One of my regrets in life is that I did not peel myself away from the t.v. set as a young person long enough to learn to cook with my Hungarian grandmother, my Nagyi. I went cold turkey on t.v. after she died in 1996 when I was 16, but it was sadly too late.
(photo caption: My Nagyi on her balcony in Budapest, doing Kézimunka- embroidery. The literal translation is “hand work.”)
I didn’t begin to truly enjoy cooking until I was 22, in grad school, and had just joined a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) farm and began receiving weekly boxes of local, organic produce. Since I had no idea what Kale was, I needed to turn to recipes to learn what to do with it, and the other unfamiliar things.
But then, at 30, I had my first son. I had no idea what to do with him either! All the recipe books for raising a child that I’d already read didn’t help much in that first moment of holding a newborn in my arms…
Any joy I might have had in cooking fell away as I went into survival mode for the next several years. As kids grew and became picky, or bored with my limited repertoire. As meals were eaten in front of a t.v. set that I didn’t even want in our home. With the lack of any words of gratitude from my now ex- to him cooking was something that just needed to be done and didn’t require any thanks. By the time of the divorce decision in October of 2021, I felt pretty done with cooking, but of course I still had to cook…
So my commitment to myself when my ex moved out was to begin enjoying cooking again. To try new recipes. To get my sons to sit down at the table with me to eat together.
It felt very validating when I read this in my Gene Keys free profile a few days ago: “It is important that you learn to prepare and cook food, both for yourself and others. This will turn out to be one of the great joys in your life, as it is a symbol of what you are all about — providing sustenance and support to those you love. Your whole being yearns to compassionately nurture other people.”
I’ve started taking selfies of us at the dining table. You can see more of those photos here:
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Do you love to cook? Do you hate it? What is your relationship with food like? Is there room for healing, growth, and transformation there?
Blessings and Courage,
Betti