Creative Rest with Bex Shindler.
Get messy with paints, cover the kitchen with ingredients, dance freely. We explore creativity as an act of mindfulness and talk all things food with Bex Shindler of The Mindful Kitchen.
You’re invited to play today. Get creative. Be childlike.
Creativity is often seen as an attribute, something you’ve got or you’ve not. And if you’re not good at it then creativity can feel like an indulgence - dare I say, even a waste of time. (It’s another example of the insiduous productivity culture I talked about here.)
But creativity is play.
Little toddlers dance and sing and paint and create and build. There’s no end result to measure themselves against, no need to prove if they’re ‘creative’ or not. It’s pure and simple expression.
The theme today is creative rest. This form of rest is either experiencing or creating beauty. It “reawakens the awe and wonder inside each of us”, says writer Saundra Dalton Smith.
Last summer I experienced the beauty of mindful food on a yoga retreat. For 5-days, myself and the other yogis were treated to the most delicious meals lovingly created by Bex Shindler of The Mindful Kitchen. We’d head out for our practice at 7.30am to Bex busy in the kitchen (often with Cleo Sol playing in the background) and came back three hours later to food heaven.
As we all sat to eat together, Bex included, the conversation revolved around the food we were eating - it looked, smelled and tasted beautiful. We were all fully present to what we were eating - meditation by mouth!
For this reason, Bex was the natural person to invite to talk about mindful food as an act of creative rest. You can find my interview with her below. (I warn you the pictures will make your mouth water!)
Hello again Bex. Please introduce yourself to the Restival-goers.
I’m Bex Shindler, a plant-based chef, cooking coach, and founder of The Mindful Kitchen, offering catering, recipes and experiences to support wellbeing.
I make plant-based, earth-friendly, high vibe food. I feel that food should be an experience - always vibrant, truly nourishing, earth friendly and bursting with energy.
I’ve spent the last 8 years playing around in my kitchen, experimenting with colourful plant-based recipes that sustain, excite and nourish! I studied Healing Diets Nutrition with the School of Natural Medicine and have now catered for over 60 yoga and wellbeing retreats across the UK and Europe, as well as for celebrities including will.i.am and the Black Eyed Peas.
What does rest mean to you?
My relationship with rest has changed a lot over my lifetime. I think there is a very strong message coming through in our society that we are only productive or worthy when we are busy, and this belief was engrained in me in my earlier life. It created a lot of overwhelm that accumulated over time and led to anxiety, insomnia and burnout. Over time, I’ve really had to learn to listen to the cues in my body and be more mindful about my energy.
Rest to me now looks different depending on what I need to bring balance at any given moment. For example, if I’ve been sat on my laptop doing a lot of brain work, I may choose to rest by doing more practical and meditative activities like cooking, walking or exercising to bring me back into the present and into my body. If I’ve been really active on my feet in the kitchen, I may choose something more restorative such as reading a cookbook or having a bath.
For me, rest is about ‘being’ without expectation, as well as bringing gentleness and intention to whatever we are ‘doing’.
Tell us a bit about mindful cooking and getting creative with food.
Food offers us endless opportunity to get creative in the kitchen. I experience the kitchen as a playground – a place to try new recipes, experiment with different food combinations, flavours and textures, and discover new meals. One of the most nourishing things about cooking a meal from scratch is that it brings you immediately into the present. It is a sensory experience that asks us to be fully aware – from selecting colourful vegetables at the store, to the simple task of chopping and the delicious aromas that fill the kitchen during the cooking process.
Mindful cooking is an opportunity to anchor the mind and focus attention on the senses during these culinary tasks.
What are the benefits of cooking as an act of mindfulness?
Food is one of the most fundamental of needs for our survival and the process of cooking with awareness can have an incredible impact on our mind, body and soul. It can really encourage and satisfy our creativity and, with more mindful awareness around our food, we tend to make healthier choices.
Cooking with intention encourages us to eat our prepared meal more mindfully, ensuring we are in a more restful state when we come to eat it, which helps us to digest our food well and make its nutrients more available.
I have found that when I am cooking regularly it enhances my ability to be more present and aware in other areas of my life. I think this is so important in a world that demands so much of our attention.
How did you discover this?
Food has always been a big part of my life, but it hasn’t always been a healthy relationship. In my early 20s I battled with disordered eating, seeing food as something ‘bad’ and eating as something to feel guilty about.
In 2013 I started running, and my mind-set around food began to change. I started to see food as fuel, as something that could nourish me and help me to feel good. It was not long after that I decided to adopt a plant-based diet, and this was a huge turning point in my life.
I taught myself to cook nourishing food from scratch and absolutely fell in love with this process, and the creativity of finding alternatives to dairy, eggs and meat products.
I would look forward to getting home from work to get creative in the kitchen – the process of cooking offered me rest from my busy office life and became my joy and meditation. This was the launch pad for my plant-based catering business, The Mindful Kitchen.
I am really passionate about helping others to find their joy in the kitchen.
What value does this bring you personally?
The compassionate awareness that comes from adopting a plant-based diet and cooking mindfully has added so much value to my life.
For me, cooking a meal from scratch is an act of self-care – it tells me that I am worthy of nutritious food and the time it takes to prepare it.
What is possible when women take time to rest?
What I am learning is that there is productivity in rest because from rest comes more creativity, more self-compassion, and actually more focused and joyful activity.
Tell us about a time when you felt ‘at rest’.
I felt truly at rest when I was as a guest on a yoga retreat last month. The incredible thing about being on retreat is that it asks nothing of you, offering you total permission to rest. There is no ‘thinking’ to be done as the schedule, the accommodation and the food has all been taken care of – all you have to do is show up!
This felt like a huge relief for me, to just ‘be’ and any ‘doing’ such as the yoga practices felt restful because I was fully present and my mind wasn’t wandering to other tasks that needed to be done.
I am passionate about creating opportunities for others to rest, that’s why I have recently launched The Gather Experience – a culinary and wellness retreat with a programme of mindful activities in the peaceful hills of Todmorden, taking place this September.
PRACTICE: You can mindfully cook-along with Bex and make a delicious, summery Strawberry, Coconut & Quinoa Crumble HERE
Bex Shindler is a plant-based chef, cooking coach, and founder of The Mindful Kitchen. You can check out her website HERE, find out more about her retreats here and follow her foodie adventures on Instagram: @_themindfulkitchen_
What is ‘play’ for you? Or what allows you to get creative? Let yourself be childlike and creative today - we’d love to see your pictures of your yunny crumbles or creative play on Instagram too. Use @_themindfulkitchen_ @emmagwillim #RestRebellion.