u/Amazing-Flow171

i posted a bit ago asking for advice how i should display my hand mirrors, and this is what i ended up doing! i really like it i think they look so good, i used hooks with double sided adhesive. i might go back and replace the adhesive with something stronger just for piece of mind, but they’re holding pretty good. i’m also certain i have more hand mirrors in storage but i haven’t found them yet, so i might have to redo this whole layout which sucks cause it was kind of a pain lol

When I read about women like Wafa Bani Mustafa, I find myself thinking about what “women’s empowerment” actually means.
Wafa Bani Mustafa is a Jordanian lawyer and politician who became the first Jordanian woman to head a parliamentary bloc. She has spent years working on women’s political participation, legal rights, protection from violence, and greater representation of women in decision-making.
This is undoubtedly empowerment.
A woman entering spaces where women were traditionally excluded, questioning unjust laws, participating in politics, making decisions and creating opportunities for other women.
But there is another question that I think we don't discuss enough:
What happens when the external chains are removed, but the chains inside the mind remain?

Acharya Prashant often makes this distinction when speaking about women’s empowerment. According to him, giving a woman more choices is not automatically the same as making her free. If she has never examined why she wants what she wants, who shaped her desires, and whether her decisions are coming from understanding or conditioning, then simply giving her the power to choose may not be enough.
A woman can be educated and financially independent and still be deeply conditioned by society.
She can have a career and still believe that her worth depends on how attractive she looks.
She can have the legal right to choose her partner and still choose according to fear, social approval, or family pressure.
She can say, “I am free to do whatever I want,” without ever asking, “Who is the ‘I’ that wants this?”
And perhaps this is where empowerment needs to go deeper.
External freedom is necessary. Laws matter. Education matters. Economic independence matters. Representation matters.
But inner freedom matters too.
Because if I don't understand my own mind, then even my “choices” can be made by conditioning that I mistake for my own desire.
This is why I find the idea of combining the two dimensions so powerful
give women the opportunity to stand on their own feet, but also give them the education to understand their own minds.
The goal shouldn't merely be to replace “a man decides for her” with “society decides for her” or even “her conditioning decides for her.”
The deeper goal is that she becomes capable of seeing clearly and deciding consciously.
Maybe real empowerment is not simply:
“A woman can choose.”
Maybe it is:
“A woman understands herself well enough to know why she is choosing.”
That, to me, is a much deeper form of freedom.

Tofurky peppered slices, pan-seared green tomatoes, roasted Hatch chiles, avocado mash, pickled red onions, green leaf lettuce, red-streaked arugula, cilantro crema and mayo on a toasted sub roll.

I always thought making vegan meringue isn’t for the faint of heart. There was something about the notion of taking unsuspecting bean juice and expecting it to become a stable meringue out of thin air and sugar that confused me (and probably the beans as well).
As it turns out, all you need is a clean bowl, a good recipe and some scientific luck.
On a completely different note, any good recipes that require 3 cans of chickpeas? 😄

https://www.lazycatkitchen.com/vegan-lemon-meringue-pie/

I baked these for a little charity event this weekend, a yoga and sketching class raising money for the Montréal Vegan Festival. I'm one of the co-spokespeople for the festival this year, which is happening October 17 and 18 at Windsor Station in Montréal. If you're vegan and not too far from the city, honestly it's a really good excuse to come visit for a weekend, the venue is gorgeous and the whole thing is very fun!

I'm a French pastry chef living in Montréal and I built a vegan cooking app on my own, Eline's Table 🥹 https://elinestable.com/app

The event itself was so lovely. Stretching, then drawing, then everyone crowding around the pastry box. Someone looked at the buns and said they looked like they came straight out of a Ghibli film, which might be the nicest thing anyone has said about my baking 🥹

About the buns: soft brioche dough, filled with pistachio pastry cream and fresh peach wedges, baked until the fruit goes jammy, then finished with a cream cheese frosting made from the plain half of the pastry cream.

Make the pastry cream the day before if you can, it pipes and spreads so much better cold!

Servings: 10

Toppings and filling
peaches 3
light brown sugar 2 tbsp
pistachios 30 g (1/4 cup), roughly chopped

Pastry cream
soy milk 500 mL (2 cups)
cornstarch 40 g (1/3 cup)
sugar 100 g (1/2 cup)
plant-based margarine 160 g (2/3 cup)
pistachio paste 85 mL (1/3 cup)
vegan cream cheese 125 g (1/2 cup)

Brioche dough
water 300 mL (1 1/4 cups), lukewarm
dehydrated baker's yeast 1 tbsp
sugar 100 g (1/2 cup)
all-purpose flour 500 g (4 cups)
plant-based margarine 75 g (1/3 cup)

Preparation
Prepare the pastry cream: heat about three quarters of the soy milk in a saucepan with the margarine. In a bowl, whisk the sugar and cornstarch together, then pour in the remaining milk and mix well.

When the soy milk comes to a boil, pour the sugar, cornstarch and milk mixture into the saucepan, then whisk as the cream cooks over medium heat. After a few minutes the pastry cream will thicken and bubble, that means it's ready!

Pour half of the plain pastry cream into a container and set aside in the fridge. To the other half, add the pistachio paste. Set that aside in the fridge too, for at least 4 hours.

Prepare the brioche dough: rehydrate the yeast in the lukewarm water. Let it rest for 5 minutes, until a foam forms, a sign the yeast is active.
Add the sugar, flour and margarine. Knead the dough by hand (or in a stand mixer) for about 4 minutes, until it's nice and elastic.
Let the dough rest at room temperature, covered with a cloth, for 1 hour 30. It will roughly triple in volume.

Knock back the dough and divide it into small portions of about 100 g each. Place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, well spaced apart. Let them rest for another 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (355°F). Using your fingers, press down on each dough ball to flatten it and create a hollow in the centre. Fill each hollow with pistachio pastry cream and fresh peach wedges. Sprinkle with brown sugar and bake for 25 minutes.

Let the buns cool. In a bowl, whisk the vegan cream cheese to soften it. Add the plain pastry cream and whisk everything together.

On the cooled buns, add a spoonful of the cream cheese frosting and sprinkle with roughly chopped pistachios! It's ready 😍

Lindsay Clancy, a delivery nurse by profession, a Massachusetts resident, and a mother of three, was accused of killing her three children and then attempting to take her own life, leaving her severely disabled in the attempt.
Everyone was shocked by the news.

But I watched and thought, really? Is it that shocking? Isn’t this something that is happening every day in different forms? Maybe this was just one of those incidents that brought to light a failed system that we are all following.

These events are universal, irrespective of culture, tradition, religion, or any of that. Human psychology is the same everywhere. It’s just that in some places, stronger law enforcement, social pressure, and fear hide these things very well, while in some places, they come out more aggressively.

Why did she need to kill them? And before that, why did she give birth in the first place? Not just one child, but three? What kind of pressure was she going through? Aren’t these questions worth asking?
She went through postpartum depression. But how much do we really understand about what happens inside a person’s mind during such a difficult period?
I have often observed people making pregnancy and motherhood feel like something automatically special, sacred, and beautiful, as if a certain script has already been written for how a woman is supposed to feel.
But do we ever stop and ask the person herself what she actually wants? Why does she want a child? What does motherhood mean to her? Does she understand herself, her desires, her fears, and the pressures she is carrying?
This is where I find Acharya Prashant’s teachings worth thinking about.
He talks repeatedly about the importance of knowing oneself, because when a person does not understand their own mind, they can spend their entire life following what society tells them to do without ever asking why.
Get married. Have children. Build a family. Be happy. Fulfil your responsibilities.
But what if a person has never really understood themselves?
What if we are so busy fulfilling roles given to us by society that we never stop to understand the person who is actually living that life?
Maybe this is what ignorance of oneself can lead to.
It doesn’t always look like a disaster. Sometimes it looks completely normal. Sometimes it looks like a successful family, a marriage, children, and a life that appears perfect from the outside.

But what is happening inside the person?
These kinds of extreme incidents force us to look at something we normally don’t want to look at.
Maybe the real question is not only, “How could someone do something so terrible?”

Maybe we should also ask, “How much do we actually know about ourselves before we make decisions that affect not only our own lives, but the lives of others?”
Because ignorance of the outside world can make us uninformed.
But ignorance of ourselves can make us destructive.
And perhaps knowing ourselves is not just a spiritual idea. Perhaps it is one of the most important responsibilities we have.

We celebrate Independence Day. Have we ever wondered how we came to this situation in the first place? How did different countries enslave us?
Was it a lack of wealth? Lack of talent? Lack of strength?
What was it?
Why did we never prepare ourselves for the worst? While other countries were conducting research, investing in technology, and educating their people, what were our ancestors doing at that time?Were they busy playing the caste system? Or wasting money on astrology or in temples? Or were some of them just busy being jealous and becoming whistleblowers out of greed?

And if we say we are free and have control, do we really? Does India have its own technology to fight its own wars without external help?

Kathi Rolls are a popular Indian street food featuring soft, flaky flatbreads rolled around flavorful fillings of your choice. While paneer rolls are a favorite, these tofu-stuffed rolls are a delicious and protein-packed alternative you’ll love!

Written Recipe (+video)

https://blessmyfoodbypayal.com/tofu-kathi-rolls-recipe/

High-protein (33g) and plant-based, these Chili Soya Chunks are packed with bold flavors, a satisfying bite, and make a delicious vegan meal or snack.

Written Recipe (+video)

https://blessmyfoodbypayal.com/air-fryer-chili-soya-chunks/