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Working for money
I’ve had the opportunity lately to work away from the homestead for someone else doing gardening. I have worked, thinking most of the time, why Scott and Helen wanted to work for themselves. When I work for money, I feel I have to be productive. When I work on my own homestead, I hope to be productive, but if I’m not, I let no one down except myself. I don’t like making money. It makes me dislike my job from the very beginning because it puts a value on me. Maybe my work is not something that can have a value put on it. I’m done with the job now. I’m glad of it , too, as I can return to the life Scott and Helen intended me to live and the life that I enjoy more. Working for myself, not for a paycheck, not for money, but for the Good Life.
Posted by Joel on May 12, 2008
Topics: Resident Stew: The Resident Stewards' Blog |
May 21st, 2008 at 7:28 am
Unfortunately in this life you need money, and working for money thus enables you to live, and depending on the amount of money you earn per hour, determines either how long you need to work, to achieve the amount you require, or to have excess to spend on something else.
I don’t know Joel, but where is he ‘Living the Good Life’?
Who owns the property where he is ‘Living the Good Life’?
The Nearings, used money to pay for the taxes on the properties they owned, for the truck, for things they couldn’t grow or barter for. Admittedly they had a sum of money in mind that they felt would cover the costs for the year, and when it was reached they stopped the commercial aspect of their lives.
If Joel doesn’t own the property, then he is working for the owners who are paying him by providing food and shelter.
The key here is to balance earning enough money to pay for your minimum needs and to be self sufficient for the rest.
At some point, Joel will need to take responsibility for his own life and strike out on his own, which will mean earning money to pay for rent or purchase of a property, and all the associated costs that go with it. I wish him success and happiness.
Garry
July 2nd, 2008 at 10:54 am
Although I don’t totally disagree with Garry I think that one option that Joel might want to consider is focusing his efforts on making as much money as possible to reduce the time necessary to make his ‘necessary’ cash. This can be done through the internet where you don’t get direct feedback (in other words hourly pay) but instead see financial benefit based on previous efforts.
August 28th, 2008 at 1:38 pm
Yeah…jus’ make money on the Innernet, man! (?!)
I’m in the same boat as you, Joel. And one of the few positive outcomes of the current convergence of climate change, peak oil, and global financial collapse, will be the slow demise of the money economy. Best thing to do right now, in my opinion, is to learn to grow/preserve food, and other skills that will be highly sought-after in the post-industrial world. Other examples: building/maintaining shelters, medical care, animal husbandry, building sustainable systems (permaculture). You should check out http://www.windward.org They’re doing amazing things there.
September 28th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
Hello from Oklahoma. I bought 5 mostly wooded acres just outside OKC 2.5 years ago, and have since built my own 750 s.f. ecohut that is passive cooling, passive heat, wood heat, solar panels for electric cost offset, compost toilet, outhouse, grey water system for keeping my compost piles wet. Now building a 1 acre, totally organic garden. My new neighbor on 5 acres is putting in rotational grazing chickens and a big garden. Any of you folks sick of where you are, come help me garden, as i’m doing this alone. I appreciate all you are saying, but when this administration went into power, I sold my conventional real estate to build my ecohut, debt free. I am very glad I jumped when I did. We americans have a very big wake up call coming. rferrell1@hotmail.com
if you wanna visit. peace. ron
February 18th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
Gosh, here we go again. Now it’s money that’s the culprit. I think Joel will realise how important money is when he gets older. We won’t all have the same health and stamina that the Nearings had. Many of my parents’ friends over the age of 80 are in retirement homes because they cannot look after themselves anymore and their children and grandchildren don’t live in the same city. These retirement homes aren’t cheap. Prescription drugs aren’t cheap. Eye glasses and dentists aren’t cheap. And how do you own land without having any money? Who pays the taxes? And how do you eat when you can’t grow everything you need? And how do you clothes yourself and where do the shoes come from? Is Joel a cobbler as well as a homesteader. Come on Joel, welcome to the real world—we all need money. Don’t forget, the Bible never said money is the root of all evil; it says that the LOVE of money is the root of all evil. It also says to help the poor, the widows and the orphans. And how do you do that if you have no money?