WHY MINDSET IS EVERYTHING (SO LET’S GET IT IN CHECK!)

IDK about y’all, but the hibernation feels are REAL. Which means soup, snuggling & getting back into the swing of settling down with a good book. 

This week’s being High Magick by the one & only Damien Echols.

I actually started this one a few months back after we returned home from a dreamy desert weekend learning about meditation from the incredible dude himself. But as you know, we all get distracted – so the only thing that matters is eventually getting back on track. So here we are!

Now, a lot of this book primarily covers the core art & exercises surrounding what’s known as (spoiler alert) “high magick”. These are the very practices that Damien credits with manifesting his freedom from wrongfully spending almost 20 years on death row — so think less velvet capes & pulling rabbits out of hats, & more channelling/harnessing energy to cast back into the world charged with your own intent. 

Naturally there’s a lot of breath work, visualization & protection practices that go along with it too, but at its core all we’re really talking about is doing things to “shape reality & create better environments for ourselves”. Which also got me thinking about the true power of mindset. 

Especially when it comes to our everyday lives. You know, as pats of butter on this giant piece of toast we call Earth.

I think we can agree that none of us are perfect. So of COURSE we all know those moments of debilitating stress, anxiety & nights where you need to just come home for a good cry (& bottle of rosé).

Venting is good. We’re all about it. But the difference to keep in mind between blowing off steam with a good vent & heading down a potentially more detrimental path is your mindset.

Hear me out!

We are humans – not vials of arsenic or cyanide that are best kept bottled up. So because of that, it’s important to know how to process & get things off our chests. You doing you to let it all out? Great! But just make sure to alongside that, not lose sight of the bigger mental picture at hand. 

As in, getting the negativity OUT in order to make room for the ~overall~ positive mindset you aim to uphold the rest of the time.

Because if you don’t, that low energy WILL consume you.

Seriously – the mind is a crazy powerful thing. And while we are human & can’t practice stoicism around the clock like a regular Marcus Aurelius, striving to maintain a positive-forward mentality truly makes a real-deal difference. Think about it, would you want to sit around & stew in a hot tub full of gunk? NO. Gross. Of course not.

So that’s the same thing as choosing to stay in a low-vibe mental state! It doesn’t do any good – & for some, can be the very thing that breaks them.

Everyone has bad days. Especially when it involves making a trip to Trader Joe’s only to find they’re only out of the four exact ingredients you need for what feels like the tenth time in a row (!!!). But if in the big scheme of things you’re keeping your energy in check, recognizing the power of attention & making efforts to lead an overall positive-inspired existence, then you’ll know that everything – in the long run – is going to be just fine.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go charge all of our water.

((& seriously, if you need a good book to cozy up with over the holidays, High Magick is IT!!))

xxAA

(((source of feature image background: @damienechols)))

SPOOKY-SWEET BAT SUGAR COOKIES

OCTOBER HAS LANDED – in case you hadn’t heard.

Meaning it’s time for fuzzy blankets, scary movies and the two official food groups of fall: soup and cookies! (though not always in that order)

But if there’s anything I’ve learned from cookie baking so far, it’s that a stand mixer is not only chic but a total game-changer…and our oven is utter trash.

TRASH, I SAY

I know there’s plenty of you guys out there that still rent, too. Which is fine and all – except when you get stuck with a 30-year-old oven. And I’m NOT talking about the type that’s so well made it lasts forever.

Alas, this snuggly baking season I knew something had to be done. We’ve had enough of toying with temperature and guessing how much extra time to tack onto recipes. So in true Alton Brown fashion, we finally rigged up a probe thermometer to take charge of the heat before us.

And luckily, it worked! So say hello to fall and the fun Halloween-themed recipes that come along with it. Starting with some ultra glam, amazingly cute, bat-shaped sugar cookies!

Let’s be real, bats are the true self-care icons. Avoiding daylight and hugging themselves as they sleep – I mean, talk about serious #goals. So to kick off this year’s festivities, we’re embracing that spooky sentiment AND exploring a simpler alternative to those expertly iced cookies you see all over Instagram.

Which mark my words, we’re totally working up to. But in the meantime, just making the most of sanding sugar and micro-sprinkles that still can elevate the aesthetic – no Amber Spiegel skills required.

Shall we?

// THE COOKIES //

++ Whisk the flour, cornstarch, baking powder and salt together in a medium mixing bowl.

++ Throw the softened butter and sugar into the bowl of your stand mixer with its paddle attachment. Mix on medium-high for 3 to 5 minutes until pale, light and super fluffy (all of the air will make for incredibly soft, pillowy cookies).

++ Add the beaten egg/milk and vanilla extract to the butter/sugar and mix for another minute on medium-high.

++ Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix on a slow speed JUST until combined into a smooth dough (you do NOT want to over-mix here – unless you love tough cookies and hate fun).

++ Throw down a piece of lightly floured parchment paper and spoon half of the dough onto it. Form it into a ball and ((g e n t l y)) roll it out to a 1/4-inch thickness. Set aside.

++ Do the same thing with the other half of dough, sandwich a piece of plastic between the two, wrap it all in plastic and stick into the refrigerator to chill for at least 1 to 2 hours (& up to two days, so I’m told).

++ Once you’re ready to bake it up, preheat your oven to 350℉ and remove the two sheets of dough from the fridge.

++ Line some room-temp baking sheets with more parchment paper (time to buy stock in Reynolds?) and begin cutting your bats. If the dough sticks to the cutter, ~~carefully~~ push the shape onto the baking sheet. If it stays on the parchment paper, use a spatula to transfer it to the sheet.

++ Make sure the cookies are placed an inch or two from one another (even though they won’t spread) and bake each sheet one at a time for 9 to 11 minutes until the bats start to lightly brown around the edges (seriously, it’s WAY better to under-bake than over-bake them).

++ Remove sheet from the oven and throw in the next round. Let the cookies cool for a few minutes on the sheet, then use a spatula to transfer them to a wire rack for the ~full~ cool ahead of icing.

// THE ICING // 

PSA in advance: consistency is EVERYTHING

++ Add the powdered sugar, meringue powder and water to a medium mixing bowl and whisk by hand for about 5 minutes. (NOTE: plenty of people use a mixer for this. I personally like to do it by hand – not only for the workout – but because it gives you way more control over the sometimes-tricky consistency.)

++ Test the consistency of your icing, which when lifted up should drizzle back down and smooth out within 10 seconds. If too thick, add a touch (and I mean t o u c h) more water. If too thin, add some additional sugar. 

++ Load the icing into a squeeze bottle or piping bag and ice the completely cooled cookies all over.

++ Figure out your color combos of sanding sugar and sprinkle accordingly while the icing is still wet. 

++ Let dry & ENJOY!

Consider this the first of many more spooky sweets to come. Until then…

xxAA