Build the Sustainable You

I put my mind to farming in 2002, got my first flock of chickens in 2003, and then goats and cows and a couple sheep by 2005. It was my own three-ring circus and I loved the work. To learn animal husbandry and small-scale farming I took many classes, workshops and seminars. Went on farm tours and chose a few farmers to mentor me. But to make money, I had to do something other than farm. So, I turned my writing skills to agriculture grant writing, research, reports and editorial opinions. It was the writing that got me into conferences, regional and national meetings of academics, entrepreneurs, farmers and activists. At one such conference about 20 years ago the topic was sustainability, and the featured speaker was a public opinion expert who warned us not to use the word sustainable. They thought sustainability was too complicated for the mainstream consumer to understand.

Here we are 20 years later and the public understands what sustainability is in terms of their own lived experience. This healthcare system is not sustainable. Minimum wages are not sustainable. This work environment is not sustainable. This cost of living is not sustainable. If it’s not sustainable, it’s out of balance. Income and expenses are out of balance. We consume more than we produce. Mostly it’s math. But when math is out of whack for a long time, we feel it in our state of mind, our emotions, our mood, the zeitgeist. I think that’s where a lot of us are right now. Our lives have been out of balance for so long, the driving force within us is resentment for our suffering.

My own life was once way out of balance and I paid a heartbreaking price. My passion for farming took so much time from my marriage that it threw my relationship with my husband way out of balance. He thought I was taking on too much debt. The expense of learning to farm animals was front loaded with years of hard work and mistakes that I did not recover from. My farm income never caught up with my expenses. And it was my dream job. I was willing to be poor to farm, but my credit cards were crushed by the truth of it. I drained my bank accounts. Then after I turned 60 my body started to rebel against the hard physical labor, and my work/rest ratio was out of balance. I reached a point where my hips and my knees hurt every day. After years of that, my pain/pleasure ratio was out of balance and felt beyond repair.

When I sold my farmhouse and the land around it in 2016, I paid off all my debt and my life became sustainable. Temporarily. To remain economically sustainable, I had to shift my lifestyle from materialist luxury to minimalism. Simplicity. I got small. It was the right thing to do, but it was emotionally ripping. I got rid of 90% of everything I owned, all my treasures. I mourned. Then I welcomed the new sustainable me. I learned to live within my means and adopted a zero debt lifestyle. It is not easy, but I do recommend it. Now my goal is to remain sustainable, to keep my income and expenses in balance. As I cope with the challenges of living within my means, I am increasingly aware of the debt culture that pushes all of us to spend more money than we have. 

Debt is big business. It is sold to us by credit card companies and banks as though debt is a privilege. But debt is economic slavery. And that’s the fight we’re in right now as a nation. Witness all the ways we are pushed into debt. Buy something on Amazon and you will be presented with the option to break the price into a few smaller payments spaced apart by time and debt. I’m sure you see the advertisements for credit cards encouraging us to go into debt by purchasing items we can’t afford. The average credit card balance is about $6,000. The average student loan is about $38,000. The average new car loan is about $41,000. The average monthly mortgage payment is over $2,000. Bank loans, car loans, mortgages, loan consolidation, education loans, credit cards—all promote the culture of debt. We spend our lives in debt. Look at the advertisements for debt and you will see how debt is portrayed as status. How fucked up is that?

Now we’re being tortured by notions of the national debt, how big it is and why it’s a problem. You don’t have to be a wizard to understand the difference between income and expenses. But bringing our spending habits into alignment with our income is painful. And doing it with a chainsaw is messy, disrespectful and wasteful. Reasonable people will disagree. My point is that we pay lip service to sustainability as it relates to climate, renewable energy, recycling and our agriculture practices. But we don’t often talk about sustainable government. We rarely ask who benefits from the national debt. Maybe that’s because the national debt is just a big mirror reflecting our culture. We have been encouraged to live beyond our means and brainwashed to accept debt as inevitable. Why? Who collects the interest on our debt? Follow the money.

Reducing your household debt and changing your spending habits is an act of resistance. The financial system preys on us. Don’t buy into debt culture. Resist the economic slavery of credit cards and loans. Resist materialism and simplify your life. Build the sustainable you. Living within our means will make us more resilient. Helping others to live within their means will strengthen our communities. Keep your money local. Support locally owned businesses with your spending. Spend less, save more, and when you do spend your money, think about the world you’re voting for with your purchase. Vote for your neighborhood. Conserve yourself. Conserve your community. Become debt conscious. That’s the path to a sustainable you. We need your intelligence, your strength, your commitment, and your resources. Put your money to work for the ideas you believe in. Not debt. Resist debt and build the sustainable you.