Here’s a no-brainer: If something isn’t working, and it doesn’t look like it is going to improve, change it.

Sometimes emotions make us say “if I stop this, it means I failed,” preventing us from moving on in our evolutionary paths. But that’s an outdated concept. Change doesn’t mean failure. It’s OK to change – change your mind, change your environment, change your situation.

It’s OK to break up with someone you are always fighting with. It’s OK to quit a job you are miserable in. It’s OK to wake up and realize that the dream you had when you were 15 years old is not the one you have and want to pursue now that you’re 28.

Acclaimed marketer and one of the most interesting minds of our time, Seth Godin, said it best in his best-selling book The Dip: “Strategic quitting is the secret of successful organizations.”

Strategic quitting – or proactive, thought-out change – is not about stopping because something just got a little hard. Strategic quitting is about identifying the DEAD ENDS in your life, and not hanging out there wasting your time when nothing is going to get better. It’s about quitting when you’re heading in the wrong direction – or no direction at all.

This applies not just to business – quitting a job where you won’t grow or get promoted or reach your dream career, even if it pays well – but to everything in life. Quit the dead-end relationship. Quit the eating patterns that don’t make you look or feel the way you want to. Quit the drinking habit that brings you social acceptance but prevents you from thinking clearly and staying motivated to go after your dreams the next day.

It’s OK to change something when it is not working (insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results, remember?) If you’re not heading in the direction you want, it’s time to change.

But first, you have to know what you want and where you want to go.

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways…that I help you get and stay healthy, that is. That’s right – true love is not just making a nice dinner for that special someone, but making sure you’re making a healthy meal that won’t clog arteries or intestines. After all, you want your significant other to have a healthy ticker with which to love you right back.

Here’s a delicious dinner plan to put some love on the plate this V-Day:

Quinoa Spaghetti with Heirloom Tomatoes: Images of Lady and The Tramp slurping that same spaghetti noodle into an unintentional kiss flood the mind with this dish. Universally loved Italian pasta has romance written all over it, especially this dish, with its red sauce. We made pasta a healthy option by trading in bleached flour noodles for protein-packed quinoa ones, and making a delicious dairy-free sauce that won’t interfere with your new year cleanse.

Silcon Sil Salad: Salads are the starter for most, but they are the star of every meal for us. Keep things fresh and raw for your honey with this “beautifying” salad that doesn’t just nourish, it also cleanses (and keeps your skin glowing). For a Mediterranean theme, add sliced kalamata olives.

Choco-Love Pudding: This is when dessert is actually GOOD FOR YOU. Made with cacao and coconut, not only will you get all the feel-good chems and antioxidants from dairy-free superfood cacao, you’ll also get the electrolytes and superfood-type oils from the coconut. Cinnamon will make sure your blood sugar stays in check. As far as flavor, we’d say decadent, but that would mean it’s bad for you. Warning: After tasting it, you may not want to share.

This guilt-free, gluten-free, dairy-free, flavor and nutrient-packed meal will win the heart of any lover, and keep it healthily beating fast for you for years to come. It will also keep you right on track with your own new year goals, whether it’s weight loss or simply cleansing. A post-Super Bowl win-win for both teams.

When I open my March 2112 Elle Decor and saw the feature on Jackie Astier I turned to my husband and said “babe, I just found my decor twin flame.” She is also a fashion stylist (I can tell by her aesthetics) and now she is my number one FAVORITE, interior Goddess. I mean, when I read the things she said and is into, I felt like she was totally channeling ME, and her and needed to obviously be friends….she was totally reading my mind. Jackie’s style is rocking my world ULTRA hard and I LOVE IT. That Damien Hirst art piece totally works anywhere.

This brass coffee table she found on Ebay is soooooooooo up my alley, and will always look sexy ANYWHERE. love the texture combo and color palette. ultra sexy and sophisticate it. She described her style as Paris in the 70′s….um… that’s me and me too. Velvet pillows, tufted chesterfield sofa upholstered in velvet with some Ikat splashes…. LORD !!! (as my eyes go extra wide open and about to pop out) So sexy!

Go big or go home. Everything is this room is love at first sigh and days after. How glorious is that dining table? Those brass pedestals for the dining table are calling my name. What? Yes brass pedestals, I do hear you! I have a personal love for brass and lacquered anything. Lacquered walls…..is my ultimate fave.  That velvet blue….plush. I can pass on those tree branches…they look a bit “blah.” She said it took 10 coats of lacquered paint to get the walls like that. ME WANT!!!

She scored not just one, but TWO of those fabulous brass coffee tables! I just want to sit on that sofa with my Ipad and Pinterest my way through the afternoon =) WAIT. Did you noticed the ultra AMAZING high gloss lacquered ceilings?? Hold up. It shines like a new car because it actually was sprayed  with automotive paint! Wow. Yes please, I’ll take two.

Above, in the first picture: I’m obsessed with the Karl Springer cocktail tables which I told my husband that I will make an inspired version of that for our bedroom nightstands one day. That room is so sexified, i just love everything about it.

The Brass/gold love continues. I get it. It never went out of style in my world. That lacquered black and brass cabinet is so SEXY. Did I mention that to me, sexy is an attitude? Is a state of mind, something you ooze form the inside out. A feeling and personal expression. This cabinet is oozing it. And those chairs are too. If you feel it inside, you can see it outside.

Saved the best for last. Absolutely went THRILL-EFIED (a sudden feeling of excitement and pleasure ) for this room. Literally, I had an adrenaline rush, all over my body, then I had an out of body experience. That’s normal for me when I’m dealing with three things: beautiful food photography, glamorous decor, and dancing to favorite music. This palette is so lovely and attractive for me in so many ways. I wish the rug was faux, but I’m not going to deny its beauty. The custom velvet head board: sexy. The brass lamp: sexy classic. The coffee table ULTRA sexy. I’m not into danish furniture at all, but this settee totally works. The ONLY thing I would change in this room is: the chandelier. I would of gone with a sexy+glorious, brass Sciolari Chandelier. Jackie is an interior Goddess, hands down AMAZING.

By the way, I’m on Pinterest now!! Follow me for more visual inspiration!

Images via Jackie Astier

I have been wanting to introduce some of my favorite food photographers out there. They inspower me so much…so, here is one of them (drum roll): the lovely Helen Dujuradi. Although I gravitate even more to darker, navy blue-blackish and intense contrast images, I think Helen’s color combos are a lighter delight and very feminine in a sexy way. Almost whimsical.

Produce is always so sexy, beautiful and colorful to shoot. I feel like they are such super models and at the same time I truly value and LOVE what they do for our health and well being. The Vegetable Kingdom is the whole package. “Will you merry me beets?” I’ve had this vision of one day doing a photo shoot with Maryl with a gown made of curly kale. One day.

Maryl and realized that we have no green or yellow linens today. I guess we are not into it. But I like in this picture how fresh the green looks and how radiant the red pops out. Radish: You are TOO sexy….

My obsession with the color purple continues…the force is strong with that one. That was our theme is today shoot. I think that I’m moving from a darker purple attraction in this lilac love up above.

I mean…are those the most beautiful radish creations ever? Such a pretty combo! What woman doesn’t love light green and pink? Thanks Helen for capturing so much beauty!

This picture above I just want to dive into. I know exactly what that tastes like.  I actually make that dish as a delicious snack, in tomato heirloom season. OMG…soooo amazing! By the way, I don’t do tomatoes, unless they are ORGANIC  heirlooms…that’s right, I’m not kidding. Once you go ORGANIC heirlooms….you don’t go back. I emphasize the organic because, conventional heirlooms can’t fool me. Someone did that to me once. She said the heirlooms were organic, and when I tasted them…..conventional all the way. When you have such a clean diet and palette, and you only buy organic, you can tell right away when something is NOT organic. BIG difference…HUGE.

Photography by Helen Dujardi

Maryl and I were recipe testing all day today and prepping food for the photo shoot. Our food shoot extravaganza for our upcoming book begins tomorrow.  I almost didn’t blog today ’cause I’m SUPER exhausted! But I thought of the daily challenge (that I put on myself…I’m very aware of that) and I said to myself, “Silvie, we have to do this…WE CAN DO IT!”  I also wanted to say that I  will blog very minimal amounts this week, for obvious reasons. There is way too much to do, and so little time. It’s all great though…lots of AMAZING Silvie+Maryl holistic goodies coming soon. Happy Monday!

Photograph by Silvie Celiz

This is from a shoot for Haper’s Bazaar Feb 2012, by one of my top five favorite food photographers Ditte Isager. I don’t know if the issue is out yet. Ryan Korban is a young super upcoming designer who also happens to be one of top five favorite designers EVER! I guess he decorated model Julia Stegner’s New York city apartment, and that’s the reason for the spread on Harper’s Bazaar. I LOVE everything about this look…I mean EVERYTHING. Specially the lighting and the abstract art. The hopefully fake animals are beautiful too. (for the love of plant-based foods….please lord, let them be fake!) …….for the love of Hermes Birkins…let them be faux! For the love of BRASS & CHROME, let them eat dark green salads!! =) Night blogging = Silvie’s accessing jokes and humor in a part of her mind that I know for a fact Maryl will totally get.

ZEBRA PRINT!!!!!!!!!!!! I almost bought today a zebra print rectangular pillow and then I didn’t because it had a dual ivory/grey color in the middle and I thought that it might make it look a bit cheap. and then I was like “Silvie, I thought we decided on zebra bench, cheetah pillow.” What? You know you talk to your self too. Idea: I’m gonna do gold borders to my black dinning table in my kitchen..inspired by this coffee table up top. Me likey very much.

I find the combination of purple and pink flowers very attractive, like a moth to a flame. I almost went Janet Jackson that’s the way love goes on all of you…almost. I might try that in my living room…the purple hydrangeas are already there, all I need is the pink. Actually, I did do that before in my home office and I loved it..I REMEMBER!!! AHA! I knew it seemed familiarly attractive. Korban…I did it first! Great minds think alike… now if he could just upgrade his mind a bit and use faux animal stuff he would be my number one fave of all time… but the animal cruelty is a bit of a problem… I still admire and LOVE his overall vision, style, color scheme and aesthetics. Breaking out in song: “we are the world, we are the children, we are the ones who make a betta place so let’s star given… Ok, I honestly don’t know where that came from…

Images by: Ditte Isager

I’m on full food photographer mode. I think I’m a bit more obsessed with food photography then interior/decor photography. Food+Decor=LOVE=Silvie’s world, party on, excellent…  I think I shopped all table top possible today. All I need is linens and wood planks in different colors which my sweet and talented husband is making for me this weekend. This book is true labor of family love.  Maryl has been editing text all week (as you all are learning about my grammar skills by reading my personal blog….not my bag) and we are gearing up for next weeks recipe testing and food shoot state of mind (enter: “Eye of the Tiger” song in my mind….).  Bring it!! I’m also excited to sometime soon feature some my favorite food photographers. To me, they are truly a huge doze of inspowerment and major spirit candy… Inner delish-ness.

For a while now I have been super attracted to the color purple, which, as you all know I’m sprinkling all over my home in decor accesories (except for the kitchen…hmmm..interesting….what does that mean?…..I must explore my mind for the answer), and as you all can see it’s totally trickling into my food photography color tear. “I can’t help it…It’s so beautiful.

By the way, I have noticed…I’m an end of the day blogger! This Mon-Fri blogging challenge (except for holidays and vacations) has been very interesting, in that I’m learning new things about my self, such as: I’m a night blogger, I love food photography more then decor photography, I’m officially obsessed with the color of purple (all hues), I’m more into color then I thought, I don’t have any purple in my wardrobe…at All..need to fix that, and I should probably do more images and less text before Maryl reads and flips over at all of my awesome grammar. Quite frankly (shrugging my shoulders) it is what it is, and I gotta keep on moving…… Breaking into song: no body gonna bre-ka my style, no body gonna hold me down OH NO, I gotta Keep on MoVIng…  =D

What song is currently on my mind as I write the end of this post?  I’ll just sing it: “She’s a night blogger…”….. I wish you could hear it as I sing it. I just made it up.

Images by: Petrina Tinslay

I will be art directing, food styling, and shooting most of the food photo shoot, so it’s a bit overwhelming but also SUPER FUN because food photography is one of my favorites EVER! (Second to interior design/decoration, of course).  I’ve been wanting to do a food photo shoot for a while now, so I’m super stoked.  I’m also looking forward to recipe testing (measuring? who dat?) with Maryl because we are such intuitive nutri-chefs. We create meals on the spot without measurements or recipes. It’s creative, in-tuning, as well as meditative. I don’t like to follow recipes because I’m so into molecular composition and quality ingredients (quality to us means: easy to digest, absorb, excrete) that if they are not up to my nourishing standards…forget it.

The next few days for me: food shopping, shopping for food shoot…shopping, shopping and the occasional “let’s make this ourselves.” Any chance I get to make it myself, I’m in. I have to stay focused because when I’m out shopping, my family calls me “caperucita roja”, which means Little Red Riding Hood in Spanish…Yes, it’s true, I usually sidetrack to home decor. But I need new drapes for my bedroom! (Which I’m making myself, thank-you-very-much). Maryl is gonna have to be my First A.D. to keep me on track.

In case you are wondering about the LOVELY artwork in this post, they are by the beautiful, empowered and very talented miss Enslee. I LOVE all her artwork!!! L-O-V-E IT. It’s definitely inspowering for me. The one at the top is obviously (in my eyes) Maryl and I. Wonder who is who? Totally reminds me of us! And the second one is me, tomorrow.  Obviously.

I LOVE white rooms and having white lacquered furniture is one of my favorite looks, but having ONE dark, black or blue  room is my ultimate faves (specially if the walls are high gloss. Currently, I’m SUPER attracted to blue and purple with black accents. I feel he need to incorporate these two colors throughout my home.  In the current home, my decor is mostly white and I have yet to find a nook or space to convert into black (my sister Pamela already when black walls on her home office and it’s very sexy). I’d like to do the foyer in black, but my mind is not 100 percent there. My current plan is to bring accent of black, purple and blue (in all hues) and sprinkle evenly in most rooms in things like pillows, accessories, and in new art that I’m creating. I love creating art my self…. or getting my husband to make it for me. My vision, then he makes it happen. Happy wife, happy life.

There is something soooo inspowering when I see a dark room that has texture, flair, sophistication, zebra or cheetah print, metal (brass or chrome) and of course flowers+quarts in it. These are some rooms that frequently grab my attention and I just stare at it like It’s a delicious dark green salad I want to create and have, as I begin to salivate. Yeah, seriously.

I’m actually replicating in my own style the circle art piece in this picture above, I really love it. But what I also love is the dark blue tones with the splashes of purple in it. LOVE IT. Isn’t the carpet amazing?

Velvet sofas are so sophisticate it and dreamy…. Yes please, I’ll take two. My husband and I have decided on velvet drapery in purple for our bedroom, but we have to find the right purple hue. I absolutely love purple. It’s perfect for our bedroom because our prosperity Gua in Feng Sui happens to be in our bedroom and one of the symbolic, corresponding colors for that Gua is purple.

I personally would not bring black into a bedroom (for energy/Feng Sui reasons) but I do love the palette and combination of furniture and texture in this bedroom above. The trellis wallpaper is amazing, I gotta use at some point somewhere cause I totally love it!

I mean…. this one above might be a bit too black all around for me, but the Gustavian style chandelier is amazing in such a contemporary room. That’s always my favorite combination. transitional with classic antique pieces and contemporary abstract art.

 Thick custom contemporary book shelving is something I LOVEEEEEEE. Three rows and filled with books laying flat on top of one another…. YES PLEASE.

Lacquered anything is a GO in my world, but specially having at least ONE lacquered, high gloss room, is a must! I just love that. LOVE LOVE LOVE. I think I made my point.

Am…. My favorite flower, the one and only: hydrangeas. I have them in almost every room of my house. My Top 5 fave flowers in order of love: 1) Hydrangeas, 2) Peonies 3) English Roses, 4) Orchids, 5) Dahlias.

There it is…that trellis wallpaper, my adoring hydrangeas, and that AMAZING antique mirror painted in black! What I really love about this room also is the thick white molding. I think that is what really makes the whole room come together…for me. …..Here we go underneath with the zebra print accent which is what takes the place of a trellis wallpaper, in my opinion. I’ll take both.

Zebra print table cloth

zebra print mirror frame

zebra print upholstery. It’s a zebra kind-a world. Dual realities.

 Image credits: Elle Decor, Architectural Digest, Jennifer Ferreira, Lonny, House Beautiful, Victoria Hagan.

It’s the third week of the new year, with the “new you” in full effect, and that may mean you’ve started to notice one of the consequences of major change: the effect of a new you on the people around you.

Making a change means adopting new habits, which implies leaving old habits behind – letting go of “old you”. This inevitably means that some people who were pretty used to the old you will probably feel the difference. Think about it.  If your relationships were based on who you were up to that point, and you decided to make big changes – maybe adopt a plant-based diet, or stop drinking, or go to spinning class instead of happy hour after work – then the people with whom you usually did your eating, drinking and hanging will feel the change too.

And with that comes a very scary question: Will everyone like the changes and support the new you? Or will some people miss the old you and even complain about the change?

Most people prefer the familiar – “business as usual” – even if it is not the best option for you or even for them (your friends and coworkers would benefit from positive changes, like adopting a healthier lifestyle). In fact, the new you may even make some of them feel down right uncomfortable (“why isn’t Sally drinking? Does she think alcohol is bad? Does she think I’m an alcoholic?”) Some may even demand the return of old you (“Bob used to be so funny – remember the time he ate five donuts in one sitting just ‘cause we dared him to? Let’s see if he’ll still do it.”)

Your change will have a ripple effect. All change does. Some people will welcome it and some won’t. Some will adapt and upgrade with you, be better for it, and those relationships will strengthen. Some others will resist – fight and attack, say “no” to the new you – but if they really care about you, they will eventually begin to support the new empowered person you’re becoming.

And some may even leave (and some new ones may show up).

The only thing you can do is be aware of this, be confident in the vision you have for yourself, and persevere. Because saying ‘yes’ to the old you to avoid upsetting someone else is actually saying ‘no’ to yourself. And that’s just about the unhealthiest thing you can do for yourself – and for anyone else.

So the real question – maybe the scariest, but also the most exciting of them all – is: How much do I love, respect and honor myself?  And what am I willing to do, and maybe lose, to prove it?