#WeekendCoffeeShare (August 28, 2026)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone! I’m joining in with #WeekendCoffeeShare once again. It’s nearly 11PM, so I’m hoping I can finish this post before midnight. I don’t think I even want water anymore before going to bed, but if you’d like a cup of something to drink, feel free to and let’s chat.

If we were having coffee, first I’d talk about the weather. It’s been all over the place. Early in the week, we had cool nights during which the temperature dropped to 7°C. Yesterday was hot again with a daytime temp of 29°C. We got thunderstorms last night and it’s been raining all day today.

If we were having coffee, I’d share that I met my movement goal on my Apple Watch each day except for today so far. Now I’m in doubt as to which option is the lesser of two evils: not meeting my movement goal or not finishing this post before midnight. Neither is truly disastrous, of course, but both cause me some autistic error.

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that, yesterday, I rode the side-by-side bike to Deventer with a staff. We visited the market, where I bought olives mostly because the vendor was trying to be friendly. I know it’s a selling tactic but I don’t care. Heck, he even suggested he’d see me tomorrow (today) at the other market I frequent. I told him not to get his hopes up.

We also ate lunch and then rode the bike to the town center for Ekoplaza, a health food store. I was looking for silken tofu, but it was in the fridge and I had to cycle nearly half an hour back to the institution, so I decided that wouldn’t be a good idea. Then I bought several other things that I later realized I should’ve bought at the regular supermarket because they were horribly expensive at Ekoplaza. Oh well.

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you I finally bought myself a food processor. I’m not entirely sure I like the particular model I got, mostly because it has a lot of gadgets I thought I could use but may not be able to after all and it lacks attachments I wish it had. For example, I full on thought it had a grinder attachment but it didn’t. That either means chopping my onions myself or investing in another part (thankfully, the grinder is available as an attachment for this model).

Tomorrow, I’ll find out whether the thing actually does the job it was originally intended for, because I’m going to make a vegan and gluten-free cake that the mixture for needs to be processed. I’m a little saddened that my best friend doesn’t feel well so isn’t going to come by on Sunday. If it turns out good though, I will make it another time for her.

If we were having coffee, then I’d tell you I did enjoy a dinner prep activity again on Wednesday. I cooked something that was called a curry on the Good Food website but it was more like a bean stew. It had kidney beans, tomato, onions, garlic and ginger in it, in addition to coriander stalks. The coriander leaves were supposed to be used on top of the curry, but the staff forgot those. The weather outside was really nice that evening, so I ate my meal at my outside table.

If we were having coffee, finally I’d share that it’s probably supposed to be this way but I just found out that another person I recently became friends with is a vegan. We met through a peer support group and for a while used to talk mostly about our issues, but today I shared about my Ekoplaza adventure and this got us chatting plant-based food. If there’s a higher power, it’s probably telling me I should go vegan too. Then again, my best friend already told me jokingly that I’m a changeling (referring to a former online nickname) for not fancying pizza tonight.

Connecting to a Higher Power or Purpose

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. I’m motivated to write but don’t know what about, so I looked through a collection of journaling prompts. For some reason, the section on spirituality and belief caught my eye. One of the prompt questions is how I connect to a higher power or purpose.

This, honestly, was a lot easier when I still thought of myself as a progressive Christian than it is now. Back in the day, it was relatively easy for me to find inspiration and spiritual guidance. Now, I still occasionally look at Christian-based sources, because I still have a ton of devotionals downloaded off Bookshare. Still, it feels off. It feels as though I’m not playing by the rules of the game that is religion. Not that religion is a game, but one of the reasons I left Christianity is the fact that it is too much tied to hate towards for example the LGBTQ+ community. I always knew, even when I had suppressed my queer identity, that I was an ally to the community. However, the truth remains that the Bible is horribly homophobic. One could say that it was written 2000 years ago, but then one would essentially abandon one of the core concepts of Christianity, ie. the idea that the Bible is God’s word. I could say that I don’t care, call myself a spiritual seeker and take what speaks to me and leave the rest. But I wouldn’t be a Christian. And, if I did still find inspiration in Christian devotionals, wouldn’t that be me essentially betraying my queer self and, furthermore, the entire queer community?

But I desire to find meaning in life. I’m still struggling with connecting to a higher power now that I no longer follow Jesus. I do believe there’s “something”, some kind of higher power, but I don’t know what it is and where and how to connect to it.

I keep trying to meditate on Insight Timer, but this feels as half-hearted as my prayers were when I still claimed to be a Jesus follower. I’m struggling to genuinely believe in and surrender to a higher power. Maybe this means I’m actually an atheist or secular humanist, but I do “feel” there’s more. I just don’t know how to align my thoughts and actions with this feeling.

There are other ways of finding a higher purpose in life. I tried acceptance and commitment therapy, which is highly based on the idea of living by your values. Then again, do I really know what my values are? No, I have no idea.

I actually often feel drawn to the fluffy side of spirituality. Affirmations, essential oils (when I still had a diffuser), that kind of stuff. There’s nothing wrong with this, really, except that it often leads to a “take what I like and leave the rest” kind of attitude. And I think there’s something wrong with that, but I can’t pinpoint what it is.