Blog

Who I Am Grateful For Today

Gratitude, in the most simple explanation is being thankful for everything you have.

Lately my husband has expressed to me directly and to his friends and family that he is grateful to me for helping him to express his emotions.You can read his blog here.

The funny thing about that is, he is the one who taught me what unconditional love is. When I was angry with him, or disappointed, it was so hard for me to feel and express the love I knew I had (have) for him. He was always right there though, loving me through each and every argument and will continue to do so.

He is my calm rock and always has been. He models patience to our children and me more than I’ve ever seen before.

Chris, I am so grateful to you for the amount of love, respect and patience you demonstrate on a daily basis. 11011717_10203999740219468_3943890846861082012_nHere’s a throw back to almost 10 years ago when the Universe put us in each others life.

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Recipes

Hemp Chia Seed Green Smoothie

I could say this is my favorite smoothie, but every smoothie is my favorite smoothie! πŸ˜‚πŸ˜‚πŸ˜‚

I LOVE adding hemp seed, chia seed, maca powder, raw cocoa powder, goji berries, camu camu powder, super greens powder. The list goes on and on. Have you ever seen our multiple cupboards overfilled with goodies? It makes for hard decisions in the morning!

This week my husband is out of town so I had to keep it rather simple and incredibly dense nutritionally.

Today I decided:

Half a cup frozen peaches

Half a cup frozen pineapple

1/4 of an avocado

2 stems worth of kale (stems removed, I juice those babies!)

2 handfuls of fresh power greens mix (ours is baby kale, Swiss chard and spinach)

3 tablespoons of chia seeds

3 tablespoons of hemp seeds (hello complete protein)

Handful of organic dried goji berries (another great protein choice)

Ice

Water
*i do not specificy the amount of water you need because it depends. Depends on your preference, do you like thick or thin? Add more water for a thinner texture. I like thicker textures. Also, depends on the blender you have. We have the nutribullet. The nutribullet makes it easy and gives you a line to fill with liquid towards the top! Also, you don’t have to use water, any liquid of your choice so long as it does not cause you inflammation. Dairy has been linked to cause inflammation so I try to stay away from it, but organic nut & coconut milk or coconut water work great too! Experimenting is key. Find what you like so you KEEP GOING

The main goal for smoothies for myself is to incorporate fruits and good fats. This is opposite of most people, most people I know enjoy smoothies to hide vegetables. I enjoy smoothies to hide fruit and boost my good fats intake as I am still nursing a 1 year old so I have two brains to feed! I have noticed since starting smoothies {EVERY DAY!} my need for sweets has drastically declined. Coincidence? I think not!
I’ll definitely share some more recipes; especially this week. Thank you for all the requests!
Ps. No photo to share today. πŸ˜€drank that too quick! 😁

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Blog

What I’m Doing Now & Why

As Marianne Williamson said in “A Return To Love”, I have written and will continue to write and share with an open heart and I hope you’ll read enthusiastically and with an open mind.

Since having children my entire life changed. It was no longer about me, or my husband and I, it was about these two baby boys we love and cherish deeply. When you’re pregnant you know your life is going to change (for the better) but you truly do not know exactly what life will be like as a new mother until you are in it, day in and day out…24/7. It is because of them and my husband that I realized something in my life needed to change. I wasn’t the mother nor the wife I always pictured myself to be.

I’ve always felt I wasn’t truly happy at my core. It always felt as if something was missing. I never had a job or a relationship where I felt whole and happy.At the time I thought it was normal (I still think it is NORMAL because a lot of people experience this, but it doesn’t have to be!!). I think subconsciously I knew better. One day this fall I asked the universe for help. I had been asking myself what I wanted to do with my life and never had any answers come to me, but this time I literally asked the universe & my spirit guides (angels if you will) what I wanted to do with my life and to please provide me a sign that gave me the answer. The next morning I was driving my toddler to school and listening to Food Heals Podcast (that’s my FAVORITE podcast. Subscribe to it) and the guest was announced as a holistic life coach. It suddenly hit me like a ton of bricks that is what I wanted to do. The amount of relief and happiness I felt is indescribable, I almost had to pull over.Β  I want to become a holistic wellness coach and help people find their true purpose in life, their authentic self, their higher self—INTUITION, whatever you want to call it! And truly start living from a happy state of mind and soul. None of this can happen without SELF LOVE.

If you asked me years ago if I loved myself I would have said yes without hesitation. It took a few months this past winter for me to truly connect to myself and LISTEN to my thoughts to realize there was a lot more negativity going on in my head than I cared to admit! Specifically about myself. A few friends and family members have expressed shock when I’ve told them this so it makes me wonder; how many of us are out there projecting a happy, healthy, positive life, but on the inside we are not treating ourselves with the love and respect we deserve? Probably a lot of us, right?!

So, this is the beginning of a completely different journey for me. Since Thanksgiving my husband and I have drastically changed our nutrition, thought processes and exercise. (Ok, my husband has been consistent in the exercise dept for a year, but I wasn’t!)

It was through dropping most animal products and processed foods, eating a plant based diet, becoming more aware of our precious Mother Earth (again) and learning to reprogram my brain that I finally discovered my own self love and happiness. Nutrition was a key factor for me. I’ve always struggled with eating…either I wouldn’t eat enough or I’d overeat–either way, it lead to a lot of tears and guilt. I suffered from IBS as well, thanks to an incredibly poor diet and lifestyle. I am happy to say my IBS is in remission (usually…sometimes I eat something that doesn’t agree with me and I remember it is a lifestyle choice I must make to continue my well being! Remember, when you ask your doctor if nutrition has any role in your dis-ease, they will likely say no because they truly have no idea, they’ve not been taught nutrition in medical schools! This is slowly but surely changing). The biggest nutrition key for me was stopping the meat and adding plants that are alive into my system. What do I mean by this? RAW FOOD. Eating raw foods sounded scary at first. All I could imagine was a sore mouth from chomping all the time, HA! But it was nothing like that. I added in more fruit, apples, berries, bananas–etc and a lot of salads. The salads were really the easiest thing to add raw produce to for me. Sprouts, peppers, avocados, onion, squash, goji berries and zucchini for example. Once I ate these daily I started craving them and no longer craved the junk. Don’t worry, I’ll post more about that journey as well! The point is, after watching a lot of documentaries (I’m looking at you, Cowspiracy, Forks Over Knives, Food Matters, Fat Sick & Nearly Dead and Fed up) I decided I needed to clean up my nutrition for good and help save our planet. No more saying oh Ill do this or that and sticking to it for a month or two. This was a lifestyle change for the better and it worked for myself and my husband. The amount of clarity provided to me by this transition was and is still incredible. Now I enjoy a large salad at least once a day as well as lots of raw snacks and cooked food. I choose to not rely on cooked food as a majority of my diet (I hate the word diet, seems so negative and temporary!) because when cooking you are literally cooking the nutrition out. I immediately lost 20 pounds of what I imagine was built up inflammation and all sorts of other junk I don’t want to know about!

No, it didn’t happen over night (the weight loss happened within two months and still going) and no, I am not done. This is the EXCITING part, I will always continue learning and cultivating my own self love and development. I am working hard on no longer acting from a place of FEAR. After all, the only REAL thing in this world is LOVE. My holistic wellness coaching is all about discovering true purpose in life and we can do that through nutrition, mindfulness & exercise. I am so excited for what my future holds and I thank all of you for helping me along the way and continuing to do so in this new path of mine!

 

Namaste.

-Nichole Causey Holistic Wellness Coach

Discovering True Purpose

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