| Coffee as a Sacred Beverage |
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[Blog (Non-channeled) March 2010]
In that split second I figured there'd be judgment about coffee. Maybe to support my own decision to lay off for a while. But the split second only lasted a, well, split second. Surpisingly, Polaris said coffee can be useful. One or maybe two cups a day, they said, but get this: Think of your coffee as a sacred spiritual beverage that connects you to its aboriginal origins. Ooo. I hadn't thought of that. Sacred spiritual beverage? Aboriginal origins? I'm liking that idea. Suddenly I have visuals of groups of people around a central fire. They have warm skin tones and are passing a vessel around the circle, each taking a drink. The drink and the fire warms them, and the drinking together connects them. It is good. Having procured some more of the "good stuff" (I get mine from Origins Coffee Roasters in Vancouver, but Camano Island Roasters in Washington is good, too), this morning I decided to drink a cup while connecting to the sacred spiritual aspects of it. I thought about drinking the coffee pure, that is, black. After all, the aboriginal origins of coffee likely didn't involve lattes. But bleh. I wanted to enjoy the experience. I don't use sugar, but I do bow to the gods of dairy, at least as much as I need to for a tablespoon of organic half-and-half. Mindful eating can be a wonderful experience. Polaris suggests it often. It involves threading your way back to your food's origins and all the hands it has passed through to get to you, including yours. You also regard the soil that the food grew in, and the sun that warmed it and the rains that fed it. You meditate on that for a while and then when you finally eat, you really explore the explosion of sensory experience that eating is: smell, taste, texture, emotional connections. Drinking coffee mindfully is much the same. Think of your coffee as a sacred spiritual beverage that connects you to its aboriginal origins. I held my cup and looked at it, admiring the color of cafe au lait. I brought my face closer and took a big inhaling breath. Instantly I saw the fire again, the people gathered around it, chanting. I saw people picking the ripe coffee beans, singing. There's a song for the ripening, and a song for the harvesting. There's another song for the preparation of the beans, the shelling, roasting, and grinding. I took another deep breath of the aroma wafting from my cup and remembered my own past as a warm-skinned, barefooted person, climbing rocky hillsides, grateful for the warmth of the fire at night when the air is chill. I sipped the coffee and felt memories course through my body. I feel them still. I am remembering. My past, our shared sacred past, is in my veins now. A part of me forever. Are you a coffee drinker? This experience is highly recommended. Leave a comment about how it goes for you if you try, too, regarding your morning coffee as a sacred spiritual beverage. Your mornings might never be the same. 
Comments (5)
  written by LoveDove, March 19, 2010
Oh! One more thing. For those of you who are over weight (like I was), you also find that you'll lose ALOT of weight! By the time I was finished with this diet and stuck to it, I lost a grand total of 50 lbs. Give it a try, ya'll. You won't be sorry. Namaste. LoveDove.
 written by Matthew Spears, March 19, 2010
I've gone for months without coffee, alchohol, etc, and been vegetarian for years. I didn't notice a lot of difference in itself, but I did notice the motivation in my behavior made a lot of difference to what my body did.
In other words, when my thoughts said "well, this authority said I should keep my body pure and be restrained, so I should watch what I ingest in every moment". It added to watching my thoughts in every moment from meditation practices. It didn't help - in fact made me much more tense from the intolerance I created to all these "negative" influences. Control. I notice this in a lot of western spiritual practice. We try to reproduce absolute authority in some external form to tell us what to do instead of listening to ourselves. It was a couple years ago I decided that for a while, I would let go of some of these prejudices, albeit "healthy" ones. I actually (gasp) went to McDonalds and had a Big Mac. I tried having these "unhealthy" foods regularly and then saw reactions. The end result is that I started listening to myself and my body instead of some outward authority, and it feels better. I still don't like junky fast food, and I like organic, fair trade, very light roasted coffee. Light is far, far better, and keeps the connection to the bean and the earth. There is something about the spiritual connection with coffee, especially in some cultures. But I don't think it's universal. Coffee works for me - at least for now. For some people it doesn't. However, I think learning to create a sacredness around food and beverages from within will always be positive.  written by Helen, April 08, 2010
Next time, in alternative to drink the full body coffee, drop one drip of coffee inside a cup of warm clear water. Taste the light side of the life and feel the full fragrance. - Chinese Green Tea and Homeopathy use the similar principle.
 written by Maribel, September 26, 2010
I loved this post. I'm from Costa Rica, where the best coffee in the world is from.
 I'm a coffee drinker. I have two cups a day usually. But what I wanted to share is that, in every now moment my body tells me what it wants. For me, there are no wrongs or rights. All is perfect in All Creation. 
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The other day a client asked Polaris in session about coffee. She wanted to know whether coffee was good for her since she had heard conflicting reports from various spiritually-oriented sources. In the split second between the client's question and Polaris' answer, I had time to wonder myself. After all, I've been off coffee for two months. In part, it was because I had run out of the "good stuff" (organic, free trade, shade-grown, light roast — none of that burnt stuff for me!). And in part it was because I had heard messages for myself at the beginning of the year to lay off coffee for awhile. And while kicking coffee could almost be a blog post in itself, it wasn't a big deal.
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I struggled with coffee too, because I love it! Now, I drink the instant "General Foods International" coffees that only say "Sugar Free and Decaffeinated". They taste really great and gives you the taste of coffee. I strongly suggest you try them. I hope I've helped some of you with the coffee dilemma. Namaste. LoveDove.