Which way does your compass point? How do you know when you’re on track? Do you have a simple system to navigate every aspect of your life?

I recently bought my daughter a famous culinary book for her birthday. In Samin Nosrat’s masterpiece Salt Fat Acid Heat she boils down what she calls ‘the cardinal directions of cooking’ into four essential elements.

Sitting in the springtime sunshine of the San Francisco East Bay has me thinking about applying the ‘cardinal directions’ framework to other areas of life.

Good health for instance. If one were to consider good hydration and proper nutrition to be sustenance; put all forms of fitness, stretching, and dance under movement; consider proper sleep and avoiding stress the same category; then what’s left? I vote for the sun, the source of life and intelligence on our planet.

So in the spirit of oversimplification, one could say that good health comes down to Sustenance, Movement, Sleep, and Sunshine.

You could extend the thought experiment and probably come up with similar simple principles for your social life, your professional career, or your family relations.

The whole point of Salt Fat Acid Heat is to release you from the regimen of using recipes in the kitchen. The idea is to free up your creativity by teaching you the underlying principles of each element and how they work together.

Diets, workout plans, communication scripts, rote memorization — these can all be useful, but if you’re only following directions at the surface level, you’re unlikely to get the promised results.

For his book Cooked, Samin Nosrat’s writing mentor Michael Pollan managed to boil down the essence of eating into seven words: “Eat food, not to much, mostly plants.” Sometimes it’s worth getting down to the real nitty gritty of things.

Next time you are relaxing under the sun‘s rays, getting a download of wisdom from the universe, ask yourself about the deeper principles guiding your life. It can help you set your compass.

Much love til next Monday!

M+

ML #617

Mark Metz
Director of the Dance First Association
Publisher of Conscious Dancer Magazine