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Sunday 3 March 2024

Breakfast: the most important meal of the day…it’s a myth!




Definitions are the beginning of wisdom. A myth is a widely held but false belief or idea. Breakfast is the first meal of the day and the word self-explanatory… to break your fast means you have been asleep all night (not eating/fasting) and whatever you eat after waking up constitutes breaking that fasting period, thus, breakfast, irrespective of the time of day.

I woke up on the morning of 25 February 2024 with gratitude in my heart and feeling delightful that God has given me an additional day to live. My mind was full of random thoughts about health, self-healing, fasting and our role in the process. The night prior, I had a WhatsApp group discussion with some friends about the role of fasting in the healing process. Digestion is an energy-consuming activity and our bodies ‘rest’ when they are not performing this task. Besides, long fasting periods deprive ‘diseased’ body cells of food, thereby causing them to die faster and let the healthier ones live on. Some health experts recommend a gap of at least 8 hours between meals. 

During our WhatsApp discussion, one of the group members made the famous statement, ‘Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. That got me thinking. For over five years now, I practice OMAD (One Meal A Day) and this meal is always in the evening. If that statement is true, how come I am doing just fine? According to the above definition of breakfast, I take my breakfast in the evening because that is when I have my first meal after waking up. I decided to Google the origin of that famous phrase! Do you know that the phrase is nothing but a marketing slogan coined by John Harvey Kellogg’s cereal company in the 19th century? It was meant to encourage people to buy and eat cereal!

Back to my thoughts… Water is the most important meal of the day. Fasting is the most wonderful gift you can offer your body. The ability to afford food isn't a passport to eat as we wish. Several diseases can be controlled through nutrition and intermittent fasting (google the last two words).

Bottomline, do not believe everything you hear. Do your research. Question the mainstream ideas and general thought patterns you have grown up paying attention to. Humans are rewarded for using their brains, not for having it. Your ‘truth’ will set you free. Unless you enjoy being caught in the processes of what other people think. Find your own truth and live it.

Blessings always, all ways 💐.


Tuesday 30 January 2024

A request to mentor another: my spirituality mentorship guide

Dr. Brigitte is an MD friend who has been my fervent WhatsApp status viewer. Recently, she asked me to mentor her on Gratitude and the Law of Attraction (LoA). This prompted me to share with her a few daily practices which generate the indispensable vibrational frequencies of gratitude. 

My spiritual journey began in 2007 when I read two books: The Secret by Rhonda Byrne and Conversations with God: an Uncommon Dialogue by Neale Donald Walsch. I enjoy reading books on spirituality because they are full of testimonies on how people like you and I overcome challenges to live a more fulfilling life. As I peruse their testimonies, I always tell myself, "If they can do it, then I can do it".

I prepared a list of items that constitute my daily spiritual routine which I shared with Dr. Brigitte. I refer to it as my Spirituality Mentorship Guide. These are things I do, mostly daily, to keep my body, mind and spirit in harmony. When these three are in agreement, you are certain to experience a healthy and fulfilling life in which the mind decides with ease, the body executes in synch and the spirit approves your actions in harmony. This could be likened to the biblical reference of Mathew 18:20: “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them” (NRSV).

My self-learning Spirituality Mentorship Guide consists of the following:

  • Writing in my gratitude journal.
  • Accepting outcomes, no matter what they are.
  • Having a vision board and reading its content daily.
  • Sharing LoA knowledge and testimonies with others.
  • Having the burning desire to know more about spirituality.
  • Using positive affirmation words as part of my passwords.
  • Trusting in the process and knowing it is never too late to expand one's spiritual journey.
  • Writing positive words with bold marker on all mirrors at home e.g. blessings, abundance, joy, peace etc.
  • Posting positive affirmations that resonate with me on my WhatsApp status. Rereading them during the day.
  • Reading and listening to positive affirmations from apps in my phone – I have 6 of them, two audios and four text-based.
  • Listening to inspirational audio messages by my favorite authors: Dolores Cannon, Joe Dispenza, Abraham Hicks, Sadhguru, Joel Osteen, Rhonda Byrne, Neale Donald Walsch, Raoul Wafo.

In case your spiritual journey has been on hold, NOW is the time to resume. Live the present moment, and know that NOW is the right time to receive this knowledge. In case you were not aware of it previously, have no regrets about the timing. Perhaps you were not ready to receive the knowledge. 
May your onward journey be richly blessed with infinite testimonies after putting some of the above into practice. This is my wish for you.

PS: what other daily spiritual practices do you engage in? I'd appreciate your feedback.

 

Monday 1 January 2024

I experienced joy today: the easiest way to experience anything is to cause another to experience it!


I always look forward to my Saturday morning sports appointment in the Mt Fébé area. On this specific day after rigorously jogging and dancing (to the songs on my iPod shuffle), I decided to take a moment to enjoy the flowers in the flower garden of the Bastos round about. As I sat on one of the benches after a series of stretching exercises, I looked into the blue/grey sky and took a deep breathe to feel the moment. I gave thanks for my life and for the many achievements, for good health and for the strength to do sports. I remembered that the easiest way to feel something is to cause another to feel it.

Just then I notice two young men picking up something in the gardens. Initially I thought they were harvesting mushrooms. Then I realized they were rather caretakers of the gardens; they were picking up dirt. I walked up to them and noticed it was peelings of sugarcane left by visitors to the garden, as well as fallen leaves from the flowers among other trash. I greeted them and started picking along with them. They were apparently overwhelmed and couldn’t help wondering why I would want to do such a thing. I smiled back and told them not to worry, let’s just work together…

One of the young men said to me in broken French, “You are really a nice Cameroonian; I have never met anyone in this country who is as nice as you”. From his accent I could tell he was from another French-speaking African country. His other companion was also very surprised that I joined them to pick up the trash.

One of the photographers in the garden walked up to me and said, “From every indication you are a housewife who likes working a lot”. I smiled, marveled at his prejudice, said hello, and continued picking the trash. Another guy in the gardens who had been jogging asked me to carry him on my back so that he could do his stretching exercises, I told him I was busy, let him find someone else.

We worked for about 30minutes and the garden was now looking very neat and tidy. I was glad I had the opportunity to make the workers feel joyful, that someone could join them in their task that morning, thereby fastening the pace of the task. They gave me a tiny bar of soap to wash my hands at the nearby tap when we finished.

Usually after sports, I buy sugarcane to eat at home. I bought some on my way home and as I drove along, I felt true joy. It is said that the easiest way to experience something is to cause another to experience it, because we are all one. Words are so limited in explaining what the heart feels at times. It felt like a combination of satisfaction, excitement, blessing, fulfillment, enlightenment… When I got back home that morning, I settled down for a sugarcane treat after a warm shower. I realized that that particular sugarcane was the sweetest I had ever eaten!

Midnight fire and insurance realities.

               Midnight.  I heard some noises that night, it sounded somewhat like a dream, at the same time like reality.  I wanted to continue sleeping but the noise and sounds persisted. I thought a thief had been caught in my backyard and was receiving jungle justice.  I woke up to have a better listen from my living room.  As I stepped in, I was almost blinded by the brightness there in!  Just then my neighbor was knocking on my door, “Patience, Patience, there’s a fire!”
               I hurriedly opened my door and behold, my neighbor’s house was in flames. Quickly, I switched off all the electricity meters in our compound and I called my landlord (his entire compound was in danger as the flames were spreading fast).    He said I should call the fire brigade.  I immediately dialed 118.
               This was my first time to call the fire brigade, and was I impressed!  I described where I live and they said they have already sent a fire truck to the site.  That truck took about 15 minutes to get there, when most of the wooden building was already consumed by flames.   They did a great job after all by putting out the flames, however, I wish they had arrived a bit earlier, perhaps some of the building should have survived.

         Now, my neighbor was living in his home with his wife and son.  They had a few tenants.  They didn’t have electricity supply at the time, thus the likely cause must have been a lit candle.  Apparently, a new tenant moved in that same night and caused the fire.  The specificity of my country is that very few people can afford to insure their homes against fire.  Insurance is such a tricky affair.  This example can better explain what I mean:

         In 2007, I was involved in a car accident.  A taxi driver reversed into my car as I was turning into another road.  Since then, my insurer has not paid me a dime for the expenditure incurred repairing my car.  I am told that the insurer of the taxi has declined payment.  So right now, the case is in the “insurance court”.  I wonder how long it will take for me to be paid, if ever.

          I asked my neighbor’s wife to see me the next day.  She came and told me how bad the situation was.  The fire spread so fast that they weren’t able to rescue any belongings.  Fortunately everyone came out safely.  She and her family lost everything.  I gave her some money and my second phone which I wasn’t using often.  I know this is very little compared to what she lost.  However, I believe there is always a place to start being generous.  May God grant me more to help her better eventually.

             One day I went into a big beauty centre in YaoundĂ© to get information about training services offered. The manager was absent and so I was received by one of the apprentice.  She responded very nicely to all my concerns and said I should wait a for the manager to give me an information sheet. I told her I was really in a haste and I think with the information she gave me, I was ok with that.  

            Just then, the manager returned and they handed me a sheet of A4 paper with all the information on types of courses and prices.  The prices per year ranged from 250.000frs to 400.000frs. I was satisfied with the information sheet. I thanked them for their service and bid them goodbye. 
As I turned round to leave, the student said, "Madam, the information sheet is 50frs". I have never been so short of words to pronounce after hearing those words. For heaven's sake, this is a business place that needs customers. They want me to pay 50 FRS for a poorly copied sheet of paper? The print was not even clear. I didn’t have any coins on me so I copied the phone number directly into my phone and handed back the paper.


              By the way, a photocopy costs 25 FRS all over town. So why would I pay more for the lower quality? Later on that day I recounted the incident to a colleague who turned out to be a regular customer there. I told her to tell them that it is so disgraceful to give potential clients a piece of paper and ask them to pay for it. Jeez. They should invest even a little to get more customers and more profit! Do you agree with me? Pls leave a comment. And your name. Thx!