Soft launching your homestead, Part 3
Paper newsletter and finding the blessing
This is the third essay in a series on doubling-down on home. If you have not yet read Part 1 and Part 2, I suggest you go and catch those if you like what you read here.
I would also like to mention that if you are enjoying this series and or this Substack in general, I would love you to consider subscribing to a paper newsletter focused on encouraging you in your home and Christ-centered life as a women of wisdom.
I am someone that prefers to live as much of my life offline as possible, but I can’t deny the good feelings and enrichment I experience from connecting with other like-minded women, reading their thoughts and sharing my own.
I have no desire to abandon that, BUT I would like to take that experience offline and on paper which is why I am working on launching a monthly PAPER-based newsletter that will be delivered straight to your mailbox.
The newsletter will be like what I share here, but richer, better and constructed in a manner so it can be consumed over the course of a month.
A multiple page experience of nourishment, encouragement with a teaspoon of loving instruction inspired by the Holy Spirit.
If that interests you, please leave a comment so I can begin to get hard numbers on the number of subscribers which will help me to assess cost to print and mail, etc
Soft Launching Your Homestead, Part 3
When I picture a homestead, I see a garden, perhaps some chickens or ducks wandering around, maybe a goat or small milk cow, a woman in an apron gathering eggs or flowers or herbs, OR
a woman watering a patio lined with tomato plants and herbs in containers, bird feeders suspended closeby, a small composting bin tucked aside and concealed on the patio for food scraps that will break down and feed the woman’s plants while a cup of iced tea rests waiting for its owner to come and sit and looking lovingly over her bounty,
or a series of raised beds in the yard on a cul de sac, children running barefoot through a sprinkler while their mother prunes the fruit trees she planted in the front yard last season and clean sheets flap in the breeze in the background, hang-drying on a line in the sun,
OR I see a young single woman sipping hot tea on the front porch of the house she rents, looking lovingly at the pansies she just potted from the nursery down the street, petting her cat as she cross stitches art for her walls and waits for the soup she’s cooking in the crock pot with the roast she got on sale at the farmers market to be finished,
OR a silver-haired woman leaving her butter churning to walk out into her teeny yard of containers flowing with plants, trimming some dill to add to her special secret pickle brine she’s using in todays batch of refrigerator pickles that she’s trading with a neighbor for some fresh eggs and tea visits…
I could go on and on and paint the myriad pictures in my mind of what it looks like for a woman to be content to make the most of her surroundings and invest in her home.
All of these situations (and many more) are equally lovely, appropriate for different people at different stages and walks of life and pictures of a nourishing home complete with a woman at rest in it.
We are too quick to focus on all the things we don’t have YET when thinking of our home-experience instead of relishing in what we do have NOW.
I’ll admit that I have been guilty of this many times in my life.
One such time that stands out is when I was a young mother with three little babies under five, we lived on 1/2 acre in downtown Raleigh, North Carolina.
I kept chickens and rabbits there and had some pretty dang prolific garden beds full of my worm castings and homemade compost. I grew plenty of food and we had quite a lovely (but not easy) life during that season, but all too often I was focused on, “What’s next?”
I felt like what I was doing wasn’t enough, wasn’t legitimate, just some bootleg hobby gardener.
Ienvied people with bigger gardens, farms and land and bigger, nicer homes and wondered, “When will it be my turn?”
I thank God He was as merciful as He was and kept me from being too focused on the next thing all of the time, otherwise I would have greater amounts of regret now, but even still, I feel sad at times that I ever didn’t appreciate what was right in front of me during that price of my life.
I feel sad for that young mom that didn’t feel like what she was doing was ENOUGH and so she often ground herself into the ground daily trying to do more all while also waiting and wanting for more.
I look at old photos of that yard now and think, “What an amazing oasis you made for your kids in that urban setting, I wonder why you didn’t see it?”
I now know why I failed to recognize it.
I hadn’t learned the secret of being content in every circumstance.
I still haven’t fully learned it, but I have a better grasp on it now and a desire to fine contentment all of the time. I search and ask God to grant it to me because my fleshy mind often focuses on the lack and not the bounty.
Scripture tells us not to worry and especially not to worry about tomorrow.
Sufficient for the day is today’s troubles. Seek first the Kingdom and everything will be added unto you.
There’s likely nothing intrinsically wrong with dreaming, aspiring and or working towards a future that features a different home or homestead situation than what you have now.
But take it from someone with a lot of experience in this area, focusing on the future can become a nasty habit to break and fosters unrest and dissatisfaction in us that ultimately is a form of pride and brattiness.
Trust in the Lord and do good;
dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture.
Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.
Psalm 37:3-4
While our God certainly wants us to enjoy the blessings He bestows upon us, He is more concerned with our learning to delight in Him above all things.
He tells us that He is a jealous God that is not interested in sharing our hearts with the things of this world.
Even when we have lovely things, they are to be received as gifts from God and not simply the results of our hard work.
Every good and perfect gift is from above,coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. James 1:17
Being chronically dissatisfied with where you are now is a form of pride, it’s our way of telling God that He doesn’t know what He’s doing, it’s ungratefulness and shortsightedness.
It’s a pouting of the heart because we don’t have the things we think we deserve and it’s hubris because it’s us thinking we know better.
Our God can see all the blessings we are missing out on right now as we sulk because it doesn’t look the way we thought it would. And it frustrates Him just like the Israelites frustrated Him in the desert with their ungrateful attitudes.
Chronically chasing the next thing can ruin the joy of right now.
It can also mean that even when we finally GET what we always wanted, we don’t recognize it because we have exercised the muscle of discontentment for far too long.
It can drive people away, sully our attitudes, stress out our husbands and erode our trust in God.
Today you and I have been assigned a cup and a portion. It’s not an accident, it’s not necessarily a punishment, it’s what’s best for you right now and He is waiting for you to thank Him for it and to be faithful with it.
Whoever is faithful with very little will also be faithful with much. Luke 16:10
We all have a place where we currently live, a community somewhere nearby, even we you don’t know it, and resources and opportunity specific to this seasons in our life that we can utilize and capitalize on and invest in.
The Lord is our shepherd.
If that’s true, then we really shouldn’t want for anything.
Where you are today, may not be where you ultimately see yourself, but I’m guessing that a little communion with God in the space that you occupy currently could lead to some inspiration on how to appreciate it for what it is so that you can find the blessings of today and it’s finding the blessings in life’s simple gifts that opens our eyes to the beauty we have now and transforms our homes into a wonderful space for both us and others!
Everything else after that is gravy.
Xoxo,
Sarah
PS-Also worm composting. Do NOT sleep on it.
I would LOVE a paper newsletter!
Beautiful Sarah ♥ I will join you on the 30th ~ Blessed Be