Category Archives: MUSINGS

Friday Feature: Vegetarian Protein Sources

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It seems at least once at month someone I talk to about my vegetarian (mostly vegan) diet asks me “How do you get enough protein?” After giving up soy, a great source of protein, I asked myself the same question. From my research I can confidently say “I get more than enough” with the following foods:

1. Nutritional yeast
2. Hemp seeds
3. Kale
4. Almonds
5. Walnuts (if I take Activated Charcoal to eliminate my allergic reaction that I just recently found out I get when eating these nuts)
6. Brazil nuts
7. Macadamia nuts
8. Sunflower seeds
9. Pumpkin seeds
10. Beans
11. Peas (I also just recently realized that I am probably allergic to peas so I take Activated Charcoal after eating peas, too.)

If you are considering cutting back on or eliminating meat (including fish) from your diet, then don’t let the fear not getting enough protein stop you. You can use the above foods in a variety of ways, including the less traditional ways in dishes like lasagna, stir frys, and protein drinks and the more traditional ways like for snacks and in salads. Check out my Friday Feature blog post “Staples in My ‘Raw Food Kitchen’” and search online for ways to incorporate these and other protein-rich vegetarian friendly foods into your menu plan.

Identity Denied

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What Do You Think? Wednesday

Last night was an amazing time of prophetic ministry during the women’s service at my church. Our women’s pastor and my BFF, Renee Carr, spurred the women to remember that “Only the Strong Survive” and challenged us to avoid the traps the devil has to give us a TKO (Total Knock Out). All while she spoke a woman near me kept shaking her head and saying “umm, umm, umm.” Most of what Pastor Carr was saying was identical to a conversation she had had minutes earlier. She knew God was speaking directly to her and received the confirmation to embrace her calling.

Sometimes, though, we don’t want to heed God’s voice even when He is evidently speaking. This happened last week while in prayer with my children when Joshua, my oldest, my prayer warrior, said a quick prayer. When he ended, I said, “C’mon, prayer warrior,” then Nathaniel, his four-year-old brother, shouted, “Pray like a prayer warrior.” I had never said what Nathaniel said to Joshua and didn’t even know Nathaniel could process like that. After Joshua attempted to pray more effectively, Nathaniel said, “That’s all you got, Smith?” (A phrase my husband uses when the boys are trying, and failing, to beat him at a game.) “You’re a prayer warrior. Pray like a prayer warrior!” Nate kept saying over and over again.

Though Joshua initially tried to deny that the Holy Spirit was using his brother to prompt him in his calling, to claim his identity, he was clear that his yet to be saved brother had some unusual insight. Joshua just couldn’t believe how adamant Nate was in telling him “Yes you are!” after Joshua proclaimed “I’m not a prayer warrior.” Denying our identity is something some recovering strong black women may have a problem with, too. We know what God is saying, but we know what we want to do instead. We know where we want to work, where we want to serve in ministry, who we want as friends and where we want to live. But perhaps we keep getting denied a promotion, aren’t working well in our chosen area of ministry, get tagalongs who try to befriend us, and can’t sell our house because what we want is a denial of our identity. What we want isn’t suitable for the person God has called us to be.

“If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. Old things have passed away. Behold, all things become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). This “all” includes everything that we want to hold onto that is definitely not “in Christ”—our attitudes, our relationships, our activities and, yes, our identity. We may have thought we would have a certain career path and God led us on what we thought was a detour, but the switch was God’s plan for us all along. He stamped our identity before the foundation of the earth. Even with that knowledge, some of us fight our identity. But there comes a time that we need to just do what the woman at my church did: Hear the words, recognize them as familiar and simply say, “Yes, Lord, I hear you. I submit to your way.” Our lives will be less of a struggle; God’s grace will be with us, and He will be pleased.

What have been your greatest areas of identity denial? Read the “Reclaiming Your Identity” article by Dr. Deana Murphy in EEW Magazine (a different, yet complementary, message to mine but for me confirmation that God was speaking this word about embracing our identity when He prompted me last week to write about this) and tell me what you think.

Persecuted for Righteousness

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One of my pet peeves is people with little to no knowledge base telling me what to do. I especially take exception when these advisers don’t have an intimate connection with me and try to guide me in critical areas, like raising my children. In these times I find it hard to show grace and the love of Jesus Christ, but these are the instances where grace and love need to be shown the most. Though I know this, my recovering strong black woman self has a hard time being like Christ, but I am working on it by simply clenching my lips or nodding my head or mustering a small smile. I try to do anything to keep my mouth shut so the wrong words don’t come out. What also helps me is that I am probably being persecuted for righteousness’s sake if God told me to do what others are trying to get me to change. Most of us don’t want opposition. Most of us don’t like conflict. Most of us don’t want to hurt, but if we are living for Christ all of these should be expected, and they place us in good company. Read more of my thoughts on this from a parenting perspective (though the points I make apply beyond parenting) in my latest EEW Magazine column that begins below:

One of my relatives has had a lot to say about a lot of my business. She has told me how I should interact with my husband, particularly what I withhold from him (physically, emotionally, information-wise and financially), how I should care for my recovering mother, and how I should parent my children. I would not mind hearing what she has to say if she were being reasonable, if she were giving me practical and godly advice because she saw I lacked wisdom.

No, she just believes that her opinions have merit because “the good Lord has let me live on this earth longer than you.” But her biggest issue is that my husband and I decided to home educate our children. I know homeschooling isn’t novel and parents are opting to educate their children in a number of ways, but to this 70-plus year-old woman, homeschooling is foreign and has no place in our family.

“He’s going to miss the most important day of his life, his first day of kindergarten,” she said after my oldest turned 5.

“Why do you want to do that, Rhonda?” she said another time.

“How is he going to have friends, Rhonda?” she wanted to know.

And each time she commented, like the time I had to tell her she could no longer babysit my son because she defied our instructions in nursing his cold, I said. . .Read more here.

My One Thousand Gifts List

#601-610
Dinner with the Carrs
Cooking dinner early
Polishing my nails
Praying while holding Nate on the kitchen floor
Having a rich time of prayer with Nate
Bobbi watching the boys
Nichole’s book-launch party
Not being rude to someone who clearly snubbed me
Getting a ministry engagement and a possible mistress of ceremony job for just MCing my friend’s party
Hanging and having a good time with Flynn

Eat With Divine Purpose

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Sometimes we just don’t seem to have time to think about what we eat. In a rush we get a donut from the snack shop for breakfast; we didn’t have time to make our lunch so we grab fast food; and we forgot to take some meat out the freezer to unthaw to cook for dinner so we just pull together whatever we can. This has happened to most, if not all, of us at one time or another, but for some of us, this is our life. And our life shows it. We have an abundance of health problems, like high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes and irregularity, and accept them as the norm. These are not always normal and studies have shown that we can reverse, not just manage, these issues if we change the way we eat.

You know I’m a testament to changing my health from eating nutritionally. I had to get sick in order to seek good health. Some of you need to seek good health because you are sick, but others of you can prevent bad health if you are proactive now. As Christians, good health should be our goal as we seek to manifest the righteousness that God has already declared us to be in Jesus Christ. Our change comes with a renewed mind and then a renewed plan.

The plans of the diligent lead surely to plenty, (b)ut those of everyone who is hasty, surely to poverty(Proverbs 21:5-KJV).

To help you renew your mind, I urge you to meditate on that scripture. The writer tells us that if we have a plan and are diligent, we without a doubt will have what we need, in our case good health from what we eat. But when we are hasty, we will lack, in our case good health from what we eat. So as you meditate on this I want you to understand that there are areas concerning your health that you can control. Also, meditate on scriptures that charge us to be like Christ, such as “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5) and “Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth” (Colossians 3:2-NKJV). When we saturate our minds on favorable outcomes, we will automatically seek to manifest those outcomes (Luke 6:45).

After our minds have been renewed we can develop a plan that we are more likely than not able to stick with:

Have healthy eating goals in mind. We can only reach goals if we know what they are. Setting a few goals at a time prevents us from being overwhelmed, which often leads to defeat.

Create a grocery list that reflects goals. Always create a list BEFORE going to the store and stick with it. Make sure to eat before going to lessen the chance of unhealthy foods getting into your basket.

Develop a meal plan. Ideally, this is done before creating a grocery list so the list reflects the meal plan. Having a meal plan helps us not to over-shop and, thus, overspend.

Plan time to prepare meals. Just like we know how much time it takes for us to shower and get dressed, we must know how much time it takes to prepare our meals. Knowing this allows us to carve out time to prepare and cook. We can eliminate another activity, like that extra few minutes of sleep or a TV program, and use the time to fix a healthy meal.

Plot out healthy restaurants in the area. Sometimes the schedule may be too tight to prepare a healthy meal so we have to go to a restaurant. Knowing the locations near wherever we will be of restaurants that serve healthy meal options will help us not to deviate far from our goals.

With a renewed mind and a renewed plan, we are able to eat with a divine purpose in mind: to be the best we can be so we can give our best to and for the very best, our Lord Jesus Christ. Let’s eat with a divine purpose in mind so we can do our part to develop the Kingdom of God.

Using the Wrong Tools

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What Do You Think? Wednesday

About two months ago my husband bought us a new set of knives. I was so thankful that I would finally have the tool I needed to open up those young coconuts that I had recently incorporated into my food regime. Before I got the proper knife, a Santoku, I used a regular kitchen blade that required me to hack a coconut several times, splattering its woody shavings all around my kitchen. After draining stray shavings from the water and removing shreds from the meat, I was finally able to use the coconut water and its meat in a variety of drinks and meals. I hated the mess that the wrong tool caused; the damage was totally avoidable, thus unnecessary. The wrong tool—person, method, message, or any wrong instrument used to get a job done can cause a great big mess like using a blade instead of a Santoku when opening up a young coconut. With the wrong tool, we can leave a friendship hanging in the balance, damage a professional rapport, nullify a winning project and close the ears of those who need to hear from us.

At times we, recovering strong black women, in an effort to keep up pace, might in haste use the wrong tool to get a job done. We may speak harshly when correcting the children, huff to convey frustration with a co-worker, roll our eyes in anger at the husband, take back a task assigned to a worker or yell at a slow driver. Of course these are just some examples of wrong tools used to inflame and bring great damage to those receiving your tool. Undoubtedly cleaning up a coconut and then using it is less of a problem than damaging people and having to deal with them in the tool shattering aftermath. We must consider AND use the proper tool to bring about the best outcome. Choose your tools wisely so you don’t make and have to clean up an avoidable mess.

What tools have you used that have caused unintended and avoidable damage? What tools do you know you need to use instead of those you’ve used in haste? Please, let me know what you think.