Today is the day that we officially call ourselves Homesteaders.
Yes, we are noobs. Yes, we have more passion than practical skills, and naught more than a little capital and a book on how to make our own humanure in our go-bags. But nonetheless, here we are, documenting our journey in the relative permanence of the Steemisphere.
Our purpose for this online journal is to, of course, keep a record of our experiences, and our roadblocks (aka speed bumps), but also to hopefully help other noobs along the way. We have found two incredible communities here on Steemit for homesteading and natural living (love you, 
So, for our first journal entry, we will share our most recent developments and brainstorms!
Last week, we closed on the sale of our apartment up in Denver. This was actually terrifying for us, and anxiety inducing, as we had for a year been envisioning that apartment as a stable, passive income, our "nest egg". We made a sort of last minute decision to put it on the market while the market was hot (or at least luke warm), and all the while we fretted and paced and pondered about whether we were doing the right thing. Yes, we would get a nice lump of capital in our pockets, but the trade-off was "losing" our investment and passive income.
Two things happened that we did not expect.
One, once all the documents were signed sealed and delivered, we both panicked even MORE. I know for myself, I have always been the type of person to live paycheck to paycheck, surviving on a dime, a scrapper. My husband is much the same way, and neither of us grew up in situations where we were sitting on a financial nest egg (that we know of, anyway). We immediately thought, holy shit, what do we do with this? I have no doubt now that money, whether you have it or you don't, is truly the root of most stress in life. No doubt about that at all. We decided over dinner later in the week, now is the time for us to get our shit together and organize, write down some ideas, come up with a plan. Up to this point, we only had ideas of plans, things that seemed far away and a long way off.
Which brings me to the next thing we realized, that now the shit is real.
It feels a little like a fire being lit under both our asses. It's real! It's happening. This is no longer something in the distance, a far away dream of our little piece of heaven. This is actually happening, right now. What are we going to do next? We realized, selling that apartment also is, in a sense, untethering us from convention, from the month to month, from the grind, and from the grid. It feels both freeing and definitive, as though we have propelled ourselves in a certain direction, down a particular path. It wasn't the intention per se, but it's certainly where we are at now. So, we sat down with our Homesteading journal today and came up with goals.
Over the past couple months we have been doing research about what it takes to create a homestead out of thin air (and soil, and wood, and metal, and chickens, and water, and blood and sweat and tears, apparently all the great ingredients of a homestead). We put together a journal of all the things we need to research while we look for land, and some points we need to consider, like land rights, water rights, and all manner of other things pertinent to cultivating. We even reached out to the Homesteading community on Steemit, and posed the #100khomesteadchallenge, receiving some really amazing and insightful responses in return. What I left space for in the beginning of our journal, since at the time we didn't have the emotional space to handle the question yet, was Our Goals.
Well, one nice thing about having a fire lit under your ass, is it's great for brainstorming and talking about goals.
So here we are, post initial brainstorming sesh, and I have got to tell y'all right here and now, IT FEELS AMAZING.
Aside from the moment my partner and I decided to get married, I have never in my life ever felt anything else that felt so right as sitting together and brainstorming our goals for our simple Colorado homestead. It's energized, it's inspired, it's... totally in the flow, and way on fleek! We asked each other what our main drive is for building a homesteading life, and our answers were very different, but both pertinent.
Turns out, his main drive is rooted in self-reliance and detachment from the system, the grid.
Mine is to reconnect with nature and community and all those things have to offer.
And after that, our secondary drives are the same, to not just survive, but to thrive.
As we sat and journaled together, we were pleasantly surprised to find that already present in our lives, in our plans, in our communities, in our minds and hearts and energies, so much abundance. We are abundant! I'm not talking about cash flow or skills, I am talking about pure energy. There's a sense of gratitude for what we have now, and for the process as well.
I believe that the best things we realized today are these few, simple things:
Our abundance. Our gratitude. Our willingness to do something that is built on passion, on intention, on livelihood, on connection... and strangely, disconnection, or perhaps better worded as reconnection in new and unconventional ways.
We are already thriving.
And it feels awesome.
We also realized, so much of our primary goals are things we are already doing, things we've been working on for years, even before we ever met and started talking about homesteading.
The rest are details. Important details, yes, but details nonetheless. My husband said this morning when we woke up, You know, I was thinking, as we come upon roadblocks and hard times, I think we will look at them as speed bumps, as manageable details. There isn't anything that together we can't come up with a decent solution for.
I couldn't agree more!
Earth Folk, our people, may our lives be filled with gratitude and joy, and connection. Good vibes going out to the universe and all us connected folk today!
Xx The Tree of Life
All images are my own!
To read an awesome article on the passion we have for Thriving, and Community, please check out this post!
https://steemit.com/naturalmedicine/@thetreeoflife/off-grid-living-and-the-importance-of-enthusiastically-embracing-community
To check out the #100khomesteadchallenge, or to read the amazing entries, please click this link!
https://steemit.com/ghsc/@thetreeoflife/homesteader-knowledge-results-of-the-100khomesteadchallenge
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