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Episode #222: Pitchfork Pulpit: Joel Salatin Gets Personal · Beyond Labels Premium

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Hello, welcome to another episode of Beyond Labels.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Dr.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: Stina McCullough, and I'm here with our favorite farmer Joel Salatin.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: And you are going to be so excited because Joel has just released another book.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's called Pitch Fork Pulpit: Wisdom and Practice in a Self-Reliant Life.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: And boy, that sounds like a must-have, especially for our younger generation coming up, right?
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: How to be self-reliant and to get the wisdom and the practical know-how from a seasoned expert like you is just uh I mean, this is like you got to put it on your nightstand and just look at it every night, right?
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: This is amazing.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: Now, it's only available in the polyface store right now through it up until Christmas, right, Joel?
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then after Christmas, it will be available on Amazon.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: But right now, go to the Polyface store.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: We will have a link in the show description that will bring you directly to this book.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Joel, this is incredible.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know how you do it with all of your traveling, your farming, the podcast, and then you churn out another book and your columns that you write.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: I forgot.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: And then you churn out another book on top of all that.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: So this is truly amazing.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: How do you do it?
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I I cheated on this one, Cena.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: This I call this this is my this is my first cheating book.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: So uh so for years, uh, you know, I'm friends with Wendell Berry, and of course, many of our listeners, of course, know Wendell Berry and uh my mentor Alan Nation, uh, who founded Stopman Grass Farmer, and uh I would always uh uh chide them or joke with them.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: I said, You guys, you guys aren't fair.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: I said, um, you know, you you just write all these articles and columns, and when you get enough to fill a book, you sift through them, you pick your favorite one, and you make it the title of the book, and you compile them and you have a book.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: I said, When when I start sit down to write a book, I start with a blank piece of paper and just start start writing, you know.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I I would joke with both Wendell and Alan over the years uh about you know that they were cheating the system.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's not fair.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I've now cheated the system um by by compiling a list, so there these are in chronological order, starting in in um in 19 or in 20, sorry, in 2014, um when I started writing the pitchfork pulpit column for Mother Earth News.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I don't want to belabor the point about you know how we how that got terminated.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: It got terminated as part of all the fallout in 2020.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: And uh we had a parting of the ways, and um, and and so that column terminated.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: But for six years, I wrote this monthly column for Mother Earth News called the Pitchfork Pulpit.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I always felt like some it was some of my best writing.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: One of the reasons is because Mother Earth News was extremely um so so they they let me give a little background.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: They they commissioned a um a study of their clientele, the the politics, the the geopolitics of their clientele.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: And they had this one of the questions was uh on a scale of one to ten, one being uh a libertarian anarchist almost, and ten being a socialist communist, uh, where are you on the political spectrum?
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: And and their they had 50% response was either was one and two or nine and ten.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, there there wasn't any middle of the roaders.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you're either you're either a rabid, you know, uh socialist, you know, leftover, beaded, bearded, brawless hippie, you know, from Woodstock, or you're a homeschool, fundamental, faith-based, you know, libertarian, you know, a Ron Paul fan.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so so for me, one of the most interesting things of writing these six years of columns from Mother Earth News was that I had never written for such a broad-based eclectic clientele.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: And so I was, I wrote always very conscious that I'm writing for I'm I'm writing for the Amish, you know, as well as Bernie Sanders, okay?
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: AOC.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, and that's a that's a pretty broad bridge, you know, to try to to try to put one foot in one side, one foot in the other.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: So as a result of it, I feel like that these columns captured the best of my heart in respecting both of those camps and trying to bring both of them into a a disentangled, self-reliant kind of life experience.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: I I have never written for anything like that before or since.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: You know, normally, you know, a magazine or something, you know, is is either a little bit right, a little bit left, a little bit religious, a little bit, you know, atheist.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, what you know, they they they kind of have this this persona.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: But but uh at Mother Earth News, it was not like that.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: It was extremely uh um eclectic and and actually well balanced on both sides.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so that that tended to bring out, I think, um what what could be presented as very strident, as a very strident argument in most places, uh, became a much more um conciliatory and uh and gentle argument, you know, in this context.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: And it was a big hit, right?
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: Your column was hugely.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, guaranteed monthly column, their only really named column.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody else, I mean, they had other writers, but nobody else had a column.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: And um and you know, what was neat was that that you know, I I I was able to to bridge that, you know, to bridge that divide.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: And um and that was enjoyable.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: So, so uh this is the first book I've cheated on by actually not sitting down with a blank piece of paper and writing it uh and compiling these columns.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I may do some more of that because you know, my as the older I get, the more I'm realizing that I I have quite a legacy of stuff that a lot of young people today, you know, 30-year-olds, don't even know that I was writing before they were born, you know, and and if you're if you're not looking for that, you're not going to find it.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, the Stoppman Grass Farmer articles that I did and my column there was the pastoralist.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: So that book will be the pastoralist.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: So that'll be that'll be 30 years of columns.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, those were a lot shorter than the Mother Earth News columns.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but those actually many of them are unfindable now because they go back pre-digital.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, and the Stockman Grass Farmer uh inventory, their offices burned 15 years ago, and that's where they had everything stored.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: They literally do not have those those first 15 years of of magazines anymore.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: Oh wow.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: They they they don't exist.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: And um and so so some of that early stuff, and and I think there too is a value in some when you're starting today, um, in a value in walking through my early thinking.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I've evolved in my thinking and all that, and and and the whatever, the the mastery of my practice, if you will.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: And it's easy to just assume, well, you know, he's always had it figured out.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it's good to go back to the early days when we were uh much more struggling with with the tensions that newbies struggle with today, uh, and and and walk through that, you know, that with with folks.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: So as you were doing that in this book, Pitch uh Pitchfork Pulpit, did you say those earlier columns when you were more like of the newbie, did you provide any you know now Joel insights on it, or you just kept it pure as it is?
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like did you do a little update section?
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, I didn't.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_01: I I put them in exactly now, they are in chronological order.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: So the first one was written in 2014, so that's now what 11 years old.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: And the first column was on um and and about about I'm gonna say 30 of these columns were were just columns that I wanted to do, you know, out of my own head, and 70% were columns that they were responding to reader questions and reader reader input.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: We'd like Joel to talk about this.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: And so 70% of them were pretty much reader-inspired, and 30% of them were just out of the blue.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: And um, and so the first column was um was titled Price Elitism.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to tackle the whole idea that this, you know, this local food thing is is elitist.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: So um, you know, I'm I'm a I'm a you know communicator, messenger, soundbite guy.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: And so I ask here, can we sound bite our way into a discussion about the price of food?
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: Can we articulate a charitable, non-offensive answer that challenges this allegation of elitism?
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: And and you know, one of the things is as Cena, as you, when you asked me to do this, I was kind of thumbing through a little bit, and I realized how timeless truth is.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: And even though this is 11 years old, it could have been written yesterday and it's still current.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: So there's even though even though some of this is a little bit dated now, you know, a decade ago, um, it's still it still um rings true.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: So uh, you know, I don't have a uh uh so I say in here, I don't know if I have an answer, but I have some proposals like to offer proposals I'd like to offer uh for size.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: Each sound bite is a question, not a direct assault, which you know me in debate and argumentation lots of times, you get farther by asking questions than by preaching.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so um, so so here here are my questions on on trying to get somebody to wrestle with the the the price elitism, you know, the the the high price thing.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: And and we get this all the time, still.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: Still, people, you know, how can your hamburger be, you know, eight dollars a pound, whatever.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: And and so number one, have you bought anything recently you didn't need?
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: Guilty, all of us have, and I have a list of you know, alcohol designer jeans with holes already in the knees, you know.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, Joel comment.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, that's right.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: Gotta show off some skin.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um especially in the winter.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like it must be fashionable.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, tobacco, people magazine, lottery tickets, um, you know, movie tickets, whatever, you know.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: But but uh look, the fact is we do we do spend money on things we don't need.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: And and so um just number two, have you cooked have you cooked a meal from scratch?
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: And you and I have talked about this a lot on on this podcast of the cost of convenience food.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, my revelation was like two months ago, you know, I was in the I was in at Kroger's getting a birthday card, and I I always go by the meat counter, and I saw um um lunchables for the first time.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: I I've I I've heard about them, heard about I've never seen one.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: Lunchables.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: Fourteen dollars a pound.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: Fourteen dollars, half of it's bread.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, really?
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: Are you kidding me?
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: Fourteen dollars a pound for lunchables?
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: I mean But it's prepared for you, Joel.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you just hand it to your kid.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: There you go.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's all done, it's prepared for you.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: But um, but you know, we you and I have talked routinely about how to save money.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: You buy bulk, you buy, you cook from scratch, and you, you know, all right.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, number three, what is more valuable to you than integrity food for your children?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: You know, answer that for me.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: What what is more valuable to you than integrity food for your children?
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: Well, not much.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: Any mom is gonna want, you know, healthy food for her kids.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: And number four is uh, have you grown anything yourself?
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: Because when you grow things yourself, you realize how hard it is to grow things, and suddenly you appreciate people who know how to grow things.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: So so you know, those are those are four, those are four quick little, you know, so these columns, they run the gamut of of food farm culture messaging to you know to to practical practical how-to.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um so what what are some of the practical how-to topics that are covered uh in this book?
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: Is it like for a beginner, for example, gardener?
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: Is it for a seasoned gardener?
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: Is it for all of the above?
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: All all all the above, all the above.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um for example, here's here's one in 2015, hoarding or hydrating.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: And it's all about ponds.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: Are ponds hoarding water or hydrating?
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: And anybody who knows me knows I'm a pond lover.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so I I present the argument not only for why ponds are hydrational and not hoard hoard hoard hoardational, but you know, because a lot is like like in Colorado, it's illegal to have a rain barrel uh uh under your under your gutter of your house, uh, because they consider that hoarding water.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_01: Oh wow, yeah.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and so so numerous states have a real prohibition on pond building, uh, they call it hoarding water.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: So if you can't have a w um a rain barrel in Colorado, I'm assuming you also can't make a pond to catch the water.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: That's correct.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: That's correct.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: Now you can drill a well, you can drill a well and pump the aquifer dry, but you can't build a pond.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's it's outrageous, you know.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's it's nuts.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um but you know, so so I I I present an argument, you know, raindrops that don't hang around create erosion, flooding, and deserts.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: Holding raindrops that would otherwise cascade downhill actually adds to the net water holding capacity of the ecosystem.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_01: Ponds add evaporative moisture to the atmosphere, increasing humidity and cloud forming capacity.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: Ponds help maintain spring and stream flow in dry times, not only by seeping slightly, seeping slightly into the landscape, but also by providing useful water for irrigation.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, I I go into the you know to the basic um concepts uh about about you know just just making the point that pond building is not hoarding water, it is hydrating the landscape.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, I go into the historical fact that you know the North America was um was eight percent water 500 years ago, and now we're less than four percent, even with all the ponds and lakes and TVA and everything that you know, Army Corps of Engineers, all that we've done, we we're still below half of what we were 500 years ago when the beavers were here.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I was gonna say, is that because we lost the beavers?
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: Lost the beavers, yeah.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: It that wow, what a profound example of how you change one thing in the ecosystem, and it can have this huge domino effect.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it really can.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: Then um and and and then then there's there's uh you know, this this one's pretty practical, you know, um written in 2015 about about scalability.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: How do you how do you scale?
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, you're a you're a little homesteader, and and scalability um must be seamless both up and down in order to satisfy world hunger and at the same time accept any participant.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, I'm I'm completely non-prejudicial on scale.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: I like big scale, I like small scale, as opposed to the industrial system, which only works at large scale.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: And and so so I'm all about a about scale neutrality from a a working standpoint.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: What we desperately need is scale neutrality, not scale prejudice.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: And so um here are some commonalities among scalable systems.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: Number one, portable infrastructure, number two, do-it-yourself infrastructure, you know, things you can do yourself.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: Number three, additional units rather than bigger stationary buildings.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I've definitely refined that that concept bigger to point out to now use the term duplicative systems rather than centralized systems.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, in other words, we we scale by by units.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, that's the way that's the way nature scales.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: If nature wants more calves, more cattle, it doesn't make a bigger cow, it makes more calves.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: If nature wants more tomatoes, it doesn't make a great big tomato plant, you plant more tomatoes.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: So so nature's nature's scale system is duplicative.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: The industrial system is not about duplication, it's about centralization and consolidation and making an existing thing bigger on site rather than berthing additional ones that are moderate-sized all around the country.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: And we know we go to we go to you know, COVID.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: Would we have had as big a hiccup in our food system in 2020 if instead of being served by 300 mega processing facilities, our food system had been served by 300,000 community-scaled systems?
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so so duplication.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that makes so much sense.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: I love it when you compare things to nature because it just it instantly it's like, oh yeah, that's how it should be done.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: It just resonates with me.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_00: Even kids, you ask the kids, and it just makes sense to them.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's common sense.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: Uh if one unit works, build more units, you know, rather than think rather than thinking about how big you can build something, think how small it can be and remain viable in function and profit.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, number four, multi-purpose infrastructure.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, think about how many different uses you can get out of a thing.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: And then number five, use it.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_01: Use it.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: Don't let a machine or building sit empty or idle.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: Depreciation goes on whether it's used or not.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: If you own it, use it.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: Rent as long as possible, own as a last resort, and only when you have enough volume to justify the expense.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: Farmer neighbors work cheap, they're used to not making any money anyway.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: Scale is a real and complex issue in any discussion involving ag models.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, that that that one is is is actually quite you know quite practical in in the kind of thing.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um there's here's another one in in 2015.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh it's um it's a it's a um a sample farm policy letter.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: If if I if I could have a pitch deck for every elected uh official in the United States, what would I tell them?
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: What would be my my farm policy letter?
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: And um so just a couple a couple points.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_01: Number one, nature is more powerful than you.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: That's good for them to understand.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_01: Nature's more powerful than you.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: Number two, freedom and innovation require protecting the lunatic fringe.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, that'll be the day.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: Number three, number three, you'll love this one.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_01: Experts are usually wrong.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: But isn't that the truth?
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: It is.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: And wait, did you write the In 2015, you said 2015.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, wow.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_01: And number four, modern economic health calculations are absurd.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: So those are those are four things that I would like every elected official, you know, to uh to know.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, it's a it's it's a broad, it's it's a broad span of of both um, I mean, here's one in 2017 on homestead grazing.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, so I've got I've got a very small acreage, you know, five acres, and I want to have a cow or you know, three sheep.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, how how do I do that?
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: So, or you know, some chickens.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, uh I I have here, you know, very, very small unit grazing.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, this is a little bit, you know, it's a little bit uh mathematical and scientific because it's animal units and you know, square footage and that sort of thing, but highly practical for a very, very small, you know, acreage for for grazing.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um here's one in 2017, um, composting manure.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_01: How do you how do you compost manure and how do you do it um simply?
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_01: Because one of the biggest uh you know and and realize this is all pre-COVID.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: This is all pre-COVID.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: Think what's happened in the homestead space since COVID.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it it's it's an expl.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_01: So all this was written pre pre this, you know, homesteaders of America, homestead festival in Columbia.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I'm just the Ozarks Homesteading Festival, the the uh modern homesteading uh one in Court d'Alain, Idaho.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: I've just uh the Food Independent Summit in Ohio, I've just named what five of those.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: All five of those get 5,000 to 7,000 attendees.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: And and and that's five of them.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_01: And there are tons more that are not as big, but but you know, none of that was happening at this time.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: None of this was happening when I was writing this.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_01: But what I've what I've learned uh as this as this homesteading movement has grown substantially is one of the biggest um deficiencies on small acreages is how do I get enough compost to be meaningful?
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: I want to plant some apple trees, I want to have some garden beds, uh I want to do plant some strawberries or you know, blackberry vines, whatever.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_01: And how do I how do I get enough compost to to do anything?
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: And and so this chapter is is about the whole deep bedding concept as a concept with with chickens, with a couple of pigs, with a couple of sheep, with a cow, uh, to go to a deep bedding system.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, I was just I was I was just yesterday on a on a uh consultation in North Carolina.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: I do a lot of farm consulting, and um, you know, it's a small farm, 80 acres.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: It's a you know, it's bigger than a homestead, but you know, a relatively small farm.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: And you couldn't find an earthworm casting in the field.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there was not an earthworm casting in the field.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: We walked the whole place, couldn't find earthworm casting in the field.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: And um and yet there were cows, there were, you know, they had horses, and and there's except for just a little bit of of um a couple of horse stable cleanings, there's no compost generated on the farm.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: So the result is that there's nothing, there's nothing actually, there's no fertility program, no ongoing, you know, strategic fertility program on the land on the landscape.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: And so so we talked about you know uh feeding hay to the cows and uh they had a uh a wonderful hoop structure that they that they had put up.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um and man, I mean that thing was gorgeous, and they got it at some auction.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: It was it had it was new, but it was surplus stuff at some auction.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: They got for like 2,000 bucks this big uh 4,000 square foot, you know, hoop structure, and uh it was it was fantastic.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um so you know, it was it was being about 20% utilized.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, well, how about going to the woods and cutting a few poles and just uh zip zip tying them or bailer tying them to the to the hoops so you have a little bit of a wall and and keep your cows in here, and suddenly you're gonna have you're gonna have enough compost to cover you know 10 acres of your place.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um instead of having it all leached down to groundwater or or or vaporize, you know, in the winter when you're feeding hay, rolling it out in the field.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: And um and so so anyway, so I've I've got a whole chapter on on composting manure.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, how do you how do you generate um um you know piles of manure?
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, feeding chickens, different, different ways, different things to feed chickens.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: Then there's you know, there's a chapter on uh on permaculture.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of people have never heard of permaculture.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: One on preparing for emergencies.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know, how do we how do we get ready for you know for if all the wheels fall off?
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, from uh energy, food, uh, electricity, you know, different things.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um you know, 2018 prepping for spring.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I don't want to bore people, but I hope I'm I'm hope I'm encouraging folks with the with the with the the comprehensiveness of these topics.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: I mean they're that they they cover a lot of a lot of things.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh how to use animals to um you know to to to get work done.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um 2018, mutual interdependence.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh do it yourself and self-reliance life themes are wonderful to a point.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: Questioning DIY themes in a homestead-style publication may seem heretical, but I'm going to pursue a secondary idea: building community relationships.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: Every movement runs the risk of becoming cultish or at least overrunning its original objectives.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um and so I propose a balance called mutual interdependence.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: So I have a list here of um of a dozen things we can invest in to make our farmstead run more effectively.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um number one, hiring front-end loader work.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_01: You don't need to own a front-end loader.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_01: You can rent one or you have a neighbor with one.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: Take him a Thanksgiving turkey, and he'll come over and you know use your use his front-end loader for you.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um number two, a slaughter, a slaughter experts for large animals.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, you can you can do them, you know, in your on your on your own farm.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh number three, a milk cow.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_01: Number four, hauling cattle.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, find people that can haul your cattle.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh five, a delivery driver.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you don't you don't need to be delivering everything.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um get a friend or a relative to be your delivery driver.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh number six, sales agents.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, other people to sell.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of people, you know, they don't want to, they don't want to sell anything.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, number seven, a mechanic.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh many homesteaders are not good mechanics, but you know, you might have a neighbor or friend or relationship with somebody who who is a mechanic.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, a bookkeeper.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of people don't like keeping books or aren't good at keeping books.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, find somebody that enjoys bookkeeping, you know, accounting, uh, excavation.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: You don't need to buy equipment to to you know build a pond or do some excavation, you know, hire somebody to do it.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_01: Web design, if you're into if you want to sell what you're producing, um, you know, uh get somebody to to develop your website that is good at it.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, those are all things where you build this this mutual interdependence.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um, when I do when I do um interviews now, uh media interviews, and and people often ask, if you had to do over again, you know, what would you change?
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_01: And without a question, the number one thing I would change is I would build a team earlier.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: I would not be so independent that I refuse to get other people on the team.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_01: That doesn't mean that they have to go on salary or get wages, it just means that you get expertise, talent, or experience that you don't have.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_01: And and and compensation can come from a lot of different ways.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_01: It can come from barter, it can come from, well, I can go help you, you know.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I've told the story often, you know, of the we went years without without a hay baler.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_01: I had a neighbor with a hay baler, but he worked, he worked a town job.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so I would get his hay ready, and when he came home from work, then I'd catch it on a wagon, he'd drive the baler.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_01: And then when he was at work, Teresa and I would run his baler over to our farm and we'd bail our hay while he was at work, and it, you know, uh, and we shared it, and that kept us from having to buy a baler.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_01: So there are a lot of those kinds of things, you know, that you can do.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think that the I I love, well, I love all the topics that you brought up so far, of course.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: And this sounds like an incredible encyclopedia of wisdom and uh practical application.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_00: I particularly love this topic.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I think this is an easy one to just kind of overlook as well, because we're also focused on, oh, let's get the garden up, let's get the chickens in, right?
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_00: But I think, like to your point, this is such an important subject, in part because of burnout and just how overwhelmed people are becoming and and have been now.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I mean, I know at least for the last 10 years, it's all I'm hearing from other moms is just how overwhelmed and overworked they are.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_00: And this reminds me of, you know, our good friend uh Melissa Norris, yeah, um, who's been on our program before.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: She's she's a doll.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_00: I just love her.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_00: She came out with a podcast um actually in October.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: And the title is Why I'm Pressing Pause.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: And she talks about you know how uh reaching burnout and the needing to slow down, breathe, rest, and she says to live in step with the natural rhythms of the season.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: And um, oh, I'm kind of getting tearing.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_00: I just because the podcast goes into her physical ailments that she has been experiencing because she hadn't slowed down and how she regrets it.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: But it's, you know, and we talked about this too, like the symptoms that your body is showing you, right?
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's communication with you to let you know something's out of balance.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_00: You know, this to me, this is God talking to me, saying something in your life is out of balance.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_00: And to hear her tell her story of just you know, fighting this element, and then this one went away, and then she fought this one, and then you know, it was my heart just went out to her, and I could relate.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I know everybody, if you listen to that podcast, you can relate as well.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: So she has done the hard step of giving herself the permission to pause, to rest.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_00: And she talks about how um it's actually um like a Christian thing to do that, and that she's actually um becoming she's a steward of that the Bible tells you that there's seasons of work and seasons of of rest and that we need to care for ourselves.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so what you're saying, it it goes hand in hand with what's happening to her and what she's now doing, because you know, when I started out thinking about homesteading, I was like, oh, I have to be self-sufficient, I gotta have my garden, I gotta have my chickens, like I gotta be able to have all the food for my family myself and not bring any inputs in, right?
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: Like make my own compost, for example.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_00: And it became overwhelming very fast as I even just struggled to produce something out of the garden, you know.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and but now I'm to the point where I'm thinking, well, no, because that's not even how tribes lived in the past.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_00: They all work together, you know, like some hunted, some foraged, for example, if you want to go way back or whatever.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_00: So now it's like that whole shift in the perception.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like I don't have to be completely sufficient by myself.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: That's why you have a local community.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: And like you said, you can trade things.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't have to grow everything.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_00: My neighbor can grow something else, and then we trade them, you know.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it's what you're saying, and in just that one column is so important.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_00: And it's really like, don't just read it and move on.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_00: Really think about that.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you know, whether you're a beginner or you're seasoned, really think about how you can start taking some stuff off your plate and and start trying to, it will, it will actually help strengthen your community as well, right?
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_00: By relying on each other um to become you know independent as a local uh community and self-sufficient as a local community.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, almost every single homesteader I know is sick.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: They're sick with some kind of chronic illness.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: And you can see, like they don't even all know it yet because they haven't got a quote unquote label of a diagnosis, but you can see it in their bodies.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_00: You can start seeing some inflammation, for example, and you can, um, they're starting to have some kind of symptoms that are coming on.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_00: But of course, like all of us, we kind of, you know, downplay the symptom or poo-poo it because it hasn't stopped us in our tracks yet.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_00: And that's exactly what Melissa Norris talked about.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_00: She downplayed it because she was still able to do, and it's the drive to keep going and going and going and do the next thing and the next thing.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_00: So really take heed with what this advice that you're giving to people.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_00: And even if you don't homestead, it's fabulous advice that you could apply to all these other aspects of your life because we're all seemingly overwhelmed.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I kid you not, I can almost guarantee that everybody out there has at least one symptom.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so, what are you gonna do about it?
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_01: Well, um, yeah, there's so many good good nuggets that you just shared.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I couldn't help but thinking of of the the development now.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I I I've we homeschooled our kids when it was illegal, way, way back, you know, in the in the late 80s.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I'm thinking today of since that time when it was all, you know, you didn't ask, you didn't tell, you closed the curtains, you didn't tell anybody.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, to today we have all these wonderful tutorial tutorials, uh, homeschool co-ops and and even athletic teams and different things that these kids can do.
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_01: That that has that that independent homeschooling movement has matured into, I think, a recognition.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_01: If you if you go to a home uh a home education convention now, I mean they're huge, they're huge, and you have all this support and help.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm trying to help people to understand that is there for you too in your gardening, your farming, your backyard chickens, whatever.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_01: Don't spurn it.
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_01: Look for it, embrace it, love it, appreciate it.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that way, goodness, you know, when you want to go away for three days to a wedding, you're not, oh no, what am I gonna do about the chickens?
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_01: Because you've already got two friends that you've helped them with their chickens, they've helped you with your chickens.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_01: And guess what?
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_01: Guess what?
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_01: When that happens, they tell, you know, you could save five minutes a day if you did this kind of feeder instead of that, or water, or whatever.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_01: And and so, you know, if it look, if it takes you 20 minutes to explain to somebody how to take care of your chickens, you're inefficient.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it it should be a no-brainer.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, here are the chickens, here's the feed, here's the water, you know, here's where you gather eggs.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you shouldn't have to spend five minutes explaining how to run the latch on the coop, you know.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, and that that comes, that comes as you as you as you partner, as you work together.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_01: That it comes as you partner.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, yes.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: And even if you don't grow something, so like right now, uh, you know, we're going into the winter and I I don't have a uh uh something that I can harvest out of my garden.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_00: But we have uh friends in our homeschool group that raise uh chickens and they do like to travel quite frequently.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_00: And so our deal is uh they're only like five minutes down the road from us.
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_00: So my boys and my well, all three of my kids and I go down and we tend to their chickens when they're gone.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_00: And in exchange, we get all the eggs.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_00: It works out great.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, especially with the cost of eggs now in the grocery store.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's a sweet deal for us, you know, because it is like you said, it's so easy to tend to their chickens, like you know, because they've set it up that way.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_00: Where, you know, I mean, I we go, we would go like almost every day to check on them because my kids love the chickens, but it literally took us maybe like two minutes to even tend to them, and then we get all these eggs, like that's great.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know what what is it about the human psyche that makes us just um just addicted to never feeling like it's enough or good enough, you know.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_01: So so we say, well, I'm gonna become a homesteader.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_01: So we so we fill our heads with, I mean, I've got this bookshelf behind me, you know, of all all you know, five acres and independence and back to Eden and all the you know those those early uh you know 1970s and and and self-reliant uh books.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: And and and these are written by by gurus.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_01: These are written by people who that was their whole life purpose.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, a lot of people who come to homesteading, it it is it is a thread of their life, but it is not their it is not their their number one thing.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so it so it it can it can be a it can be a third cousin, you know, in your life.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't have to be your firstborn, you know, and and and and and I don't know what it is about the human psyche that that um you know that that we've gotta that that every time we think about doing something, we've suddenly gotta be number one the firstborn, the whatever, you know.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, at our farm, we've you know, early on, you know, people came by and you need to franchise this.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_01: We still get we still get you know all sorts of things.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: You need to patent this or franchise this or turn this in, you know.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_01: And we just I just don't have any desire.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I'm I'm very happy with what we've got and have no we don't we don't even have a sales plan.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: We don't even have a a sales target.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, we it's one of our 10 values.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: We never make a sales target.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we just rock along and whatever comes, comes.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_01: And if it goes down, we say, well, we must not be taking care of people.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_01: And if it goes up, we say, well, we must be doing okay, you know?
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and it just is.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_01: I had a conversation yesterday with a with a with a lady that that just couldn't believe that we didn't have an advertising budget.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_01: You mean you don't know, we don't have an advert, we do not have an advertising budget.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_01: We don't advertise.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, and we let that we we let instead we let service and product be the driver of of sales.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's so fascinating because that reminds me of Scott Adams and how he harps on you, you know, don't set these goals like I want to lose 10 pounds.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, you put a system in place, which is more it's doable, and it doesn't it doesn't tend to result in this feeling of lack of good enough or failure because I didn't meet this exact goal that I set.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_00: You could you have a system, and the system actually helps you achieve whatever the goal is anyway, but you focus on the system.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_01: Great.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_01: That's a good yeah, like like um just ran into a lady that lost what'd she lose?
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um 80 pounds.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I uh what in the world?
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_01: She says, I just quit eating after four.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_01: I just I'm not gonna eat after four.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, and look, that's all she did.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_01: I I can't believe it's all she did.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh she might have stopped eating mac and cheese and and you know, whatever, but but uh, but but that's all she said.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_01: She said, just stop eating after four.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's exactly what you're talking about.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_01: Make a system, look, look, look at a system that will do what you need done, and then um and and then let the you know let the ends uh come out.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_00: I will piggyback on that story because Donnie, my husband, just did something very similar.
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_00: He created a system when the kids and I went out to California to see my dad, he created his own system where he decided that he was going to do Intermittent fasting.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_00: So he just ate everything between in like an eight-hour window.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: And to his recollection, as best as possible, he doesn't think he actually changed uh what he ate.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I know he didn't change the foods that he ate for sure.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_00: He only eats a certain amount of foods.
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like he doesn't really want the diversity.
• 44:21
  SPEAKER_00: He just wants these are my free foods I eat, for example.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_00: So he ate the same foods, but he doesn't think he changed the energy that he consumed.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_00: He thinks he ate the same amount of food, but he did change the window which he ate it.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_00: He has lost, it's been almost two months now.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_00: He has lost six pounds, and it's six pounds of fat because he hasn't lost any muscle.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_00: He actually feels like he's stronger, and he lost uh belt size.
• 44:51
  SPEAKER_00: And that's all he did was implement that one system.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like he did want to lose weight, but he didn't say, Oh, I'm trying to get to this number on the scale or this pant size.
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_00: He just said, I'm gonna do intermittent fasting every day.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's incredible, just like that woman you talked about.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's truly incredible, you know.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_00: And and he didn't feel like there was a deadline, you know, like I'm gonna do this in 30 days.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't set that as the parameter either.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_00: It was just I'm just gonna start doing this every day.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_00: And then look what it reminds me of your challenge that we had in one of the previous podcasts, like, you know, do this for certain what was it, 56 days?
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, 50 56 days and it becomes a pattern.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's exactly what Johnny did, and now it's not a big deal.
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_00: He actually feels so much better, so he just continues to intermittent fast.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_00: And he said he he has so much more energy now as well.
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's incredible.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, that's that's wonderful.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_01: That even at at this at this um developmental stage in your journey.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um well, guy guys are always slower to the table than women, so you know, it's just so you know, maybe um maybe maybe he'll he'll live half as long as you do then with those changes.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I know I am five, I am five years older than him, and so he always jokes around that he's gonna live longer than me.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, what are you talking about?
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's like women, no, we're gonna live longer.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_01: Like yeah, women live outlive men by by a long shot.
• 46:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_01: So uh, yeah, so as we come kind of toward the end, you know, uh in 2020, um, here's here's one on what animals teach us.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, what can we learn from animals?
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of a um please say you have dogs in there as an example.
• 46:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uh no, it's I think it's more pigs.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um well now I give you an idea for you, another column.
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_01: So, so um, so you know, uh things we've learned from animals.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: Number one, train early and be serious about it.
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_01: Number two, each animal has a gift or talent that needs to be discovered and leveraged.
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_01: And obviously, what I do is I take each of these and apply it.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_01: We can learn this as people, people to people, you know.
• 47:07
  SPEAKER_01: Your children, uh train, start early and be, you know, and be serious about it.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_01: Don't, you know, this this this whole business of all right, I just told you to do this.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_01: One, two, two and a half, two and three quarters.
• 47:23
  SPEAKER_01: No, no.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh uh, you know, but that's Joel, that's how we teach our kids fractions now.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_01: That's funny.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: I've never heard that.
• 47:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's hilarious.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_01: That's how we teach fractions.
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'd rather teach fractions by a quarter cup of a quarter cup of butter and a you know, a third of a cup of uh flour.
• 47:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but but but anyway, um, all right.
• 47:45
  SPEAKER_01: And number two, then each animal has a gift or talent that needs to be discovered and leveraged, just like people.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and number three, be gentle.
• 47:56
  SPEAKER_01: Perhaps the most common admonition I need to give urban visitors to our farm, especially the children, when they get around animals, is to not make sudden movements and to speak gently.
• 48:06
  SPEAKER_01: Sudden anything scares animals.
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to be a temple grand and aficionado to understand this basic interactive axiom.
• 48:14
  SPEAKER_01: Sudden anything uh frightens animals.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, we can learn a lot from animals, God bless them.
• 48:22
  SPEAKER_01: I'm still learning every day because they have so much to teach me.
• 48:26
  SPEAKER_00: Could you imagine if we took those steps and applied that in our own lives and interacting with each other?
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_00: The world would change like instantly.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_01: It sure would.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then and then here's uh here's one in 2020.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_01: We're getting toward the end here.
• 48:44
  SPEAKER_01: I have one uh called The Future.
• 48:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know, people ask, Yeah, I may be turning into an old geezer, but I'm still loaded with dreams for the future.
• 48:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh my my partner bosses at TMEN at Mother Earth News wanted me to share some of my future projects and goals.
• 49:00
  SPEAKER_01: So here you go.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, this is 2020, so this is now five years old.
• 49:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, number one is you know, additional enterprises on our farm.
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh what you mean you still got other things you can do?
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, there are plenty of things.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um, number two is uh uh food truck.
• 49:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh number three, clean food, fast food.
• 49:19
  SPEAKER_01: I'm still you know bullish on that.
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh number four, fill up the land base, you know.
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um number five, write more books.
• 49:27
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I've I think I've accomplished that.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh number six, composting toilet.
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um we eventually that that was gonna be for the for the Lunatic Learning Center.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, because we have 15,000 visitors a year.
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_01: And um, as it as it turns out, we've we've abandoned that and gone.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_01: We're not sure what we're gonna do yet on that, but it turns out that a that a composting toilet in a public space is very, very difficult to maintain.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's much easier to keep flush toilets clean and and uh whatever inviting than a composting toilet where you've got sawdust and you've got people in there digging and putting in it it sounds neat, but you gotta have buy-in from a broad spectrum of people.
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_01: And we do a lot of events here where you know women in high heels come and and a I'll just leave it at that.
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um and and and and what what we as in our all of our exploration and our thinking, we just found the composting toilet was problematic for a public space.
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it just it's just it's just har it's hard to it's hard to keep clean.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_01: And so um anyway.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um the only negative goal that I would like to see is McDonald's and Chick-fil-A start closing stores.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh number eight is uh polyface hot pockets.
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um number nine, a new amendment to the Bill of Rights guaranteeing every American citizen the right to acquire the food of their choice from the source of their choice.
• 51:14
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, you know I'm I'm I'm still very hot on that, you know, food emancipation proclamation.
• 51:19
  SPEAKER_01: Number ten, build more ponds.
• 51:20
  SPEAKER_01: And we've built more ponds uh since then.
• 51:23
  SPEAKER_01: So um, so you know, the it's just an encouragement to realize you never arrive.
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_01: You never arrive, you're on a journey, and and it's oh and it's okay to not arrive.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_01: Okay not to not arrive.
• 51:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, because you've done other things.
• 51:40
  SPEAKER_00: You you've achieved other goals that may not have even been on that list, yeah like our podcast.
• 51:46
  SPEAKER_01: Like what podcasts, like, like uh, like shipping, like, like, uh, like national shipping.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_01: That wasn't even on our, you know, it uh that wasn't even there, but uh yeah, that's that's become huge.
• 51:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, yeah.
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_01: So uh then there's one here on farm entertainment on how do you how do you entertain yourself on a farm?
• 52:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um how do you how do you how do you beat how do you beat Disney and Caribbean cruises, you know, on a farm.
• 52:15
  SPEAKER_01: And uh so I have several real fun, you know, fun things that, you know, as a as a kid.
• 52:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um you know uh and and and things that we we still we still do and have done here.
• 52:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um especially, you know, even we went so far as we you know, we we never we didn't never had a TV.
• 52:38
  SPEAKER_01: So um you know what what what can you do on a farm to entertain uh to create your you know to create your own um recreational stuff.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, uh it it spans it spans a lot of topics and um I'm I'm hoping will be and and the nice thing the nice thing about this book is that because each chapter is a self-contained column, it can be written, it can be read like a devotional, you know, you can read each one in about five, ten minutes, and and and they're all self-contained.
• 53:18
  SPEAKER_01: So you you don't have to try to pick up where you left off, you know, if you if you put it down for a few days.
• 53:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um you can you can read it in little increments and each one is self-contained, which you know, which has its own advantage in trying to you know get through a book.
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I'm thinking that this could also be a great homeschool curriculum where you could do one column at a time, you know, and have that be kind of your roundtable discussion, discussing that discussing the topic.
• 53:45
  SPEAKER_00: And when there's you know something that's practical, you can also implement that as well with your children.
• 53:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um so to me, I mean that I like things like that that are divided out for me, like day one, and you can do this on day two.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_00: So that would be a great book, like even like an evening uh homeschool.
• 54:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, like we do story time during the day, but we also do it in the evening.
• 54:10
  SPEAKER_00: So it would be a great, like, you know, instead of turning on the TV, like because we try to be off the screens, like all screens at least by six.
• 54:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so instead of doing that, we just we do reading uh and and we try to pick books like this where you can have a conversation with the kids about it.
• 54:27
  SPEAKER_00: And since this one's wisdom and practical um applications, it would be perfect for that.
• 54:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I so I'm going to again put in a request that I so I don't know if you remember, but when we were on Zoom many months ago, I requested that um your next book be a compilation of your talks.
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because you don't write your talks out, but you have the you know bullet points, you you know, you have your your outline.
• 54:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember you telling me at the time that that was cheating.
• 55:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_01: So so I don't know.
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_01: So so so one of the things I've said here is I don't know now if it's just that I'm old enough to have enough material to to put one of these together, or if it's if it's just the wisdom of understanding that um you know that that you can fudge a little bit on your um on your techniques and and go with it.
• 55:26
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, uh a compilation of of my uh of my speeches would be would be really really really fun to do.
• 55:35
  SPEAKER_00: And that one is not really cheating because you didn't write them out already.
• 55:39
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_01: No, I all all I have is basically a a skeleton, a little bit of an outline, and then uh and then I go.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, there's there's some uh there's some really really good ones.
• 55:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I now have in my repertoire, I've got like 150.
• 55:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 55:54
  SPEAKER_01: So I mean this is this is 40 years of uh wow.
• 55:58
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's it's funny, uh Cena, to walk into these conferences like like like this one, you know, the ages one, and I'm looking around the room and I'm the oldest guy there.
• 56:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that that's a that's a real change for me because I've done this for so long.
• 56:13
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I was I was the boy wonder early, you know, and the the young kid, and I had these, you know, there was Elliot Coleman and Wendell Berry and you know, these these these iconic, you know, Charles Walters, uh, Akers USA, Alan Nation, you know, there was these the these guru mentors that uh you know, Alan Savory, and now, you know, they are they're leaving us, and um, and now I'm I'm turning into that elder.
• 56:39
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a it's an interesting kind of psychological, emotional uh thing I have to, you know, I have to get used to.
• 56:46
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I still don't feel like it, but um, you know, I realize that's kind of where we are now.
• 56:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 56:54
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean, on the positive, you're the seasoned veteran that, you know, people are looking to for this type of wisdom, um, you know, in in perception.
• 57:05
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, a lot of people are trying to get in your mind of how you think about things, um, in and as well as the practic, the practical application of how do you actually do this like dance with nature that you do.
• 57:18
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's truly incredible.
• 57:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's how the rest of the world sees you.
• 57:23
  SPEAKER_00: So even but it's great that you don't, right?
• 57:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so, number one, like you said, because you feel youthful, but also it's what makes you one of the things that makes you so humble and just down to earth.
• 57:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so you do continue to open yourself up to learning, you know, from others.
• 57:38
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's yeah, you're truly are a remarkable person, it's incredible.
• 57:44
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you're very you're very gracious and very kind.
• 57:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we're we're out of time.
• 57:49
  SPEAKER_01: So um I I actually am I'm kind of stumped with a question this time.
• 57:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know what might be a kind of a cool question, um, harking back to the question you posed in this podcast, something around the line the subject of how you said you were stumped on why people feel like they have to keep doing more and more and more.
• 58:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like, why is it never good enough for us?
• 58:14
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe, and you you can turn this into you're the brilliant mind behind the questions, but something about just asking, let's just ask people.
• 58:21
  SPEAKER_00: I I love to know what makes people tick, what motivates them, their behavior.
• 58:25
  SPEAKER_00: It was part of my undergrad degree.
• 58:27
  SPEAKER_00: So, what is it that that keeps motivating people to feel like they haven't arrived, right?
• 58:34
  SPEAKER_00: To feel like it's still not enough.
• 58:36
  SPEAKER_00: And even if they're overwhelmed and they feel overworked, why do they feel like they need to keep pushing and adding more things to the plate?
• 58:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's a fair, that's a fair question.
• 58:47
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe we could ask it this way.
• 58:49
  SPEAKER_01: What um what is the litmus test for your personal satisfaction?
• 58:56
  SPEAKER_01: What's a benchmark?
• 58:57
  SPEAKER_01: What's a what's an indicator that um that puts you in a satisfied frame of reference?
• 59:06
  SPEAKER_00: So, like when do you know it's enough?
• 59:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 59:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, how do you know when it's enough?
• 59:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 59:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 59:13
  SPEAKER_00: Especially going into the holidays.
• 59:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's such a fabulous question.
• 59:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, it is, it is.
• 59:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 59:19
  SPEAKER_01: That's okay.
• 59:20
  SPEAKER_00: This is wonderful.
• 59:21
  SPEAKER_00: I love that question.
• 59:22
  SPEAKER_00: And and Joel, this book sounds fantastic.
• 59:25
  SPEAKER_00: I can tell, I haven't read it yet, of course, but I'm gonna get my copy and I can tell this is gonna be one of my favorites already.
• 59:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna read it to my children, pass it down to them.
• 59:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's called Pitch Fork Pulpit Wisdom and Practice in a Self-Reliant Life.
• 59:39
  SPEAKER_00: Again, it's available now at the Polyface store, and we will include the link in the show description.
• 59:45
  SPEAKER_00: So click on that link and get yours hot off the presses.
• 59:48
  SPEAKER_00: Joel, thank you so much.
• 59:50
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so excited to read this one, and I'm looking forward to the next one, which will be your speeches.
• 59:59
  SPEAKER_01: Uh well, we'll see.
• 1:00:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I'm I'm I'm I'm right right now, I'm hoping to get out the emancipate the food emancipation proclamation.
• 1:00:06
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, okay.
• 1:00:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, perfect.
• 1:00:08
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's that's really gotta that's we're on a bit of a wave.
• 1:00:12
  SPEAKER_01: We we need to we need to, you know, we need to ride it, and uh, I think the time is now.
• 1:00:17
  SPEAKER_01: So all right, everybody.
• 1:00:19
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for joining us on another um episode of Beyond Labels.
• 1:00:23
  SPEAKER_01: We hope you enjoyed it.
• 1:00:24
  SPEAKER_01: We we love visiting with you every week, and um be in touch with us if you can, and we look forward to visiting with you again next week.