While studying for my undergraduate degree I realized how lucky I was as a single mom to have a supportive community of leaders to guide me on my journey with compassion. As hard as it is for me to admit, I was struggling. While I was studying Sustainable Food Systems, I was able to slowly realize how malnourished I was. Protein bars and sugar filled coffees were not going to cut it anymore. I was sacrificing what money and energy I had to make sure my child was fed everyday with the best balanced meals and organic snacks I could find on a work-study student's budget. Upon talking to my academic advisor I learned that other students were struggling to find nourishing meals too. With Prescott College sustainability funds, I designed and implemented my own small way of giving back to my community through food. I began a weekly event in my first semester of my undergraduate degree, which has been running for close to four years now. Every Tuesday, Prescott College students come together to create a fully from scratch meal completely for free with locally sourced produce from the Prescott College campus gardens and the Prescott Farmers Market. Seeing how positively people can come together through preparing food and eating together made me want to dive even further into the food systems. This led me to becoming a certified Yavapai County Master Gardener during my undergraduate studies. I thought being a master gardener would be the highest achievement in the food systems world. Weekly, I volunteer my time to the public sharing scientific education around gardening. I learned quickly that there was a disconnect that people in the community were having. There was pretty landscapes being grown and no nutritional benefits. I am seeking to enhance my nutritional knowledge to back up why growing certain polycultures of plants is necessary for the soil health and for their body. Providing an all encompassing cohesive relationship between the plants, the nutrients and our bodies to my fellow humans is the goal. I aspire to learn about how our food affects our social community, physical wellbeing and our mental health. Through my education I have a strong will and belief that our health in all aspects, mental and physical should be addressed through the root causes. Being healthy should not be difficult and confusing misinformation. We should all have the ability to know how to nourish our minds, bodies, and souls.