Maybe you’re looking for ways to make lunch more interesting. Or maybe you’d like to be able to pack a quick picnic in the evening. If so, here’s a post from Apartment Therapy’s The Kitchen – Grab and Go lunch using canning jars.
Canning jars don’t leak, clean up in the dishwasher and they allow you to cook or bake safely in a microwave – without the lid of course.
The article lists five fun and unexpected ideas for lunch: layered salad, miso soup, chili with cornbread that bakes in the jar, vegie sticks in hummus and a crustless quiche – 3 ways from the blog Krista and Jess. Check it out, then try it out!
If I’m not able to freely choose that which contributes to my health and wholeness – whether it be healthy, mutual relationships, nutritious food or enriching activities – then I’m not truly free because something or someone else enslaves me. That enslavement, addiction or distraction impoverishes me because it keeps me from being able to choose freely for those things which will keep me healthy and sustain my life.
If you think you have a good idea about wealth distribution in the United States – watch this short video gone viral on Wealth Inequality in America and then tell me if your understanding squares with reality.
Likewise, read “Exceptional upward mobility in the United States is a myth.” Check the results of this new study from the University of Michigan here.
Lest you believe the often repeated – but false – meme “But the rich create jobs,” let me remind you that the rich have been subsidized with lowered income and capital gains tax rates since the mid-nineties and jobs have not been created. In fact, in subsidizing the rich with billions in government welfare (lowered income tax rates) millions of people have become unemployed.
The truth is that the rich do not create jobs. Merely having money does not cause one to start up a business. Rather, it is demand that motivates new business start-ups. Demand for goods and services creates jobs. A strong middle class, therefore, stimulates demand and in doing so creates jobs.
You may also be surprised to know that small business owners are the largest employers of our economy – not big corporations. Helping the middle class helps them expand and create jobs.
If you want a healthy, job-creating economy, support tax policies that provide basic necessities for those who are vulnerable (mostly women and children) and strengthen our middle class. Eliminate massive government welfare for the rich and corporations inherent in income and capital gains tax subsidies.
Yesterday I saw this posted online, “For Lent I gave up . . . period. I just gave up” and I laughed out loud. Lest you think the poster was depressed and that I have a perverse sense of humor, she was quick to note that ending it all was not what she meant.
Part of the task of adulthood is being able to accept reality as it really is – in all its beauty and messiness. This means giving up other expectations – of changing other people, for one. Expecting the world to be different than it is, for another.
Instead we are called to surrender to reality as it really is and to what the universe is calling us to do, not what our family, culture or ego think we should do – or worse, what we wish other people would do.
Surrendering is a good practice for Lent. Just give up. Then observe carefully and see what reality is offering to you!
I’ve not posted too much lately because I was asked to teach a J-Term class at the university where I work (think one month, January, fifteen weeks crammed into 18 days!). The course was on theology and consumerism. “What’s the connection?” you might ask. Well . . . everything. How we see God – loving, compassionate and present within each person, for example – influences how we make decisions regarding everything we buy or whether we buy anything at all.
For Christians (and others too) we believe there is an inherent responsibility to consume less in order to relieve the stresses caused by carbon and waste to our planet. There is concern for the 23 million human beings enslaved worldwide to produce cheap goods for industrialized countries. I live in an urban area (Twin Cities) that is sadly one of the centers of human trafficking in this country. Finally, there is a concern about the inhumane treatment given to many of the animals we consume.
In many ways this seems too overwhelming to consider. And yet we have a moral responsibility to do exactly that. However, education and changes can be made slowly over time. It’s a process that is on-going. Choosing to live more simply is a great way to start. It is a way to use less, take care with what is actually used and frees time to learn more about what and how we consume.
So this was the topic of the course. The students were engaged, thoughtful and brought excellent suggestions and ideas to their discussions. I am always amazed at how much young adults are already doing to learn more, help others and the earth. They are inspiring for sure! They inspired me most definitely!
How many planets would it take to support your lifestyle? Here is one of the links a student highlighted that calculates what our lifestyle choices mean for our planet. Get started. Click on the map and find out if you should consider living more simply.
