When I was a kid, I would come home from school and walk over to my pantry to grab a snack. It was always stocked full of my favorite foods like chips, pop tarts, cosmic brownies, and fruit rollups. We would also have fresh fruit and carrots in the fridge, but I had a sweet tooth and always craved sugar.
This was years before I knew what nutrition even was. I didn’t have the healthiest diet growing up, which isn’t necessarily anyone’s fault, but there’s a lot of misinformation floating around the internet that can be pretty misleading.
Now, as…
When I was 18, I decided to go vegan. I was finishing up my last semester of high school and I had been contemplating about adopting a plant-based diet for some time.
Both my dad and two older sisters had already gone vegan a few months prior, and I followed shortly after. I was heavily influenced by my family to adopt a vegan lifestyle, and I slowly transitioned to a plant-based diet overtime. I didn’t stop cold-turkey, because I knew if I had, it probably wouldn’t last. The first vegan swap I made was milk.
I drank dairy milk religiously…
The camera, dented and bruised.
Lost with pained memories of burning brick —
a vessel shipwrecked at sea,
sunk to the bottom of the ocean.
The remnants of an ash-covered
polaroid. My childhood home,
smoke-sooted brick, engulfed by flames.
That’s my home.
The camera emerges from a shadow,
slowly peeking out
behind a screeching, cracked door.
And all I can hear,
ringing in my ears,
is the faint sound of the camera —
clicking, clicking, clicking.
My eyes grow numb, pupils
widen from the blinding light,
distorting my vision.
There is no pain.
I let go of the pain
the image of the burning brick brings,
and a part of my soul melts
away from the past. Still
and lifesless,
the camera limp in the corner,
where all that is left
is a blurred shadow —
concealing all the memories
from my wounded past.
I wake up, shuffle downstairs, and make myself a cup of freshly brewed coffee in the mornings. It’s not your typical cup of cheap coffee that’s mostly water either.
I’d be lying if I said I didn’t like a hot latte from a coffee shop, but after going a few too many times and seeing my bank account slowly dwindle down, I decided enough was enough. It was time to stop relying so heavily on pre-made coffees and start making my morning coffee from home.
I use to stop by a coffee shop on my way to my 8am class…
When I was younger, like most kids, I hardly knew anything about nutrition. I would tag along to the grocery store with my family and pick out my favorite snacks to bring for my school lunch.
My sisters and I would pick out snacks that looked yummy and didn’t require any prep. I didn’t cook back then — the most cooking I ever did was pour myself a bowl of cereal or make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
However, as I’ve gotten older and educated myself more about nutrition, I’ve quickly come to realize how sugar is often sneakily…
When I scroll through my social media feed, I get ads that pop up where they try to influence me to buy a product. This happens quite regularly, and I’ll admit that it can be tempting to buy them. The company always makes it sound like their new product is revolutionary, but oftentimes, it’s pretty disappointing and hardly resembles the image from the ad.
There are so many expensive kitchen gadgets that cost hundreds of dollars, but the simple and more affordable appliances often work just as well as the fancier ones. …
When I first started playing sports, I would spend hours in the gym working on my shot, dribbling skills, and endurance.
I naively believed that in order to increase your fitness, all that mattered was your training. The harder you train, the stronger and faster you become. This was coming from an athlete’s point of view, and it made sense at the time.
Over the years, however, I quickly realized that it wasn’t a linear relationship. Training hard does not always lead to fitness gains, because there are so many other factors that can negatively impact your performance.
Factors like…
Until a few months ago, I trained almost every single day for basketball. I had been playing for the past 15 years, so I was either running, lifting weights, or shooting hoops daily as part of my training.
It was pretty easy for me to workout. I was part of a team and there were specific times each day that were blocked off for practice. I couldn’t just not show up, and overtime, it became a regular routine of mine that I became accustomed to.
However, now I’m no longer a competitive athlete. I don’t have teammates or coaches forcing…
If someone asked me to go for a run at 5am tomorrow, I would do it in a heartbeat.
It’s not that I love lacing up my running shoes and getting my blood flowing shortly after rolling out of bed. In fact, it would be quite difficult for me to get myself out of bed and out the door. I’d be tempted to hit the snooze button on my alarm clock and get some more shut eye.
It normally takes me a bit to get going in my workouts, and the mornings can be especially brutal. …