Have you ever wandered into the darkened area of a New Age store, hunting for that secret place where a woman is waiting for you, a crystal ball in hand, promising to tell you of your future? At some point or other, all of us have reached out to others for guidance and there is nothing wrong with seeking help. What is wrong in my mind is when the guidance from others becomes a program, albeit one that is hard to understand and decipher. Whereas in the past it was fashionable to consult a fortune teller and gaze into her crystal ball, I would like to write about the reasons why not consulting a fortune teller will serve your future better.

Please remember that what many fortune tellers see or feel is filtered by their own perceptions, fears, and feelings. In my eyes, a pure channel (someone who is connected directly to the Source) is not authorized to tell your future; rather, they help you make better decisions based on your present moment. Be wary of those who tell you God is speaking through them, for often it could be something less pretty!

Another reason why consulting fortune tellers might not truly serve you is that whatever they tell you might stay in your mind a very long time, and could actually hinder rather than help you. Once I consulted a woman who told me my brother was going to have an accident at a certain age, and my whole family became terrified, even my skeptical brother. As time went on, we realized that our fears might actually be creating this event instead of avoiding it. You might recall that energy flows in the direction that our thoughts do, so focusing on a dark future will certainly create that future. In the end, we learned to erase from our minds the words of this woman, and my brother still stands today, thank God.

Lastly, fortune tellers, for the most part, do not really see the future. Sorry to bust your bubbles folks! What they do see is what you already know, what you already carry within you as a future plan or goal. If you have consulted a fortune teller, oftentimes you find yourself saying, “Amazing! She saw all my talents and dreams!” and this is true. What they do is take what is inside of you and shape it into what they believe might be the future for you. So in reality, you could consult your best friend and get a better reading of your future, in my opinion.

I recommend, if you want to look at your future, take that crystal ball into your own hands.  Say out loud what you would like your future to look like, instead of trying to “see” into your future. Create your future, words have a lot of power! You might be surprised how much your future will be prosperous, beautiful, and filled with love. Instead of letting others guide you to certain goals or dreams,  guide yourself and with enough self-confidence and self-love, you can manifest anything your heart desires!

Buddhism often compares the perfect mind state to a desert. The term sunyata, or the emptiness of emptiness, is a state in which no thoughts exist, no time exists, and the mind is empty completely in order to receive what the universe has to offer. The Chinese believe that before you can be complete within yourself, you must first empty your cup in order to be filled with true wisdom.

Being in the desert forces us to accept silence and vastness. We find ourselves suddenly flashing back to our past, to the mistakes we have made, to the things we regret doing, to the things we wanted to do. The desert is a powerful mirror of what we don’t usually allow ourselves to see and come in contact with. For me, the desert is a very masculine force, a force of great strength and power and discipline. This force can push us to action if we allow it to.

I have always been an ocean person, but being in the desert forced me to re-think about sunyata and about how it is necessary to achieve a proper balance between the yin-yan force within us before achieving true enlightenment. The ocean is often referred to as Mother Ocean, because the ocean is enveloping, soothing and calming. The desert for me resonates with the masculine force because after being in its power for some time, you are subtly pushed to action. Out of your reflections in the desert comes a need for action, a need to burst through layers that you never before wanted to burst through.

The Joshua Tree, found in the Mojave desert, is a powerful symbol of this masculine force. It stands erect and proud, stretching its branches up to the heavens. When the Mormons first crossed the Mojave desert in the mid-nineteenth century, and saw the famous yucca brevifolia, they thought that the tree reminded them of a biblical story in which Joshua stretches out his hands to pray to the heavens. Living for up to one thousand years old, the Joshua Tree has a power that shakes us to the very core.

For those lucky enough to visit with the desert, keep in mind that it is the perfect time to empty your minds in order to receive new wisdom. One of my spiritual teachers speaks of the desert as the perfect place to consciously root ourselves in our bodies. In the desert, she explained, the soul returns with great force into our bodies to allow us to put to action our thoughts that have been simmering for so long.

I have not always been into cooking. Actually, for many years I was quite lazy in the kitchen; I would come home from my long days at the university, look at what I had for frozen food in the freezer, and then pop it into the oven without a second thought. Most of us do this, although we like to pretend we don’t. We’re tired and we just don’t have the energy or the time to cook something.

With the years, I started to realize that what I put into my body can totally transform the way I feel afterwards. For instance, I noticed that eating frozen pizza gave me a heavy feeling afterwards whereas if I had made myself a salad, I would feel much lighter. After reading in several spiritual books that eating was key to maintaining a high energy level in our daily lives, I began to change my eating habits, and what a difference that has made in my interaction with my environment.

My friends know me as the “living food” practitioner. “Living food”, as I call it, is basically fresh food off the shelf that has all its nutrients and has not been frozen. Cooking living food has several benefits, the first one being that it is a form of self-love. When you cook for yourself, you are directly loving yourself and your body. You are saying to your body, “I care for you and will spend time to make you healthy and strong.” The second benefit of eating food that you cook yourself is that you actually have more vitamins and minerals than in frozen food, thus giving your body more what it needs. Frozen pizza might taste good but in the long run, it is pretty much what I call “fluff”: empty food without real nutrients or love.

But the best part of living food is that it feeds your mind, body and spirit, all in one bite. All that love you put into your food is felt at different levels because love is not just something digested physically. Masaru Emoto, author of “The Hidden Messages in Water”, explains that our thoughts are directly absorbed into water particles that we come into contact with. For instance, if we think of love when we hold a glass of water, this intention will embed itself into the water particles and the water becomes a source of love.

Living food is all about self-love and higher energy. Once you start cooking with love, and seeing the difference in your daily life, you won’t ever want to return to the pre-packaged way of life. And what’s fun after your cooking is you get to meditate while you do the dishes, what I call “moving meditation”. Whatever you choose to cook, it will certainly fill you with greater energy and in no time you will realize that your body, mind and spirit are all thanking you.