Why I Do Not eat Onions

When I was a small child growing up in a prairie village in Saskatchewan, I was a curious and empathic child. I was three years old, my older sister was in school, and my brothers were not yet in the picture. I had a great imagination and I liked playing by myself. I liked to twirl and make my skirts float up. I liked to look up at the clouds and imagine that they were goddesses, and animals, and ships. I liked to think about life.

My mom was pickling cucumbers. Onions were involved.

I was playing outside and came tearing into the house for some reason, maybe it was to tell mommy something or ask for a glass of water. Whatever the reason, it was soon gone; one look at my mother and I knew that something was wrong. My mother looked devastated – tears were rolling down her cheeks, her eyes were puffy and red. I imagine I was greatly frightened; my mother from whom I had never seen anything but love (and possibly anger) was crying. I flung my arms around her legs and asked, “What’s wrong mommy?” I imagine my heart was beating rapidly too. Without a confident caring mother, what could a small child depend upon? 

Not Really My Mom

She just wiped her eyes with the back of her hands and explained, “It’s nothing, honey.  It’s just these darn onions!” She thought she had explained the whole thing, by saying it was nothing, but to me, it was not NOTHING, it was EVERYTHING. My provider, protector, and guide was made helpless, driven to tears, by “onions.” Onions must be very bad indeed.

From that day on, during my childhood no-one could get me to eat onions. My mother put them in everything, even fish sticks, and I always knew. She was always trying to trick me to eat them.  Even if I took a bite, I couldn't swallow it.  Onions would stick in my throat

For many years, I just thought I hated onions. When I was in high school, and started understanding that there was a cause for everything, I asked mom if something traumatic happened to me.  Mom told me the story. I thought knowledge would make it better. But still onions stick in my throat. Yes, I know they are good for me. It is ironic that mom was trying to help her child be a less-fussy eater, and I was unconsciously trying to protect my mother from those ”bad” things.

This is a simple example of how beliefs are formed and how they can affect our lives. It is interesting to me that simply understanding that the original belief was incorrect and even knowing the opposite is true, it has been very difficult to change my beliefs.

It is difficult to change beliefs and most of our beliefs, remain underneath the field of awareness and scrutiny. Some of us think that that’s just the way the world is. But God didn't make one kind of vegetable that was bad, regardless of my personal preferences. All creation is part of the oneness that is an expression of the Divine. 

Great chefs everywhere use onions as flavoring. It would be a good thing to change my mind about onions, so that I could have a more enjoyable life. I will continue to expand my awareness of good.

It brings me to the question, what erroneous beliefs do you have that are stopping you from living a sensational life? I don’t like onions, and that is too bad for me. However, I have managed to live quite well just the way I am.

But are there other unexamined beliefs, perhaps also starting with a childhood perceptions, that really are making a difference in my life? It is likely so.

Ernest Holmes wrote: “By far the largest part of our thinking processes are automatic, casting, as it were, the images of their acceptance into the universal Mind which reacts upon them. And thus it is that fear can bring about the condition feared while faith can reverse it.”

So I am determined to look through eyes of good and see good everywhere. I am determined to know that I am an expression of love and that everything in my life has been a response to love’s call. I am determined to use my knowledge to help myself and others. Every memory contains a gift.