think that you know your kid's going to suffer because you know you can't do the big consumer situation right it's been and it's the original rubber band scenario yeah it's sort of like, oh, well, I overate and I over drank. I overspent. And now it's January 2nd. I'm in debt. I feel horrible. I'm overweight. I'm hungover. And now it's time to make the New Year's resolutions and go on the diet and do all the whole thing. And like, and you're doing this weird slingshot thing all the time. there's no balance to any of that that's right and so if you if we do it like this and we just do a little prep then we're just prepped just to keep moving

just really balanced through the whole thing we're going to have a we're going to have fun we're going to have meaning we're going to be healthy we're going to be well we're going to be spiritually connected but we're not going to go to these extreme levels, which are stressful and detrimental to the body, mind, and spirit. There you go. I think that's a good place to wrap it up. Is that it? Yeah. What do you think? You want to keep going? I think it's good. I don't know. Is there anything else? Well, you never run out of stuff. I mean, we could keep going, but I think that that's a

really nice bookend to what we're talking about. And if people want, you know, leave a comment on the blog page, um, for this episode. And, uh, if there's more dialogue and discussion you guys want to have around the holiday stuff, we'd be happy to reconvene and talk about it more, but, you know, leave a comment and let us know, um, if there are other things that you want to hear more about. Yeah. Right. Absolutely. It'd be great. Yeah. Cool. cool so um julie pyatt is on twitter at at jai c j-a-i-s-e-e-d but your new favorite social media is instagram instagram i'm shreemati at shreemati s-r-i-m-a-t-i yeah you gotta you gotta how do i keep them the same you know you have two different things like the twitter say goodbye to the Twitter people?

No, you can change your... And keep my same following? Yeah, I don't know how you do that. Well, I do that yesterday if I could do it. You're the king of too many names. Too many names. You've got to consolidate one thing. What am I going to do?

I don't know. So anyway, yeah, on Instagram, you're sharing recipes, and you're going to be posting a lot of pictures of holiday recipes. Yes, and also I'm working hard to get a food blog up. So it's a lot of new things after the new year. So we've got a second cookbook coming. In the meantime, you can just put your food posts up on richroll.com. And we'll do it there that way.

Thank you. Thank you so much. We already have that, right? Okay. That's good. I didn't know I could do that. You can. And for, yeah, if you want to kind of learn more about some of the meditation techniques that Julie talked about today and has talked about in the past, you can check out her Jai Release Meditation Program, which is up on ritual.com.

It's like nine bucks. Downloadable series of MP3s. And more recipes in the Jai Seed Cookbook. And we're working on a hardcover recipe book. Yes. I don't know when that will be done and ready to be out, but it'll be, I don't know, soon. Probably early in 2014. Yeah.

And lots of requests for the Plant Power t-shirts. We are in the middle of reconfiguring the website. You might notice a couple changes. We just changed the header, and we're playing around with some new stuff, and we're building out a new back-end shopping experience, and these things take time and are not as simple as sometimes they might seem. So we're trying to get it right. It's taking a little while to configure everything,

and we're getting all the T-shirts in stock. We're going to have a couple different design options and we should have those up hopefully in time for people to buy them for Christmas or the holidays but I'm not sure I can't make any commitment on date yet for that yeah we're just we're really trying to get the color palette the way we want it and uh we're working on a new logo and it just has to be right yeah i mean it's easy to slap up products but we want to have some really cool high-end quality stuff so we're just trying to you know sort of cross the t's and dot the i's um but we will be getting those things up soon and there's the mind body green course you can gift that for the holidays too yeah that'd be good. At mindbodygreen.com. And Julie's music?

You can find my music on iTunes. Mother of Mine is my debut album. Or you can read more about me at srimatimusic.com. Right, and on iTunes, you search Srimati, S-R-I-M-A-T-I, in the music store, and you can find her album there. That's right. And I just had a, I did a video blog for a beautiful singer named Sonnet. And it's called Living,

I forgot, Living the Dream, Living Your Dream. She did a great job. She interviewed me and there's multiple videos there about the music. And it was really wonderful. I'll put a link up to that in the blog post. That'd be great. It'd be cool. And anyway, we had a great gig in Austin. Thanks to everybody

who supported and it was really fun to check out. Austin's a great town. We had some great vegan food. The boys and I had a great trip and we're looking forward to our next gig. We'll let you know where that is. Right on. Alright. Digging the Plant Power Mission.

Want to support the show, everything that we're doing. Want to expand plant power consciousness. The easiest way to do that is to tell a friend about the show. That's really all we ask. But if you're going to buy

anything on Amazon, particularly all your holiday gifts that you're, of course, getting sewn up and configured before the holidays, right? We're not buying very many. Please don't buy too many things. But if you are going to buy stuff on Amazon,

click through the Amazon banner ad at richroll.com. It will not cost you a penny extra. And Amazon throws us a couple nickels, and that keeps the bandwidth flowing, and we appreciate it. There's been a lot of people using it. It's great. I think I'm going to start reading off like some of the interesting purchases

that people are using. So we can see what's trending. No, I can look on Amazon. Like I can look at all the things that have been bought. I want to see. Yeah, I'll show you. There's some cool stuff.

So maybe next week I'll pick a few and give some shout outs to some people. So we really appreciate that. Thank you for all the comments and five-star reviews on iTunes. We love that. That helps us with the iTunes ranking. So if it feels right to you, go to the iTunes page for the show and leave us a nice comment. If you haven't done so already, subscribe at richroll.com and you get a free seven recipe download. And then you'll be on our

mailing list for our newsletters to date i've been sending out sort of podcast announcements and we're going to start sending out more informational like a weekly email with kind of a curated um sort of a curated newsletter of interesting sort of topical news stories and videos and blog posts that are all kind of related to plant-based nutrition, fitness, health, all the, all the sort of themes and things that we talk about on the podcast. That's great. So yeah, sign up. It's this little subscription thing at richroll.com. You can check that out there. And, uh, I think that's it, right? That's it. I think people can donate to the podcast if they want. And that's great. We appreciate that greatly

doing that, which is really super awesome. So thank you very much. It's touching that people would spend their hard earned money to, uh, pay for something that, uh, is, is free and will always be free. So we greatly appreciate that. So join the Plant Power Nation. It's a movement, people. Come on. Are you on board? Get on board.

All right. Are we done? I think we're done. All right, cool. Happy holidays, everyone. Have a beautiful journey, and we'll see you next time. I think you'll be back before the holidays. I'm excited to prepare my next show. Yeah, all right. Okay. to prepare my next show. Yeah.

Okay. Namaste. Thank you. Peace. Plants. Thank you.