Gifts from the Sea on the Sonoma Coast
The Intentional Table
A Green Sea Anenome looking for a snack! In the culinary arts and herbal medicine worlds, sea vegetables have carved out a niche as versatile, nutrient-dense ingredients. Among the most celebrated are kombu and bladderwrack, two brown seaweed types stapled in traditional diets and remedies for centuries. 0715 @ Bodega Bay. = Heaven #IAMSOSPOILED because I live only 45 minutes from several beaches with an incredible abundance of seaweeds. I went yesterday and hand harvested about 20 pounds! The ones I love the most are Kombu, Bladderwrack, Nori, Sister Sarah, and Feather Boa. Yesterday,...
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Arugula... it's a vegetable... right?
The Intentional Table
Arulgula…. it’s a vegetable! Click the Image above to hear it! Arugula Examining the Health Benefits and Nutrition of this Powerhouse Leafy Green Arugula was a valued green in ancient Rome, where it was celebrated in poetry and prose for its effects on mind and body. Unfortunately, it’s far less popular today than its cousins spinach and kale, even though arugula may be the healthiest green of all. In this article, we’ll look at the evidence for arugula’s health benefits and see if those ancient Romans were right to celebrate it. I know I shouldn’t do this because of...
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Auto Immune Release Series Part 2
The Intentional Table
Apple Blossoms @ Musea. Showy! Well, here it is, our second week of thoughts and inspirations about Auto-Immune conditions, how we all have a little of it going all the time, and what we can do about it. Spoiler alert: I am going to write about a plant-based diet this time. My hamburger loving self cringes. But remember that I said last time everything in moderation? Here is a good time to take a breath and remember that you do not have to go cold turkey on the turkey! Increase your intake of rainbow-colored fruits and vegetables. Consume more colorful fruits and vegetables to get as much...
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Auto Immune Release Series Part 1
The Intentional Table
Apricots Anyone? @ Musea What is an autoimmune disease? Why are we speaking about this, at length at the Intentional Table? Great questions! Let’s do this in reverse order. The why of this is life. We all know we are alive, as the machines that go ‘ping’ tell us when we are strapped in. But we also understand that there is way more to it than that. We are sometimes led to think that we are simply biological machines and that, like getting the oil in your car changed, you can go to the doctor if you live your life poorly, and they will ‘fix’ you. Then, out the door and on your...
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Intentional Wellness from Musette
The Intentional Table
Greetings all, How wonderful it is to speak to you through this simple platform. I wish we could all sit around the Intentional Table itself (mine or yours) and drink in the feeling of togetherness, which is the ‘why’ in the ‘what’ around here. I would like you to have a gift. It’s a preview of a book I am writing about Nutritional Wellness. It’s not a b…
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I Taste, Therefore I Am...
The Intentional Table
At the Intentional Table, we taste. Do we ever! Every person who learns to eat, cook, or serve should also learn how to taste. Sounds easy, right? Not so fast, my dearest. Taste is an objective and a subjective thing! It’s objective because every person that is a person (despite a few unfortunate outliers) has taste buds built into the design. However, just because you have the hardware doesn't mean you have the software. If you do have the software, then you have an appreciation of fundamentals when it comes to how your organ of perception, which is your mouth, your tongue, your nose,...
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Biodynamics Basics
The Intentional Table
Hello, my intrepid Intentional Table guests! Today, with our afternoon wine, will be the topic that is near and dear to our hearts here. Biodynamics. What is it, you may ask? Why is it important to this table, Musea, and our lives? All good questions. Read on, and if you want the DEEP DIVE EXTRA CREDIT, it’s at the bottom.⬇︎ There are two polar views of scientific reality when it comes to the consideration of the active practice of biodynamics. One is the left-brain approach, represented by the Newtonian Analytical view that has dominated science for the last two centuries. Newton...
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February 4 is World Cancer Awareness Day
The Intentional Table
Take a look at this team. They are really on it. Click the image for link. You may ask yourself, now, why would he say that? It certainly could apply to any human, anywhere. There are 340 activities around the world for Cancer Day. So, it must be happening, you know, out there somewhere. Hubris leads to nemesis. Cancer, hunger, war, disease, and crime all happen. It must happen because it’s all over the news. It’s hard to connect with anything like this while you read it on the device in your hand while it charges at Starbucks as you sip your mocha. Our children have never seen it. Our...
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The Agony and The Ecstasy of the Table
The Intentional Table
I thought I would take a few minutes to see if you would like to travel with me back in time to revisit exactly what the intentional table is and how it's considered here in our little conversation and in real life. If you asked me to cook for you, I would be delighted. That's all there is to it. I wouldn't question what our budget was, what the logistics were, or really what it was that you wanted to eat when you're with whom. All those things are in a particular way beside the point. What this means is that you're asking me to create with intention, something for you that actually serves...
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Only the wounded eye can see
The Intentional Table
I came up with this phrase while meditating yesterday. It was inspired by something my dear friend Andrew Johnstone told me recently. At the Intentional Table, we find ourselves circling back to an important theme with a recurring and increasing frequency: Gratitude. It's an incredibly overused, misused, and, I think, sometimes misleading term. Oxford says, “the quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness.” In the latter part of that sentence is the key, which is ‘returning.’ There is an idea that we commonly refer to in Intentional...
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What does it take to be a Spirit Warrior?
At the Intentional Table, we know. Soon, so shall you!
There is not one single thought, idea, nor concept that I can relate to you that would adequately describe a life as singularity as this story that I am about to ‘relate’.
Relate is the wrong word to end the previous sentence. My grammar checker tries to tell me, with that irritating little red line, that it’s not correct. That is, in fact, the perfect metaphor for Carmen Baraka. Not correct, perfect. Let’s make a distinction right now and get it crystal clear. I have had plenty of opportunities to think about what is correct and what is perfect. They are clearly not always the same, and most of the time, given the current social constructs of our lives and communities and world, correct is the last thing we need. Correct brought us here; revolutionary gets us there. ‘Relate’ has a special meaning in this post. Read on, rebel soul…
Aho Mitakuye Oyasin
This is where the soul of the revolution lives. In Lakota, it means “All my relations.” in Carmen’s worldview, this was the most beautiful statement of the interconnection of human beings that she could possibly refine or pick from the entire constellation of native wisdom that she carried. This was demonstrated to me so many times that I cannot count it. Her "big tent" and inclusiveness took into account every person that she met as a distant family member and treated them accordingly.
Carmen agreed to, accepted, and retains a unique and special role in Intentional Creativity. It is hard to recall the occasions of her smiling, dancing, dreaming, performing ceremonies, drinking tequila, laughing, and rising all boats with her high tide of excitement because there are simply too many to mention. Her hospitality and gregariousness were completely infectious, and I am amongst the many who felt the warmth of her smile and the touch of her kindness, care, and attention.
Of course, there is no way that I could create a monologue or other recantation of her entire life because it would be much too large. It includes her professional-level drumming and her incredible perception of depth as an artist, creating paintings of magnitude and exquisite expertise. Way too much to add here, but suffice it to say, it was a mighty catalog for a great mind.
Are you a Spirit Warrior, too?
Would you stand up, speak out, and advocate for the things that you knew were true, beautiful, and proper? Would you love others with your whole being? Would you feel that this was your work to do in this world? Would you consider it a privilege or a burden? Imagine for a moment that you are standing before the entire United Nations, speaking to women from hundreds of foreign nations about the conditions and struggles of the Native Americans. Imagine the look on the women delegates’ faces from all over the world when they learn that the condition of American citizens is less than the most impoverished people in the world that they serve. This is what Carmen was made to do. Advocate, rebel, champion, uplift, and have one heck of a good time doing it.
One year, on our trip to the United Nations, she decided that she would drum and smudge every flag of the member nations of the United Nations. She lit a smudge stick the size of a small baseball bat, and Shiloh drummed. An entourage of approximately 20 women marched the entire length of the United Nations while Carmen and the ladies sang; she smudged, said prayers, and they drummed. It was the same week that Russia invaded Crimea, and Hillary Clinton, as Secretary of State, was visiting the United Nations. Security was intense, and I collected passports and driver’s licenses from all the ladies just in case they got arrested so that I could get them out and post bail. (Not kidding)
What lengths will you go to to be a witness and a champion for authenticity, self-agency, and freedom?
Carmen, if you are a student or a practitioner of intentional creativity, you may know, departed this time and place. Here, we call it “walking into your future.” She faced some long-term health issues that played her for many years but without complaint. It was not evident to anyone except for those who knew her most intimately.
Carmen's life exemplified what we teach at Musea and converse about at the Intentional Table. A life of courage and passion, and life of the “devil may care” adventurer, and an interconnectedness with all beings, along with a desire to end the suffering for the same.
In our heart of hearts, there is no loss greater to us. And, yet, there is no celebration greater than this. In that divine dichotomy lies the answer to whether you, friend, are ready to be a Spirit Warrior.
I'll tell you something now that I have not told anyone but her (not even her partner, Denise, and not my wife, just her…), and it's quite intimate, so please consider it for yourselves. The reason is that I feel her telling me to tell you. It was the last time I spoke to her.
I told her that a human dies three times. The first time you die is when your body perishes and no longer functions. The second time you die is when no trace of you remains. The third and final time is the moment when your name is no longer spoken. I told her that day that as long as I lived, I would speak her name aloud. She cried, I cried. I am now.
It was as beautiful of a gesture that I, a white male from the same people who destroyed her very culture, could offer as a soul friend could make.
But, how will I speak of you? How shall you speak of me? How shall we honor each other by speaking our names into the realness of now?
Below is a video from the deck and in the redwoods above Carmen’s Spirit House. It was raining, and the sun was shining off of Humboldt Bay.
When you watch this, all glorious 15 seconds of it, find her in the droplets; find yourself there, too. This is where we will all meet, arrive, and join in peace.
This is the best peace that I, the author, could ever offer you.
You will become a Spirit Warrior, too, by asking your relations (all Earth):
“Is my Spirit enough to serve that which I am here to do and is mine to do?”
Your answer, in case you missed it along the way, is not the answer you think…. it’s that you had the courage to ask it in the first place.
Carmen Baraka
Carmen Baraka
Carmen Baraka
There is wisdom here, my relations. Ask for your guides. Listen to the smallest voice within you, and THIS is where the Spirit Warrior will do her work.
With the finest grains of love and respect,
