Ways To Feel Happier + Slow Cooker Split Pea and Brussels Soup

From Zimbabwe to Texas and everywhere in between, people just want to feel connected, happy and loved.

That’s it.

No matter how fucked up, how “normal”, or how many mistakes have been made along the way.

No matter how perfect, how squeaky clean, or how hot of a mess you might be.

Regardless of how much cocaine has been snorted or how many green juices have been consciously swallowed.

Whether there’s millions in your bank account or just enough for groceries.

It doesn’t matter if religion is your driving force or a force driving you straight to atheism.

Whether you eat leafy greens at every meal or you have no clue what to do with a Collard Green.

When the stars and planets come out at night and we take the time to look up, we all wish for the same thing.

To feel connected, to feel happy, and to love and be loved. Even if the wish is for something else, the end result will always be connection, happiness and love.

And for you, that might mean being embraced by the waters of the Caribbean.

For someone else it might mean paying rent and having money leftover for dinner and a movie.

The magic might be waking up with the person (or cat) you love each and every morning, or it could be going another day without a drink.

Maybe dancing and letting the music pulsate through your body until 3am makes you feel connected and full of electricity, or you might find your bliss by curling up on the couch and eating cake.

But whatever it is that turns us on, we can’t truly be connected, happy and loved until we’re connected, happy and loved from within.

At our root. At our core. From our base.

We have to feel sparked up and alive from that unexplainable place within us FIRST, before it can flow out of us like pink sparkly lava, intoxicating everyone in our path.

Once our connection, happiness and love is solid from within, then outside stuff can start to complement and enhance our human experience.

But there’s one thing that’s guaranteed to throw grapefruit sized hail on our happy parade.

I’m talking Boston winter conditions, when you were planning on a day at the beach with your two piece, your fabulous new sunhat and a fresh pressed green juice.

When we physically feel like shit, none of our joy will feel joyful. Not the Caribbean, not the dancing and not the cake.

When we feel like shit, we have a hard time feeling connected, happiness is “out there” somewhere, and love feels weak – even if our heart is bursting open.

So let’s tread lightly on our body and recognize it for the miraculous place we call home for right now. One day it will get tired and have to be put to rest.

But right now, in this moment, as you’re reading this, our body is hard at work making sure that we have the best possible human experience that we can have.

And in my book, that deserves the very best looking after, love and care that we can possibly give it.

So today, vow to hydrate your beautiful body with lots of water, feed it lots of whole plant foods, get a solid night’s rest, stop it with the processed foods, get your heart pumping and then, put up your feet and take the time to melt into relaxation. And all the while, please make sure you talk nicely to yourself.

You are perfect, and you’re exactly where you need to be in this exact moment.

I want to wrap this up by telling you that there are a lot of things that I’m not good at.

• Spelling for instance. I’m as appalled by my spelling as my spellchecker is (and I just spelled appalled “appauled”).

• Names. I’m terrible with names. I have to know you for at least a year before I get your name right, and even then I DEFINITELY won’t be able to spell it.

• Singing. Oh dear god. I’m so tone deaf that I have no idea whether a contestant on American Idol is doing a great job or a crap job. I have to wait for other people’s reactions, and then I follow suit.

And I’m not self hating here, these are just basic facts about myself that I lovingly accept.

And there are a couple of things that I’m really good at. And one of them is helping people eat better.

And I’m passionate about helping people eat better because I understand the connection between eating like shit and feeling like shit.

Because there is a direct connection between what you eat and your happiness.

Eating might seem like such an inconsequential (I’m not even going to tell you how I spelled that one) thing because we do it so often, but yet it has the most impact on how we feel and how healthy we are, more than anything else we do.

And that’s because we do it so often.

Our bodies are self regulating geniuses. They work hard every single millisecond of every single day to restore balance and health.

If you’re feeding your bod the wrong things, it can’t properly maintain that balance, and this can lead to a host of problems, ranging from a weak immune system, to diabetes, heart disease, autoimmune diseases, and even some types of cancers.

And when we’re sick in bed, our bliss is hard to find.

On the flip side, if you feed your body the right things, you will thrive.

Your energy will sky rocket, your immune system will become amazingly strong, your cells will go into self repair mode, your digestive system will work like a charm, and you’ll protect yourself from chronic disease.

When we’re energized and feeling good, connection, happiness and love come as naturally as our next breath.

If you or someone in your circle of peeps is having a hard time feeling connected, feeling happy and feeling love, the first thing to examine is the food going into their pie-hole.

The food that you eat has the power to change your entire life. It has for me. It has for the people I’ve worked with, and it absolutely can for you.

If you want to eat better and have no clue the difference between chard and kale or if you want to eat better, but you don’t have the a clue where to start or what to do, come grind with me right here.

Today I’m giving you a recipe for a nutrient powerhouse of a soup. It’s packed full of phytochemicals, protein and fiber.

If you make one thing this week, let it be this. You can eat it throughout the week and when you get sick of it, put the rest in your freezer for another time.

Slow Cooker Split Pea and Brussels Soup

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Author: Molly Patrick of Clean Food Dirty Girl

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Ingredients

• ▢ 2 cups green split peas 445g, rinsed
• ▢ ½ cup onion 65g, diced
• ▢ 1 cup celery 120, chopped
• ▢ ½ cup carrot 65g, chopped
• ▢ 1 cup red cabbage 85g, chopped
• ▢ 10-12 turns cracked black pepper
• ▢ 1 teaspoon garlic granules 4g
• ▢ 2 teaspoons dried basil 4g
• ▢ 1 teaspoon paprika 2g
• ▢ A few shakes of red pepper flakes
• ▢ 1 cup brussels sprouts 120g, quartered
• ▢ 6 cups water 1.4 liters
• ▢ 1 ½ teaspoons sea salt 8g

Instructions

• Place all ingredients in your slow cooker, give a gentle stir and cook on low for 8 hours.
• Place a couple of handfuls of chopped raw kale in a bowl and ladle the hot soup over the kale. The kale will become perfectly cooked from the heat of the soup.

I hope you have the perfect week, filled with connection, happiness and love (and of course, pink sparkly lava).