Our Core Book

This is the book that got it all started for us. Remember that group that we were thinking of forming a community with, well a good friend recommended we read this book. I went and purchased it as soon as possible.

I must admit. It is INVALUABLE for someone in our situation who is looking for more understanding of how to go about creating more self sustaining lifestyle. We hadn't even completed the whole book before we made the decision. What we had read was THAT informative and convincing that ANYONE can make these changes and achieve what the book teaches.

It goes into detail of how they left the city life for the country life. It was during the beginning of the depression, in economic crisis, they opted out for better living and truer freedom. But it is much different from other books of this matter, for the fact that the Nearings purpose, drive and convictions are extremely firm and intact. This aspect we greatly appreciate.

"We left the city with three objectives in mind. The first was economic. We sought to make a depression-free living, as independent as possible of the commodity and labor markets, which could not be interfered with by employers, whether businessmen, politicians or educational administrators. Our second aim was hygienic. We wanted to maintain and improve our health. We knew that the pressures of city life were exacting and we sought a simple basis of well-being where contact with the earth and home grown, organic food would play a large part. Our third objective was social and ethical. We decided to liberate and dissociate ourselves, as much as possible, from the cruder forms of exploitation: the plunder of the planet, the slavery of man and beast, the slaughter of men in war, and of animals for food."

We feel and have felt for some time the same way. We have read and keep rereading each chapter to get a better grasp of how to go about what we are doing. Because of the finite detail, we have applied so many of their personal experience to our lives. We wrote a mission statement, as you see on the side of our blog. We just finished our 8 guiding principles. They have 12. We just made ours a bit more concise.

Our plans for our garden, orchard and building are also similar. Even if we are not as exact, we can and will be applying many, many of their teachings. We do live in a warmer climate and are dealing with changes, as they lived in a very cold climate, it still can help ANYONE achieve their goals. Even if your goals are minimal or not as grand as ours, this book can still help you to apply any changes toward any goals, big or small. If it's just creating a garden, building a more energy efficient...earth friendly home, or plant a few fruit trees, you will find the answers your looking for.

"The Good Life" really is "an underground bible for the city-weary." We figure we will be reading it over and over for the rest of our lives, really. We are EXTREMELY GRATEFUL that we found it and hope we can keep applying its teachings and educational principles better and deeper each time we read it.

Abundant peace to all,

Rachel

The Crash Course

My brother sent this to our family blog. I HIGHLY recommend you watch ALL of it. I know it is long but I decided to post this and the other video on both of my blogs (www.livingmom.net) because of how VITAL both are. Chris and I spent the last 2 days watching them in between daily chores. Our conviction that personal change is needed NOW was reiterated.

It is DIRE we take action both physically and psychologically, as both videos portray. We can make PHENOMENAL changes, quickly....effectively....easily..... when we take responsibility not only for ourselves but, like Chris Martenson says in the last video, each other too! What that means is we are doing things like sending this video forward to others. Just a small step to help others along their path of removing fear and choosing preparedness and more self reliance.I stand with Chris Martenson where I don't know the future but I would MUCH rather be ready for any large change than not.

The personal changes we are making as a family, we recognize, are not for everyone. They might be a bit severe but....this is the course of action that is working for us. By watching the video and then getting on Chris' website, you can take his self assessment test and find out what changes will work for you. We have found that even the tiniest steps in a conscious direction of responsibility has made HUGE differences in any insecure or unsure feelings we may have.

So, our hope is that after watching this video you might take the time to figure out where you are at and what changes you can make for the betterment of not only ourselves but human kind, as a whole. We hope you'll keep checking back to our blogs and websites. We hope that some information we share will help you in this endeavor.

Abundant peace to all,
Rachel

Law Of Deliberate Creation

Life's Symphony

"To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion....In a word, to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common. This is to be my symphony."
~William Ellery Channing

Coming Into Our Own

While in the emergency room just hours after our car accident, I realize it is going to be almost impossible for me to nurse or take care of my baby...let alone my older children. I was in EXCRUTIATING pain, like I have NEVER had before. I actually felt myself trying to leave my body so I didn't have to deal with the pain but I decide that the pain is there to teach me so I will stay as long as I can to listen. Soon after taking my ex-rays, we learn my collar bone is, in fact, broken. Something that was QUITE obvious before the x-rays were even taken. I call my mother at 1 am, from the hospital, hoping that her deep love for me will come through and she will, like she has SO MANY times before, come to my aid and uplift and support my family and I through this healing. She arrives a day and a half later, more ready and willing to help than I think I have ever seen her before. I'm so THANKFUL she has come and know it is for the best I called her.

3 days after coming home from my trip, the dream comes again. This time it is changed slightly. I still walk into the colorless room and feel the energy surrounding it, it's just that I am only there for a moment. With the first dream, it felt to me that I was in the room for a VERY long time and the feelings I was feeling would NEVER end. This time I walked into the room knowing about and looking for my friends who had come to teach me in the first dream. Sure enough, as soon as the dream started, they showed up and again repeated almost verbatim exactly what happened the first dream. This time though I was there MUCH longer and understood more of what the white buckets were and what I should be learning.

So, within the first few days of my Mom's arrival, we start chatting about my life and such. I explain to her a how we are going down to San Pete County to look at some land and what we are thinking in regards to our future and what we are hoping to create for ourselves. I tell her about my dream and how we were feeling drawn to make some kind of move so we could build a more self sustaining life style. I still smile when I think of the look on her face when I was sharing this with her. I actually saw the light bulb come on of how she could help us, as my mother is ALL about helping anyone she can. She looks at me and says “Well, you know, we have 25 acres of land in Marshall and no one is living on it or planning on doing anything with it anytime soon. I'm sure if you were planning on putting in an orchard, if you put in an extra few fruit trees for us and take care of them, we wouldn't mind if you lived on the land and used it how you need to..”
My first reaction to this was to turn her down immediately but that is because I spent many of my growing up years in Texas and there was just something about it that I didn't like. Living here once again, I have found out what that is. BUGS and HEAT! But that's for another time so I'll wait to give my sermon on how I am struggling to live harmoniously with all living things....like our mission statement says.

Anyway, as soon as I see Chris later that evening I start to discuss the idea with him. He states that he already knew they had land and had even thought about mentioning it to me but he was sure I would have turned him down before he even mentioned it. Up til that point, I'm sure I would of but because of my experience in California and now my car accident I knew, for a surety, that things were in no way an accident and my life was being laid out for me and all I had to do was take it or not. I apologized about not being open sooner but told him I was open now and wanted to talk about it. With the VERY limited amount of money we had, we knew unless the land was gifted to us or we try to create our dreams on the small plot we were currently living on, there was just no way we could become as self sufficient as we were wanting.

So, after some long conversations and lots of praying, I told my Mom to seriously consider was moving there and asked her to talk to my Dad about it. That evening she did so and sure enough there were both in agreement that they were open to us using the land. Looking back and even now, it seems SO SURREAL how easily this whole moved ebbed and flowed. I can tell you I felt and still feel that so much about this is not about me or my family. I remember when I was studying to become a midwife, so many of them would comment on how they didn't decided to become a midwife....how midwifery called them. This is EXACTLY how we feel about everything about this move. It all came together so easily, gently even perfectly that we felt and feel called. It's hard to explain. I hope you understand.

The Dream

Just days before I left on my trip, I had a dream. One of the most VIVID and ALIVE dreams I have EVER had. Now understand, as of right now, I have never considered myself to be a big dreamer or I should that I've never felt I've had any gift in regards to dreams or dreaming. But....this dream was really like no other I had experienced before. It was more than just real. It was NOW! I was living it right then and I awoke KNOWING it. I really am not progressed enough in eloquent English to even be able to describe more accurately what I am talking about. It just felt like no other dream I had been a part of before that time.

As soon as I awoke, I woke up Chris to tell him about it. My dream was this and to this day it is still almost as vivid and real as it was then. In my dream, I walk into a room, it looks like a VERY SMALL apartment but looks similar to the kitchen/dining area of our current American Fork home, where all color is missing. Everything around me is black and white. I look to the far end of the room and there is a old wooden table and chairs that are barren. My eyes shift over to my family I see sitting in a corner of the room on the floor. Chris is standing looking down at the children....eyes tired, shoulder sagging and ever so burdened. There is an air of ABSOLUTE and COMPLETE desperation and longing for something that seems can now NEVER be given to Chris, myself or our children. I recognize that something is FOREVER lost and can or will never be returned. This feeling is almost palpable.

Upon looking at Chris and my children and the surroundings of where we are living, I soon realize we are destitute. We have next to nothing. Chris is VERY thin and my children look almost gaunt. You can tell they are not standing because they are too weak, thin and almost lifeless. I struggle to be able to even properly describe the thoughts and feelings I was flooded with upon entering this scene but thoughts and feelings were DEFINITE and I knew exactly what I was looking at and what was meant for me to learn. I can see that my family is starving. I look at Chris longing for answers. I walk to him and ask him what we are too do. With his head hanging, he shrugs his shoulders and states there is nothing we can do. It is too late. I processed to cry. I have never nor hope to ever feel this feeling of sheer desperation again. It was and still is like no other feeling I have felt before. It reminded me of how the Jews might have felt as they were driven away from their families and homes. That was the sense of doom and gloom that pervaded the air.

As soon as this feeling of nothingness entered and I was sinking deep into it, a light entered the room and the dream was split into half. Directly down the middle of my view, I could still see my family but the new scene that was arriving was now in this BRILLANT color....bright, shining, new, awakening, alive, refreshing like jumping in cool clean pool of water on a hot and weary day. Any and all of the negative and deep doom I had been feeling was IMMEDIATELY relieved and removed by this new scene entering our view. First, there was a couple...a man and a woman who walked up to us and gave a very friendly hello. I knew right away there were part of Chris and I, a enlightened, radiant, divine part of each of us. They didn't look like us which was interesting. The woman was blond and a bit overweight and the man looked like a farmer, thin and tall, wearing overalls. This was an strange sensation to know that these represented an unknown part of Chris and I but looked nothing like us.

Anyway, this man and woman were so friendly and inviting. They smiled like no other smile I had ever seen. Complete safety and longing for teaching and learning from them soon entered my spirit. After saying hello, they soon beckoned us to follow them. The woman held out her arms to show us the BEAUTY that surrounded where they live. I look around and notice they live in, what looks and feels like, the Garden of Eden. Everything is lush and green and growing like I have never seen before. They have a small but quaint log home. Peace, joy, and bliss permeate everything I see and feel. I stand in awe of this glorious place these people have set up for themselves.

Not many words are spoken between us and this couple. Most everything is communicated through thought or feelings. The woman then walks us over to her house and show us a room that seems to never end. It goes on and on and on. The only real description I can give this room is a long narrow hall like area where there are shelves on both sides. It reminded me of all the food storage rooms I had seen in many of the homes of my church going friends. On the shelves, stacked neatly in rows and right next to each other were white 5 gallon buckets. They went on as far as my eyes could see. It was obvious that much effort and hard work had gone into building, setting up and maintaining this room. Neither the man nor woman looked or carried an air of being worn out, in the least,. Quite the opposite. They were so humble yet anxious to show us this room. They watched our faces as we looked at their room to see the light come on inside us as we soon wanted to know how we could gain this self sustaining happiness that they had and were maintaining.

I immediately and excitedly asked how they had put together so much assurance for themselves. But even more than that, I wanted to know WHAT was inside the white buckets. The woman looked at me and responded with a short but quick answer that what was in the bucket was what was bringing their abundance. Abundance was the prevalent thought and word, once this couple entered the dream. I KNEW that whatever was in those buckets was what was giving them or bringing them to where they were which was a state of freedom, self sufficiency, utter joy, acceptance and peace like I never had nor since, felt.

The rest of the dream is me asking the woman what is in the buckets and her response each and every time is something in regard to it being the “thing” that had brought them their abundance. It was the “thing” that brought them to where they were. It was VERY OBVIOUS though that they were letting us know we could have it too! And it didn't feel hard or even out of reach in ANYWAY!! Quite the opposite. It felt light and easy. It felt that we could have it as soon as we wanted it and were ready for it. There was nothing we had to do to get to this place that they were at other than desiring it. Longing for it and then believing we can have it too! Right after that, I woke up somewhat disappointed to leave the feelings that had and were just being instilled like nothing else, into my heart and soul. The dream lingered with me for the rest of the day and some time after. At the time, the dream meant some kind of learning for Chris and I but I still hadn't realized the growth and understanding that would take place because of this dream.

The Car Accident

In January of this year, I drove to California with my sister in law Yulia, a good friend Charlene, and her daughter Katrina and my little Mabel for a “Birth Into Being” apprenticeship 10 day course. This 10 days became one of the most life defining and life changing times unlike any other that I have EVER had before. I left that experience clearer and more assured of who I was and what I wanted and was ready to take hold of in my life. We packed our things, anxious and excited about what the future lay hold for us. We loaded up and drove away feeling renewed and refreshed.

To our discouragement, half way home, in Battle Mountain, Nevada....we hit black ice slid across the freeway and flipped our car, more than once, to land right side up on the other side of the freeway. Luckily, the only semi serious injury what my broken clavicle. Katrina came out needing a few stitches while the rest we're pretty banged up and bruised. We thanked God and Goddess for our safety and limited hurting. Especially for our dear Mabel who was so thankfully strapped securely in her car seat. Not a single scratch or scrap, physical or otherwise. From a logical standpoint and from the looks of the car, we should have all been dead but no....as we soon have all realized our Divine had other plans for us!

The car accident, along with the broken clavicle, facilitated something inside me that had been needing to be released for sometime. To this day, I still am not sure of all the physical, spiritual and emotional implications that have taken place because of this accident as I am sure there are even more to come. What I do know is that the physical force that took place with the spinning of the car created some kind of vortex that ( I know this sounds so weird but I am pretty “out there”) aided to taking my physical body to a new place it needed to be in order to aid in the creation of my current desires and dreams. Then with the pain of my clavicle, I was able to work through TONS of regressed and unconscious, unneeded energy that had laid dormant for some time. I recognized almost as soon as it hit that this was taking place and took every advantage to work through it and move it as quickly as possible.

How It All Started

I think it appropriate to share why we decided to make this move. I'm putting this information into several posts, as it would make it way too long to post it all at once. It is pretty detailed but I hoped that might make it a bit more interesting.

I should say that the idea for something like this way of living popped into consciousness for us about 4 years ago. We were thinking of putting together some kind of retreat on a large plot of land with a friend. At that time, we were living in California but planning on moving back to Utah and had a friend who was trying to purchase land in San Pete County for this to take place. To no avail, and to our now relief, that did not take place....all plans fell through and we moved back to Utah living the city life we had always known.

Well, then again about a year or so ago, another good friend mentioned that her, along with others, were seriously considering putting a small group of people together to purchase land to build a community. This is of more interest nowadays than it has been in the past because of our current economic situation which is at it's poorest point than it's been in awhile. In Utah, we found a few websites of people putting together what they called “Intentional Communities” which is basically a small group of, usually somewhat like minded people, to aid and help each live and create a more self sufficient and self sustaining life style. I must admit, this is sounded VERY appetizing to us as we had been ready for some time to move out of the current city lifestyle to a more simple, peaceful way of living.

Over the year's time, we met with a group of those parties interested in building this community and even drove to look at land that we thought might best serve our needs. 3 years prior Chris and I started a little used car selling business and at this time, had just went into another business with a friend repoing cars. The car business, because of our current economic situation, was plummeting quickly. The repo business looked as if it might fair nicely for us but we felt that grabbing this opportunity while we can would be the BEST for our family. These reasons, along with our longing for this change for years is what prompted what happened next.