There is one lesson I learned really quick when I took the off grid plunge, and that lesson is it pays to be fit and healthy!
The reality is, if you are planning to homestead, you will either need a whole lot of money to pay others to build things for you, or you will need to build it yourself. Materials are a lot heavier than they appear. Wood, rock, dirt, all weigh much more than you would ever expect it to.
When I went off grid last year, I realized very quickly that I was more out of shape than I had realized. We had to build fences, dig ditches, construct structures, mount solar panels, and so much more. Everything takes more exertion and if you are not in the construction industry or a laborious career, you will quickly find out that it takes extreme effort, endurance, and physical strength to get your homestead up and running.
This flipside to this is you will become stronger every day that you work on your homestead. We used the natural soil under the trees to put into our raised beds. I dug up hundreds, if not thousands, of cubic feet of soil, wheeled it over to the garden, and dumped it into our cut barrels.
I was burning thousands of extra calories a day, just getting our garden ready for the season. We also constructed a 1500 square foot crop cage to keep birds and deer out of our garden. Pouring concrete, handling chicken wire, and erecting the framework built muscle and trimmed fat.
Key takeaway: Homesteading will make you buff!
But there is more than just being in good physical fitness to run a homestead.
Your mental and emotional state will be challenged, possibly on a daily basis. Mental fortitude is no joke, and homesteading likes to push the boundaries of what we can handle.
When you pour your heart and soul into a project, and things break, die, or simply don't go according to plan, your mental and emotional state will be tested. You will have doubts, feel depressed, cry, or want to give up.
It has happened to me several times, especially when our power inverter to our solar system got fried because mice got into it. I was so pissed off, I literally broke stuff. We put so much time, effort, energy, and money into this system, and all it took was one little mouse to sabotage the whole thing.
But, I recovered and moved forward, because I had to.
In this podcast episode, Cyrus and I talk about the strength you need to be a homesteader. I hope you listen to the podcast because this one I think really gets into what we all need a bit more of.
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Thanks for stopping by!
Sincerely, Regina Cal.
