Cleansing

There are many methods of cleansing and I suggest you do a lot of research and small scale experimentation before you give up and choose to not cleanse at all. A general trend in cleansing is to ground yourself, which I find really important. I use a tree grounding technique where I imagine myself with roots pulling energy up from the earth as well as leaves that send energy back down. Another trend that I've noticed is the use of four elements, however I prefer to use five. Five?! That's right, not a lot of people think about the fifth element and it has many names that it goes by: akasha, essence, soul, life energy, etc. I prefer to call the fifth element either akasha or essence. :) It's pretty easy to work with essence since it's what makes everything up. For me the point of grounding is to allow myself to work from my essence with my environment instead of getting carried away by the other elements or my environment, which happens a lot in cooking. >_< I'll go ahead and explain how I ground and cleanse as long as you remember that this is something that I came up with through trial and error for myself. Don't feel like you have to do it my way, figure out what's best for you!
To ground I stand in a quiet place with natural lighting in comfortable clothes. I place my feet shoulder width apart, move my arms a few inches away from my body and face my palms forward. The tricky part for me is to slow my breathing and to keep it slow, as well as breathing deeply but not deep enough for me to get all dizzy and pass out! Relax your shoulders and focus on your spine. Imagine it as the core of your trunk, and imagine your trunk being your abdomen and legs. Move your awareness down until you reach your roots, which I assume are at different places for everybody. My roots start somewhere around my knees and when I reach them I push the air in my chest out as I push my energy down through my roots. I imagine the cool earth around my roots, the soil, water and rocks that make it up becoming aware of me. Push your energy only as far as is comfortable for you, I say this because when I push my energy too far I become the opposite of grounded and have trouble keeping my balance. If you could imagine what a plant feels when it's uprooted then you could imagine exactly what it feels like to push your energy to far. Once you've reached your comfort level going down breath in bringing your awareness back up through your roots, trunk, and up through your shoulders into your branches. The energy following your awareness back up trough your body will feel different than the energy you send down which may seem a little sketchy but once you experience it you'll understand that it's not. Then I send the energy taken from my leaves down into the earth.
The energy I draw up from the earth helps me expand my awareness through my branches growing while staying firmly in place through my roots and remembering who I am opposed to the world around me through my trunk. I usually stop when I feel, well for a lack of better words grounded and purified. grounding like this everyday helps remove spiritual baggage.
Some people use meditation to remove emotional baggage, but what I do is write. Mostly I write poetry but I write a lot of journal entries too! Free writing is how I reflect and sometimes when I'm really mad at someone or about something I write a letter to it/them. Then I just sit that letter out where I can see it everyday and let my emotions slowly settle. When I've settled down I draw a red X at the top of the paper and write a new letter apologizing and explaining that I'm sending those emotions away from me to the light. I love free writing. ^^ It's awesome! Other forms of cleansing include bathing, and meditation.
To cleanse and to clean a room are two different things, but I can't have one without the other. Unclean places always feel frustrated and absent minded to me. :/ So, before I even start cleansing I spend time decluttering. When I cleanse I light my sandalwood-rose incense because that's just a scent that I can really relate to. For me, incense is both fire and air, but from a lot of what I've read incense is usually considered strictly air, but whatever, magick is about doing what feels right to you. :) After that I take my salt water and spray salt water everywhere! I think that's my most favorite part, haha. Oh, I also try to have only two opening's in the room. For instance if I was cleansing my room I'd have a door and a window or two windows open because then you can start at one end of the room, and kind of shuffle uneeded stuff through the window. Don't be rude about it though! Remember your manners when handling energy and stuff 'cause it remembers and can come back to bite you in the ass. :P I'll let you guys figure out how to be nice though.
I think that's about it, grounding, emotional, spiritual, and physical cleansing. Sounds about right. Now ya'll come back now you here? Haha, couldn't help myself, my  country side needs to romp sometimes. Bye bye  now! :)

From the Rooster's Mouth: Pico de Gallo

Just so you know I don't actually use measurements unless I'm baking. If this isn't a pastry item please take that into consideration and don't hate me for ruining your dinner party.

I. Love. Pico de Gallo. I eat about 1 liter of Pico de Gallo per week. It's safe to say I have an addiction to this lemony, spicy, tomato relish. I figure I was destined to love this stuff since I've always hated salsa, but to fit the South American stereotype it was necessary that I like some kind of spicy tomato thing! It was such a predicament. I would've been the shame of my family if it weren't for Chipotle. Thank Goddess for the McDonald's industry, right? I went to Chipotle almost weekly just to get my Pico de Gallo fix, because the last thing I want to deal with is withdraw symptoms. It's comparable to the horrors of a meth addict going cold turkey. I could've died!

Ok, in all seriousness, I just love Pico de Gallo. Yeah, I do eat 1 liter of it a week but don't worry, I don't suffer withdraw symptoms if I chose to abstain for a day. On another serious note, don't do drugs! I hear they're bad for you, but I wouldn't really know since I don't want to experiment with them to find out. Just a friendly suggestion from your friendly internet kitchen witch.

I'm wondering how I'm gonna present my recipe on here... oh whatever, I'll just wing it.

Pico de Gallo (Pee-Ko Day Gai-Yo) aka Yummzers (Yummzers):

Makes about 1 liter

2 Lemons, maybe more

3/4 Medium Yellow Onion

2 1/2 Cup Fresh Chopped Cilantro, maybe more

6 Almost Ripe or Ripe Small- Medium Tomatoes

1 Seeded Red Bell Pepper

1/3 of a Small Seeded Jalapeno Pepper, depends on how spicy you like things, if you don't like spicy things at all add 1/4 of a Small Seeded Jalapeno Pepper because it really does change the flavor to have none at all.

Salt Not Too Much, Not Too Little

Directions: Pico de Gallo gets spicier the longer that it sits, so keep that in mind as you're deciding how much you want to make as well as how much jalapeno to add. If you want your Pico de Gallo to be spicy from the very moment it's made juice your lemons first then carefully cut off the the amount of jalapeno desired and remove the seeds. I cut my jalapeno into tiny pieces so that it doesn't get concentrated in any one place, but if you like to get unexpectedly slapped in the face by jalapeno flesh, be my guest and cut it exactly the way you like it. :) Don't lick your finger or rub your eyes after you make this stuff! Bad ,bad idea.Even if you wash your hands don't consider yourself safe. O_O If you don't want your Pico de Gallo spicy right away add the lemon juice after this next step without the jalapenoes then wait till the end to add the jalapenoes.

Next you'll want to move on to the tomatoes, bell peppers, onion and cilantro. Chop up all these ingredients and add them to a large bowl, or if you're as lazy as me add it to a tupper wear container that can hold as much as you plan to make.

Sooo, did you cut your onion up yet? What about the cilantro? Yes? Oh, you're getting to it. Just make sure to peel the onion before you cut it up. x_x When you're done with that add it to your tomatoes and bell peppers and combine please! It's pretty huh? :) Just be sure to not bruise those tomatoes! I may not be a grammar nazi but I sure am a texture nazi.

Pour your lemon juice over the rest of your ingredients and mix. If you have jalapeno in your lemon juice use a silicon mixing paddle to stir your ingredients, if not go ahead and use your hand or a spoon if you want but once you add those jalapenoes you want something that's not gonna soak up the capsaicin, as well as something that isn't gonna burn like hell afterwards (I'm talking about you're hands :P).

Wala! You have now made Pico de Gallo, and you can now expect me over within the hour, tortilla chips in hand. ^^

Magickal Significance:

Lemons: feminine, sun, summer, happiness, clarity, reflection, water, purification

Yellow Onions: earth, insecurities, love, patience, protection, understanding, clarity, the universe, the moon, masculine

Cilantro: masculine, awareness, passion, keeping secrets

Tomatoes: love, feminine, home, intention, prosperity

Bell Peppers:

Jalapenoes: lust, reaction, forethought, masculine, fire, without remorse

Pico de Gallo: Clarity, awareness, cleansing, water, fire, interactivity