Chaos

It was the end of April 2020 when things were beginning to change for me and not in a good way. When I say change, I’m talking about my body and my mind. Whenever I eat, my stomach would let me know painfully. I dreaded eating and was getting scared to eat. Mentally, it was stressing me.

My head wasn’t in the right place. That inner negative, that we all have, was fighting against me in a big way and taking over my world. After isolation was soon over, our friend David visited for dinner but I struggled to eat even basic foods like lamb and vegetables. The pain was like something I’d never experienced before. I was so concerned and didn’t know what was happening. I felt helpless.

Diet, Stress & Gastritis

When my dad was diagnosed with cancer about seven years ago, I developed gastritis which is a condition when the stomach lining becomes inflamed because of a bad diet and stress. I tend to neglect my diet and eat what can only be described as crap food, sugary foods.

Sleeping was difficult. Everyday, exhausted and stress with loosing lots of business with Covid 19 and with little government support, I sometimes think “how the hell did I get through it all?”

I knew, from experience, that I had to change my diet and approach new ways with dealing with my anxieties.

Working with Brockley Bean Cafe

It’s been over a year now that I started photographing and working for Brockley, a unique cafe and catering business down one of Wrexham’s quaint streets, Charles Street. It’s run by my friend and business owner, Jess Wills, a trained Chef and assisted by my other lovely friend, Lesley Wills (Jess’s mum) who is a trained nutritionalist. Some of my food images taken at the cafe have been shortlisted for Pink Lady Food.

A Blessing

I say, and continue to say, that I’ve been blessed because my eating issues and the solution for them was on my own doorstep. The solution was Jess and Lesley and their knowledge and experience with food, healthy food. I have had so much support from both ladies about my diet and what I should and shouldn’t be eating from drinks like slippery elm which coat the oesophagus and linking of the stomach, nature’s natural way without the need for liquid medicines from the local chemist. Foods like lean meats and vegetables like cabbage, carrots, etc which are full of antioxidants and which heal the stomach.

Brockley Bean Story

The story behind Brockley Bean Cafe with Jess:-

“I was born in 1979, raised and brought up in London in a place called Brockley on Coulgate Street opposite Brockley train station. This was where mum started a tiny whole foods shop (below photo) and eventually squatted next door as that was an 1980’s and squatting wasn’t a big deal like now.

When I was aged 5, mum decide to open the first vegan vegetarian cafe in London and the UK. I remember the day when I sat there in the cafe room designing menus for Brockley and I said why don’t we call the cafe Brockley Bean and on the front of the menu was the shape of a drawing of a round green face, a smiley green face rather like the logo they have been using before their recent brand change.

Old Brockley Bean Cafe, Brockley, London

Old logo

At age 7, I worked in the local Deptford Market and then from age 14 onwards we moved to Anglesey and didn’t do very well at school because of dyslexia and found it hard to fit in with schools that only spoke in Welsh. My passion was always with food and then went to work in catering and then being a chef in Bangor where I qualified to be a chef.

I later moved to Chester but unfortunately there wasn’t much work to do with catering or being a chef so I decided to give retail a try and worked for Next for 11 years and worked my up to Store Manager and then another 11 years at Top Shop as Store Manager.

In 2017 Skinnys opened in Wrexham which is a health food shop. I worked there for a really good guy called Kane and his family. It was like meat, vegetables, chicken, steak, etc and I was lucky enough that Kane gave me a position, after a few months, to run the shop for him. 2017 was a real moment for meal preps for people and cooking for people who haven’t got time but wanted clean healthy food and meal preps are for fitness, bodybuilder people. I later run Skinnys new shop in Chester and help support that shop also.

In October 2017, I wanted to do something else so I went to help mum manage her cafe in Bangor. Her cafe was called Follow Your Bliss. We both enjoyed working with each other and it was a real buzz and we had ideas to take Follow Your Bliss to Chester. However, it wasn’t working. In November 2017, I had calls from old customers asking me to cook for them. Before I knew it, I was cooking for 75 clients and working 7 days a week in a small kitchen. I was at this time exhausted.

Then with luck or maybe universal law, one day I was delivering to a customer, I couldn’t park in my normal place, so I walked down Charles Street and I saw the shop that we’re in at the moment, 20 Charles Street, The Brockley Bean and the rest they say is history.”

Healthy Mind & Meditation

I remember calling in to the cafe one Thursday morning to visit Jess and Lesley and as my stomach health was starting heal with a new clean diet, my mind still wasn’t where it needed to be. I still had that inner negative voice. After a long chat with them both, they advised I read “The Untethered Soul” by Michael A. Singer.

I can’t remember the last time I read a book! This book changed my life in so many ways. I’ve learned to calm my inner voice with meditation, daily medication. I think of it like cleaning of my mind. I no longer waste energy with worrying but I focus on the now and look forward to my tomorrows.

I’ve also learned to meditate, twice a day and I’ve also found it even more rewarding when I meditate with with others.

Please, if you are suffering with that negative inner voice, and are serious about it not ruling your life anymore, please read the book and please talk about your thoughts, no matter how crazy they may seem, it’s such a release to open and talk about everything.

A clean diet and a clean mind have released me from many months and probably years without knowing it, from years of chaos and confusion and I’m thankful and lucky to have two key friends who have changed me for the better in my new life journey.

Take care everybody. We are all going through tough times but stay positive, don’t follow the negatives in life. Choose you’re own positive way. It takes more effort to be miserable than to be happy.

Ray xxx