Rituals In Chocolate
conversations with open space
This is my favorite winter beverage. It’s homemade hot cacao.
It’s a delight. I drink it almost every day and I’ve memorized the recipe, sometimes altering it depending on what sounds good to me at the time. I always, however, revert back to the original list of ingredients:
1 cup nondairy milk (I’ve tried coconut, almond, cashew, oat, and macadamia nut and so far this is my favorite)
1 tbs cacao powder
1 tbs raw honey
1 tsp coconut oil
1/2 tsp tumeric
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 scoop Four Sigmatic Defend mushroom powder (sometimes a full scoop, but a whole scoop alters the flavor and sometimes I don’t want that particular flavor)
salt to taste (I love it on the saltier side and mix salt in while it warms in the pan, and once I've transferred the beverage into my mug I sprinkle even more salt on top)
I’ve sometimes added other spices, typically warming ones like cinnamon or cayenne, and it’s nice. But I really love the rich subtleties of this recipe without the spicy kick.
Anyway, this isn’t suddenly a food blog and if it were it would mostly feature breakfast foods at any time of the day, deviled eggs, a list outlining where I believe fruit does or does not belong in relation to an assortment of desserts with a detailed description as to why, and my favorite Mexican or Indian take out. So let’s see where this segway is taking us besides hungry town.
Making this beverage has become a ritual for me. Whenever I don’t know what to do, whenever I feel my self spiraling into doubt, repeating over and over again “what in the fuck am I doing?”, I hear some aspect of my self say:
“just go make some hot cacao.”
So I do. I gather the ingredients mise en place style in preparation. I methodically add each ingredient one at a time to the pot on medium heat. With every whisk I pray. My gaze softens with every stir round the pot, my body melts with every dissolving clump of cacao I witness, my intention infuses into every frothy bit that is born as if each step of the process gathers me more in to my self, deeper in to presence. At the end, I add salt as if it were blessing the whole thing. As if it were to say “and so it is. I am here.”
I am here.
Sometimes after I pour the drink into my mug I stare at it hoping that some kind of sign would appear. A word spelled out of the swirling froth, an image conjured in the salt contrasting against the chocolatey elixir. I listen for an opportunity for conversation between me and the energy of the cacao. I believe in plant allies. I have many.
But sometimes the silence speaks more than plants or signs or messages or chocolate ever could.
Which is just funny to me because I’ve been doing guest spots on podcasts recently (one featured below with more on their way in the coming weeks) and each conversation has touched heavily on my process with trusting the signs and synchronicities that show up in my life. I’ve practiced having an awareness for things outside of me that affirm things within me. That the reality I’m creating on the inside is translating in to my external environment. But sometimes, it seems, I’m asked to simply just trust my self. Without any outside affirmation. To just feel the weight of my presence here. The gravity of my existence.
[a prayer and intention ]”I gather my self into presence to add weight to my existence in the fabric of space and time to create a gravitational force where what ever is meant for me may find me.”
Honestly, I don’t know what I’m doing. And [un?]fortunately for me, all of my astrology and Human Design says that my life trajectory and experience in this lifetime is completely based in experimentation. In blazing my own trail. In failing over and over again to discover what works. In developing a self knowing and self trust I hadn't mastered in other lifetimes because I was busy mastering being in relationships and not being as self sufficient as I could have been.
And I think this process of making hot cacao when I am about to launch on a rocket ship into complete defeat and giving upness and self betrayal where I leave behind the world and reality I’m creating to retreat back to a familiar but soul sucking one is a ritual to bring me back to my heart. Back to what it is that I do know, a truth that I come back to and rediscover over and over and over again. That here, I am safe. In this moment, this continuous ever lasting now moment, I am exactly where I’m supposed to be. Everything is right on time. Right here, I have everything I need. I am provided for, I am loved, I am worthy, I capable. That surrender is a warm embrace with unimaginable wisdom. That the heart doesn’t need words or signs or messages - it has it’s own language of truth.
That language abandons all collectively agreed upon logic. It asks me to have my own conversations with what feels logical to ME. To examine every belief system as if to ask “is that belief really one you want to use as one of the pillars of what you are building?" and “does what you are building have to make sense to any else but you?” and “when will you let your truth be enough?”
These middle spaces have always produced the most rich and new questions.
So, I sink in to a deeper layer of surrender. I make cacao and remember that cacao ceremonies are a centuries-old ritual seen as the ultimate heart-opener and revel in the mysticism and the wisdom of my heart and body that lead me to this plant in this season of my life. I find comfort in one of my favorite Albert Einstein quotes (my gravity bro) where he says “as the area of knowledge increases, so too does the perimeter of ignorance.”
The more I know, the more I don’t know. Living within that paradox is hard in our modern society that is laden with capitalism and the patriarchy, but I’m getting there. And I surrender to it all.
Liminal Spaces
I was on a podcast! Not long after I quit my job I was in the shower one day and thought “I’d like to be a guest on podcasts”. Within a couple of days invitations were rolling in, providing proof that the shower is a portal and we should never overlook all of our best thinking and dreaming and channeling we do there.
My conversation with my dear friend Rachel of Doorway To Self covered so many of my favorite topics. You can listen here on Spotify, here on Apple, or any other platform you usually find your favorite podcasts.
When you listen, reply to this email and let me know what came up for you if you feel so inclined. Otherwise, I’ll see you back here next week.
Tallyho and Happy Imbolc my friends,
<3 Jenny