a repository of thoughts, photographs, and observations from wherever we find ourselves

Lori Hoeck of Think Like a Black Belt, and I discovered during a series of blog comment conversations that we had similarly been attracted to and involved with a certain type of charismatic individual. Our relationships with these individuals had gone on to transform into macabre dances of co-dependent need.

You might think this all might be some kind of exotic, bizarre, coincidental circumstance uncovered on the Internet. Rest assured, the bizarre aspect to these toxic relationships is why the vast majority of individuals allow themselves to be subject to them. Just like so many others, Lori and I each had been involved with a narcissist.

Most of us can point to the origins of mistakes we’ve made with relationships upon reflection. While hindsight is always 20/20, we may have become involved with people whose expectations and behavior ultimately hindered our growth. Perhaps we chose to ignore the warning signs that might have steered us differently. More often though, like Lori and I, we might have found ourselves wondering in bewildered fashion just what was going on with all the drama and emotional pain we experienced with these people. And even more alarmingly, we might even have concluded, as I did temporarily, that there might be no escape back into relative sanity.

How could things have been different? Were there red flags that Lori and I ignored? Did we willingly suspend our intuition and self-protective reactions to accept harmful behaviors in others? Were we somehow contributing to the toxicity or signaling availability to emotional opportunists? Was everything really our fault, as we were repeatedly told? Or might there be another integer lurking in the equation?

Lori and I battled our way out of those destructive relationships. We both acknowledge the heavy price we have paid in achieving our self-extraction. What we’re doing now is passing along not only what we learned, but what others know, and more importantly, what you can do to keep yourself in healthy relationships with a confident, assertive outlook. We’ve written The Narcissist: A User’s Guide and are making it available for free.

A narcissist is an individual with a wounded psyche who engages in protective behaviors with others. The relationship, to a narcissist, is a source of emotional nourishment. But the narcissist’s appetites are different. They feed their self-esteem by sucking yours out of you. They are having all the esteem they can possibly access and have no qualms about leaving very little of it around for anyone else.

Narcissists are found in all walks of life. They use a comparative method to determine their place in the world. Because deep down they view themselves as “less than,” they are constantly searching for someone – possibly, you – who by comparison is inferior. The tactics a narcissist uses can take many forms, but they are all rooted in ego fulfillment. They can masterfully seek out unresolved fear or pain you might have, push those buttons in you, and create an interplay that will certainly deplete and may ultimately destroy your emotional well-being.

The Narcissist: A User’s Guide turns that dynamic on its ear. Lori and I have gathered information, but more importantly, specific tips and scripts for you to use to start setting the terms of a healthy relationship. Neutralizing and negating a narcissist isn’t for the faint-hearted, but it can be done. You might decide your interests are better served by leaving the situation. Whatever its form, your decision to stand up for yourself will take guts and determination.

Lori and I meant our Guide to provide a basis from which you can draw your own conclusions. We’re betting that you may have had similar experiences, or you might know someone who has. Perhaps you’re currently involved in a narcissistic relationship.

You may want to educate yourself and your children to beware of these individuals, and thus move confidently and purposefully through life. In order to do that you’ve got to know who you’re dealing with, and the strategies and mechanisms you’ll need.

Lori and I wrote The Narcissist: A User’s Guide to help identify the harm that arises from interacting with a narcissist, and to validate an assertive, confident way through life’s journeys. We hope you’ll enjoy our e-book, and pass it along to anyone you think should have a look.

Follow us on Twitter:
@betsywuebker
@lorihoeck

The Narcissist: A User’s Guide has a Facebook page with a discussion area and a Squidoo lens.

If you have a story to share about your experiences with a narcissist, we’d love to hear it.  Drop me an email at betsywuebker AT passingthru DOT com.  If we stand up to narcissists, they’ll stand down.

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According to Wikipedia, the term laying the keel has “entered the language as a phrase meaning the beginning of any significant undertaking.”  In traditional shipbuilding, the keel is the structural beam around which the hull is built.  The keel acts as the spine of the ship, keeping it upright by providing ballast to counteract the lateral forces on the sail from the wind, and generating lift to “convert the sideways motion of the wind when it is abeam into forward motion.”  A ship won’t sail upright or straightforwardly unless it has a proper keel.

The importance and integrity of the keel was understood by the ancients.  Wikipedia also tells us that “the word “keel” comes from Old English ceol, Old Norse kjóll, = “ship” or “keel”.  It has the distinction of being regarded by some scholars as the very first word in the English language recorded in writing,” referring to Saxon ships in the 6th Century.  Nowadays, laying the keel is the first milestone in the history of a vessel.

Last November, Lori Hoeck and I set a keel in place.  We began the collaboration that resulted in the e-book we will launch next week, The Narcissist: A User’s Guide.  As I thought about everything that has led up to this moment of launch – the many blog posts that so intrigued me on Lori’s site, the offer from Sirius Graphix to give our words a beautiful presentation, and the additional support from those with whom we’ve shared the project – I realized more needed to be said.  I needed to tell you more about our project’s keel.

When Vikings built their ships, they split logs to make planks, planing them by chipping with an adz.  They understood that wood has a tendency to wick water, cell by cell, so the strength of any board could be easily compromised. Each log’s composition was evaluated for knots or scars. The adz planing process accommodated the individuality of the wood by extracting the planks from its center marrow, where the radial pores of the cells could run parallel along the plank’s length.

Jørn Olav Løset tells us the Vikings’ choppy, labor-intensive method actually contributed more to the individual plank’s strength by compressing the wood cells, creating a smoother surface that was more resistant to water.  The direction these planks were placed in the boat’s structure allowed the adz markings to work at rejecting the water flow, as well.  By working with the wood, not against it, the Vikings built stronger, more seaworthy boats than those of their contemporaries.  They sailed longer distances and weathered greater storms.

You can probably guess where all this is going.  When Lori and I began preparing the keel for our e-book project on narcissism and its harmful effects on relationships, we had to re-examine.  We knew we had independently arrived at similar conclusions from our own experiences in very dark places.  Organizing and categorizing what we’d concluded for me meant revisiting the forest, in search of the hardwood that would comprise my contribution’s spine.

What I found were the signs of pain, defense, and defiance.  I viewed the markings that parasitical opportunism had emotionally inflicted.  Some of the wounds had been very deep, and while certain areas had knit together in a haphazard emulation of unimpeded growth, others were barely protected with very thin scars, vulnerable.  The forest, just as I remembered it, was very dark.  If something grabbed me, its teeth could easily pierce me again.  But still, I had grown.

Instead of Lori and me laying the keel for this project, I realized this project had really done the selecting and the setting.  In choosing us, our content found something it could work with. For me, scraping away the layers, chipping around the hard new skin, planing the emerging surface with smoothness and calm imperviousness, was a process that revealed a stronger spine.  In Lori, I see work akin with her “determined heart and mind.”

Flanking the keel are the strakes that Sirius has provided.  Their visual representation is frankly stunning in its capture of the hard, dead-end realities of dysfunction, but leavened by the visual punning in a colorful peacock’s feather.

You, who will read this book and pass it along to others in similar situations, will be the rivets, the ribs, and the caulk, keeping our hull worthy of the sea.

There are many places to sail.  Away from and to.  PassingThru was conceived to be any number of journey-based reflections.  But before any launch, there must be “a keel that is truly and fairly laid” with authentication. Consider it done.

PassingThru is also honored:

• by the opportunity to post at Eliza Fayle’s Silver and Grace today about my other spine, the one that is affected by osteoporosis.  Thanks to Eliza – what a great site she is building!
• and by the effervescent Jannie Funster, who has bestowed upon us a Scary Clown award, citing the wordsmithing on PassingThru.  Ha!  Jannie today you get more!  Thank you!

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I’ve been on a journey and it’s about to take a new tack.

For the last couple months, Lori Hoeck, of Think Like a Black Belt, and I have collaborated on a project.  The result, The Narcissist: A User’s Guide, will be unveiled next week.

You might have already seen some Tweets or a post about this effort.  Sirius Graphix has done an outstanding job of giving our content a visual makeover, allowing it to sing with full-throated melody.  They could do the same for you and the song inside your writer’s voice.  Read about how it all happened with us, and what it could mean to you, here.  What goes around, comes around.

If you’re like me, when somebody launches an e-book, you’re interested in how it came to be.   Like any travel writer, I’ve found I can’t possibly give you sufficient detail of my stay in a place that would compare with your actual experience of being there, had you never been.  And even if you had, you’d be looking and experiencing with your own lens.  And so it is with this book.

While I won’t give you my entire story for a variety of reasons, I can tell you I was involved with a narcissist for more than two decades.  As well, there have been and possibly still are additional narcissists who play supporting roles in my life.

What’s different now? My dealings with them are more on my terms.  If you’ve ever known a narcissist, or if you’re dealing with one now, you know your own terms can be a very difficult destination to reach.

It’s taken me a long time to get here. All those years ago, my primary reaction to narcissistic behavior in others was disbelief – as in not being able to comprehend how a person could ever think it was acceptable to treat other people so terribly.  I never considered there might be something good that would emerge from such a horrible situation when I was living there.  But now it has.  What goes around, comes around.

Narcissists are emotional predators. In order to build up their own self-esteem, they suck yours out of you.  Inhabiting their grotesquely distorted world – where you constantly fall short of ever-changing expectations – can lead to depression, apathy, feelings of dread, and other more serious disorders.

Like a garden-variety addict, a narcissist needs ever-greater amounts of his “fix,” which is comprised of elevating his own status by comparison with his inferiors.  This would be everyone, of course, but most of all, you.

Lori, whose mission is to empower people to take charge of their physical and emotional safety, and I realized we had similar experiences with narcissistic individuals.  When we agreed to collaborate, we wanted to organize what we had learned, and share tactics we had used with success.  I never dreamed this process would send me on a temporary visit back to the barren emotional wasteland I lived in when involved with my narcissist.  It was harsh, oppressive and terribly frightening.

And so, in a way, this collaboration has been a re-affirmation of the lengthier journey I made out of the dark years to the much better emotional place in which I live today.  What goes around, comes around.

In The Narcissist: A User’s Guide, Lori and I provide a way to turn a toxic dynamic on its ear.  Instead of the narcissist using you, the tools in the Guide can be used to leverage your strength and goodness against this emotional vampire. You can then demand the predator hunt elsewhere for its victims.  And more importantly, you can put boundaries in place to guard against future detrimental encounters with narcissists.

Here are some reactions from previewers:

This is incredible! As it is printing off I am reading it…the contents cannot but help provide a space for reflection, decision-making, and healing for anyone involved in this kind of relationship. Great work!  -  Gracia Hegener

We all know the meaning of the word “narcissist”.  Many of us know one or more of them and even more of us know someone with “narcissistic tendencies”.  But we aren’t necessarily able to quickly identify them and how they operate in our lives.  Lori and Betsy helped me in that regard.  Their workbook is filled with examples, situations, and definitions that helped me recognize the narcissists in my life.  Because of their work, I am better able to keep these narcissists at arm’s length and less a part of my life. Betsy and Lori have defined “freedom” in a new way for many.  I highly recommend reading their work. – Mary Hoffman

Lori’s post today at Think Like a Black Belt gives you more great insight about what’s in the e-book.  From start to finish, from identification to good riddance, at whatever stage in your relationship with a narcissist, our guide will help you move forward.

Instead of being stuck in a relationship that’s out of your control, you can take some back.  Instead of someone constantly lording it over you, you can reclaim sovereignty over your own healthy relationships.  And while you may not be able to change a narcissist, you can liberate yourself from their attempts at emotional imprisonment and deprivation.

Narcissists live and work in the same places we do.  They make problems for human resource departments.  They adversely affect teamwork in professional and recreational settings.  They poison family relationships with abusive and cruel behavior.  They inhabit the hallways of bureaucracies and troll the internet.  The effects of their havoc can live on long after their departure.  We think it’s time more people stood up to them. The Narcissist: A User’s Guide will show you how.

I said when we started, “If this e-book helps ONE person escape a damaging relationship, the work will be worth it.” I can tell you with certainty this objective has already been met.  When it’s released next week, we’re going to see it happen over and over again.  What goes around, comes around.

The Narcissist: A User’s Guide will be available for free download on February 2, 2010.

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Approximately one-third of us who made New Year’s resolutions are on track to break them before the end of the month.  Franklin Covey’s survey found that “35 percent of respondents break their New Year’s resolutions by the end of January.” Additionally, 77% are abandoned at some point or another altogether, leaving only a 23 percent success factor.  While some people can seemingly break their promises to themselves with relative impunity, it’s safe to say most people will be disappointed in, and critical of, themselves.

Our Inner Critic can be a valuable resource, inducing us to strive for better performance after evaluating the quality of our work and relationships.  But for some people, the Inner Critic goes into overdrive.  When your Inner Critic is on steroids, you’re convinced you’re no good.  You can’t, you’re less than, you’re not worthy, and ultimately, you’ll be fearful of risk and change.  Paradoxically, the very thing you want to do – change something – is the thing you’re kept from doing.

While it primarily uses self-talk, the Inner Critic isn’t afraid to take messages from others – implied or overt – and adapt them to suit its purpose.  This is rooted in the idea of protecting our fragile esteem, but things can go haywire relatively quickly.

Much of the time, we talk to ourselves in ways we would never dream of speaking to another, and we accept harmful messages from ourselves that we would never put up with if they came from someone else.  Freeing ourselves from the toll these messages take and the harm they can wreak requires constant vigilance.

In worst case scenarios, the Inner Critic can transform a healthy psyche into a neurotic, compulsive, compensation machine. Since the Critic’s means is comparison, unrelenting harsh assessments can result in envy, which in turn can manifest feelings of dread, depression, anxiety, eating disorders, self-mutilation, and narcissism.

Aaron Ben-Ze’ev, writing in JSTOR: The Journal of Philosophy, argues that while a state of envy might imply a need for balancing an inequality, reducing inequality in most cases raises envy’s intensity.  If by comparison we find ourselves lacking in a desired attribute, such as material wealth, beauty, intelligence or something else we desire, we feel more inferior, resentful and even hostile.

As well as cultivating envy, inferiority and mistrust, your inner critic relies upon the premise that you don’t deserve what you desire.  We’ve all had brushes with Imposter Syndrome no matter how accomplished we are.  Muffling our Inner Critic is critical to keep things in more realistic perspective, where the process of changing behaviors can occur in relaxed circumstances, free from negative thoughts.

It’s a difficult process to mask or reduce the effects of negative criticisms that come from within ourselves.  Reviewing your credentials and accomplishments can remind you of your factual successes.  Since your inner critic is rooted in emotion, objective response can be neutralizing.

When you strive to do things well – perfectly, even – you can unwittingly give your Inner Critic an open invitation. I have frequently said, “No one can beat me up better than I can myself.”  The truth inherent in that statement is that internalized messages are likely amplified by the voice of the inner critic so much as to not even closely resemble an accurate appraisal.  It was a revelation to realize that “good enough” regularly does just fine.

Resolving to make changes, setting goals and objectives, and stretching our performance levels in our personal and professional lives are worthy activities.  While you’re starting something new, trying to make a change or when you know you’re doing your best work, inviting your Inner Critic to take a hiatus is a healthy alternative. Susan David, at the Harvard Business Review writes, “The trick to dealing with your inner critic is to develop a balanced relationship with it: to not ignore or avoid it and the emotions it raises, but to also not allow yourself to be bullied by it.”

What happens to someone who allows himself to be bullied by an Inner Critic? Well, as you might suspect, it isn’t pretty.  Sam Vaknin tells us we can be “. . . besieged and tormented by a sadistic Superego which sits in constant judgment. It is an amalgamation of negative evaluations, criticisms, angry or disappointed voices, and disparagement . . .” In other words, an Inner Critic that is allowed to run rampant can create a need to “satisfy the inexorable demands of his inner tribunal and to prove wrong its harsh and merciless criticism.” Behold, the narcissist.

Lori Hoeck, of Think Like a Black Belt, and I have been collaborating and exploring how a narcissistic response to an Inner-Critic-on-Steroids evolves.  We’ll be revealing our conclusions in a reference you can download.

Lori and I envisioned our project as a way for you to protect yourself from a dysfunctional dynamic within – the first line of healthy self-defense.  Additionally, our scripts and tips can neutralize some of the more unpleasant realities if you have been or currently are involved with a narcissist.  It’s coming soon!  Even if you’re simply struggling with hyper-critical self-messages, you will be amazed by how harmful the unchecked effects of an Inner Critic can be in contributing to unhealthy co-dependencies.

Letting our Inner Critic run rampant creates a mental prison that keeps us from our best. It will distort, bully, and resist the changes we so desperately and regularly attempt to make.  Instead of allowing it to beat us up, a more healthy way of keeping it in check is to realize it’s there, confront and deflect, and then move forward with clarity and strength.  “Yeah, I was disappointed in myself when I didn’t follow my exercise plan.  I even wondered why I couldn’t seem to stick with it.  I’ve decided to start going to the gym before work when my day is first beginning, instead of after work when I’m tired and too easily tempted to just go home and stay there.”

While you may have already broken your New Year’s resolutions, there’s still no reason you can’t start them all over again. If you never made any because you told yourself you’ve never been successful at keeping them in the past, you can begin working on a meaningful goal, too.  After all, with your Inner Critic on hiatus, wouldn’t everyone be in your corner if you did?

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Traveling by car for more than ten hours gives you plenty of time to think, even when the weather is dicey.  When Pete and I set out to visit family in Michigan for the holidays, I welcomed the drive time.

It seemed as though the entire blogging world was filled with end of the year content: enumerating best posts, reviewing quantifiable results, looking forward to the New Year, wondering if it would be “okay” to unplug for a week or so without conceivable harm, and so on.  Except here.  “Oh well,” I thought to myself.  “You’ll write something for PassingThru when you’re moved to write it.”

And the truth is, I wasn’t moved to write something until now.  A post Chris Brogan wrote on January 1 resonated with me and I thought about it on our way back, all the way through Wisconsin.  (And our friend Lance at The Jungle of Life knows just how long that is!)  Chris selects three words each year to guide his goal-setting and keep him mindful of his objectives.  It’s an admirable practice.

Last year, Lance asked what our word might be for 2009, quoting Oliver Wendell Holmes: “A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged; it is the skin of a living thought, and may vary greatly in color and content according to the circumstances and the time in which it is used.”

Lance chose as his 2009 word, “Courage.”  Mine was “Mindful.”  I commented, “My word is mindful. I think I’m fairly aware and observant, but, like Vered, I want to live more in the present. What’s done is done, and what comes will come. Right now needs to be vivid and abundantly enough.”

I mentally reviewed the events of 2009 as we hurtled westward on I-90 chasing a darkening sky.  I had definitely been more mindful.  Circumstances had aligned to cause Pete and me to abandon the past, and appreciate the things in our midst.

Our best outcomes were unveiled easily, logically, sequentially, and contained an element of joy.  Worst outcomes have always been the ones where we struggled against the current, forcing a deal or reluctant result.  We had finally said goodbye to activities that needed to go, and had opened our minds and hearts to new opportunities.  We had celebrated and renewed relationships in the family.  We had mourned, and we had rejoiced.  It was all good.

Still, I wondered.  What might the word be for 2010?  Better yet, could I possibly come up with three words, as Chris did?  Chris’s discussion centered on how his three words “sit above the actual goals, and set [his] guiding principles in place.” His post advised to “come up with something that would take more than a sentence to describe, but that when you think about it, the ideas explode out to fill your head with thoughts of how you might want to conduct yourself.” Words with life in them.  Words made of bedrock, not clay.  Words that would spark.

The blue moon’s remnant rose to our north and illuminated the frozen midwest landscape in the late afternoon of the first day of the year.  As we stopped west of Black River Falls at the Club 95 for dinner, I set my thoughts aside and people-watched.  The rural revelers were capping off the holidays.  A waitress’s parents came in and she greeted them with unbridled delight and an “I love you.”  New babies were content to be passed along to willing surrogates among several generations.  At the bar where we sat, folks were greeted by name, and we felt comfortable joining in the good-natured banter.

Earlier, around Madison, we had tuned into Wisconsin Public Radio.  The subject was champagne.  Tilar Mazzeo, who had written The Widow Clicquot: The Story of a Champagne Empire and the Woman Who Ruled It, mentioned this seminal quote from her book: Toward the end of her life, in the 1860s, she wrote to a great-grandchild: “The world is in perpetual motion, and we must invent the things of tomorrow. One must go before others, be determined and exacting, and let your intelligence direct your life. . .” Mindful, the Widow Clicquot was.  Her words might have been “invent,” “go,” and “determination.”

On the show, Mazzeo also debunked the oft-quoted fable of Dom Perignon, who was said to have cried out after his first sip of his creation, “Come quickly!  I am drinking the stars!”  No matter, I thought.  Champagne is by far one of the happiest accidents.  The Widow Clicquot married her considerable entrepreneurial skills with her passion for creating a flawless, sparkling product for new markets in St. Petersburg and London.  Mazzeo attributes the work of Madame Clicquot as paving the way toward “mass-culture celebration.”

As we completed the final 50 miles to the Twin Cities, I thought again of our own celebrations.  Before we left for Michigan, we enjoyed the company of family and friends on a lovely winter Sunday afternoon.  The champagne flowed freely, and we honored each other with gifts chosen or handmade from the heart.

When we arrived in Michigan, we celebrated with members of my family.  My brother and sister and I had not been all together at Christmas in over thirty years.  The following days we spent with cousins, for whom it had been more than forty.  We toasted many times during the week, culminating with a midnight glass on New Year’s Eve.  We honored those who had left us, and anticipated one new baby and two upcoming weddings.

As Pete and I rolled across the St. Croix River bridge, I had my three words.  Not as business-focused, perhaps, as those Chris Brogan chose.  Not as reverential as a more enlightened thinker might select.  But definitely filling my head with ideas about how I might want to conduct myself, and easily taking more than a sentence to explain – even for someone not as wordy as me! 

My three words remind me to not let the day-to-day distract me from celebrating what matters.  I will appreciate and support.  I will continue to let go of negative influences.  I will seek out positive people and opportunities that constantly flow.  I will enjoy life unfettered by needless worry of my own making.  I enter the new decade filled with promise and good will.

My three words:  Drink. More. Champagne.

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Wow, where did December go?  Here we are getting ready to travel to visit family in Michigan over the holidays and it seems like I wrote our last post just a few days ago!

Let’s see, what have we been doing?  Well, for starters, my daughter Robin (on left) and her two BFF’s, Thu Tram (center) and Kelsey (right) came over a few days before our holiday party to decorate oodles of gingerbread moose and houses, as well as the best cookies ever, if I do say so.

Here is the recipe:

Cream Cheese Sugar Cookies

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup softened butter

1 – 3 oz package of cream cheese (I substitute the 8 oz package to make chewier cookies)

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon almond extract

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1 egg yolk (reserve white)

2-1/4 cup all-purpose flour (can need up to 2-3/4 cup depending on dough consistency)

In large bowl of stand mixer combine sugar, butter, cream cheese, salt extracts and egg yolk. Beat with wire whisk attachment until fluffy. Switch to paddle blade attachment and stir in flour in small amounts until blended.

Divide dough in half and wrap with plastic wrap, chill for 2 hours. Preheat oven to 375 F.

On lightly floured surface, roll out dough to 1/8 inch thickness. Cut into desired shapes with cookie cutters. Place cookie cut-outs 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets.

Leave plain for post-baking decorating, or brush with lightly beaten egg white and sprinkle with colored sugars. Bake 7 to 10 minutes or until light golden brown.

Cookies will puff up during baking somewhat. Cool in pans on wire racks, and then transfer cookies to wire racks until completely cooled.   Decorate with royal icing, sprinkles, or silver dragees as desired.

The girls had a lot of fun and it was really great to have a house filled with their laughter.  They were inseparable throughout high school and now that they’re all in college, they don’t see each other as much as they’d like.

Kelsey has always been quite the artist and her creations underscore how talented she is.  Check out the technique on this gingerbread moose!  I showed Kelsey a photo and she went to town!

Little Daisy loves her girls.  She was so excited to be part of the fun, despite her serious look here.

On Sunday, we held a Christmas party for family and friends.  Pete cooked up a storm:  Walnut/Apple Butter Ragelach, Empanadas, Crabmeat Cups, Mini Pumpkin Pies, Curried Carrot Dip, Sundried Tomato Dip, Spinach Feta Dip and other things I’ve misplaced in my brain at the moment.  Everyone was merry and the champagne flowed freely.

Preparing for this party and another project I’ve been working on have taken the time between Thanksgiving and now.  I’m excited about collaborating with Lori Hoeck of Think Like a Black Belt on a project that is a different kind of recipe: an antidote that many of us might find extremely helpful after enduring difficult moments with certain kinds of people.  You know, the kind who make things unnecessarily trying.

That’s all I’m going to say at the moment, but there will be more after New Year’s!

This is another recipe I received in an email yesterday.

Recipe for Christmas All Year Long by Joanna Fuchs

Take a heap of child-like wonder

That opens up our eyes

To the unexpected gifts in life—

Each day a sweet surprise.

Mix in fond appreciation

For the people whom we know;

Like festive Christmas candles,

Each one has a special glow.

Add some giggles and some laughter,

A dash of Christmas food,

(Amazing how a piece of pie

Improves our attitude!)

Stir it all with human kindness;

Wrap it up in love and peace,

Decorate with optimism, and

Our joy will never cease.

If we use this healthy recipe,

We know we will remember

To be in the Christmas spirit,

Even when it’s not December.

As we travel tomorrow, our thoughts will invariably turn to all the wonderful friends we’ve made here at PassingThru.  It has been a great experience throughout our second calendar year, and we’re always so gratified when old friends and new stop in to say howdy and offer a comment or opinion on what’s striking our fancy.  Thank you to everyone.

Whatever your plans, and wherever you’re Passing Thru this holiday season, we wish you the Merriest of Christmases and our best regards for a healthy and prosperous New Year! And to all a good night!

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One of the not-so-nice things about winter is drier skin.  When temperatures drop in Minnesota, the dry air and hard water conspire.  If you’re a hot shower lover like I am, you pay the price with itchiness, extra flaking and even cracked, scaly skin.  Last year, I happened upon a soothing, moisturizing scrub recipe that is so easy, you’ll want to mix up a batch for yourself and treat your friends, too!

I made this scrub in small batches last year for gifts, and decided to go all out this year.  Pete took photos this time so that I could share with you – see our snowy Minnesota weather out our kitchen window?

The scrub ingredients are simple, and easy to find:  Epsom salts, oil, essential oil if you desire fragrance, and food-safe coloring if you desire color in your product.

I use different sized canning jars for containers, but you could certainly use a plastic container with a lid, or a recycled jar.  Just make sure it has a wide mouth so that you can scoop out the scrub by the handful.  You can get decorative jars and containers at craft and import stores, too.  Look for lids that can be closed tightly to guard against leaks.

Epsom salts can be found at any drugstore and most grocery stores.  I got these 4 lb cartons on sale for about $2.00 each.  This carton is about the size of a half gallon of milk.  Who knew Epsom salts were such a wonder-product?  Not only can they be used as a laxative, but also as a soak for pain relief from sprains and bruises.  The coarse texture is great as a skin exfoliant.  If you like a finer texture for your scrub, you could substitute sugar in this recipe, too.

I use a large, stainless steel mixing bowl.  I pour the entire 4 lb carton in and crush any lumpy bits with a potato masher.  The Epsom salts are actually magnesium sulfate crystals, so they glisten.  Did you know Martha Stewart uses them as “snow” in her holiday table displays?  Now you do. 

From a 4 lb carton of Epsom salts, you’ll get about 4 pints of finished scrub, depending upon how much oil you add.  I use Grapeseed Oil.  It’s kind of pricey but it goes a long way.  You could use just about any oil – olive or canola or even vegetable oil.  I like the Grapeseed because it has more Omega 6 and Vitamin E, plus it has almost no fragrance.

Just pour the oil in on top of the salts in the bowl and stir it in.  About 1/5 or 1/4 of a 1 Liter bottle is enough.  I suppose you could mix it in with your hands and they’d be really soft when you’re done, but I use a spoon. 

Once you’ve mixed the oil in, you may want to add a fragrance.  The best way to do this is to use essential oils, found in craft stores and organic markets.  Some people even mix a couple of scents together, but I prefer a simpler one-note fragrance.  I’m using lavender – restful and calming,  and grapefruit – a little zestier. Each of these tiny bottles cost around $7.00.

As with the Grapeseed oil, a little goes a long way.  The bottles come with built-in droppers so you can conserve this expensive ingredient.  I usually add around 10 drops of essential oil to each batch of mixed salts.  Just enough so that the aroma doesn’t knock you over. 

Next I like to add a little color, so that I can tell the fragrances apart.  Here I’m using food-safe coloring that we had left from coloring Easter eggs.  Again, just a couple of drops go a long way, as you don’t want too much color, especially if you have fair skin.

Here I’m using two drops of red and two of blue to make purple for the lavender batch.  I used two drops of red to make a nice pinky grapefruit tone for the grapefruit batch.

It mixes up pretty quickly, but you do want to stir thoroughly to disperse the color throughout the batch.

Once you’ve got a uniform color throughout, you can ladle the scrub into your jars.  I use a funnel, and I pack the contents down with my spoon so the jars are full.  Invariably, I’ll have a bit left over that isn’t enough for a full jar.  This goes into my personal stash. 

The scrub can be used in the shower as an exfoliant or skin rub, or if you’re a bather, add a handful to the bath water to soften your skin.

Lavender essential oil is a remedy for nervous tension, treats pain and respiratory problems, and enhances blood circulation.  These benefits are just what we need to survive a cold and brutal winter!  It’s often recommended for insomnia, too – so bathing in lavender just before bedtime must ensure a restful sleep!

The essence of grapefruit has been used as a stimulant and for treatment of depression.  It’s an anti-oxidant, and benefits the lymphatic and digestive systems.  It’s particularly good as an antiseptic for skin infections and eruptions, and on bruises and wounds.  It looks like I’ve made two great choices in essential oils without even realizing it!  I’ve decided I will be making tags with information on the organic ingredients in the scrubs.

The jars are really pretty when they’re filled.  I like to play up the feminine look of the pastel scrub with complementary ribbon.  This year’s theme is silvery snowflakes – a lovely homemade gift for just about anyone!

Related articles by Zemanta

• Olive Oil: Nature’s Best Moisturizer (chocolatechiq.com)
• How To Care For Dry Sensitive Skin (howcast.com)

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Thanks to all who voted for Pete’s From the Garden Pumpkin Pie on the Squidoo Thanksgiving Charity Cookoff.  It won! If you’re planning your holiday dessert menu, Pete’s pie recipe, which uses fresh pumpkin, can’t be beat.  Our friend, Julie Riddle of Random Meanderings, made the pie and posted this comment on my Facebook:  Betsy, I followed Pete’s pumpkin instructions and his recipe. The BEST PUMPKIN PIE I’VE EVER HAD! Phenomenal! Thanks, Julie!

With over 23% of the 3001 votes cast, the pie lens pulled ahead of a competitor to finish strong, although it was very close for some time.  Pete had another lens, How to Roast a Wild Turkey, qualify for the competition and it siphoned some votes away from the pie!  He didn’t get much sleep on Monday night!  Thank you, thank you.  Your votes mean a $5000 donation to Wildlife Forever from Squidoo.  Check out all the great recipes submitted in this competition here.

Speaking of Recipes and charity . . . our friend Patricia at Patricia’s Wisdom has been busy compiling some favorites from our blogging friends into an e-book, Harvest Potluck (free download here).  Patricia envisioned this as a gift from her to you in exchange for your voluntary donation to UNICEF:  These recipes evoke love and hope, offered as a “gift” and to bring awareness to the cause of feeding hungry children.

Now there’s a delightful twist!  A generous group of Secret Santas has come forward and offered a $1000 donation to UNICEF if her e-book is downloaded 1000 times by Friday, December 5th.  How cool is that?!  If you go here for the free download, then click to save, you’ll have 50 pages of delicious recipes and Patricia will reach the goal.  Note:  Pete’s Recipe for Scallops with Jade Sauce, a meal that changed my life, is included along with some of our photographs.  Thanks, Patricia!

Remember our friend, Becky Blanton, whose personal experience with homelessness we profiled in Into Invisibility with Breathtaking Speed?  Well, just at a time when we’re looking to do for others, Becky’s free e-book, Homeless for the Holidays is here.  Becky’s guide is a resource that helps you get beyond a financial donation and into the business of meaningful giving.

There is so much great advice and information packed into this amazing product, and it’s free!  Learn about God’s Pit Crew and Angel Food Ministries.  Meet folks like Tellman Knudson, who is running barefoot across America to fundraise, and Mark Horvath, who created Invisible People TV.  Acquaint yourself with panhandling etiquette, and understand just how much work it is to stay clean, safe and presentable when you’re on the move.

Becky reminds us, “No one plans to become homeless.  It happens.  They may see it coming, or fear it, or find themselves spiraling toward it as a result of bad decisions, or unexpected events, but no one sits down and says, ‘Gee, I think I’ll go be homeless and destitute for a year or so.’  . . . no one in their right mind wants to live on the street, moneyless, starving, cold, hot, lonely, attacked, belittled, disrespected.”

Did you know Steven Pressfield – super Marine Corps strategist and author of The Legend of Bagger Vance, Jim Carrey, Kelly Clarkson, Martin Sheen, Hillary Swank and Cary Grant were all homeless at one point in their lives?  Becky’s philosophy is that we can wage the war on homelessness in the arena of economics, instead of morality.

In The Wisdom of the Sands, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry wrote,  In giving you are throwing a bridge across the chasm of your solitude. As we enter this season of giving, we’re grateful we can join with you in celebration and donation to these worthy efforts.

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It seems as though we’re encountering more chatter about food. As Thanksgiving and religious holidays approach, charities that distribute food get more media play.  Food supply and governmental policy are hot political issues, with an overlay of ethical concerns, especially in terms of health and security.

In our day-to-day lives, we’ve noticed an up-tick in the conversations we’re having that are food-related:  menu planning for special dietary needs, lip-smacking as we anticipate holiday visiting and parties, budget considerations.  Not an hour goes by that something doesn’t come up (pun unintended) that’s food-related.

In our younger days, my brother and I used to chuckle when we’d hear from our snowbird parents.  Mom and Dad would phone long distance from Florida to check in.  The conversation invariably turned to the subject of food. The minutes would add up as they recounted what they had to eat at various get-togethers, or how all the “old people” (not them, of course) would start lining up way ahead of time for the all-you-can-eat buffet in the hot sun, and my dad’s knowledge of organic eating and vitamins.  “Save us,” we’d eye-roll, “from ever being like that!  We don’t want to hear about mashed potatoes, gravy, or prunes on an expensive long distance call!”

Fast forward thirty years and my brother and I are exactly like that now. Perhaps even more so, because it’s fun to talk menus, implements, memories, and techniques with each other.  Put my husband into the mix and it’s a rip-roaring conversation that makes me grateful for our free long distance cellphone plan. 

I got to thinking even more about food yesterday. This was after a discussion in my LOL group, which meets every Tuesday morning.  Yes, we Laugh Out Loud often and heartily, but the LOL stands for Little Old Ladies.  We’re studying and applying internet marketing techniques.  While we’re each not particularly old per se, by comparison with the internet gurus, who all seem to be about 12 years old, we’re definitely long in the tooth.  Anyway, as Old Ladies ™ tend to do, and I just did, we digressed.  Instead of internet marketing, we talked about food.

One of the ladies lives in Cologne, Minnesota, close to New Prague and Heidelberg (can you tell where early settlers came from in this neck of the woods?) where Odenthal Meats who processed our piggy is located.  She recounted how the local retail butcher in Cologne had sold his store to a group of Somali entrepreneurs who are busy specializing in goat meat.  They serve the larger Somali community in Minneapolis from this small-town location, and she can actually hear the goats bleating all day long after they are delivered to this butcher.  This lady and her husband also raise half a dozen chickens as part of a project that she described as “Grandpa teaching the grandchildren where their food comes from.”

Another of our group brought up the issues raised in the documentary, Food, Inc.  This movie’s appeal is limited to anyone who eats. While Pete and I eat a high percentage of food whose provenance we can track – locally produced or grown by us, shared or traded with family and friends, and more recently “commissioned” as with our piggy – I’m more and more concerned about the origins of everything.  I want, paradoxically, to broaden my choices in food, but limit its provenance to trusted sources.

The ecology and economy of food was forever changed after World War II. Suddenly, its production and distribution was industrialized.  An entire range of choice was available to the American consumer, whose pent-up demand arising out of wartime rationing and Great Depression economics was unleashed.  Convenience foods catapulted in variety and sheer numbers.  Processes were “improved” and augmented to result in greater yields from more depersonalized sources.

These innovations were touted as part of an increasingly media-driven perception as “modern” and “liberating,” in that they decreased the amount of time devoted in an average household to production, procurement, preservation, and preparation.  All this came at a huge price, though; we’re paying for convenience and access with our health. Along with this decline comes the decline in time spent enjoying the process of eating.  Dinner, instead of a nightly occurrence for which you were never late or absent, is a special occasion.

Food Inc. has created somewhat of a sensation for its controversial views.  What could be controversial about promoting ecologically sound and healthful practices in producing and distributing food, I wondered?

Well, as it turns out, plenty.  Food is big business. The largest privately owned company in the world, Cargill (headquartered just a few miles from our home here in Minneapolis) responded to the criticisms raised in the film with a cautionary note: ” . . . ‘one-size-fits-all’ answers to a task as complex as nourishing 6 billion people who are so disparately situated across the world. Generally, open markets, which provide access to both locally and globally sourced food, are the most efficient means for people around the world to meet their food requirements with nutritious diets.”

A growing number of organic value-added entities have stabilized a long-standing decline in Minnesota’s farms, in particular.  However, the same article points out that, “organic farming on a large scale would require us to triple the amount of land we farm to feed our population, with all the attendant environmental consequences. Nobel Prize winner Norman Borlaug, the father of the “Green Revolution” of the 1960s and 70s — once said that broad practice of what he termed “medieval farming” could feed at most 4 billion people, much less than what the world population is today, to say nothing of what it will be by 2050.”

Borlaug, whose tireless work was inspired by the cause of eliminating hunger, and who is credited with saving at least 250 million lives,  opined, “Some of the environmental lobbyists of the Western nations are the salt of the earth, but many of them are elitists. They’ve never experienced the physical sensation of hunger. They do their lobbying from comfortable office suites in Washington or Brussels. If they lived just one month amid the misery of the developing world, as I have for fifty years, they’d be crying out for tractors and fertilizer and irrigation canals and be outraged that fashionable elitists back home were trying to deny them these things.”

It’s sobering not only to contemplate a hierarchy of food availability, which currently exists and is exploited, but also one that might devolve into a triage-like distribution apparatus tied to quality.  Can you imagine, if you are one of those who is lucky to have food in abundant supply, having restricted access to the quality of food that you prefer?  There are already millions who can’t get enough food, period, let alone good food.

The publicization of the presence of poisonous components in imported pet foods, toys, building products and human food from Chinese sources made me hypersensitive to the impression that there’s some kind of “there there.”  What is the incentive behind deliberately including toxic components in foods that are not only exported to nations who are political competitors, but fed to your own population? This can’t purely be financial, can it?  The vast implications of that supposition make my head and my heart hurt.

We find it best to do what we can do for ourselves within the context of what we serve at our table, and within our sphere of family and friends.  Within that sphere, I was amazed to count the numbers of folks who had worked, or continue to work, in food-related businesses.  Our grandparents were farmers, Pete’s in Iowa and mine in Michigan.  There is Pete’s father, retired from 30 years as an executive with a major grocery chain.  There is my brother, trained at the Culinary Institute of America , and formerly a chef at a gourmand’s landmark in our hometown.  Two of Pete’s sisters work with food – one as a customer service professional at a wholesale baking supplier, and one as a rep and trainer for a company that builds and installs large delicatessen equipment.  I still work with food indirectly:  even though I recently sold my gourmet gift basket franchise unit, I continue to work for the franchisor in development and communications.  One of my largest customers was Cargill, whose core business is developing hybrid seed for greater crop yields.  We now have a working farmer again in our midst.  And so, we come full circle.

I’d said after a series of disastrous dating encounters that I’d never be happy with someone who wasn’t adventurous with food. The Universe saw fit to couple me with someone who is not only adventurous and interested, but also extremely talented.

Pete’s thousands of entries in his recipe database rely heavily on organic, and non-processed ingredients.  Sharing this knowledge and talent comes naturally.  We’re a family that constantly talks recipes – there are plenty of gourmet cooks and even more happy eaters.  

Now there’s even more outreach.  Pete’s lens, From the Garden Pumpkin Pie was designated Lens of the Day on Squidoo.com, winning $1000 for his charity, Wildlife Forever.  Another of his lenses, How to Roast Wild Turkey, was also Lens of the Day last week.  However, his less-than-stellar luck hunting turkeys is legendary. 

Next year, we will likely purchase a steer that our daughter’s boyfriend,  Scott, is planning to raise (we’ll do shares with other families), and fill our freezer with humanely-raised, organically-fed, and respectfully-processed beef and pork from another pig.  We’re hoping we can convince Scott to raise some chickens for us, or perhaps my friend who is teaching her grandchildren could be persuaded.

Just prior to writing this post, I read this one, by our friend Patricia at Patricia’s Wisdom, who wrote an open letter to Michael Pollan (who was featured in Food, Inc.) after reading his In Defense of Food.  The quote she used bears repeating: 

“Eating with the fullest pleasure – pleasure, that is, that does not depend on ignorance – is perhaps the profoundest enactment of our connection with the world. In this pleasure we experience and celebrate our dependence and our gratitude, for we are living from mystery, from creatures we did not make and powers we cannot comprehend.”

This quote reminded me that I had sent up a silent prayer of gratitude to our piggy, in appreciation that he had given his life for our sustenance.  This notion had rarely occurred to me, if at all, prior to becoming more personally involved with what we were about to eat.  Much in the same way that my friend’s grandkids are learning about the chickens and their eggs (I wonder which they’ll decide came first?), a more personalized relationship with the sources of our food has illuminated and expanded my thinking.

Perhaps if we all keep sharing what we learn and know, and incorporating actions and principles that are respectful, not only of our own health, but that are also ecologically sound, we can truly change the world, one table at a time.  I fervently hope so.

What do you think?

Photo Credits:  Pumpkin in Snow – Peter Wuebker

All Others – Apture

Related Reading:

• The Botany of Desire, by Michael Pollan
• Fast Food Nation:  The Dark Side of the All American Meal, by Eric Schlosser
• The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals, by Michael Pollan
• The Man Who Fed the World , by Leon Hesser

• Locavores, More and More (passingthru.com)
• Mark Miller: Blending Agriculture and Technology to Create New Jobs (huffingtonpost.com)
• The Organic Center’s “Core Truths” (slideshare.net)
• We all have choices (timesunion.com)
• Norman Borlaug, anti-famine crusader who won the Nobel Prize, dies at 95 (dailyfinance.com)
• Food will never be so cheap again (telegraph.co.uk)

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