Sunni Dawson

After uploading my Dahl video on Youtube last week, I’ve had a few requests for the written version of the receipe. This is a delicious Sri Lankan inspired Dahl, I hope you enjoy it! If you missed the video, here it is again:

Written instructions (to feed about 10 or so, or plenty to freeze!):

Soak a few cups of red lentils in water and salt for at least 4 hours (locals usually do it for 30 mins) and wash thoroughly.

Tip lentils into large pot with water 1cm above the lentils. Add 1 teaspoon of turmeric and also chilli powder (chilli powder to your taste – I also added 2 teaspoons of chilli flakes as well). Roughly chop 3 or 4 cloves of garlic. Bring to boil and let the water reduce.

Optional extra: I add in a couple of cups of chopped pumpkin/squash to the lentils when they are boiling above. Creates a really beautiful taste!

Whilst that is cooking, finely chop one onion and cook in a little coconut oil. After onions become translucent, add 2 teaspoons of mustard seeds and at least 10 curry leaves (if you don’t have curry leaves – totally okay, you could also substitute for coriander/cilantro leaves). Fry for 2 minutes. Add 1 or 2 freshly chopped tomatoes and fry for another 2 minutes. Turn off heat and set aside.

When water has reduced, add in a couple of teaspoons of salt (to taste) and a cup of coconut milk. Let this boil and reduce for 5 -10 minutes.

Stir in the onion / tomato mixture to the boiled coconut lentil mixture. This is then ready to eat! Yah!

Suggestions for serving: with rice, by itself, with chopped spinach, bread or any other random groovy idea you may come up with!

I’m going to be posting more cooking videos in the coming weeks, so look out for them!

Millions of people are currently being compelled to #socialdistance and #selfisolate in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Many of us may not have not have experienced substantial time in isolation before. It can be scary, especially when you don’t know when it may end and what the health, financial and social consequences may be for your life and your loved ones.

Over the past decade I have spent weeks and months completely isolated in order to write, develop coaching materials and work on myself. Although my isolation has been intentional and planned, I have developed a number of practical daily strategies to deal with uncertainty and loneliness. Here are my five top tips for remaining positive and forward moving (and keeping most of my sanity in tact).

Strategy 1: Exercise before breakfast

If I can’t go outside (due to weather, no access to a gym or walking paths) I exercise inside. I do this before breakfast, because after breakfast I just want to lounge around in the glorious after glow of food intake.

Even though I know a lot of exercise routines, I nearly always follow a YouTube video because then I can switch my mind off and follow the instructor. I have a number of pilates and yoga videos I rotate through on a weekly basis. Sometimes I just want the tried and familiar, sometimes I feel like switching things up.

I will also have a sunset session of exercise which may just be a gentle stretching or a stress release yoga sequence. If I can, I will go for a long walk. Being in nature is incredibly grounding.

A regular routine helps, because I simply follow it. The post exercise feels always makes me want to do it again the next day. My body and mind feel somewhat empowered and ready to rock (in whatever way I choose) from the exercise.

Strategy 2: Make nourishing food

Nourishing food is essential. If you can get access to fresh vegetables and fruits, these will boost your immune system at the same time. I love cooking, but even if you don’t, learning a few quick recipes (there is a wealth of healthy blogs, YouTube vids and Pinterest posts for quick tasty meals). Make more than you need and freeze some. If you can, swap some with a neighbour or even better donate a few meals to the elderly folk down the road (if you have good relationship and it’s safe and healthy to do so).

If you are able to freeze and swap food, it will add variety to your diet and also help you connect to your local community.

Adding and preparing healthy food into your day is a very loving thing to do for yourself. It certainly makes me feel good.

Strategy 3: Have a project (or three!)

As a writer and an online coach I am always working on a few projects simultaneously. This helps me keep motivated. I have goals that I am continuously working towards and this also gives me variety. The goals in themselves are motivating for me, but also reporting in on social media and to my friends on my progress helps keep me going.

Now is the time to think about something you’d like to learn more about. Do you have a hobby you’d like to dive into more? Want to learn a foreign language? As long as there is internet there is a wealth of opportunities to do online courses (many are free) on almost any topic of interest.

Is there a side hustle that you’ve always wanted to start? Now is the time to learn more about it, study what you need to do to develop a business and learn from people in the industry by checking out their website and other materials. 

Strategy 4: Connect!

I have spent days at a time watching the latest Netflix series. I find when I have done this over a period of days I get into a slump. Making progress on something that is important to me makes me feel better and more motivated. So spend time watching movies or series then stop. Start on strategy 3 above and also connect.

Social media was designed to help people positively connect with friends all over the world. Get in touch with a friend you haven’t spoken to in a while. Call a loved one. Video messaging apps outbound these days and most are free.

Think about people that need support. Share love with service industry workers. These are people who risk their lives everyday but we don’t remember to acknowledge: nurses, doctors, rubbish collectors, truck drivers and all the wonderful service industry folks. Without them everything would stop. Send them love today!

Ask yourself the following question: if this were your last week on earth, (and I trust it won’t be), what would you like to be remembered for? What message would you like to leave for those that are important to you?

And finally think about how you can help. Check facts before sharing information (misinformation can led to more fear, distrust and even panic). Is there a neighbour you can check on? What messages would be helpful to share with your loved ones and community? How can you support others who may be out of work because they are casual, are sick, or artists who have had their gigs cancelled?

Strategy 5: Breathe outside

Nature is powerful. If you can get outside on a balcony or a backyard, fantastic. If you can go for a walk, even better. If none of these are available to you, open a window for a while. See if you can get some sun rays or cloud rays!

Breathe in as deeply as you can and exhale slowly. Repeat a few times or seven. 

Observe the life going on around you. Listen. 

This will help calm and refresh you.

Bonus strategy: feel all the feelings

Emotions are big right now. Fear, anxiety and panic have taken over many of us. What I know is that you need to feel the feelings. Feelings need to be given their time in order to transform. Pushing them down means that they will be condensed over time, and potentially explode later in ways that are not helpful for ourselves or others.

Feel the fear and anxiety for as long as you can, then take a break. Journal about what comes up or talk to someone about it. 

Another thing we know is that if you are feeling this way, so are many others. Connection is a key tool in transformation and healing.

I hope this is helpful to you! Let me know your strategies for dealing with isolation.

‘Where are you from’ she asked as I entered the communal kitchen.

‘Ooohhh, that’s such an interesting question, there could be so many answers to that. I live in the world. I’ve been living in different locations for the last 7 years.’

‘Well, where were you born?’

I hesitated, ’Australia, but I don’t live there. And it certainly doesn’t tell much about me.’ I smiled, ‘What’s your name?’

I decided to make it easy on her (and myself) by telling her where I was born. Then I proceeded to ask what I think should be perhaps a preferred first question to someone you first meet.

It is an interesting process meeting anyone for the first time. According to many psychological studies we make judgements about people within a 10th of a second of meeting people, facial features, trustworthiness, aggressiveness, likability, competence are all assessed. 

A glance, a look, perhaps a word or many more. We are instinctually judgmental creatures, sizing each other up, a threat, a friend, a foe, someone to use, someone to connect with, someone to run away from. All in a few seconds. A blink in time. And then we fill the next few minutes usually with a few short questions and answers which tells us all we need to know:

‘Where are you from?’

‘What do you do for a living?’

‘What’s your name?’

And that’s it. Perhaps, if people are open, have more time, are interested, a conversation about other subjects like, how long have you lived here, or how long are you staying may follow.  

So I’m forever Sunni from Australia, and perhaps a writer or lawyer or vagabond or whatever label the other wants to bestow upon me. 

But where I’m from and what I do or have done does not define me. It doesn’t define you either. It’s a box that we put each other in to make ourselves feel comfortable. I know where to place you in my mind so that my perceptions, biases, world views stay stagnant.

In some cultures the question of where are you from is more important than what you do for a living. Where you’re born and who your family is defines you more than what you do. For me, these questions have similar energy of placing people in particular boxes that we mostly subconsciously relate to that person in the future from our ideas of what a lawyer should be or act like, or how a person from a particular region in the United States or a person from Cambodia behaves.

You and I both know that all people from the United States are not like Donald Trump or look like Julia Roberts or always act like Kanye West having a night on the town. Yet we carry some bias, and again it’s usually unconscious, about how Americans or Australians or Iranians or Argentians or Texans behave and that’s how we then proceed to relate to them.

‘Oh you’re from Australia, it must mean you like vegemite, like drinking, wearing flipflops, you must be an expert surfer and love danger. And of course you’re fun to be with.’

Just to let you know, some Australians are boring. And some aren’t laid back. Some are as uptight as a five year old getting ready to have her first molar pulled at the dentist. Some are terrible at outdoor sports (like yours truly). 

Every country I’ve travelled to has bias and racism. It’s human to judge and put people in boxes, but I believe we need to start to be more aware of our bias, in order to help us to relate to others better. To have more fulfilling interactions. Life’s too short to keep someone as ‘Dan from London.’

I would much prefer to know that Dan is exploring his love of building environmentally sustainable guitars whilst bringing up two children and supporting his ex-wife to follow her passion for human rights.

Sometimes this bias is overt. Recently I heard Nicaraguans are aggressive drinkers and Costa Ricans are two faced, ‘Everyone knows this’ one foreigner told me. This may be based in some reality for some people, or it may not. Even if any of these could be characteristics of some people in the country, it doesn’t mean all people within the countries are the same. You and I both know this logically, but often we continue to relate to people in particular ways because of these racist remarks.

‘I don’t know what is in the heart of a berber’ was told to me by a Moroccan man from Arabic background. Arabic peoples conquered the region1200 years ago. I still find it difficult to understand that such bias / distinction between peoples still remains, despite religious and cultural practices being predominantly adopted by the Berber peoples.

I have found similar biases in countries across Asia, Europe, Australia, North, South and Central America. Biases 100s or 1000s of years old. It could be a feud over land 100s of years in the past from one family and the resentment, cautiousness, wariness, suspicion is carried through. For 100s of years. For many they don’t know why they need to hate the person across the paddock from them. Yet they do. Because that’s how it’s always been done.

And it all comes from ‘where are you from?’. Which box can I put you in?

Of course there is a lot of pride for some people to say where they are from. Including deep cultural pride and identity. And that’s wonderful. There is magic in learning about culture, practices and religion, and it’s a big part of the reason I live the life I do. I’m not proposing we step away from understanding others’ culture, practices and identity, but to go deeper with people we meet, from the beginning.

I am proposing we test out some different first questions when we meet someone new. Here are some to try, and please let me know if you have any of your own:

1. What are your hobbies?
2. What’s your favourite thing to do outside of work?
3. What’s your favourite sport / food / cuisine?
4. How long have you been living / staying here? Are you enjoying life here?
5. What’s your favourite animal?
6. What’s been your best day in this past week and why?

And for the more bold:

1. How are your happiness levels at the moment?
2. What brings you the most joy?
3. What’s your favorite childhood memory?
4. If you had superhero powers what would they be?
5. What are some little things that bring you joy in your day to day life?
6. If you could do 3 things to change the world, what would it be?

Try some of these out… see if it changes the dynamics or relationship to people from the beginning. And I’d love to hear how it goes for you.

If you want to dive deeper into your relationship dynamics with friends and acquaintances I’m an intuitive coach. I’d love to help you understand your deeper emotional blocks to connection with others, and release them for more freedom in all areas of your life.

One of the questions I’ve been introducing into my conversations recently is ‘What are you most proud of?’. I love this question as it gets people to look positively into their past and tell you some gems about themselves. It’s a great way not only to encourage reflection, but also to get to know the people around you deeper (especially if they go deep with the question, more below).

It’s the time of year for big reflection for me. It usually happens from December, New Year, then Chinese New Year (I love the fact that different countries around the world celebrate New Years at different times, and again in April I get to celebrate with my Thai, Cambodian and Nepali friends’ New Years, it’s a chance to either start the year afresh again, or just celebrate the diversity and beautiful cultural practices of the human race), and of course my birthday, being at the start of the year it’s helpful to me to create ongoing reflection (and potential modification) as the year sets off.

The question ‘What are you most proud of?’ I immediately reflect on my career achievements, the work I did as a lawyer, the awards, the government work, the massive amounts of volunteer work I have done and continue to do. But once I skip over this external stuff, I go deeper. I have realised that some of the core values and ways I interact with the world, is far more profound for me. It may be for you too.

Here are the 4 things I am most proud of. It may be a starting point for your reflections and questions for those around you. Try this question out on your family members, friends and even work colleagues. It’s a great way to get to know those around you, better. And even if you think you know what they might say, they may surprise you, or you can take them deeper by asking (if they focus on external achievements and you’d like to go deeper) what ongoing values they’ve demonstrated in their lives that they are most proud of.

Contributing to planetary peace

Without question on the the things I’m most proud of is 21 years of minimising violence in my life and this marvellous planet we call home. And on a daily basis, working towards peace. This is 21 years of being a strict vegetarian and the last 5 years of being mostly vegan. I am super proud of this.

Commitment to reflection and healing

The next proudest thing for me is my individual commitment to reflect, process and heal. It’s no secret I come from a challenging background (which many of us do) and my personal commitment to taking responsibility for my emotions, my actions and life I really admire in myself. 

Commitment to kind

I am super proud of my commitment to kind. Kindness and compassion are the cornerstones in which I act in the world. When so many people are so hard on themselves and those around them, I use and practice kind as much as I can.

Commitment to making the world a better, more compassionate place

In all the various work and volunteer work I have done since I was a teenager, and throughout my working career in Australia and now across the world I love contributing in a multitude of ways to the people and communities I interact with. I know on a daily basis I’m creating change. And that is more than amazing for me.

And I would love to hear yours!