I love Fall.  I love the colors, cooler temperates and cozy sweatshirts.  It’s trips to the cider mill, cinnamon sugar donuts and pumpkin everything.  I love fall candles, Halloween preparations and turning on the fireplace for the first time when cooler weather hits.  It’s magical.  One of the other signs of Fall is the arrival of Autumn Squash Soup at Panera.  It is so good!  It is cozy in a cup and this year I had the crazy idea I could replicate it at home.  Armed with my Instant Pot and the frozen Butternut Squash from Costco, I stepped into the arena of my kitchen with all the hopes of a middle school basketball team about to win their local tournament!

I am not a great cook.  I did not inherit any cooking skills, but sometimes I’m just inspired to do better or make something yummy!  I have become more adventurous since I received an Instant Pot for my birthday two  years ago.  The wonderful people posting recipes in the Instant Pot Community on Facebook do all the hard work for me.  They make it, post pictures and tell me how easy it is to make and delicious it is going to be.  They take the guess work out of it!

I was a little surprised when I opened the Instant Pot a couple of weeks ago and added the last ingredient to the copycat autumn squash recipe.  I should have known better.  I do not like greek yogurt and this recipe called me to add a half cup of greek yogurt at the end.  Even with the yogurt it was still too thin and now smelled terrible because the smell of greek yogurt is nauseating to me.  Kevin was so gracious.  He thought it was ok, but I immediately drove to Panera and bought two cups of soup to bring back home.  I needed him to taste the real thing so he could know the imposter was a terrible stand in.

I did not lose hope.  I tried two other recipes.  They were ok, but not the real thing.  I love leftovers and could not make myself eat what was left of these soups.

A few nights ago, Kevin made dinner in the Instant Pot.  He had to clean out some fake autumn squash soup out of the Instant Pot liner in order to make his dish.  He asked me, “Are you mad that I got rid of the soup?”  I emphatically said, “No.  It’s not good.  It’s not the real thing and I’ve obsessed so much over this that the real thing doesn’t even sound good anymore.”  He just laughed at me.  He knew how much I loved that soup and I had ruined a staple of fall by trying to replicate the real thing.

I keep coming back to this thought about ruining the real thing.  I do it all the time.  I settle for something that is OK.  I do it for a variety of reasons and in different areas of my life.  As I stare down the barrel of my 40’s, I don’t want to live in the OK anymore.  I don’t want to be OK with the imposter life.  I want to live my life and experience the real deal.  I want genuine relationships.  I don’t want to miss out on anything because of fear. I want healthy boundaries and the ability to know who I am.  I want to courageously take risks and humbly admit when I’m wrong.  I want to be able to say, “No, thank you,” and not be overcome with shame.  I want to say, “Yes,” to things I have only dreamed about doing and not listen to the negative voices in my head or in the periphery.

I am going to continue to be brave and try new things.  My Instant Pot opened up a new world in my kitchen and my failures with my Instant Pot have helped me realize how I can be better in many areas of my life.