The Homestead Mindset

As I am sure you can guess, I talk to everyone I can about being self sustainable. I have come to the conclusion that most people do not even know what it is to have a homestead mindset. It is almost like homestead has been educated or programed out of people. Especially those who have a desire to make the homestead life way to make a living. I am going to try to explain why I think people no longer understand what it means to make a living on the homestead and the things we can do to get the homestead mindset back.

The homestead life is about cash flow not salary. We have been taught that our hourly wage or our monthly salary is what matters. We look at our financial lives and the decisions we make in lieu of monthly payments and whether or not we can get overtime or bonuses. People have not looked at things that way for very long. I have talked to a lot of people who could not live without knowing when their next payday will occur. A person who truly lives off of a homestead may know within a few days when pay will come, but it is not normally everyday. A farmer may only get one payday a year. The farmer's expenses continue just like everyone else... well kind of.

My family is fairly new on the road to self sustainability, I am not new to this lifestyle. I was blessed to have been raised in a family that believed in producing as much of our own food as possible. Just the other day my daughter asked me, "When was the last time we had to buy eggs?". I told her ,"Well baby, it has been a couple of months. "She said "That is awesome". We haven't had to buy green onions in months. My goal this year is to produce as much of our own food as possible. That means less money that has to be spent for our food. A true homesteader is not just interested in a profit.They are interested in producing as much of what they need and finding a way of turning their over production into an income. I am not saying that there are not folks that run a business in conjunction with their homestead. I know several who do just that. Homesteading is more about knowing that you can provide for yourself no matter what happens.

Let me say right here I do not see anything wrong with a person making millions of dollars because they invented or improved a product. Awesome for them. What I am saying is the person whose sole focus is on earning or amassing more and more money is missing something in their life. I have known a few people like this. They are never happy. When they make X amount of money one year, their goal is to make a certain amount more next year. They run their life like a corporation. Anytime they meet someone with more money than they have, they will not rest until they have learned how this person did it and have made just as much. Again I say if your primary desire in life is earning more and more money please, look at your life and see if you can find something else that will fulfill you.

The first duty of a homestead family is to provide for their family, then for their neighbors, and finally for a profit. There is no shame in making a profit. But you cannot view profit in the normal mindset. Profit is after you have produced enough for your family. Think self sustainable. Don't get into debt for anything except real property.Pay off the debts you have. We must break the chains of financial slavery.

No one can produce everything they need. No one can know all the skills they will need. The important thing is to know we cannot do it all. Do what we are best at and work with others who do different things better.If we do this,we can trade what each of us do best. This is called a symbiotic relationship. Community is important. We should be able to rely on each other. We can reduce our dependence on government and corporate powers. We just have to change our mindset and be more homestead minded.

We can learn to.

Keep It Rural