Solidify Your ‘Why’

This is My Story.

Veganism is a lifestyle, and when you first step onto this path, you will know why you are vegan. But the why can dim over time.

We all come to veganism in different ways. This is my story, and I hope it inspires you to solidify your vegan why.

My beginning was rather a fluke. I stopped eating meat because most animal products were too expensive. Thankfully, I knew a little about cooking with beans and lentils, as when my son was a baby, he refused to eat animal products.

Now back in the 80s in rural Aotearoa, NZ., if you were vegetarian, you must be a bare-foot hippie, but if you were a vegan, you were definitely an anarchist activist. Luckily I had a vegetarian friend who taught me the basics of cooking with beans so my son didn’t starve. In fact, he thrived, as did the rest of us, because we increased the vegetables (although meat was still on the plate).

When I took the leap into a vegetarian life in the late 90s (meals still included eggs), I was grateful that my son was grown up and had become an excellent cook. Although he lived far from me, whenever he came home, he taught me the essential ‘how tos’ of vegan cooking.