The Magic Ingredient

Food, glorious food!!!

Life without food is unimaginable, obviously. But to a person who's every waking moment is planned around food , a life without food becomes merely survival and nothing more.

The wow! Factor of life is food, for me. It's the chilli , the spice and the sweetness. And even though food already played a huge part of my conscious and intentional life, this practice was glorious, if not more.

The Magic Ingredient.That is what Gratitude is called.

The way to add it into the food I eat, and eventually into my life is so simple. I look at my food before I start stuffing it in my mouth. I think back (as much as I can with what I know of food production) about the steps involved before the raw ingredients became the marvel that is on my plate.

I also go back to how the raw ingredients came to be. Sometimes, I even go as far back as to when the Earth becoming the Earth we know it to be. And when I bring that sense of worldliness to my plate, I feel overwhelmingly grateful.

That is when I feel that what is on my plate is truly magical, in par with the Elixir of Life even. Capable of giving me endless health and harmony ; balance and inner peace. Then I take a bite. And I assure you I am not lying when I say that the flavour explode in my mouth and I hastily look around checking if I still live in the same Universe. Though this happens during every meal, it never ever gives me the " been there, done that" feel. It's exciting and new and beautiful and definitely not like the first time. So I have magic stew, magic pancakes, magic payasam, magic food everyday!

Water, so often is pushed to the background, by its flashy counterpart, the delicious taste bud tingling food.

Sure, water doesn't have any taste but it has a certain feel to it that is totally unique to it. Nothing else can wet a parched throat like water does, cooling you from head to toe. Nothing else can drench you and envelop you in its flow, even as it is leaving your skin, leaving behind a fresh 'cool as a cucumber' feel. And that is only a part of water's role in what our physical senses directly experience. Water does so much more than that; has so much of a greater part of our lives than that. Water is what makes life as it is for us.

Day 7:
1. I am grateful for trains and airplanes, buses and all public modes of transportation that make take us across cities and towns, seas and oceans bringing us closer to loved ones, closer to experiences and change and more life.

2. I am grateful for icecreams because they are cold, they are creamy, they come in so many flavours unimaginably exciting and vast, they come in cones and cups, they come along with brownies, they come as cakes....

3. I am grateful for the scenery that zooms past in the opposite direction because it feels awesome and exciting!

4. I am grateful for calm, peace and focus being the natural state of the mind because that makes our adventure on earth so much more potent to excite and teach, stacking all odds against our favour, making it impossible to fail in life!

5. I am grateful for the volatile substances in food because I get to enjoy the amazing aroma of scintillating food whether I am eating it or someone else is!

6. I am grateful for the feeling of dizziness when I whirl and twirl because I can pretend that I am flying!

7. I am grateful for windows because they let the air in, bringing with it the chirping of birds, a cool breeze, the warmth of sunlight and night's magic .

8. I am grateful for comforters because the feeling of wrapping myself in one when the air's cold is pure bliss!

9. I am grateful for living in a world with so many people of so many types, even more than ice-cream flavours, because I get to share everything I experience and sharing is one of the best feelings ever!