If you are passionate about something but don’t yet know how to incorporate it into your life or you want more passion period this month’s book is a must buy.

The recipe this month can be served at an elegant New Year’s Eve dinner or a day after brunch. These roasted vegetables are versatile and, as always, delicious and nutritious. 

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The desire to change and improve is still there, regardless. In order to get a different result this year, we have to do what?

We have to do something differently.

I’ve got some suggestions and they start with this idea:

Ditch the word resolution. It’s fraught with the weight of failure from years past. And, it looks to me like this: Re-Solve. Working to solve the same problem over and over again. It’s a set up and I’m here to suggest a new way of looking at the changes you want to make. We’ll begin by trying on a new word, Revolution.

Let’s review the reason I chose The You Revolution for the title of this newsletter. In the first issue I gave a nod to my ever so smart friend Chris who suggested the title and pointed me to one of the definitions of the word.

 "Revolution; n. 1 a drastic and far reaching change in ways of thinking and behaving."
How many of you can see that it will take some very different thinking as well as different ways of behaving to bring about the life of your dreams?

Good, you are the smart woman I suspected was reading this. "But Greg, how does this apply to successfully making changes in the new year?" you ask.

I’m glad you asked so let’s get started. You’ll need a pen and paper or your computer for the next couple of steps.

• First list the many changes you have in mind to tackle. Don’t worry about the order or the how of making them work.
• Next go through these items—lose weight, get my finances in order, be a better parent and so on--and put the number 1 next to the one that is screaming, "pick me, pick me."
• Ask yourself if this is the one thing above all else you feel you want to accomplish. If you can only change one thing this year, this one feels most necessary.
• Ok, now go through the remaining ones and put them in order of importance. Or if they seem to have less energy, discard them.

Three little words……

Ready?........

“What One Thing?”

What one thing can you do to move you towards mastery in your chosen area of change? Rather than being stopped because you can’t exercise for an hour, eat 3 healthy meals while traveling, or take 14 supplements because you don’t really feel like it, what one thing can you do to move towards your health?

Isn’t success made one step at a time? I’m not telling you anything you’ve never heard before, I know. What I am doing is giving you a tool for success. It’s a solution to the all or nothing habit. And trust me, if you can come up with one thing when nothing seems possible on your path to lasting change, you will feel like a million.

And when you do one thing celebrate like crazy. We are reticent to reward our efforts. Rather, we down play them saying things like, “Oh it was nothing.”, or “I could have done more.” Don’t make me take out my whisk! I don't like hearing that! Put on the Rocky theme song when you make 15 minutes to walk rather than your intended hour and feel good about it!

Oh, and music? It’s a brilliant motivator and energy shifter. If you have a favorite up-tempo song that you can use as your theme song around this goal, you’ll be enhancing the likelihood of your success.

I’m going to close by quoting another bit from the first newsletter. I see you all as successful at whatever you decide to be, do and have. Become a revolutionary thinker by practicing this:
If you are willing to “try on” different ways of thinking,
will consider it true that you always have a choice,
and will visualize yourself as achieving the dreams you thought were unattainable,
your life will transform!

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This recipe will serve 8 as a side dish.

I prepare the vegetables in two ways during the prep phase. Everything gets combined at the last.

Ingredients:

• 2 medium Garnet sweet potatoes
• 2 medium Acorn squash
• 3 medium carrots - peeled and sliced on a diagonal
• 3 medium parsnips - peeled and sliced on a diagonal
• 2 medium rhutabaga - peel and cut in half, then in quarters
• 2 Granny Smith apples - cut each apple into eighths, skin on
• 4 small to medium Yukon Gold potatoes - or similar, quartered
• 1 medium red onion - remove the skin and cut into eighths
• ½ cup walnut halves and pieces - roasted if you want the best flavor
• 2 sprigs of fresh thyme - pull leaves off and chop if needed
• 2 sprigs of fresh oregano - pull leaves off, no chopping needed unless you don’t like the leaves whole
• ½ cup olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 375°. When hot, place the sweet potatoes and acorn squash on a rack over a sheet pan.
2. Roast these til they are tender but not soft. Times will very wildly but I’d start with 30 minutes.
3. Put a medium saucepan half-full of water over a high flame til boiling. You will blanch—par cook—the carrots, then the parsnips. This allows you to use the same water. If you do the parsnips first, the water will have a strong parsnip flavor and so will your carrots.
4. Just blanch those two, you don’t want them cooked through. You can strain and put them on a cookie pan to cool or shock in cold water.
   *Note: I do not like putting things in water when it’s not necessary. Obviously it washes away some of the flavor. When doing a green vegetable that you want to keep its color, an ice bath is magic. Other than that use it only in emergency.
5. Place the potato wedges and onion in a bowl, toss with ½ of the olive oil, the herbs, and some salt and pepper. Toss it well.
6. Put the potato wedges in a roasting pan with plenty of room. You will be adding the other ingredients eventually. Place pan in the oven. Use the same oven you are par-cooking the sweets and acorn squash to save energy.
7. You want to keep an eye on these. Stir gently about every 15 minutes. By the time these are half cooked you will be ready to add the other items.
8. When the sweets and squash are ready pull them out and let them cool.
9. When the sweets are cool enough to work with, peel the skin off. Cut them in half lengthwise, then in slices on a diagonal, about ½” thick.
10. Pull your roasting pan out of the oven and add the carrots, parsnips and sweet potato slices.
11. Add more olive oil if need be and the walnuts. Stir gently with a high heat spatula.
12. Put the pan back into the oven.
13. Meanwhile cut acorns in half, scoop out the seeds. Cut into moons where the natural separations are. These are too delicate to stir around with the rest so I place them at the edge of the pan, then place them into the serving dish so they don’t break.

Once hot, arrange on a platter, cover to keep hot, serve when ready. These can be made ahead and reheated just under cook them a bit so they don’t turn to mush.

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Once the universe grew hoarse from trying to get my attention about this work she put me in a room with the author. Janet Attwood was a speaker and I was working the event. Not only did I have the pleasure of learning from this warm, funny, and very smart woman, the universe was going to ensure I read the book.

Janet asked for audience participation and a couple of us working had the job of running a microphone to the person called on so all could hear the answer. Janet called on a woman right up in front of the stage on my side of the room so up I went, mike in hand. Janet listened to the sharer, thanked her and gifted the woman a copy of The Passion Test for her willingness to share. As I turned to leave the stage area, I heard, “excuse me” in my direction and turned around. In mid-seminar Janet asked my name. I told her and she grabbed another book, thanked me for the work I was doing and handed me The Passion Test. Consider this month’s book divinely inspired.

Wow, What a great book, the universe is smart.  What, you might ask, makes this a great book? The simple process the book leads you from “where do I start?” to clarity about what you want your life to look like based on what you love to do, be and have. And clarity, as T. Harv Eker says in the introduction, “is critical to success. Clarity leads to power—the power to act—which is the basis of achievement, fulfillment, and happiness in life.”

As some of you know I’m a person who spent two years in search of a way to work and live passionately. Whereas food is still a passion of mine whether I’m cooking or eating, doing food, day to day for work was no longer satisfying. Taking The Passion Test allowed me to get clearer on what it is that floats my boat and how my ideal day looks as I pursue it.

The authors encourage dreaming bigger than ever before based on what you love and not limiting oneself with the little voice that will ask, “But how am I ever going to achieve that?” The how is not our concern only the what. Janet supports this idea by weaving in a story of how one of her wildest, loftiest ideas about which she was passionate became reality. The story will make you go, “wow, that’s amazing.” And so it is, but the same kind of amazing is available to all of us. This system makes it easy to identify your passions and get started towards living them even if life is just a drag right now or you don’t have a clue what steps to take.

To further show what’s possible there are six transcripts of interviews in a section called, The Passions of Real Life Legends. The insights from these super successful people on how important passion is to success and happiness are worth the whopping $16 cost to buy the book. What’s more, there is a section of resources for books, courses, and trainings in all areas of life mastery. Some I can vouch for, but the company the others keep is enough of a recommendation for me.

Just in case you can’t see the value of having your passions sorted out if it won’t pay you, there is a link for a free report called “eight little-known secrets every wealthy person uses—and how they practically guarantee your success…”

Sound like hype? I’d feel that way if it was not coming from these two authors. They have a long history of helping transform people’s lives and I have witnessed their integrity over the years. What Janet and Chris say in the first paragraph of their free report offer is this: “Please don’t close this book saying, ‘Wow! What a great book!’ Though that would be flattering to us, what we really want is to help you take the next step and turn your passion into a profitable, wealth-producing, and fulfilling life.”

That alone separates this book from so many others in the personal development world. What a great way to start a new year; to discover what you want your life to look like, to know that you’ll be living passionately, excited about the possibilities that will unfold. Honestly this may be the single most important exercise I’ve done to reassure me that the path I’m on is the best one for me and to encourage bigger dreams than I dared dream before. Best part? I know I will realize those dreams if I do the work of keeping my eye on the things I say I’m passionate about. Simple, powerful, not to be ignored; it’s a great book!

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Q&A
Be sure to send your questions to Greg so she can answer them here in future issues of The You Revolution. Send her an

Q: Not that I’m a lush, but on New Year’s Eve I like my bubbly cold, and in copious amounts. Is there anything I can do to prevent a hangover? If not how can I silence the wailing of cats in my head the next day?

A: I believe firmly in the concept of “excess in moderation” and will be enjoying some bubbles myself that night. Prevention or damage control is always preferred to waking up feeling like crap. There are as many theories as there are drinkers but my research points me to these:

1. Don’t fall asleep while you are blotto. Your metabolism slows down when you sleep and we want to process as much of the extra booze as possible.
2. Take 2 Ibuprophen NOT Acetaminophen which is toxic to the liver anyway, but becomes more so when combined with alcohol.
3. Drink lots of something other than booze or sugary sodas.
4. Check out www.hangoverreview.com for product reviews and test results. Their top two products are based on charcoal which “trap the congeners in alcohol.” This means they can’t do their damage—hangover prevented rather than minimized.
5. If you can, get a B-complex vitamin or an anti-alcohol supplement down you during the evening to help with free radical damage.
6. Drink one water for every drink. I find this works for about the first hour.
7. Oh, and eat for heavens sake, don’t drink on an empty stomach.

Morning After
Ease yourself to the fridge and get something with sugar and electrolytes into your system. You are dehydrated and out of whack. Foods with potassium like bananas, potatoes, orange juice will help.

A hair of the dog may in fact make you feel better, but it’s only prolonging the agony. I however, am all for immediate relief and make mine a spicy bloody mary for the potassium. No really.

If you crave a burger with cheese, fries and ketchup go to the diner. Protein, calcium, salt, potatoes, even fried ones, will help wake up the feel good hormones you put into a coma the night before.

Steam rooms, pure oxygen, and sleep are also high on the list of tools used to fight back.

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