Thriving The Future Podcast – Détails, épisodes et analyse

Today is the first day of the rest of your life.

You can literally start over (maybe with some pain and consequences, but it is still true).

This mindset is real Freedom.

Show notes for this episode

It’s a New Year and statistics, and personal experience, show that most of you will give up on your resolutions by Jan-20. That’s because you are approaching it as a task and not adopting it as a mindset and core identity.

Change Your Identity

Resolutions fail because they try to change outcomes without changing identity. The fundamental problem isn’t willpower or technique—it’s that people say “I’m going to lose 20 pounds” instead of “I am no longer someone who eats this way.”

A resolution is “something I’m going to do.” An intention is “what I am doing.”

It is who I am.

The research on smoking cessation proves this: people who say “I quit” restart more often than those who say “I am not a smoker.” One is a temporary action; the other is an identity shift.

I was on the Paleo diet for 2 years. Then I started bargaining and failed.

A new diet is a new identity –

When you start a diet, you say, for example, “I am on the Paleo diet”. This implies that you can get off the Paleo diet or you can have a cheat day. You start compartmentalizing and bargaining.

Instead of saying “I am on the Paleo diet”, adopt it as your identity. “I am Paleo”. Those who succeed at this see it trickle down to their friends, who know that they will have to have or make alternatives for this person at their dinner, party, or get-together.

Stop making resolutions. Start making identity statements.

Not “I’m going to garden this year.”

“I am a gardener.”

Not “I’m going to start a side hustle.”

“I am building my business.”

Then ask yourself what that person does every single day—and do one small piece of it right now.

It even comes down to your friends

“I am the sum total of the people I spend my most time around.” - Perpend

If your friends aren’t doers, their inaction will pull you back. This doesn’t mean abandoning relationships, but honestly assessing: are the people I spend the most time with aligned with who I’m becoming?

Plan your life with intention so you are moving toward that goal.:

Involving kids in your intentional life

As I shared in You Need to be Bloomscrolling, Not Doomscrolling, no one wanted to clear the weeds from the overgrown raised beds at my daughter’s house. I got my grandchildren excited about gardening by giving them a homeschooling assignment to look at the seed catalog and choose some seeds based on the color and whether they think they would be tasty. Then they pushed those seeds into the ground and weeded and watered them. They grew moonflower, a purple cabbage, stocky carrots, and a watermelon that they thought would be “juicy and tasty”.

Today is the first day of the rest of your life.

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Scott runs Grow Nut Trees (Midwest Memory chestnut and hazelnut trees and perennials like elderberry cuttings) and is a Chestnut Orchard Architect, designing orchards and food forests for Midwest homesteaders. Currently booking consults for Spring. Sign up for your Free Discovery call where I help you with your Big Picture.

Andy Hickman (shagbark_hick on X/Twitter) has gone viral in recent months as he has tried to form community in Northern New York.

He shares about the tension between loving a place yet watching it die. Do you stay? Is there anything left to hold onto?

“People talk about community. There’s already community. There’s already a structure that makes sense. It’s the small town, the city block, the village, the neighborhood. We’ve done this for thousands of years.”

Despite having a difficult year, he is still one of the most positive people I know.

* His plans for the New Year - to travel South. He may even purchase a car (!).

* Some of the places in the Southwest that he loves and wants to visit, to share with his wife Keturah, who has not seen that part of the country.

* His new writing projects, including a potential book deal.

* Andy’s favorite Christmas memory: Being the Yule King and riding the Yule log through the city square.

Hickman’s Hinterlands on Substack

shagbark_hick on X/Twitter

Andy’s love of the Southwest:

"It doesn't even feel like America because it's so American, if that makes sense. It's this weird horseshoe zone where you feel like you're in a foreign country, but you're actually in the heart of your own country."

Actionable steps

Actionable Steps

Stop reinventing community structures. Before trying to form an intentional community with elaborate rules and shared land, consider whether you could just move near like-minded people and be neighbors. Let natural community form through proximity and shared values rather than formal agreements.

Audit why you live where you live.

What’s the one thing that anchors you to your place? If that thing disappeared tomorrow, would you still have reason to stay?

Look for communities with their “mojo” intact. Vitality isn’t about economics or amenities. It’s about whether people gather, whether families are growing, whether there’s optimism. Some declining places still have thriving pockets. Some prosperous places are spiritually dead. Notice the difference.

Reclaim Sunday. Turn stuff off. Sit around and talk. Gather with family. This isn’t about productivity hacks or “intentional rest”—it’s about Thriving.

Thriving the Future Substack is positive solutions (and even bittersweet conversations). Subscribe and get more - over 170 podcast episodes, and many articles on how to Thrive in a challenging and changing culture.

Wyldewood elderberries make some of the best elderberry wine. Plus I make elderberry syrup and cough medicine for when I have a cold.

It’s mid-Winter but it is the perfect time to get some elderberry cuttings. Just poke the stick in the ground and the elderberry will take off right there.

Get your elderberry cuttings to grow your own elderberry for wine at Grow Nut Trees.

Travis from Backyard Berry on Substack shares about his series "Building a Sustainable Nursery".

His favorite trees: Pawpaws, Persimmons, and Pin Cherries (for the birds).

What is it like to be so near the central area where Pawpaws are grown, attending the festival. He is even drinking pawpaw ginger ale!

We also talk about his series on "Homegrown National Park". Everyone was talking about national parks being affected by Federal land sales a few weeks ago. Travis posted that "What if the largest national park in America wasn’t a remote wilderness, but your own backyard?"

The idea: "transforming America’s private land into vibrant habitat corridors that restore biodiversity and ecological health."

Travis also shares about what it is like to work on an organic vegetable farm.

Times are tough. You want to be more self sufficient and grow more food, with enough to share with family and friends or even sell some of that surplus.

You’ve heard of this “food forest” thing, but it’s so overwhelming to get started. I can help.

My Thriving Food Forest Design can help you realize your dreams of an edible foodscape or perennial paradise that will come back every year so you can grow more food and be more self sufficient. Schedule your FREE Discovery call with me at:

Buy my chestnuts, hazelnuts, elderberry, and comfrey that are adapted to the Midwest.

GrowNutTrees.com

Raised beds that I am building to test Perennial Kitchen Garden layouts:

Vego Garden Modular Metal Raised Bed (which I will make 5' x 3.5', 17" tall).

I use this for a perennial kitchen garden - growing herbs to use daily in the kitchen. Just come along and pick what you need for tonight's dinner.

Foraging and Perennial Gardening on your Homestead.

This week I visit with Roxanne Ahern (Happyholistichs on Twitter) about her book:

Holistic Homesteading - A guide to a Sustainable and Regenerative Lifestyle (physical book), and Kindle.

We talk extensively about foraging and perennial gardening on your homestead.

I like this book because it has a nice balance of permaculture, gardening, foraging, wildcrafting, and cooking. The pictures are fantastic and pop off the page.

It's the "weeks of want", the end of February and early March. Before supermarkets, this time would have seen a gap between the end of the stored food and the new greens or crops of Spring.

We share our favorite perennials to forage:

• Henbit/dead nettle

• Chicory

• Purslane

• Plantain

• Dandelions

• Nettles

We also share what we are planting in the gardening in the coming year:

• Asparagus

• Jerusalem artichokes

• Squash

• Mortgage lifter tomatoes

Check out the show notes. Episode website: https://thrivingthefuture.com/holistic-homesteading

Sponsor:

Elderberry cuttings and comfrey crowns and root cuttings are now available at Grow Nut Trees - https://grownuttrees.com

Is homesteading (and localism) a form of retreat from society?

It can lead down a lonely path if you do not also develop community.

Jason Snyder (@cognazor on Twitter) of Doomer Optimism Podcast joins me to talk about his recent tweet:

"I don't like the narrative of modern day homesteading (and localism more generally) being a form of retreat or disengagement from larger societal concerns. I see it more as a prefiguration of a healthier society that can emerge from its broad-scale and networked diffusion."

We discuss positive steps to move forward, not "retreat":

• Get back in touch with your where you food comes from - grow your own food. You can be a localist, even in the city.

• Plant as many fruit and nut trees as possible. Make passive food sources a common part of your city and homestead landscape. Jason knows a guy who grows out lots of nut trees in pots and gives them away.

• Build community. Learn new skills. Share your skills, even if you are not an expert. We have a motto: "not an expert, but we're still going to get stuff done."

• Help each other - (work days and workshops). Jason relates how he is building community, forming a 'barn raising' group and helping each other on various homestead/farm projects. They recently had a workday/workshop helping a friend tear down a trailer.

• We share our plans for 2023.

Let Jason's pinned tweet be your goal for 2023:

• New virus coming? Plant trees, cultivate garden, tend livestock.

• Supply chain shocks and inflation? Plant trees, cultivate garden, tend livestock.

• Climate change? Plant trees, cultivate garden, tend livestock.

• New war coming? Plant trees, cultivate garden, tend livestock.

Check out the show notes on the episode website: https://thrivingthefuture.com/localism

Sponsor:

Elderberry cuttings and comfrey crowns and root cuttings are now available at Grow Nut Trees - https://grownuttrees.com

We are having a contest drawing in Feb for a copy of Roxanne Ahern's book "Holistic Homesteading". For details, and to sign up for the drawing, go to https://thrivingthefuture.com/contest.

This back-to-basics episode is a backyard starter kit for raising chickens.

The Spring Tradition of Chick Day is Almost Here!

It's Chick Day. This is the time-honored Spring tradition every year where the tractor supply and the other farm stores have chicks for sale. But with the egg shortage and the demand for chickens, there's likely to be shortages of chicks at the farm stores for Chick Day this year.

Many people have asked me, “Can you hatch some chicks for me?”

Let's dive a little deeper. What do they really want?

“I want eggs.”

Okay, so do you have any limitations?

“I live in town and I cannot have any roosters.”

• Options for Buying Chicks - Sex Link or Straight Run

• Breeds

• Cornish Cross are Meat Birds

• Sources for Chicks

• Buying Pullets Rather than Chicks

• Pain Points for First Time Chicken Owners

• Take it easy the first year

Episode website: https://thrivingthefuture.com/backyard-chicken-basics

Sponsor:

Elderberry cuttings and comfrey crowns and root cuttings are now available at Grow Nut Trees - https://grownuttrees.com

Hurry - get them before they come out of dormancy!

Use coupon code "Thriver" at checkout for a 10% discount for Thriving the Future Podcast listeners!

We are having a contest drawing in Feb for a copy of Roxanne Ahern's book "Holistic Homesteading". For details, and to sign up for the drawing, go to https://thrivingthefuture.com/contest.

If Life is a Simulation - How that Worldview Affects your Mindset.

You've seen the Elon Musk tweet: "If you don't think there's at least a tiny chance that you are an NPC...you are an NPC."

Everyone is talking about NPCs. Some people consider themselves as the hero in a video game or Simulation and everyone else is an NPC.

Perpend is back and we talk about Simulation theory - that life is a simulation or we are in someone's else's simulation. And how that worldview and NPC thinking affect your mindset.

We talk about NPC thinking and its root in Transhumanism and Gnosticism.

Perpend: "I read somewhere that maybe the NPCs are really something to be admired because they are being very efficient with their life because they're not expending any energy, time, or dialogue on anything that doesn't matter to them.

Even the NPC in the game is doing that. The NPC in the game is here to give you the key if you say the right password or you do the right thing. So it will not do anything outside that. So it's actually being the most efficient and therefore it is just preserving energy and being a good citizen."

Episode website: https://thrivingthefuture.com/npc

Sponsor:

Elderberry cuttings and comfrey crowns and root cuttings are now available at Grow Nut Trees - https://grownuttrees.com

We are having a contest drawing in Feb for a copy of Roxanne Ahern's book "Holistic Homesteading". For details, and to sign up for the drawing, go to https://thrivingthefuture.com/contest.

Making Solar Work for You - Considerations You May Not Have Thought Of.

This is Part 2 in a series on Solar energy. Steve of RegenerativeHomeSolutions.com gives an overview of solar energy, what questions you should be asking yourself, and considerations and pitfalls as you plan for your solar energy needs.

"I want to add solar to my home." - Considerations:

• On grid, off grid, hybrid, retrofit system options.

• Does your house face the south enough to get sun exposure? For example, the outbuilding that Steve has his solar installed on faces the SE, so he doesn't get a full day of sun exposure.

• Install on the roof or on the ground?

• We discuss that perhaps it is better to install a free standing solar panel system on the ground, in a pasture.

• If you install in the pasture, consider installing it higher so that you could mow under it or livestock would graze under/around it.

• Installing solar on your roof:

• How old is your roof? You may need to replace the roof first.

• Installing solar may void the warranty on your roof.

• Check with your insurance company. Installing solar may affect your insurance coverage. The insurance company will be very interested in the process - who installs your system and how it is installed.

• Will you need to remove trees?

• How to navigate the bureaucracy.

• Do they offer any grants, rebates?

• Selling energy back to the grid - net metering vs. flat.

• Sell/Buy ratio: In KS they sell energy to you at about 12 cents per kW. They buy at 4 cents per kW. But they are planning to lower the sell/buy ratio.

• in CA, the sell/buy ratio is they sell energy to you at 30 cents per kW but they only buy it at 3 cents per kW.

• "How big of a system will I need?" See the episode website link to download a Free energy audit checklist PDF.

This was an audio review of a Solar #GSD Workshop that we put on as part of our local community group.

For more information on Steve's setup, see his website Regenerative Home Solutions.com - Cultivating a Sustainable Lifestyle.

The energy audit worksheet and the solar workshop PDF are available as downloads on the episode website: https://thrivingthefuture.com/solar1

Join the Thriving The Future Community - Telegram Group or mailing list: https://signup.thrivingthefuture.com

Sponsors:

Grow Nut Trees - Elderberry cuttings and comfrey (crowns and root cuttings) now available! - https://grownuttrees.com/

Can you use AI and still Live Not By Lies?

Everyone is talking about AI since ChatGPT came out. You can use it to write content for your business, blog posts, full fiction and stories, and even higher education dissertations.

So how far will you go? Is it moral to use AI for school or work?

I follow a lot of side hustle groups and they are already touting AI where you can "write endless content and not work so hard!"

Perpend and I discuss - Can you use AI and still Live Not by Lies?

"Simple men create simple times, and overcomplicated times call for men to simply live" - Perpend

The week of Christmas, the Boston Federal Reserve, in typical government style of releasing controversial press releases late in the day on Friday, announced that it had completed its Project Hamilton project, a collaboration between the Fed and MIT developers, who are also on the Bitcoin project (!).

The Fed released a white paper last year. It sounded like they were just starting a "Pilot" project. As seen in the video below, they were much farther along (years) than implied.

Biden has directed Federal agencies to put forward plans to roll out and operationalize CBDC in their agencies.

How close are they to rolling it out? What will you do?

How far can you go? It depends on the ultimate question - what are you willing to die for?

Episode website: https://thrivingthefuture.com/ai

Join the Thriving The Future Community - Telegram Group or mailing list: https://signup.thrivingthefuture.com

Sponsors:

Grow Nut Trees - Elderberry cuttings and comfrey (crowns and root cuttings) now available! - https://grownuttrees.com/

Making Solar Work for You

This is the first episode in a series on Solar. Steve of RegenerativeHomeSolutions.com gives an overview of solar energy, what questions you should be asking yourself, and drives into an energy audit as the first steps for sizing your solar needs.

This was an audio review of a Solar #GSD Workshop that we put on as part of our local community group.

The energy audit worksheet and the solar workshop PDF are available as downloads on the episode website: https://thrivingthefuture.com/solar1

For more information on Steve's setup, see his website Regenerative Home Solutions.com - Cultivating a Sustainable Lifestyle.

Join the Thriving The Future Community - Telegram Group or mailing list: https://signup.thrivingthefuture.com

Sponsors:

Grow Nut Trees - Elderberry cuttings and comfrey (crowns and root cuttings) now available! - https://grownuttrees.com/