Sharing Insights Podcast: Exploring Permaculture, Homesteads, and Community in Costa Rica

Regenerative Land Management * This blog contains a few links to products on Amazon.com I’ve found useful. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from any purchases you make through these links. It’s a great way to support the show while greening up your lifestyle. Our earned commissions won’t cost you a dime! Hello and welcome to Part 4 of a 6-part recap series. It’s been a humbling exercise to keep up with all the fun stuff that comes with producing a podcast. Creating new episodes is only one of them. Interviewing a bunch of rebel back-to-the-landers was a pretty attractive introduction to the idea of starting a podcast and getting good ideas out in the open.  I’ve loved it and am excited to release the other episodes that I have edited and waiting for you. Doing these recap episodes, however, has been another kind of adventure. Don’t get me wrong; it’s been an invaluable practice for me to do these reviews.  I feel like I’m getting out of this podcasting adventure the education that I was looking for. All the same, creating audio content from a screen full of notes that you’ve taken from what other people have said is a lot more difficult than just speaking off the cuff. We humans are intrinsically a part of the planet we live on, and we're as inseparable from it as we are intertwined with its other expressions of lifeforms we co-exist with.  We are all composed of recycled molecules that we cyclically share with bacteria, viruses, other creatures, and the soil itself. There are plenty of religions that tell the story of how we came from the soil, and to the soil, we return.  Yet we continue to tell ourselves and teach our children, the egoic myths that lead most people to think that we can somehow live healthfully, independent from healthy soil, not to mention the life-enriching variety of other earth dwellers that we share it with. It’s imperative for us to weave our inherent interconnection with the rest of our planet's existence back into our culture. We’re all part of an organic planet. Like the unimaginable number of different cells that we need for our bodies to function properly, our planet (our larger self) needs its cellular diversity to remain intact and cared for.  Like us, when the planet loses significant parts of its functioning body, imbalances occur that can be much more difficult to return from than if things were already in a more relative state of balance. This episode is all about land management and what we’ve learned from those who’ve been doing the work and measuring their results.  Building healthy soil is one of the most important things that any of us could be doing right now. I’m going to say it again; a healthy humanity depends on healthy soil. I’m going to be a little honest with you. I’m not the plant guy of the family. I  enjoy planting things here and there, and I love preparing food with fresh harvest from the garden, but  I’m generally not the guy you can rely on to keep a seedling alive long enough to transplant it or make sure the fertilization schedule stays current. This episode was a bit of a challenge for me to get into. I’ve had to shed a bit of my imposter syndrome to be talking to a bunch of plant-enthusiasts about something that I know very little about, compared to them. At the same time, that’s the theme of this entire podcast.  While I certainly have a fair share of things I’ve learned and can teach newcomers to the farm, this has been my season to humble down, take notes and be a student. Let’s see what that’s looked like. I’ve divided this episode into three sections. First, we’ll talk about the planning stages of land management, followed by a recap of some of our guests’ soil-building tips.  Lastly, we’ll wrap it up with some insights they’ve learned from working with the plants themselves. Let’s jump in... It all starts with a good design. Justin Dolan learned a valuable lesson about doing your due diligence and having your land surveyed. While he strongly recommends doing so before buying your property, it worked out to his advantage when he disputed his neighbor’s practice of spraying herbicides too close to his gardens.  A little investigation taught him that what they both thought was the neighboring golf course’s road, was actually on his side of the property line.  The circumstance drove the golf-course developer toward unexpected production costs, leading them to sell the property to Justin at a low-enough price that Justin was able to take it on and turn it into what’s become the country club’s 18-hole permaculture disk-golf course. In telling his story, Justin recommends that when negotiating your land purchase, you can often get the seller of your new property to share the costs of that assessment. Justin also recommends hiring someone to do a biodiversity study, upon buying it, to educate yourself on what you have living on your property.  How cool would it be to have a customized bird-watching laminate card for you and your visitors to relate to your neighboring critters with!? He says that “real” country clubs should be taking care of the countryside.  What a concept! Water management is a crucial element to focus on, for any land project.  Amidst that is to give sufficient focus on how we manage our wastewater.  Justin’s greywater and blackwater systems are built to bioremediate toxins. Bioremediation is a process where certain plants break down the molecular structure of certain toxins, transforming them into inert matter. The methods he uses make both economic and ecological sense.  Some of the plants he uses include planting lana, hemp, fungus, and oysters to filter the water. He says that hemp is an ideal product to feed with these wastewaters.  He also uses plastic bottles filled with biochar to further filter out pathogens. Esteban Acosta was another guest who's put some significant thought into optimizing greywater and blackwater.  His biodigester systems have been refined to a point where they produce cooking gas, by fermenting the kitchen and bathroom wastes produced from a small residential home! The price of gas keeps going up, folks.  Investing in a design that can give you free fuel while creating garden fertilizer is an investment seriously worth considering, especially if you’re still in the process of building or designing a new home. One thing that Justin expressed that stuck with me was that if you design your communal spaces to be beautiful, people will want to protect and contribute to them. Justin has an infectious enthusiasm for using his property as a living seed bank. He encourages us to share and propagate as many different seeds as we can find. Like Nico Botefur from Essence Arenal, Justin encourages us to plant our houses by putting bamboo in the ground as early as possible. He boasts that it’s like printing your own money.  Seeing the price you can pay for prepared bamboo canes in some places, I’d say he’s right.Nico further reminds us to plant plenty of it and use it liberally in ways that the bamboo poles can be replaced easily. It’s a renewable resource that can be fun to work with once you get the hang of it. At Finca La Isla, Peter Kring has designed his food forests in an impressively systematic way. His property is designed as a network of crisscrossing rainforest corridors that frame out a series of 1-3 acre lots. Each of these lots has a themed collection of fruit trees and exotic palms planted within them.  That way, the wildlife can pass through his property freely, and while he loses some quantity of food to these neighboring critters, they contribute to the health of the soil, and therefore trees, in very beneficial ways. The key's just to plant more trees! His neighbor, Terry Lillian Newton, invites us to try and let go of our attachments to what we think the property should be and learn to appreciate its innate essence. Terry reminds us that if you want to have horses, plan for plenty of open space and a diversity of grasses, herbs, fruits, and flowers. Plant them all around their grazing areas or along the perimeter. She recommends learning more about this method in a book called Paddock Paradise [https://amzn.to/3GAlUn4], by Jamie Jackson. Building Healthy Soil Switching over now to the topic of building healthy soil, we’ll start with Ed Bernhardt, the guy who refers to the back-to-the-land movement as a “silent revolution.” Ed refers to himself as a deep ecologist who aims to live with the land rather than on it. Ed provides us with several great recipes for making valuable items like fast compost, his “kombucha for the plants,” a kitchen-made insecticide that's suitable for chewing insects, and even a biosand water filter.  We’ve made a PDF [https://sharinginsights.net/ed'sthreerecipes] with these recipes outlined out for you. You can find a link [https://sharinginsights.net/ed'sthreerecipes] to it in the transcripts of this episode, as well as in the show notes of Ed’s Episode (#002.) Ed also reminds us to do what we can to recycle our waste. Shredding newspaper and food scraps into compost is a great start.  If you live in an urban environment, you can look into buying Compost Drums [https://amzn.to/3nKAVKd] or Worm Bins [https://amzn.to/3GFDN42] to make transforming your trash into treasure, faster and tidier. Justin Dolan makes his bokashi microorganisms in his livestock corral and uses his animals to mix it.  The process adds nutrients to the mix while creating beneficial bacteria that eat pathogens in the corral. Making bokashi in the animal corals and spraying a tea version of it around the coral keeps it disinfected and smelling great. In Justin’s bokashi-production video [https://youtu.be/ZPmh8zRE9jY], we also looked at his method of sustaining moisture and nutrients in the soil by creating Biochar.  He digs a big hole, about  2x3 meters wide and a meter or so deep, and fills it with wood waste. He ignites it, covers it with a dense layer of palm leaves with some sand on top, and leaves it to smolder. He comes back the next day to remove the leaves, and he’s left with a pit full of biochar - enough for the whole year! His extra touch comes when he removes the biochar. He fills the hole back up with wood to make a hugelkultur bed.  Hugelkultur is this great method of mounting up wood logs and covering it with dirt.  That dirt is planted on, and the wood underneath goes through a slow decomposition process, providing long-term fertilizer for the garden. Peter Kring mimics nature in the ways he applies mulch to his food forests.  He mulches heavily around the dripline of the trees, adding biochar and manure to the mulch.  That way, the biochar-inoculated-mulch bed slowly covers the area as the trees develop. Peter also adds micro-organisms to the mix during wet times of the year. For more efficient use in your dripline applications, he recommends harvesting mulch from a nearby forest floor and hydrating it to extract the beneficial microorganisms before applying. When taking harvest from our trees, he encourages us to put something back for the tree to continue to thrive.  Find out what minerals each tree needs and create a schedule of application.  It doesn’t have to be a heavy fertilizing regiment.  A bit of calcium carbonate (or rock phosphate) mixed with some manure and worm compost can be very effective.  He recommends making it in large quantities and then adding your biomass, biochar, and micro-organisms, as needed, throughout the year. For more information on biochar, Peter recommends checking out the documentary The Secret Of Eldorado - TERRA PRETA [https://youtu.be/0Os-ujelkgw], on YouTube. Esteban's businesses, Sembrando Flores [http://sembrandoflores.com/] and Viogaz [https://viogaz.com/], focus primarily on soil improvement.  Esteban has proven again and again that Biodynamic-preparation applications significantly improve commercial-scale coffee and wine production. In his practice of working with other landowners, he teaches those coming from a more conventional background and don’t trust organic methods to consider replacing a small percentage of their fertilizers with compost to start.  That way, they can measure the results and make decisions from there. He encourages us to grow our biomass precisely where we want to plant our gardens and trees in the coming year. He primarily uses plants like Macuna & Mexican sunflower for this task. Plant it heavily where you want to plant, and chop it back just before it goes to seed. This practice aligns with Esteban’s approach of setting up conditions where the soil can feed itself. Healthy-soil biology largely replaces the need for soil amendments.  He recommends using small amounts of high-quality compost with high quantities of cheap biomass grown on the fields. Simply apply compost tea on top of the biomass. His Biogas installations provide multiple yields of gas & liquid fertilizer in quantities that can allow you to apply an abundance of that tea weekly, or even daily. In Nico’s YouTube video [https://youtu.be/u7CuXlmRZaw], he uses the water from his tilapia ponds to drain directly into his biomass pile, which composts down and is moved to the gardens for top mulching. He also has hoses to inoculate his garden beds with the tilapia pond water.  Nico shares the opinion of many of our guests of how building soil should be the #1 priority when starting a new project. Now, onto the Wonderful World of Plants My first guest, Suzanna Leff of Finca Amrta, is as passionately connected to her gardens as anyone I’ve met.  Planting and processing harvest are some of her favorite tactics for helping her volunteers experience the magical qualities of life. In Finca Amrta’s farm tour video [https://sharinginsights.net/videos/suzanna-leff-video/], one of her volunteers describes how they grow their vanilla beans by gently helping each flower pollinate itself.  So cool! Ed Berhardt shared a valuable insight when he pointed out that many medicinal herbs often tolerate shade, making them great to plant near the house or amidst tall trees. One of the most exciting things I’ve learned from Ed occurred when I went to his place a few years ago, and he taught me how to propagate bamboo by cutting down a culm and creating several 1-meter-long portions from the upper third of the cane.  You cut each piece so that it has at least four nodes.  In between each node, you cut a small square out of one side of the culm - big enough for rainwater to get to it. You plant the cane laying down lengthwise, half in the soil, with the open windows exposed to the elements.  As the culm fills with water and hydrates, it’ll send roots down at each of the nodes, as well as shoots that’ll begin to climb to the sky.  It takes a little longer to get going than if you just dig out a more mature shoot from the side of a clump, but it requires much less effort. Besides the hemp & lana that Justin uses for his blackwater bioremediation, he also uses Mexican Sunflower, a plant that he and Esteban use for Green Manure. Another one of his favorites to plant around is a bush called Miracle Fruit.  He says that it’s an excellent food for people with diabetes.  This miracle fruit removes your ability to taste the acidic qualities of the foods you eat afterward.  This results in sour foods like lemons and vinegar tasting sweet!  It’s a great way to satisfy a sweet tooth with non-sweet foods! Justin likes to play with different plants to create microclimates for other plants and his living spaces.  He uses vining plants to cool down the walls of his house and also uses them to create trellised wind-breaks or dappled shade for more delicate foods. He encourages us to rearrange our perspectives on what medicine is, or can be. He sets the example of planting herbs as a living first aid kit all around and outside your home. He also encourages us to plant things like neem, hombre grande, madero negro, garlic, and chili, to be used as ingredients for natural pest control. In some cases, it might even be worth importing some beneficial insects like the praying mantis or ladybugs to eat more invasive species like ants and mites. Besides, who wouldn’t love to see more praying mantises and ladybugs around, right? While he recommends that we remove weak and dying plants to keep insects away, he also reminds us that intentionally stressing plants can build resilience in some cases. Peter Kring is another master gardener who turned out to be a treasure trove of tips.  Most notably, he recommends that most fruiting trees should be pruned after their fruiting cycles.  You have to do your homework, though.  Some fruits, like rambutan, can be pruned back as much as 2 meters, while others, like the mangosteen, don't like to be pruned at all. Peter’s nursery operation consists primarily of grafted durian, chompadek, and other exotic fruits that produce better quality fruits faster when they're propagated as a graft.  As he explains in his YouTube video [https://sharinginsights.net/videos/durian-grafting-propagating-trees/] on the topic, it can shave several years off the time you might have to wait for the tree to bear mature fruits. Another little tip that he gave us is that if you mix the variety of durian trees you plant in an area, they’ll pollinate each other, and the diversity will increase your harvest seasons. I’ve seen similar things done with avocados. While, like me, Lynx Guimond may not necessarily be Sailcargo’s go-to plant-management guy, the tour we took on his farm really blew me away.  There are far more foods that can be planted near the beach than I ever imagined.  For any properties that need to conserve water, he’s demonstrated, yet again, that greywater filtration is a powerful way to water your gardens in a nutrient-rich way. I’ll leave you with one final tip that I’ve picked up from my own land management learnings. It’s in alignment with the principle often described as Value the Marginal. While planting food has its obvious value and importance, don’t skimp on the pollinators.  We need to plant pretty things. If not for ourselves and the aesthetic pleasure of our guests, we need a diversity of flowers in our gardens to attract the ever-vigilant birds and bees that make our gardens an Eden. Whew! I know this episode was jam-packed with valuable information, so for your convienence, we've created an awesome, downloadable PDF that contains all the tips and tricks from this episode! You can download it here:https://sharinginsights.net/land-management-tips-pdf [https://sharinginsights.net/land-management-tips-pdf] With that, my friends, I bid you a wonderful rest of your day.  Remember to subscribe to the podcast if you haven’t already, so you’ll get notified when I eventually release our next episode on natural and sustainable construction methods.Until then, Go find a seed and plant it somewhere lovely! P.S: Besides leaving a rating and review or sharing the show with someone who’d like it, you can support the show and yourself by visiting our Support the Show page [https://sharinginsights.net/support-the-show]. There, you'll find an array of helpful information, links, and products that I thought you might find useful.  Check it out! * Music: Rite of Passage by Kevin MacLeod * Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage [https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage] * License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/] --------------------------------------- Download your FREE guide to Permaculture Living, at: https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/ [https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/]

Welcome to the third installment of our Season 1 Recap series, where I’ve been reviewing what we’ve learned from a dozen interviews with veteran landowners throughout Costa Rica. In today’s episode, we’re going to take a dive into the concept of ‘Community’, our place in it, and how we can be more harmonious members and effective contributors to our communities [https://sharinginsights.net/what-is-sharing-insights-podcast/], both within a project and amongst our neighbors. In my twenties, I spent a lot of time visiting communities around North America.  I’ve seen it done a lot of different ways. I’ve seen projects try and fail and I’ve seen the humble groundedness of those who’ve changed with time. There are a lot of things that can make or break a community. Let’s see what’s worked best for our guests. What is Community? “Community” can mean different things to different people - at different stages of their lives, even. Within the “back-to-the-land” movement, the term often refers to a group of individuals or families who co-owns the property, share some level of resources and responsibilities, and (if they want to last more than a couple of seasons) have some manner of formal agreements in place for how to manage the sharing of those resources and responsibilities. The term community is often used in other contexts, as well. One of those would be our relationship with our neighbors in our surrounding region.  Shared roads, aquifers, and other utilitarian items inherently bind us. When we look a little deeper, we expand that list of shared assets to include companionship, insights, tools, labor, information, food surplus, child-raising, and more. Taking the time to connect with our broader community brings fresh perspectives, wisdom, security, and a multitude of other invaluable gifts. Of course, the term community can be further expanded to include groups of people that aren’t in the same bioregion but are united by interest. Online communities are a growing phenomenon, and if that’s something that you’re actively involved in, I encourage you to listen to this episode with a conceptual translator on.  I’m sure that much of what we review here can be relevant to what you’re doing.  For that matter, much of this advice could even be used to build more healthy neighborhoods, in cities and in suburbs. Our Lineage of Communitarians One of my favorite references to community is when Ancel Mitchel described [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/ancel-mitchell/] sitting around a table with others, processing raw harvest into a cleaned product for storage. This is the work passed down to us from our ancestors. This is a practice of community that goes back to prehistoric times. The practice of cleaning food that’ll be used for communal sustenance, with others whose lives are intertwined with their own, builds community in a way that few things can. Our ancestors had it a little differently than we do, however. Their sense of community was inherent in their existence. That is, people didn’t move around nearly as much as we do these days. In most parts of the world, to have left your tribe was a bigger deal, and if you did, it was generally into some other well-established tribe. We live in a new age now. We’re redefining what “tribe” and “community” mean to us. To make up for the absence of these established generations-deep traditions, Alnoor Ladha asserts that longevity is born from a robust social infrastructure, and it’s one that we have to intentionally start designing into our communities. I quite agree with him. As I mentioned, I’ve seen the remnants of a number of projects that didn’t make the distance. Those who’d taken the time to fortify their invisible infrastructures with community-living agreements, time spent working & playing together, and developing a common vision, faced their storms better than those who had far less to anchor them. The time spent developing the social infrastructure of any community, large or small, pays off in often unexpected and life-enriching ways. A New Age, A New Way In our age of mass transportation, the phenomenon of seasonal community members can make cohesion difficult. Developments of online meeting forums have alleviated this a bit. Still, a land-based project needs more than a couple of members to hold it down for extended periods of time, in order to prevent that seasonal community vibe from evolving into awkward cycles of unresolved differences of opinion for how things should be run. This can break momentum before it ever gets the chance to get going. At the time of our interview, Brave Earth was developing a school to assist members who’d like to be able to stay year-round. Where we send our children to school will always be something that needs to be considered. For many people, sending their kids where more support is provided is preferred over local, rural schoolhouses. Knowing who we want to live with is another vital aspect to consider. Brave Earth has designed [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/brave-earth/] its community model and manifesto to call in masters of different trades needed to internally craft their theme of transformational retreats. Starting with this kind of goal in mind can make a significant difference in the quality of the community that forms. As part of their social infrastructure, members are asked to contribute 10hrs/week to the community in some way. It’s trust-based and flexible. They pretty much invite any contribution to the community that one feels like offering. It’s expected that each member spends some time each week, leaving something better than they found it or simply making someone else’s day. I like that. After that, additional employment may be available at times, through the community’s profit-generating activities, like retreat production. Coming Together for Common Vision Many community-focused projects usually experiment with different formats of rhythmic check-in forums to hold space for a general sense of connection as well as to address any issues that might arise among the members or guests. It’s generally recommended to make time for different circles for discussing work and logistics, apart from celebration or conflict resolution. Suzanna Leff reinforces [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/suzanna-leff/] that conflict resolution requires training and intentional practice. For her, weekly meetings are ideal. She only has one land partner, so her weekly meetings are primarily with her volunteers. She encourages the practice and was sure to point out that the volunteers often know more than we do. To that, I can definitely attest! Sailcargo Inc. is a unique community, in that it’s essentially composed of semi-long-term employees who are there for a functional purpose. Many of them will likely move on when the project is complete. Some may stay longer, while some leave sooner. They’re all there for different reasons, which might not be to live in a community, but rather to build something they all believe in. Nevertheless, they’ve begun self-organizing living arrangements to improve the form and function of their beachside homestead. Each player makes their own contribution, and it keeps getting better.  It’s a pretty cool scene, really. It’s a blend of organized vision and labor, mixed with a flavor of anarchy amidst its unique players and their individual contributions to the collectively shared spaces. Lynx Guimond, the ringleader of the bunch [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/lynx-gamond-sailcargo/], says that healthy and happy people are high-quality assets. He emphasizes the importance of taking the time to check in with guests, volunteers, and team members and make sure that they have a chance to be heard, if not helped. Over at the Permaculture Country Club, Justin Dolan designed a model [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/justin-dolan-part-2/] where he sold shares of the community to members that wanted to live within the shared grounds of the property and also sold sovereign lots to neighbors who wanted to live nearby. The idea was to call in a bit of an eco-village. His aim to have like-minded neighbors has worked out to a degree, but with that approach, you really don’t have any say over what someone does with their land in the way you do when all the members agree to collective land-use agreements. Are We Having Fun Yet? Justin puts significant value on the spirit of healthy competition within a community. He finds that it compliments the spirit of cooperation. Games are an enriching element of community design and something Justin’s designed into his project. Upon entering the country club’s community center, it’s impossible to miss the giant chess board that blankets the center of the floor, with its meter-high pieces. My eyes lit up, and the child in me couldn’t resist wanting to move them around and play. Around the corner, Justin has a whole games area [https://sharinginsights.net/videos/natural-home-cooling-justin-dolan-st-michaels-permaculture-country-club/] including bow & arrow, throwing stars, and hatchets. Of course, that’s just at the entrance. What lies beyond are several hectares of a permaculture-designed disk-golf course that draws visitors in from around the world. What’s it like to raise kids in the community? Justin and I talked a bit about raising children in a project like this. Growing up on these farms is a uniquely enriching experience that can be unfathomable for someone who grows up in a city. My boys grew up amidst trees and the countryside. They oftentimes knew more about what the best plants were for snacking on than anyone besides our groundskeeper! Climbing trees, walking through the hills, meeting people from many different cultures, learning tolerance, humility, and a sense of expectation to participate in the community have set them up to be diversified, healthy, adaptable, and kind human beings. Ultimately, I won’t argue that growing up rurally might not have offered them the same education as being in an institutionalized school in the city, but what they’ve gained has been priceless in setting them up to be dynamically adventurous young men that many people will surely be grateful to know. Meghan Casey [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/meghan-casey/] and her husband Davis, from the Chilamate EcoRetreat, agree. They’ve raised their girls as part of the team. It gives the girls a healthy sense of responsibility, interaction, creativity, and resourcefulness. Of course, we don’t want to take unhealthy advantage of children in these situations, but children thrive on being included and trusted with important responsibilities. That being said, I realize that volunteers and many other guests, also seek opportunities to contribute. It makes me remember Suzanna’s comment that “the more you can allow people to be involved, the richer their experience has the potential to be.” Should Animals Be Considered as Part of Our Community? I want us to reflect on my visit with Terry Newton for a minute. Her contribution to this topic isn’t always associated with the term community. For Terry and many landowners, animals are valued members of the community. Terry’s final words to anyone [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/kindred-spirits/] considering bringing a horse onto their project is to take the time to drop in deeply with the animal and connect with it before making a choice. I don’t think she was referring to a momentary reflection, either. Bringing home a large animal like a horse is a massive responsibility and one that can be a far greater joy than a chore when it feels connected to its owner, and vice versa. She goes on to suggest that once you get it home, take the time to hang out and bond with it, before getting into all the training and doing. Terry cares for her animals like she would her guests or family members. She uses natural healing methods for first aid response but doesn’t delay medical assistance for cases when the natural methods don’t seem to be working fast enough. Especially if the animal is suffering. A new approach that I hadn’t heard before was the practice of unshoeing one’s horses for optimal health (and reduced maintenance). As a kid, I always found it strange that horses should need shoes. They didn’t evolve that way, and we don’t shoe other animals. Terry explained that the practice of shoeing animals [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horseshoe] is suitable for terrains like concrete or desert rocky plains, but in the tropics, it can actually be a hindrance and a place to harbor pathogens. I appreciate her contemplative approach and willingness to look outside of the ‘one-size-fits-all’ solution frame of wellness care. It makes sense to consider options based on their relative need rather than some norm. We Need Each Other as Ever In my interview with Brandy Heidy Montegue on her podcast, I spoke on the importance of forgiveness as an invaluable tool for longevity and cohesion within any relationship structure. The opportunity for harmony blossoms from acceptance of each other's imperfections. We’re all in school, my friends.  From the womb to the tomb. Life gets a whole lot less burdensome when we embrace the fact that we all have faults. Blame is generally fruitless, and the only person suffering from our indignation is ourselves. Healthy communities are built on the development of relationships, and it’s irresponsible to think that conflict will never arise or that it’s “bad” when it does. The key to getting better at navigating our triggers and those of the people we’re in a relationship with is to follow the Four Agreements and get better at assertively expressing our feelings and needs in ways that are about us, and not other people. Book Recommendations Besides the 4 Agreements [https://amzn.to/3hJO6sE] by Don Miguel Ruiz and Non-Violent Communication [https://www.amazon.com/Nonviolent-Communication-Language-Life-Changing-Relationships/dp/189200528X/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3LGCTGEEUO9R9&dchild=1&keywords=nonviolent+communication&qid=1633113966&sprefix=nonviolent+communication%2Caps%2C256&sr=8-1], by Marshall B. Rosenberg,  there are a couple of other books that I feel are worth mentioning. Creating a Life Together, by Diane Christianson, is a must-read for anyone looking to live in a community. I strongly recommend that anyone who intends on forming a new community, should not do so before reading this book.Cultural Emergence [https://shareasale.com/r.cfm?b=278912&u=2653875&m=30889&urllink=www%2Echelseagreen%2Ecom%2Fproduct%2Fcultural%2Demergence%2F&afftrack=], by Looby Macnamara, draws upon the lineages of indigenous wisdom & permaculture design to transform how we see and interact with ourselves, others, and the world around us. Before we jump into what we’ve learned about creating resilience in our regional communities, I’d like to take a break to share a quick word in support of the show’s resilience... Regional connections Now that we’ve reviewed some of the insights we’ve learned on building healthy communities at home, let’s open up the lens and see what we can do to foster deeper relationships with our regional communities at large. Importance of Allies We’ll start off with our first two guests, Suzanna Leff and Ed Bernhardt. As we learned from Suzanna, Ed was the neighbor who welcomed her into the community, introduced her to what’s become her home, and surely had a hand in helping her get settled into life there. They’ve been friends for over 30 years. The power of having their two projects next two each other has brought an invaluable cross-pollination of people, resources, ideas, and other types of support; enhancing the impact that each of their projects has been able to make. For that matter, her volunteer program started as an overflow of Ed’s program. Be a Friendly Neighbor Ed tells us in his interview [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/ed-bernhardt/] how, in the early days, he began working with local children in the pueblo, teaching them how to garden. He even reached out to the local school and made an agreement for him to guide the kids in planting their own schoolyard garden. I loved watching Ed’s face light up when he described how excited the kids were about getting the vegetables they were growing served on their plates at lunch. Ed encourages us to integrate with society as friendly foreigners. Beyond his local community, Ed has written for many local newspapers in both English and Spanish, with a passion to teach his international community as much as he can about plants, gardening, self-care, and mindfulness. Ed is currently working with Global College [https://gci.edu.np/], in Heredia, to create online courses in organic practices. Speaking of being a friendly neighbor, Ancel Mitchel’s been doing what many permaculture-minded entrepreneurs have done and has a campaign where she collects compost scraps from her neighbors. She describes it as a great way to build a sense of community while harvesting a wasted resource, which she then turns into food for her cacao forests. By inviting neighbors to provide extra services to guests of Essence Arenal, Nico Botefur has not only improved his guests’ experiences but has created lasting friendships and alliances throughout his neighborhood. His neighbors get to feed their families with money earned from sharing their gifts, thanks to the infrastructure he’s provided. The Benefits of Participating in Associations While being a friendly neighbor and ambassador of your culture is vital for growing healthy humanity, Peter Kring pointed out something that really made an impression on me. He says that the best way to get your neighbors’ attention and get them naturally interested in whatever methods of land management or business that you might want to demonstrate to them, is to show them that what you’re doing can make money. He encourages us to remember that farming is a business, and you need ways to sustain it Many of the locals that Peter influences are those that come to his place to buy trees. They see what he’s doing and start to ask questions. Peter gives back to his community in many ways. He heads up the local farmers market and is part of a group of farmers who’ve formed a local organic certification association. By applying collectively, the farmers are able to save significantly on fees. An awesome byproduct is that they end up working collectively to uphold the standard. Selling at the farm and farmers’ market doesn’t require organic certification, but Peter and the association created a unique market, specifically for certified growers. They’re now able to efficiently assist other farms to acquire the certification so they can be permitted to sell there. Aly Kahn & Alnoor, along with their cohorts at Brave Earth, have formed a non-profit organization, called Fuerza del Amor, to enhance resilience in their biosphere. One of the accomplishments of Fuerza del Amor has been the organization of a mutual aid network among neighbors. The concept works out something like this: If 40 people, in a village of 200-400 people, join a volunteer network with a commitment to show up once a month to a work party, that would give you 10 people per week coming out to assist in each weekly work party. You can do a lot in a day with 10 people! Brave Earth offers the organizing team, which generally consists of 3 people. They also donate the use of their tools for these Sunday work parties. The non-profit provides $500 per house toward hardware, and the people collectively decide how to use it. This isn’t only a brilliant program for enriching relationships and improving local infrastructure. It’s also a way to pull in investors to acquire more land for communal transformation and benefit! One of the projects getting attention is a community rec center.  The community center is being built in rented space from someone in town at a generously low price. This whole thing makes me recall the story of Stone Soup [https://www.amazon.com/Stone-Soup-Audio-Read-Along/dp/0545353947/ref=sr_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=stone+soup&qid=1633114607&sr=8-4].  Everybody throws in what they have, and everyone benefits from the feast. Of course, it’s worth mentioning an important detail, concerning the planning of projects like this. Please consult with the neighborhood about any initiatives that you want to take before putting energy into them! Brave Earth has a small dedicated team that’s been systematically visiting their neighbors throughout the pueblo to learn more about who they are, what they need, and what they might have to offer. We never really know people’s needs until we ask and LISTEN to them. Another valuable branch of Fuerza del Amor has been their part in organizing a community policing arm to keep neighbors alert of suspicious activity in the area. It collectively empowers them to take corrective measures into their own hands, especially when municipal authorities don’t necessarily need to be involved. Teach a Trade Lynx Guimond made an impact in his regional community, by importing tradesmen from other countries to work with and teach local craftsmen skills that are expanding what they can do with their trade. The Sailcargo [https://www.sailcargo.inc/] shipyard is a dynamic blend of international talent and local carpenters, coming together to create a prototype that hopes to change the way we fuel international shipping Again, it’s worth mentioning Lynx’s reflection that healthy and happy people are high-quality assets, worth investing in. Lynx believes in giving a sense of ownership to the members of the team. He asks new people how they see themselves fitting in, before assuming where they’ll be best placed. The Sailcargo mission is collaboratively directed by the executive team, but measures are in place to bond the entire team in a co-creative spirit of dedication to innovation. It takes a village to build this ship. Long-term employees earn shares of the company, along with their room, board, and wages. Empower a Culture of Entrepreneurship My interview with Meghan Casey was almost entirely about the topic of fostering resilience in our regional communities. Meghan’s husband, Davis, was born in Sarapiqui, where their ecolodge is located. While I’m going to touch on a few of the highlights from that interview, I encourage you to check it out to get the full inspiring story of the impact they’ve been able to make on their neighbors’ lives. Meghan made her first contribution, providing English classes for people in the pueblo. From there, she began organizing art workshops and cooking classes. These were being taught and attended by some of her guests, as well as folks from the pueblo. Out of convenience, they started out hosting the classes at the ecolodge. That changed when the hotel became busier. At that point, they started moving the classes into the pueblo, where some of the neighbors took the art and cooking classes on, with Meghan’s guidance. Meghan was able to send her guests to their homes for these cultural experiences. She charges a small commission for organizing things, but the women in the village found access to an income stream that didn’t previously exist. It’s beautiful.In my pueblo, we enjoy the pleasure of having a friend in the village, who occasionally prepares home-cooked meals for guests. We made up a simple menu, laminated it, and hung a copy in each of our cabins. Guests can order and have food delivered, or (pandemic notwithstanding) they can sometimes go to her house to enjoy a meal on her back deck. This simple arrangement has been the highlight of several of our guests’ stays, and has brought a small, but highly valued, amount of money into this elderly woman’s home. Meghan also helped many of her neighbors set up extra rooms that they can rent out to tourists. This has turned into a nearly village-wide farm stay program. Meghan found that her efforts were starting to breed an awkward sense of competition among neighbors hoping to get the next guest. It’s something that’s taken some navigation, but she emphasized to the women who were opening their homes to guests that-  “If we aren’t all successful in this effort, none of us can be.” Community Independence Cultivates Diversity and Resilience Meghan says that ongoing training is crucial. Opening up and feeding new opportunities like this, and orienting new entrepreneurs to host people, is easiest done with the co-creation of standards of operation. It’s also important to teach, for instance, cultural nuances that might improve feelings of safety and comfort for the visitors. At the same time, she encourages them to keep it real. After all, the people signing up for these classes and accommodations are looking for an authentic cultural experience. Guests definitely don’t need fancy imported processed foods to feel like they’re receiving value. Meghan encourages her neighbors to embrace every part of their culture, even the humble ones. (Especially the humble ones!)Besides, it can be incredibly beneficial to get people out of their comfort zones. Meghan calls it the “stretch zone” and says that’s where amazing relationships and learning happen. For social programs to be successful, the nearby communities need to actually “feel” the benefit of the project. Otherwise, they feel apart from it, and not only is little impact being made, but problems can also arise. Again, it’s best to do interviews with people in the pueblo to see who has what to offer. Who knows, you might find yourself helping to co-organize an annual community festival! If that sounds too daunting to take on, maybe consider offering a small piece of land for a neighbor to grow food on or graze their horses. The rewards are life-long lasting. On this topic, I’ll end by saying that communities rely on cooperation. Consider the unimaginable number of synergistic relationships that exist between all matter, living organisms, and systems on our planet. Interdependence is a fundamental factor of life. Evolution isn’t just a story about the survival of the fittest. I, and many others, believe that evolution is a story of mutual benefit and the extension of generosity. The most resilient systems are those who’ve developed interdependence with their surrounding environment and cohabitants.It’s a practice worth developing. That’s what I’ve got for this episode, friends. Tune in next time for a dive into the array of land management tips we’ve picked up along the way. If you like what I’m sharing here, share it with a friend. Beyond that, consider leaving a review on the Apple podcast, or even on our Facebook page. I’d love for more people to benefit from the insights we’re sharing. And don't forget – we've created a downloadable PDF with all the tips and tricks we've collected on how to build and grow resilient communities! You can download it here:https://sharinginsights.net/building-resilient-communities [https://sharinginsights.net/building-resilient-communities] Till next time, Stay connected P.S: Besides leaving a rating and review or sharing the show with someone who’d like it, you can support the show and yourself by visiting our Support the Show page [https://sharinginsights.net/support-the-show]. There, you'll find an array of helpful information, links, and products that I thought you might find useful.  Check it out! Special thanks to Peter Mukuru for editing this episode! * Music: Rite of Passage by Kevin MacLeod * Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage [https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage] * License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/] --------------------------------------- Download your FREE guide to Permaculture Living, at: https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/ [https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/]

Welcome to Volume 2 of my Season 1 recap series. In this episode, we’re going to review some of the advice we’ve been given about hosting guests, volunteers, and students. Hosting is a hot topic for many new landowners as welcoming in volunteers is an enticing way to get much-needed help building foundational infrastructure. For many new landowners, it also fulfills a desire for social connection and a sense of community. When done well, hosting guests as volunteers, apprentices, students, tourists, farm-stay guests, or curious neighbors can bring an enriching element of cultural interaction, personal growth, and prosperity to your project. Learn from Guest Hosting Veterans Suzanna Leff, from Finca Amrta, has been hosting volunteers for over 30 years. At first, she was reluctant to host but opened up to it with some experimentation. Suzanna’s personality and love of new experiences have brought her to treasure the interactions that her program has to offer both her and her guests. She gets to stay home tending her garden while the world comes to her. She helps people to explore and harness their passions, and that practice has helped her meet her needs and live a long and happy life by the riverside. She gets to share what she’s learned with others while continuing to learn from them in return. Suzanna’s suggestion is to integrate guests into as many aspects of farm life as is comfortable for you to do so. It enriches the guest’s experience and, if done well, can yield greater returns than you’ve originally invested. Finca Amrta hosts guests for a reasonably low rate, giving them board, access to the beautiful riverside property, and ample food provisions for them to prepare in the community kitchen. In return, her guests help out around the homestead 4 hours a day, 5 days a week, and Suzanna is often right out there alongside them. She explains that the most authentic teaching happens when everyone is working together. Being in the present moment is very satisfying. It gives her a chance to check in with volunteers regularly. Passing conversations can help keep spirits strong and minimizes build-ups of tension, misunderstanding, or stress. Identifying unhappy volunteers and exploring where their passions lie can reap unimagined benefits and value. Suzanna believes in redirecting volunteers toward tasks that maximize their individual skills and passion. She even encourages people to sing while they work! A Beautiful Guest Hosting Story In her interview [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/suzanna-leff/] and the farm tour video [https://sharinginsights.net/videos/suzanna-leff-video/] that we did with her, Suzanna tells a story of transforming a person’s experience from resistance (aka suffering) into joy and a lasting expression of beauty. One guest who initially hated their experience ended up painting a beautiful mural on the community kitchen’s wall. My friends, that’s impact! Hosting Guests: The Key to Success I asked her secret for getting good volunteer administrators to help manage some of the program’s responsibilities. First, she says we must train ourselves to get better at teaching others. That’s something worth saying twice.  If we want to succeed at leveraging our time so that we have more time to do the things we truly love, we need to take the time to train ourselves and become better at teaching others to do what needs to be done. This is not a quick tip; this is a life path choice. It’s one that has given Suzanna the freedom to live the life she desires. This principle applies to anyone wanting to become an entrepreneur of any kind. Take the time to learn and practice communication and project management skills early.  It’ll be worth the effort. How to Attract Good Volunteers Suzanna’s found the majority of her best admins by offering the opportunity to pay volunteers who’ve shown the right qualities needed. When people contact her asking for a full work-trade opportunity — and she suspects that they might be a good fit for the position — she invites them to first come out and volunteer for a month. If they fit the role, they can take the full work trade for the months that follow. One resource that Suzanna shared that’s worth re-mentioning is VolunteerLatinAmerica.com [http://volunteerlatinamerica.com]. It’s one of several useful sites for landowners to find volunteers and vice versa. Other sites I’ve found useful are: * Numundo.com [http://numundo.com] * Workaway.info [http://workaway.info] * Wwwoof.com [http://wwwoof.com] * HelpX.com [http://helpx.com] The Dangers of Hosting Guests and Tips for Survival Suzanna mentioned something else that I wanted to address, that despite the more common message, people often survive snake bites. She said this about her encounter with the well-known terciopelo, a pit-viper common to Central America. She was bitten and survived. The reason for mentioning this isn’t to discount the fact that many people die from snake bites — especially those of terciopelos. My point is to highlight points of reference and patterns of belief. One of the reasons this topic excites me so much is my background as a traveler, having visited many different places as a volunteer. I learned a lot over those years, but what was more valuable is what I unlearned. To this day, unlearning things and breaking negative or incorrect thought patterns continues to be one of my favorite undertakings. It’s challenging and requires working with subtle aspects of the mind, but the rewards are empowering. Mindset Shift for Guest Hosting Success One of my favorite things to see, with any of my guests' experiences, is when they find themselves transcending a previously held taboo. For most of us, our childhoods are filled with programming meant to keep us behaving suitably for the comfort of those around us. It’s actually a very useful skill to teach our children and helps them to integrate into wider society. But I also believe it’s important to teach them how to let go of “rules” once they’ve learned them. It can be tricky to do this while still feeling like we’re giving proper guidance. All the same, teaching others how to understand the difference between absolute concepts and contemplations is critical to growing healthy humans who can stand free from the entrapments of social programming. It can even be valuable to practice freeing ourselves from our own rules as a form of self-examination. Honestly, I’m not sure how far to go on with this here, but I just wanted to put it out there that dangerous things are worth recognizing as dangerous things. Likewise, treating dangerous situations appropriately is a skill worth learning. However, we don’t need to use the potential for danger as a lever to believe that “badness” is sure to come from those thing’s very existence. Sometimes, dangerous things exist, and that’s okay. Navigating the mystery skillfully involves moving forward with a sense of openness, as well as awareness. Poisonous snakes, scorpions, spiders, rabid bats, bacteria, viruses, and scary humans exist.  Welcome to planet Earth. It’s important to be able to identify and avoid these potential hazards or approach them with caution. Places, where these things are likely to exist, are likewise important to know about and prompt us to proceed with caution. Allowing fear of these things to keep us from having life-enriching experiences, on the other hand, is a tendency we would do well to challenge. Many times the best way to meet that challenge is head-on. Even if you get bitten, you just may go on to be a happy, healthy human. Who knows, you might even go on to one day tell a story about how you’re better off for it. Different Ways to Host Guests Successfully While hosting volunteers was a particular focus of Suzanna’s interview, most of my other guests also host people in one way or another as part of their programs. Aly Kahn & Alnoor Ladha [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/brave-earth/] from Brave Earth creatively responded to change by swapping from a no-volunteer-program decision to making exceptions when ramping up and preparing for a retreat. Otherwise, they did effectively harness guest labor to help build their aircrete domes during a workshop where guests paid to learn the process. These guys didn’t even need to know how to make one, they just called DomeGaia to come by and teach the workshop for them. Brave Earth only needed to take care of the hosting and marketing.Justin Dolan of St Michael’s Permaculture Country Club and Meghan Casey of Chilamate Rainforest Eco Retreat both shared similar insights about looking for organizations that work with student groups who might be looking for new places to host their programs.  Meghan has found success working with the World Leadership School [https://worldleadershipschool.com/]. How to Start Hosting Guests, Volunteers, or Students Personally, I’d suggest reaching out to any of your local university’s ecologically focused departments or programs. A campaign like that could not only bring students, money, and exposure to your project, but networking with these organizations can develop into long-term perennial relationships that can benefit your project for years to come. Like Ancel Mitchel [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/ancel-mitchell/] of Talamanca Chocolate, both Justin and Meghan mention the benefits of putting together long-term apprenticeship or intern programs. This experience tends to be more meaningful for both the project and the student. They also offer opportunities for deep learning beyond what’s generally taught during a 1-2-week event, such as a Permaculture Design Course [https://sharinginsights.net/permies-pdc/]. Nico Botefur [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/nico-botefur/] of Essence Arenal shared a lot of great advice around hosting guests. When getting started, he saved some money in a way that’s added value to his guests’ visits ever since. He bought some old canvas tents from the Salvation Army and hung them over bamboo frames to make his first Glamping accommodations. By purchasing several of them used and having them shipped over he saved a bunch of money while recycling what had been discarded by the military. Nico believes that giving your guests a quality experience is the best investment you can make in marketing. He builds strong relationships with his staff and has a way of making them feel like part of a team. As a result, the staff has a way of welcoming guests that feels akin to being welcomed into their home. Another touch that had an impact on me was a drone image he had taken of his farm, illustrating pathways and other notable spots around the property. That image was then blown up, laminated, and hung near the reception area to help visitors get an instant sense of orientation upon arriving. That one, small thing goes a long way toward enhancing the guests’ experiences and reducing the staff’s need to give repetitive directions regarding trails and other points of interest. In my opinion, one of Nico’s most profound adaptations came in his early days when he wanted to serve good quality food in an area where it was difficult and expensive to get locally. He solved this problem by taking a Permaculture Design Course [https://sharinginsights.net/permies-pdc/] and growing his present-day food forests [https://sharinginsights.net/food-forest-course/] and greenhouses.  The video that we took [https://sharinginsights.net/videos/food-forests-permaculture-hotel-restaurant/] of Nico’s food forests is definitely worth checking out. Lynx Guimond [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/lynx-gamond-sailcargo/], at Sailcargo Inc, is no longer hosting guests, volunteers, or students. The volunteer-run education program that they were teaching to people in the pueblo got shut down with the onset of the pandemic, but that just led them to pivot and find funding to pay those they were able to keep on board with the project. Lynx used his connections with their non-profit organization to help earn funding and reshape the program.  As a result, he’s ended up with a more dedicated and loyal crew. Lynx shares his perspective that healthy and happy people are high-quality assets. Take the time to check in with guests, volunteers, and team members to make sure that they have a chance to be heard, if not helped. Like Suzanna, he suggests that we ask people what they want to do and offer variety with their service. Gaining a point of reference for rural living is a life-enriching opportunity worth giving to oneself, let alone a valuable tool to offer others. Staying at places like this as a guest, retreatant, student, or volunteer brings value to people’s lives. Many people who have visited places like this as workshop students, apprentices, or volunteers have developed marketable skills that have changed the direction of their lives. As we discussed in the last episode on financial sustainability [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/financial-sustainability/], it’s essential for the longevity of a project to recognize this value and charge accordingly. Guest Hosting Tips for Beginners If hosting guests in any form interests you, make a list of unique experiences that your guests can experience. Add it to your welcome guide to help them see the site with this expanded point of reference. When designing your welcome guide, include things like: Links to video tours of the property, showing trailheads and harvestable foodA photo gallery of animals, birds, insects, and flowers that they might find around the placeA Guest Book where they can read and add to a collection of meaningful testimonials and reviews from those who’ve come before them If you really want to improve a guest’s experience though, it’s perhaps even more important to work on your communication and other interpersonal skills. You can have a lot to offer, but if your approach doesn’t put their experience first, you’ll lose out in the end. If you’re listening to this episode as a traveler who likes to visit unique projects like those highlighted on the podcast, remember that you get out of it what you put into it! Life isn’t a spectator sport. Dive in and participate! That’s what I’ve got for you this week. Make sure to tune into the next installment and review what we’ve learned about developing healthy communities, both within an intentional community, as well as in our interactions with regional neighbors. And don't forget – we've created a downloadable PDF to offer you a list of all the tips we've collected for hosting guests, volunteers and students! Check it out here:https://sharinginsights.net/hosting-volunteers [https://sharinginsights.net/hosting-volunteers] ‘Till then, Stay open P.S: Besides leaving a rating and review or sharing the show with someone who’d like it, you can support the show and yourself by visiting our Support the Show page [https://sharinginsights.net/support-the-show]. There, you'll find an array of helpful information, links, and products that I thought you might find useful.  Check it out! Special thanks to Peter Mukuru for editing this episode! * Music: Rite of Passage by Kevin MacLeod * Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage [https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage] * License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/] Download your FREE guide to Permaculture Living, at: https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/ [https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/]

Hello, world! Jason Bliss from the Sharing Insights Podcast here. I’ve been on one heck of a journey. Over the last 9 months, I’ve dived into permaculture, exploring different ways we can develop sustainable [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainability] homesteads and communities for a better way of life. We’ve interviewed a whole host of amazing people, all with their own unique experiences and insights to share with the permaculture community. Last month I decided to assemble a recap episode to look back over the show’s highlights and discuss what I’d learned along the way. When I began, I had one goal in mind: To tell the story of my adventure [https://sharinginsights.net/about/] doing these interviews and my personal takeaways from them. As I started putting it all together, I quickly realized that this approach didn’t capture the essence of what I had intended for this episode. Initially, I wanted to do a bit of studying to see if I could compile a list of best practices [https://sharinginsights.net/podcasts/] and use them to create a guide for new and veteran landowners alike. My hope was that they could use these guidelines to take inspiration from and improve their own business models for greater impact. After some reflection, I’ve decided to restructure my recap into six separate episodes, each one covering a unique aspect of project stewardship. This way, you won’t just get the cliff notes on each topic, but rather a genuine contemplation of the relevant subjects that I feel they deserve. In Part 1 of this series, I’m going to jump right in and start with the topic of financial sustainability since it’s something that brings a lot of listeners to the show. Part 2 will focus on advice regarding hosting guests, volunteers, and students. Part 3 will focus on Community, both internally and regionally. Part 4 will review what I’ve gathered regarding land management tips. Part 5 will address some of the more interesting information about Physical Infrastructure. Finally, in Part 6, we’ll wrap it up with a few words about cultivating impactful belief systems. With our roadmap set, it’s time to get to work and tackle our first, big topic: Financial Sustainability Financial sustainability is a topic that almost everyone on Earth thinks about on any given day of the week. It can make or break a project. It can lead a team to high-fives or heads hung low. Whatever your opinion on money, chances are you need it, and you could make more of an impact with it than without it. I’m sure this generalization could be challenged, but I’m also sure there are many people who share this opinion. While much of the advice offered by my guests focused on improving the efficiency of their overall designs — ultimately affecting the project’s bottom line —  there were several important bits of advice that I’d like to focus on in hopes that the messages might sink in even deeper. How does a volunteer program work? I’ll start with my first guest, Suzanna Leff of Finca Amrta [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/suzanna-leff/]. The focus of her interview was hosting volunteers. I begin here because the topic of hosting volunteers is very much wrapped up in financial sustainability (or lack thereof) for many projects. Unfortunately, an improperly designed volunteer program can easily steer a project toward a financial crisis. Many people think of hosting volunteers as a form of free labor. With time, most landowners find this thinking fairly inaccurate, especially in places like my own home, Costa Rica. The time and energy that goes into hosting and training volunteers can far exceed the costs of hiring local laborers for the same job. In some places, with high labor costs, this can work, but it still must be executed with good business sense. Suzanna does what many veteran projects end up doing. She charges her volunteers a small fee to cover the costs of their stay. Suzanna points out that charging for the volunteer program should be relative to the education and experience that you’re offering them. Volunteering is an invaluable experience for people, and these places need support. That said, inviting a bunch of inexperienced people into your program requires a significant degree of guidance. If you’re going to invite volunteers in to help “contribute their energy” to your project, you’ll be wise to make sure that they’re contributing their energy toward activities that are going to produce or save sufficient revenue to cover the expenses of hosting them. At this point, it may be worth mentioning some of the hosting factors that are often easily overlooked. I’m not only talking about obvious consumables like food, toilet paper, gas, and electricity. We also have to consider additional expenses like broken dishes, broken tools, poorly completed projects that need to be taken apart and redone, overuse of glue, screws, paint, & other resources that should be used conservatively. What about time? How much time does it take to teach someone how to do something? How much time does it take to teach them about rural living? Where is the value of that time when two months later they leave to go traveling somewhere else? How about time spent helping them evolve through their conditioned belief systems? Consider conflict management, as well. Discussing simple discomforts and attempting to accommodate those discomforts all take up valuable time. Are you helping them arrange travel? Do they do less work on the days before or after going on a trip? What happens when they decide to lean more into the vacation part of their working vacation? Do you have to take time to figure out a way to communicate the fact that they aren’t meeting their agreement? What about when they get ill and can’t perform yet need to be attended to with attention and medicines from your personal first aid kit? When hosting volunteers and giving them access to your valuable tools, materials, and time, there are many expenses to consider. It’s nice when you have someone with you long enough to get settled in and become a truly valuable part of the team, but how often does that really happen? It’s safe to say that not every volunteer will come through in a way that truly adds more value than they expend. For this reason, many veteran projects that host volunteers regularly learn to only accept skilled volunteers or charge for the education that unskilled volunteers require to start contributing the real value they intended to your project when they first signed up. My own project ignored this wisdom for many years, becoming the place other projects called on when they had an unskilled person at their gates looking for a free vacation. The bottom line is that although we had a lot of fun hanging out with these people, it cost us time that we might have better spent on our children, ourselves, and revenue-generating activities. Another popular model for keeping money flowing through a project to meet its many needs is growing food and creating value-added products for sale. Suzanna has a few products that her volunteers help her make, such as herbs for tea, herbal salves, and chocolate, although her distribution market is very small. Charging volunteers for the experience to work, live, and eat in this charming place is how she’s stayed open for over 30 years. The power of digital products Ed Bernhardt, from New Dawn Center, likewise has a few small physical products that he and his wife sell at their local farmers’ market, like tea blends and his “kombucha for the plants.” He’s also written a few small books that he can now sell digitally for passive income. Many people are finding digital products [https://sharinginsights.net/resources/] to be a highly sustainable, zero-carbon, renewable resource that can be used to bring ongoing support to their projects. Ed, for instance, mentions at the end of his farm tour video [https://sharinginsights.net/videos/ed-bernhardt-video/] that he intended to make a solar food dryer with bamboo and clear plastic. Now he’s done so, and we’ve begun making plans to create a small online how-to course to teach his techniques for harvesting, curing, splitting, and joining bamboo to build this highly useful and cost-effective technology. Make sure to sign up to our mailing list [https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/] so you can be notified when this course is released. The benefits of local organic growers association and farmers’ market Peter Kring of Finca La Isla [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/peter-kring/]has a few different products he grows to sell. He long-ago recognized the need for small-scale growers to have a safe and effective place to sell their wares. Since then, he’s been one of the founding pillars of his region’s farmers’ market and local organic association. In his interview, Peter makes an impactful point, commenting that if we want to make a social impact with our projects, we need to show that they’re profitable. Otherwise, the locals watching the project’s development may maintain that the methods are unattainable because they don’t have the same kind of foreign money needed to keep the project afloat. One of the things that Peter grows for sale is grafted fruit trees. In a video we recorded, [https://sharinginsights.net/videos/durian-grafting-propagating-trees/] he talks about how grafting plants for sale has been a profitable cottage industry for him. He also propagates a wide variety of bromeliads in his nurseries. It’s a great example of turning one’s passion into a niche business and a tool for further financial sustainability. As you’ll see in the video mentioned above, a simple shade structure with replaceable poles and scrap wood tables is all that is needed. Putting a bag over newly grafted trees for 2-3 weeks helps increase humidity and improve the healing of the plant material.Some plants are better grafted up in the living treeGrafted trees tend to give more fruit in fewer years Peter has a wide variety of exotic fruits planted throughout his property. He advises that you invest in having the fruit properly picked and cared for to bring to market. Peter also suggests that fruit tours are another cottage industry option (fruit tourism). This is most traditionally done by manually walking someone through your food forests, either for free or for a fee. Furthermore, making a video tour that can be delivered to guests renting cabins can be a great way of adding value to their stay without requiring that you take half a day out of your schedule to give each guest a tour of the grounds. I myself have considered doing a video tour of our fruit forests each month, so I can have a catalog of videos pertinent to which trees are harvestable at any given time. How great would it be to show up to a location that offers that kind of added content to your stay? A few other cottage industry ideas that Peter suggested include: Black pepper and dehydrated ginger Dried Mamon chinosSoap Peter also suggests investing in a reliable drying system. He mentions that solar dryers are hard to control, but I’ve seen designs that use a thermostat to activate a fan and move air when temperatures get too high. A small solar panel and battery can even power the fan if it’s stationed in a remote location. Other measures can be added to store heat in water or sand at the base of the dryer, extending its ability to stay warm after the sun goes down. One of the main value-added goods that Peter and his partner, Ancel, have been working with is chocolate. As Peter points out in our interview, chocolate is a difficult value-added product to beat. It has a high-profit margin and almost universal appeal. In places that grow cacao, the raw product is abundant and ends up being sold for cheap. He’s able to pay twice the going rate for high-quality cacao seeds, and he’s still getting it at a reasonable enough price that when producing a quality product (which they always are), it can be sold at a substantial price in a strong market. As an added bonus, it also preserves well! Alchemical Activation After a full day interviewing Peter and touring his food forests and nurseries, I headed just off the island of Finca la Isla to visit with Ancel Mitchel [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/ancel-mitchell/]. There she has a kitchen that doubles as an education center where she teaches the fine art of cacao alchemy. Besides making artesian value-added goods, she also teaches classes and takes on a few long-term apprentices at any given time. When done well, an apprenticeship program can build a valuable structure into daily life, as well as providing the assistance needed to produce your goods. In most cases, an aspiring student will be happy to pay for tutelage in a trade like this. Some programs may charge for the first 1-3 months and then offer a reduced cost for additional months, or remove the fee entirely for students that show that they have become adept at the skill. Ancel says that the most important thing when considering the establishment of a trade is to simply start. We never really know where anything is going to take us, so just jump in and bring a little magic into whatever you do if it doesn’t work out pivot. It reminds me of the adage that imperfect action is better than perfect inaction. Another maxim that fits here is the infamous, “Just do it!” With the disruptions of the pandemic, Ancel has recently begun to teach online classes through Amazon Explore. Amazon may not be an ideal marketplace for what she has to offer, but creatively responding to change [https://sharinginsights.net/creatively-use-and-respond-to-change/] is one of the founding permaculture principles and one that is as pertinent now as ever before! Pivot with Passion Another guest who shares that sentiment is Terry Lillian Newton [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/kindred-spirits/] of Kindred Spirits. She says, “If you aren’t in love with what you’re doing, consider completely remodeling the business plan to connect with your passion.” And that’s exactly what she did when her hospitality business began to feel empty to her. She found a way to bring her love for horses into the mix and has incidentally created a successful niche business using horses as a tool for yoga and mindfulness training. Terry also gives the creative option of inviting teachers from local universities to come in and teach classes/workshops at your location. We’ve built these places, and just because we aren’t ready to conduct our own workshops or courses doesn’t mean that we can’t still host them. Two of the four PDC’s that we hosted at our farm were taught by outside teachers. One of them was led by a pair of instructors paid for by a nonprofit organization that sends instructors to teach free permaculture courses to rural farmers with a modified format. It was a series of weekends without accommodation, followed by a couple of months break for the farmers to implement some of the newly learned tactics. The teachers then returned to teach another series of weekends. This time, the student group traveled to each of their farms, in turn, to show off the results of their implementations. As a result, they were able to discuss and learn from each project as a group. In my opinion, this was one of the most impactful PDC’s I’ve seen. All we had to do was provide the classroom and organize some email communications with the organization and teachers. They took care of the rest, and our region is better for it. Don’t be a statistic, do your research Esteban Acosta [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/sembrando-flores/] from Sembrando Flores and Viogaz shares an essential perspective that he’s earned from his years helping commercial coffee and wine growers convert to organic and biodynamic practices. He says that before planting cash crops, consider what the optimal crops are for your climate and altitude. More importantly, research the market and make sure you’ll have a buyer. This may sound like common sense, but what’s far more common is that a grower will take a shine to a particular product only to find that their location isn’t hospitable for that product or that finding a buyer is more challenging than they thought. When making significant investments, it’s essential to plan appropriately — another reminder to observe before we interact and to start with small and slow solutions. Slow and steady wins the race... Nico Botefur [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/nico-botefur/] has brought Essence Arenal to a state of financial sustainability using small and slow solutions. He started off with an inherited property where he began hosting his first guests in some glamping tents and simple cabins. He started providing services to the first guests, both on-site and by welcoming in neighbors who had services to offer. He developed what has now become his restaurant, which has brought significant revenue back into his project. With the money he made from renting the cabins, feeding guests, and booking them out for services provided by his neighbors, he invested into solving his problem of insufficient locally-grown organic produce. He did so by studying permaculture [https://sharinginsights.net/what-is-permaculture-and-how-it-can-make-your-life-better/] and establishing what has now become an expanse of food forests and greenhouses that are feeding back into the business by providing farm-to-table dining experiences for his guests. A nice side-effect of this is that it’s increased the inherent draw and value of his guest’s stay. While leaning on conventional business models can be very useful for establishing financial sustainability, many of the rebel projects that caught my attention have stretched beyond the box and are questioning conventional approaches. Invest in a regenerative future Aly Kahn & Alnoor Ladha [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/brave-earth/], from Brave Earth, have been doing precisely that. Alnoor poses an intriguing question when he asks, “How do we use capital to build a post-capital infrastructure?” It’s not to say that we’re against capitalism, but it’s essential to recognize its inherent instability, especially given the current global economic environment. It’s important to consider ways to invest our funds now in order to secure our lifestyles and livelihood for times when the money isn’t there. While the topic of finances often revolves around the acquisition of revenue and other resources, it’s also important to consider who has what rights to do what with those resources. One popular idea among back-to-the-landers is to put their property in a trust. A land trust is a private legal contract in which the real estate owner transfers the title of the property to a trustee. There are many legal reasons that someone may choose to do this, but Alnoor recommends putting the land in a trust as a great way to avert the potential for owners to commodify the property for personal gain. Brave Earth has also designed an interesting profit-sharing model into their community’s agreements. They’ve created a retreat center and other services as communally-owned and operated economic engines. They use what they refer to as a 50/25/25 model to direct the allocation of profits generated by community-run events and services. This model directs the proceeds from the operation of community business efforts (after paying the costs of production & facilitators) and divides them as follows: 50 percent comes back to the community for ongoing growth and maintenance25 percent goes into a profit-sharing pool to be divided equally among all community members and their employees25 percent then goes into an outreach account that will eventually fund their desire to assist other communities in replicating their model While this model is still yet to go through its trial phases, it’s interesting to consider the wisdom of dividing funds in a similar way to help with the longevity of your own project. It’s long been taught that creating savings accounts, investment accounts, and tithing accounts are valuable practices to develop. Plan for resilience Like many landowners who invest in a project with the intent of sharing it with others, Justin Dolan [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/justin-dolan-part-2/] of St Michaels Country Club has built his community’s financial sustainability into the sale of shares into the project. Justin projected what his project would need to grow its infrastructure over the years and designed that into the cost of shares of the community. He also put a portion of the purchased land aside to sell to neighbors who want to live nearby without being a part of the internal community. He then paced out the sale of shares and properties to limit how many would be available per year, paced growth, and planned for longevity. The members of the community share expenses as well as resources and profits from the country club, which provides services for both members and neighbors. These include a restaurant/banquet hall, games areas, and an impressively biodiverse disc golf course, to name a few. An important thing that Justin points out is that if you have land, it makes sense to produce enough profit to pay for its legal and maintenance costs. Personally, I’d say it’s not just a good idea but rather an essential element for sustainability. Empower the people and build your tribe The last stop on our interview tour was Lynx Guimond [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/lynx-gamond-sailcargo/] of Sailcargo Inc. Lynx has taken a different approach to his project than many others. He didn’t start what he was doing intending to establish a permaculture homestead, but rather as an effort to change the global shipping industry. Their team of international shipbuilders and local carpenters are the ones who’ve taken the initiative to plant up their project’s beach-side property and expand on the sustainability aspects of the shipyard’s business model. One of the most exciting things about Lynx’s model [https://sharinginsights.net/videos/renewable-cargo-ships/] is that he’s not only established a reforestation program to offset the wood and energy consumption needed to build the ship but has partnered with a 501.c3 nonprofit organization to receive funds for this and other fundraising initiatives, like social outreach and education. This approach has increased the size of his team and the impact they can make with their efforts while significantly enhancing the results of their fundraising efforts. My final two cents... In reviewing the interviews for this recap, I also went through Brady’s interview with me [https://sharinginsights.net/podcast/vagabond-permaculture-podcaster/] for her podcast. If there’s anything from that interview that I’d like to repeat here, it’s that if you’ve spent any portion of your life learning how to do something, and you decide to invest yourself into sharing that knowledge with others, please recognize that what you have to share is valuable and charge accordingly. Don’t let cultural money stigmas block you from receiving what you need in return to continue sharing your work and building your dreams. If any people on this planet deserve to thrive, it’s those of us who’ve invested ourselves into caring for the land, caring for other humans, and sharing what we have with the world. Please support those who are, and do what you can to be one of them.If you like what I’m sharing here in this blog, be sure to subscribe to the podcast [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sharing-insights-podcast-exploring-permaculture-homesteads-community-in-costa-rica/id1543142421] and tune in to my upcoming reviews. For that matter, send the episode's link to someone who might get value from it. In the upcoming episodes, we’ll be exploring more insights into: * hosting guests * building community internally and regionally * land maintenance * tips for sustainable building methods * upgrading your belief system and capacity to make a greater impact on the world Until then, we've created a downloadable PDF to offer you a list of tips you can use to enhance your project's financial sustainability! Check it out here:https://sharinginsights.net/financial-sustainability-pdf [https://sharinginsights.net/financial-sustainability] Jason Bliss Sharing Insights P.S: Besides leaving a rating and review or sharing the show with someone who’d like it, you can support the show and yourself by visiting our Resources page [https://sharinginsights.net/resources/]. There, you'll find an array of helpful information, links, and products that I thought you might find useful.  Check it out! Special thanks to Peter Mukuru for editing this episode! * Music: Rite of Passage by Kevin MacLeod * Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage [https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage] * License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/] * Facebook: https://facebook.com/groups/sharinginsightspod [https://facebook.com/groups/sharinginsightspod] * Instagram: https://instagram.com/sharinginsightspod [https://instagram.com/sharinginsightspod] * Twitter: https://twitter.com/sharingipodcast [https://twitter.com/sharingipodcast] * YouTube: https://youtube.com/channel/UCqV63Fonev-y25FVSjGDvCg [https://youtube.com/channel/UCqV63Fonev-y25FVSjGDvCg] Download your FREE guide to Permaculture Living, at: https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/ [https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/]

This episode is part 2 of my interview with Brandy Montague from her podcast, For Animals For Earth.  In this half of the interview, I shared a bit of advice for travelers looking to visit impact centers as guests, volunteers, digital nomads, or students.  In the end, we’re all really students! Brandy asked me to share a description of what it might be like to visit a place like mine.  I freely shared some of the comforts along with several of the discomforts that one might expect as part of the package, from composting toilets, harvesting food, being in close proximity to many people for an extended period, and even some thoughts around our conditioned fears around bugs and snakes.  When asked, “What’s the one thing that people can do to make a positive impact on the world?” I get into the importance of being a conscious consumer and supporting businesses that approach their products and services with social and environmentally ethical practices as a priority. If you get anything out of this conversation, you get a peek at me speaking a bit more raw and uncensored than you will in most of my interviews with others. I strongly believe that we need to take personal responsibility for our daily decisions and the effect they have on the whole.  I also believe that we’ll do well to take the permaculture principles beyond land management and apply them as tools to examine ourselves, our business practices, and our connection to the human condition. If you appreciate Brandy’s sense of curiosity and enthusiasm for learning about change makers and what they’re doing.  Consider adding her podcast to your subscription list to learn more about what other humans are doing to be a benefit for animals and for the earth. Resources I mentioned: * My free eBook: Permaculture Lifestyle Explained: The Eco-Enthusiast's Guide to Efficient Living [https://sharinginsights.net/permaculture-lifestyle-ebook/] * Directory of Impact Centers: https://numundo.org [https://numundo.org] * Directory of Intentional Communities: https://ic.org [https://ic.org] * Directory of Ecovillages: https://ecovillage.org/ [https://ecovillage.org/] Besides leaving a rating and review, or sharing the show with someone who’d like it, you can support the show and yourself by visiting our Resources page. I’ve collected an array of helpful information, links, and products that I thought you might find useful.  Check it out! Special thanks to Peter Mukuru for editing this episode! Music: Rite of Passage by Kevin MacLeod Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage [https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4291-rite-of-passage] License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/] Follow Sharing Insights: https://sharinginsights.net [https://sharinginsights.net] Facebook: https://facebook.com/groups/sharinginsightspod [https://facebook.com/groups/sharinginsightspod] Instagram: https://instagram.com/sharinginsightspod [https://instagram.com/sharinginsightspod] Twitter: https://twitter.com/sharingipodcast [https://twitter.com/sharingipodcast] Youtube: https://youtube.com/channel/UCqV63Fonev-y25FVSjGDvCg [https://youtube.com/channel/UCqV63Fonev-y25FVSjGDvCg]