About New Homesteading
Post 56:
It’s always the dream of the thinking person to believe you’re in the midst of some epochal change. I’m talking about a revolution, whether it be intellectual, spiritual, or governmental. Something BIG.
Maybe it’s not a dream. This will probably be the first in a series of posts I do on the subject of New Homesteading. It’s a nascent philosophy, and like all fledgling threads of thought, it will either gain traction or collapse under the weight of its own inadequacy.
Have to start by defining our terms. By New Homesteading, I’m talking about the future and what it means to make it in this world. Looking at what’s available, I see ubiquitous technology and almost infinite means to disseminate whatever product or idea you want to. The internet is like the west in the age of Manifest Destiny, only there’s no Pacific Ocean on the other end. You know, pending an all-out apocalypse or something like that.
Looking at what’s not available, I see over-priced college and other institutional forms of education. Now, we still need our doctors and engineers, so higher education is obviously relevant to some extent, but for the most part, this is becoming a “teach yourself” world. Guess what I didn’t know how to do three months ago? Make a website, start a blog, publish a book, God help me, “tweet.” Okay, that’s three things, and right now they’re admittedly small. But with a little help from friends and some mental elbow grease, things are happening. I’m not looking to be an overnight sensation, but you have to start somewhere.
But this thing isn’t about me. That was just a little example. Let’s return to the old days for a second, when land was in abundance. Folks of all levels of skill ventured out into frontier to set up their life and make it work. Besides the people living on the next farmstead, it was the definition of do-it-yourself. Dig a well, plant your crops, build a house, all that animal husbandry, get your wife pregnant twenty times so you have people to work around the house. Quite a lot. How many of us could do that now? Very few, close to none. And these folks weren’t the educated, not the elite. Now you could argue that a lot of those intrepid frontier folk ended up dying a cold, horrible death. I won’t argue back, but I will say this: there is a west. All kind of states and cities and everything. So it must’ve worked for somebody.
I won’t go on too long, but I’ll wrap up and wrap up my definition. The New Homesteading is based more on the sovereign ability of the individual to learn and do his or her own thing. It’s becoming easier and easier to turn your hobby or skill into something that one day might make you some money. It makes less and less sense to work for somebody else. Anybody have superiors that they’re sick of? Guess what, when you’re out on your own, the only superiors are your own lack of initiative or scarcity of money or influence.
Okay, scarcity of influence sucks. Scarcity of money sucks. But remember those old days. They were scarce on, let’s see… everything. And a lot of them made it.
Go west, my friends. See you after.
