38 thoughts…

Posted on October 19, 2020 by Bhanu Misra Marya

Hey!! Today is my 38th birthday. Grateful for another trip around the sun and I felt compelled to write a list of 38 thoughts/words of wisdom that have inspired me…

1. Be creative everyday

2. Communicate with transparency in interpersonal relationships

3. Get out of your comfort zone

4. Use post it notes to organize, prioritize and remind yourself

5. Learn something new everyday

6. Surround yourself with successful people

7. Listen to more music

8. Understand your biases so you can move past them

9. Use your voice (both verbally and written) to share your ideas, thoughts and opinions (the world needs it)

10. Don’t follow the trends or masses

11. You don’t have to like, watch or do everything online, that your friends post/do or because everyone else is doing it

12. Sit in silence

13. Meditate and journal daily and in that order

14. Run (longer but slower), stretch and foam roll

15. Be better than you were yesterday

16. Being disciplined with yourself is self love

17. Drink more water

18. Nail polish isn’t something I need to wear everyday

19. Hug and say I love you to the kids/hubby multiple times a day

20. Your best & highest self is who you should connect to everyday

21. Reach out of your network to make new connections

22. Being an introvert is amazing

23. Read more / scroll less

24. Brain dumps and list making is very therapeutic

25. There are 3 mindsets you can use in any situation: growth, opportunity & detachment

26. Try your beat to envision your best self/life everyday (especially on the hard days)

27. Forest walks for the win

28. Before you go to bed: brush/floss your teeth, wash your face, wear an eye cream and brush your hair with your head upside down

29. If you really want something, talk openly about it to people who can support you in getting there

30. Listen, always listen

31. Know you are loved + love yourself

32. Appreciate where you are (knowing you wanted this!)

33. Dress up (and take a picture of your OOTD whenever you can!)

34. Slow down, rest, pIgor but then keep going

35. Mornings are my magic (morning pages, morning walks and especially morning distance runs)

36. Dance, for no reason

37. If you want something done right, best to do it yourself

38. Be grateful, always!

Make Art/Memories

Posted on October 3, 2020 by Bhanu Misra Marya

In the most ideal situation I would have stacks of photobooks for us and the girls to look through. But my art doesn’t get created there.

So for memories sake I create these and share with you and my future self these inspiring quotes about making art.

The arts are not a way to make a living. They are a very human way of making life more bearable. Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven’s sake. // K Vonnegut

Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art. // A Warhol

A creative life is an amplified life. It’s a bigger life, a happier life, an expanded life, and a hell of a lot more interesting life. // E Gilbert

15 Mid-Week Mood Boosters

Posted on September 24, 2020 by Bhanu Misra Marya

Sharing a mid week list of mood boosters + some of my creative photography! I truly loved capturing the image of the flowers and the lines of shadowed light. I need to get better at prioritizing capturing creative photography everyday! Scroll down to see the image as well as a list of mood boosters. I hope that one or two works for you!

Read 5 pages or a chapter of a book
Put on a cute outfit and take some mirror selfies
Make a list or a do a brain dump
Write a letter to your future self about how proud you are of your accomplishments
Tidy up some space in your home
Setting up personal BHAGs and breaking them down into executable steps/milestones
Hug everyone in your family
Take a warm shower or a bath if you have enough time
Go for a walk or run (make sure a portion of it includes being in a forest)
Meditate
Use the pomodoro effect to focus on completing a piece of work
Make a vision board
Write down what you are grateful for
Drink an entire bottle of water
Do something creative

Quotes to start your Monday off right!

Posted on September 21, 2020 by Bhanu Misra Marya

A few quotes to set you up for your week!

Life is a series of baby steps // Hoda Kotb

Lead from the heart, not the head // Princess Diana

Everyday is not success, every year is not a success, you have to celebrate the good // Reese Witherspoon

No one is you, and that is your super power // unknown

To succeed in life, you need 3 things: a wishbone, a backbone and a funny bone // Reba Mcentire

5 Ingredient Vegan Cookie Dough Bars

Posted on August 17, 2020 by Bhanu Misra Marya

OMG! This FIVE clean ingredient INDULGENCE is so good and addictive. I’ve made this recipe several times, rounding measurements up and by half – each time it turned out equally good. I’d even think it would taste amazing with a sprinkle of flaked sea salt!

The texture is so incredibly like raw cookie dough but without the butter, eggs or white sugar. The coconut oil helps everything stick together perfectly. But the real star is the almond flour (I used the Kirkland brand blanched almond flour from Costco).

You could definitely make this for a potluck by swapping the 1/3 cups for 1 full cups, all other ingredients would be to taste.

Want more cookie recipes? Check out this vegan, gluten & guilt free cookie, granola that tastes like cookies, 3 ingredient breakfast cookie or this chickpea chocolate chip cookie (ha! don’t knock till you try it!)

Exploring Glen Stewart Ravine

Posted on August 11, 2020 by Bhanu Misra Marya

The last few months of the shelter in place with the people in your own household was challenging and rewarding experience. On one hand, we were with each other all the time without the help of our village and on the other hand we got to spend all this time together that I always felt we were missing out.

When some of the restrictions lifted it was nice to enjoy the warm weather which worked really well as some of the first areas to open for public use were golf courses, open space parks and trails.

We have some great friends and family who made plans / did the research to figure out where to go and what to see (Nokiidaa Trail, Moccasin Trail and Wahoosh Falls) and then finally got out of my energy rut and found Glen Stewart Ravine and knew we had to check it out.

Glen Stewart Ravine is a lush, deep forest albeit short trail walk in the middle of the city is pure magic. There are number of streams, downed logs for seating and lots of shade.

There are a few different entrances (Beech St, Glen Manor Dr and Kingston Rd), we came in from Kingston and there were a few 100 stairs to make it down. We managed to see the cute stream (pictured below) and then found a cute shaded area to eat lunch (pictured above).

The middle of the trail is the entrance from Beech and it literally looked like we were in Hawaii!

The trail is not stroller friendly so keep babies in a carrier and leave the bikes/scooters at home. The air is fresh and the way the sun pours in through the trees is amazing – you’ll just wish the trail was much longer :)