Political Maturity: Accepting "The Others"

We are new to politics, still discovering it, still knowing its rules, boundaries, and etiquette. We have all been guilty at one point or the other of being

Life post the water fast retreat- Two months in the real world: Struggling

I am struggling. I've been back from the retreat for 2 months now, I feel lost, and I can't find my way back. I started all this even before I went on the retreat, with one goal only, and that is to
live a healthy lifestyle, forget the pressures of losing weight, because it will happen automatically with the lifestyle change, and just be happy, quite simply be a happier healthier version of myself. I came back from the retreat sure of who I am, knowing what I wanted to be, knowing the changes I needed to do... It was like a dream of utopia, I touched and felt utopia, I knew utopia personally, utopia was my best friend... Then I came back to reality. The first three weeks or so were perfect, I was sinless, I knew what I was doing and I did it well. I was on the right track, no one and nothing could tempt me. I was meeting a lot of people who were reading my blog, discussing everything with me, encouraging me, and at very cherishable moments they were inspired by me. I was happy, balanced, I had no doubt in my mind about anything. But then things changed, I got new input, and my output just got crazy, and as we all know: with every action there is a reaction… There was an action, I am reacting, and out of control. Though only very good things happened to me since then (2l7amdolela), but I got tipped over, I fell, lost my balance, and dropped my utopia somewhere, and no matter how hard I try I just can't get it back! I'm trying and trying, but I am sinking, I am struggling. I am losing focus of why I am doing all this, I am losing perspective, being pushed into a dark hole filled with all the wrong reasons on why, and at many times being brainwashed to change my perspective, to give in to old habits and obsessions. I decided that I need some stability in my life, some familiar friendly ground that I can rebalance myself on, to be able to get back on track; I decided to water fast for a day. I did it! Even though I had a long day, even a class to attend and concentrate in, but I still did it, I was so proud of myself, up untill 11:30 pm, when the day was just about to end... I, for no reason at all, broke my fast! I ate! Why?!!! Why!!!! Seriously, whyyy?!!! I couldn't understand why the hell I did that, I wasn't even hungry! I was extremely disappointed in myself.
Day after day I'm struggling more and more, losing myself, remembering those sweet utopian days where I had no doubts and no temptations, and unable to know why I am unable to go back there, it was so easy and so perfect, why is it now so hard and complicated? I feel like crying my heart out in sorrow and disappointment. I have no one and nothing to blame but my insecurities and emotional instability. It is a fact, I am admitting it: I, Nevine A. Abaza, am emotionally eating. I feel overwhelmed at times, I feel scared, vulnerable, and insecure. I'm terrified, to say the least! I have no one to blame but my inner self, which only makes it harder and harder. How can I get myself out? How can I stop drowning? How can I pull myself out of this deep dark F-ing stupid hole? Why am I so fragile? So easy to lose my balance? All this out of good things? Great things? Happy things? I haven't even yet faced bad things yet (2l7amdolela)! How will I face those?!! Life is not a panic room nor a safe haven, life is struggles, changes, burdens, and obstacles to overcome. I cannot fall just because my world changed. I cannot fall just because I did not see this coming. I can't fall because I got new input in my life. I cannot fall. I just cannot handle another fall. I cannot fall. I will not fall. Yes I am failing, but if I never fail then it only means that I'm not trying. I am trying, I will fail, and then I will fail, and maybe then I will fail some more, and just then, maybe and hopefully, I will succeed. So screw you failure, damn you insecurities, fuck you imbalances, I will F-ing succeed! I will not lose sight of my real goals, I will not have my wings cut just so I can be like everyone else. I am not everyone else, I am myself, and I will only be my crazy self. I need to refocus, I will refocus, and I will keep trying, till I do it the right way. I will balance myself, deal with the inputs as they come, and learn to just handle it! Find coping mechanisms so I don't fall every time the wind blows. I have to! I will! Maybe I fell down, but I will get up again, even if I fall 7000 more times, I will get up, brush the dust off, and keep going.
Bring it on life!

The Last Days Of The Retreat

The first days of refeeding were the hardest for me. While it seemed natural and easy for everyone to

How To Deal With People Who Dismiss Your Talent

You know you are gifted. Your soul elevates to a pure haven when you use your talent, be it music, dance, art, cooking, writing, sports, or whatever talent you possess. For those few moments you know who you are, you have no doubts about your identity, or where you belong. You just know that there is nothing in the world that can make you feel more in harmony and in peace. You are gifted, but people that surround you don’t encourage you, even if they do admit that you are talented, but they see it as nothing more than a hobby, something to do when you have nothing better to do; they just don’t get it.

Illusions and Realities of Pain

As I drove back home I couldn't help but over think some things that are causing me to feel terrified. I thought about all the bad things that could happen that would cause the current scenario to end in pain and suffering. As I drowned in panic, fear, and self pity, I finally reached my home. I was met by a very sad and seemingly careworn valet. I knew he had

Red Pepper Hummus dip

Ingredients:

Potato Leek Soup

Ingredients:

7 leeks

4 medium potatoes

A delicious meal- 4th day of re-feeding after 14 days of fasting

Today was a calm yet pleasant day. I woke up, tidied the mess I did to my room yesterday, then headed to the meeting room. I found my gorgeous purple breakfast waiting for me. I had no clue what was in it, but it was love at first sight. The color was amazing, the taste was pure perfection. It turned out to be slow juiced guava and red grapes! Who could've imagined this combination working together so harmoniously. For the first time since I started re-feeding I was not trying to finish the whole cup and feeling overly full, today I finished my cup feeling happily satiated. We had a lecture summing more things up and adding some new and very useful information that can help us survive on our own, out of

1st time to eat actual food! (3rd day of refeeding after 14 days of fasting)

Today was by far one of the most fun days of the retreat.

2nd day of re-feeding after 14 days of fasting

I couldn't sleep last night, i spent hours and hours in bed just trying to fall asleep but in vain. After about two hours I finally slept, only to wake up a few hours later, again unable to sleep. It was a torturous night, I felt sick and dizzy. After hours of unrest I finally managed to get back sleep, but woke up to find that I already missed breakfast and a lecture was in progress! If you have been reading my blog you would know that I don't miss those lectures no matter what, this was the very first time for me to miss a lecture since the day I arrived here. I was still dizzy, nauseous, and my heart was palpitating, I had no clue why, I didn't even have those side effects when I was fasting, so why now?!

1st day of re-feeding after 14 days of fasting.

I set my "smart alarm" to wake me up around 8, I know we are a huge group and they needed some volunteers to help make the food. My alarm

Fasting: Day 14

I woke up with a terrible metallic taste in my mouth. My first thought was that my stomach finally created an ulcer and it is bleeding, but that was not it,

Fasting: Day 13

I woke up cranky. My back and stomach were killing me, and I did not have a good night sleep. I couldn't stand myself and couldn't get myself out of my room. I decided to

Fasting: Day 12

Today was a simple day. I woke up late, not in the mood to rush in to catch yoga, I wanted to

Fasting: Day 11

I woke up today at 10 am, I kept trying to go back to sleep because I was really sleepy and exhausted but failed. So I got up and joined yoga instead. I was ok, but drained and edgy. I could barely focus during the lecture, and tried my best to focus with our guest speaker, but it was quite a challenge. I really needed

Fasting: Day 10

There was a very interesting side discussion today about eating animals and what was mentioned in religious books, the Bible and Quran mainly, and its is insane what we reached. According to a verse in the bible meat should

Fasting: Day 9

Today was a funny weird day. Everything that could go wrong went wrong. We had unexpected non-stop showering rains that flooded the hallways, the pool, the balconies, and even the rooms. Lights went off, air conditioners got ruined for good, they need to fix something centrally, and the network was either extinct or barely there.

Fasting: Day 8

I stayed up so late last night, finished what I was doing by 4 am, and by the time I went into bed and actually slept it must've been 4:30 am! I couldn't wake up, I was so exhausted. I know we should take it easy, limit our efforts, do the minimal, especially now that we started week 2, but I just couldn't help myself. I forgot to drink water, I ended up

Fasting: Day 7

I am proud to say that by the end of today we officially completed 7 days of fasting!

But thats not the only great news! Today I was "the star" of the group as they said :) I officially lost a total of

A Pleasant Surprise :) Day 6

We had an evening surprise today. One of the guys in our group turned out to be

Fasting: Day 6

Today is another fine day. My energy levels are up, and I am inspired to write. I am sitting in this view right now, just out of the water, writing my diary. What could be more inspiring than this? I would have to say that Aswan was way more inspiring as a place, but it was such a short retreat filled with a million things to do that I never had the time to even consider sitting down and writing a daily diary.

Waiting for my medical examination one person was asking me questions and comments that included somehow a statement that I probably ate too much because of my current extra weight. Every time I am faced with that comment I want to scream out this is not who I am, you don't know me, and feel like grabbing my phone and getting out an old picture of me to show them who I am, what I looked like before I gained this drastically excessive weight.

Fasting: Day 5

Today was my first re-energized day. I was able to generally do more throughout the day, and even wrote my first Facebook status about the retreat. Even though somehow we are mostly taking it easy, doing the minimal effort, I still found no time to do anything during my previous days, mostly

Fasting: Day 4

Today started with a bad mood. I was just so exhausted, pissed off, and just so simply feeling like crap,
not physically but rather psychologically. I hadn't slept well and the pillows seemed to be made of stone even though I didn't have issues with them any night before. I was miserable and considered staying in my room and avoiding everyone, I was feeling angry, sad, depressed, sluggish, and out of place. I started doubting if I fit in this group of not and feeling like a total outsider, I was just not in a good place.

Fasting: Day 2 & 3

I was tired, sleepy, and still unsettled. I wasn't in a bad state, but not a good one either. I am always smiling and peppy so I doubt anyone felt that. I was just trying to stick to whatever the schedule was, trying to escape to my room ever-so-often, ignoring my phone to the maximum, and whenever possible cuddling up in my bed with no sound, or with the TV. We were taking some kind of a salt, in

Day 1 - Starting the fast

The plan is that we fast for 14 days on nothing but water, followed by one week of a re-feeding phase where we will gradually start eating while learning healthy ways, recipes, and tips. We are allowed 3 cups of herbal teas with a few drops of honey (no more than 3 teaspoons) three times a day only, advised to pace them into a breakfast, lunch, dinner drinks kind of.

The first day of the fast was both exciting and terrifying, not knowing what to expect, how will my body react, how much will I suffer, or how hungry will I be. I know I have great tolerance to not eating, after all I was anorexic for 6-12 months before where I literally would barely take a bite or

Day 0 - Arriving at the retreat

I didn't sleep for a minute. I spent the whole night packing my bag and trying to get ready to be able to catch my flight. I had no clue what to pack, I ended up with one large bag and a smaller one, if you saw those bags you might start thinking that I am leaving the country for good! I even ended up paying

Pre-retreat: Why would anyone in their right mind fast for 14 days and only consume water? this a brief about me and why I am doing this.

I always had a lot of issues with food, I will discuss everything in details in another post. But the fact is that I was was bulimic since I was 14, up until I turned 21, except for one single year where I was actually anorexic. My weight fluctuated all the time, so one day you would see me somewhat healthy looking (I was never skinny though, just normal), and later you would see me and find me

Chocolatey Chocolate Happy Ice-Cream!

Who's been waiting for this recipe?!!

Heaven sent chocolate goodness with no guilt whatsoever!

Calories per scoop are as low as 95 calories of healthy chocolatey goodness!

Thats more than half the calories of a regular chocolate scoop of icecream, with non of its guilt or preservatives!

Ingredients are as simple as:

El Gouna: The Green Star Of Egypt

By: Nevine A. Abaza
Published in Identity Magazine. July 2011.

When I first heard about how “eco-friendly” and “green” El Gouna is, my honest first thought to myself was “what a typical cliché, its just another marketing scam”! But my thought was instantly corrected and changed during my interview with Sherife Abdel Messih, the Environmental Advisor of the Chairman of ‘Orascom Hotels and Development’ on renewable energy projects, and the founder and CEO of ‘Future Energy Corporation’, the leading company serving renewable energy industry in the Middle east and North Africa. El Gouna quite simply is an environmentally friendly, zero waste, energy saving, green, beachside resort, with no compromise on comfort or style.

Surviving A Terrible Relationship

By: Nevine A. Abaza
Published in Identity Magazine. February 2014

Relationships come in all shapes and sizes. No matter what the relationship is like there will be moments of bliss, pure happiness, and strong love, as well as moments of disenchantment, lack of passion, and disagreement; that doesn’t make the relationship bad, it makes it normal. A bad relationship is more intense, it takes the worst of all relationships, the struggle, frustration, disagreement, and makes all the very depressing and hurtful parts of relationships extended and more extreme, keeping the pain ongoing, continuously pulling you in and down, sucking the life out of you. In a bad relationship you can find yourself running out of work during working hours because you just had a fight so intense with your partner that you start breaking down at the office, and suddenly find yourself driving on the highway with a panic attack that almost kills you because you almost got sandwiched between two huge trucks during your unexpected first time panic attack. But this doesn’t stop here, its only a dot that leads you to a pool of dots, every dot an extreme incident just as disturbing, or even more so. A bad relationship will convince you that this is normal, that this is just because your love is stronger and so the pain is stronger, but thats not true. Strong love would never abuse you, hurt you, cheat on you, manipulate you, or physically terrify you. In order to move on from this nightmare relationship you have to start realizing that it is not the circumstances that caused this situation, you have to start seeing the pattern, and start understanding that this is in no way good for you, or for anyone.

Make Your Own Almond Butter - Home Made Recipe (Healthy Food, Healthy Eating, Healthy Snack)

You see people talking about making their own almond butter and you think "Whoa! I can never do that!" Fact is that making your own home made almond butter is way easier than you think.

Ingredients:
Almonds, 4 Cups

Here's how to make this super yummy and healthy almond butter…

How To Be Super Cheesy On Valentine's Day

The best thing about being in a relationship is that you get to be all tacky and yet super cute. On a day that is haunted by tackiness and cheesiness like Valentine’s day, it is very easy to turn into a stinky cheesy person who makes people in need of urgent ventilation. Planning on making people sick? Here are some tips on how to do just that!

How To Deal With The Loss Of A Parent

Written by: Nevine A. Abaza

No matter how close or far you were, how good or bad your relationship was, how old or young you are, losing a parent is never easy. Every last conversation you had keeps playing in your head, you have no clue how you will survive another second without them, how will life go on, and how will you ever be able to breath again. It hurts, like being continuously stabbed by a million knives at the very same time, trying to escape the pain but you simply can’t.

Do You Peel Vegetables? Don't throw them out! Here's what you can do with your vegetable peels...

I've been working on changing my bad habits, including of course bad eating habits. I am trying to mostly consume vegetables. With this new good habit of mine, as you can imagine, I end up with endless vegetable peels that go to waste everyday. Every time I throw those vegetable peels in the bin I feel guilty, which got me thinking of what can be done with all those vegetable peels.

Here are some ideas on what to do with your vegetable peels:

What is Creamy, gooey, and better than Ice-cream?! Try this HAPPY icecream! Guilt-free!

HAPPY Icecream!

Whats creamy, gooey, and better than icecream? A creamy, gooey, guilt-free, healthy, low sugar, low calorie, and natural icecream! How to make it? Betting you will find this easier than learning ABCs!

Ingredients:

• 1 Banana (1 banana =  1 scoop of icecream)

Recipe:

Berry Banana Citrus Smoothie

Serving Size:
1 BIG serving!
or 2 1/2 normal servings.

Ingredients:

How To Change Your Life… To The Better Of course!

By: Nevine A. Abaza

Published in Identity Magazine

Asses Yourself

Sit down with yourself. Jot down what you think are your pros and cons, dreams, life goals, write down everything, don’t limit yourself or holdback. Start setting a plan and figure out the changes you need to do.

“Everybody is a genius. But if you Judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” Albert Einstein

Motivate Yourself

Constantly remind yourself of your dreams and goals. Stay strong and don’t wait for anyone else to motivate you or to believe in you. Push yourself forward, break your old habits, and move on to being who you want to be.

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence therefore, is not an act, but a habit.” Aristotle

Hey Women! Do you find yourself blocking a guy you have a crush on? Here's how to get over your fears...

HEY WOMEN

YES, NOW I'M TALKING TO YOU!

Published: Identity magazine

You meet a guy and you think he’s cute. You day dream about him, talk to your friends about how attractive and smart he is. Your dreams come true and he finally starts doing those steps that show he is into you, and what do you do? You find yourself backing off, treating him differently, getting out of your way to avoid him, do your best to talk to other guys when he’s around, and when you find him talking to another girl you decide he’s not into you, and you will let her have him.

Wait a second, what happened there?! No wonder guys think we’re insane! Let me tell you exactly what happened...

Hey Men! Do you have a crush that doesn't know you exist?! Here's how to make her notice you...

HEY MEN

YES, I'M TALKING TO YOU!

Published in Identity magazine.

You meet a girl, and think she’s the one. You can’t stop thinking about her, yet she seems to have no clue, and you don’t know what to do to catch her attention. One thing for sure is that she is no psychic, and even if she is, it’s quite impossible to know that a guy likes you just cause he says, “Hi, how are you?” Do you have any idea how many people say that? We can’t walk the earth believing that every guy that ever says hi and asks how we are has a crush on us, secretly we are his one and only love, and the girl of his dreams.

If you love a girl you have to let her know.