I came home and looked at my checking account. I was challenging my SELF about this empass OF WORK.
I have not been at all satisfied. I see well what is missing (the contrast).
My body wants to hardly work at all BUT I AM wanting to be active, contribute Something, make a Difference to myself too..... to play and pay the bills...so I talked sternly to my higher self..... show me the way?

Next thing, I checked into youtube and found a suggested video.
Synchronicity, an inspired message tonight.
I want to share the opened up feeling in this message.

[youtube]https://youtu.be/tP5bOr0aC58[/youtube]

I had a friend who said that if we farmed in the way that is earth empathic, we'd have so much free time, we'd need to fill it with something.
He used biochar and Ormus and essential microbes.
Maybe NOW is the time for me to try framing in my yard?

I think I was shown a practical way that says YES to my request....maybe it is yours too?
This way fits my theology because my religion is about thriving in life.
I am Gaian.

Gaian means to me that I was born to work with the Mother and her beings. I was born to stand in the Sun.
But I still have neglected lots of daily experience of living what I know I believe...

I still believe the world is what we make it but with a helping hand from greater than me GOOD.
There are not gods but principles to know.
Creator IS....The workings of Life are.

I have inklings of the cooperation of sentience of LIFE.
Matter, I know She is MY Mother, knows my needs and can fulfill my necessities.
I am a Solar child, in the light stream of radiance...
My Father. he loves ME.
He wants only that I be alive in the BIGGEST way.
Access to the whole IF you care to share them...the more we are, the merriers.
Literally No End to blessing if we receive what is offered freely.
This is so natural IMO that we access the bounty.
(Mental notions are IMO AI...and can be poison like ingested cynicism, gloom and doom and scarcity).

I have been in the dark about what I could DO?
I have been wondering how to get outside this box that is miserly?
What something else could work?

I wonder "what if" several newbies play in the dirt in 2016? OR Play bigger than before?
Maybe support some dirty goals of thriving?
On the earth where you perch, you dig the sentiment too.
maybe It is a Divine directive?
Hymns played and trumpets blasting
What is Welling up from behind The Earth and the Sun's intention?
Maybe the message for now is: WE LOVE farmers......

I will be rooting for us in the yard.
This thread will be open for posting what you might share?

I am hearing this song just now on pandora and it is feedback.
I choose to live under the sun and ground what is real....it is bigger than EVERYTHING we think.


Nick Drake
Things Behind the Sun

[youtube]https://youtu.be/6btXe5j17oE[/youtube]

Open up the broken cup
Let goodly sin and sunshine in
Yes that's today.
And open wide the hymns you hide
You find renown while people frown
At things that you say
But say what you'll say
About the farmers and the fun
And the things behind the sun
And the people around your head
Who say everything's been said
And the movement in your brain
Sends you out into the rain.

Love, Maggie

So beautiful Maggie ... feels the warmth of your inner garden.

I'm kinda the opposite way around.

I was brought up as welly wearing farmers boy. The old school small farming thing. Raised sheep and cattle for meat. Slowly developed a vege patch that we did on a big scale with a tractor to do the grunt work.

Eventually my father got ill and was persuaded by my mother to jack it in and sell up.

I've always missed that place and the way I lived then. I found that when I arrived "on the street" I was the clueless one who was always the last to realise things.

I had a wonderful realtionship with dogs. Never had to take one for a walk. We just hung around together, like it should be, me thinks.

Yes.

I grew up on a farm as a kid. So many memories flood the mind as I think about that time in my life. The crackle of freshly cut alfalfa stubble as I walked across it in the early morning hours with my brother changing hand line irrigation pipes. The incredibly wonderful smell of the air at this time of day. The big bins of wheat after harvest waiting for the big trucks to come and take it away, which also smelled heavenly. My dad chasing me with a board totally out of control with rage after finding me up in the cattle pen agitating them because I was bored. The image of my dad jumping up and down because I screamed something about a black widow spider that turned out to be a stink bug. Driving the old ford tractor at the tender age of nine while my brother and dad loaded the irrigation pipes on the trailer to put them away for winter. Killing potato bugs in the garden to keep them from eating everything. I could go on and on. Even though my early life was difficult, I still believe it was this immersion in nature that got me through it with some sanity left. Nature heals.

So yes, I am a farmer.

Spiritwind wrote:I grew up on a farm as a kid. So many memories flood the mind as I think about that time in my life. ........ Even though my early life was difficult, I still believe it was this immersion in nature that got me through it with some sanity left. Nature heals.

So yes, I am a farmer.

YEAA!
Thanks to Christine, Norman, Hermit and Spiritwind for adding to this thread. So what will you plant this year?

I remember one day as a child when we visited my Great Uncle's farm. I remember shelling peas and snapping beans for dinner. They had horses and though I had only briefly taken a couple of lessons of riding at Brownie Camp, they let us just ride a horse in the pasture and the whole day was just a free, wonderful experience. Immersion in this kind of freedom left an impression.

My house in North Georgia is on a property where with just two and a half acres, the family before me used to have a huge garden and plowed the corn patch with a mule. Trees have since grown up where the corn field used to be. There is a picture at the post office of the man who had this "farm" with his mule and buggy because he was the last post man in this little hamlet to use a buggy to deliver mail.

There is still an old (now in serious need of repair) barn where my three chickens live. They are the last of my chickens who have numbered up to a couple of dozen and They are still laying one or two eggs a week at the age of 4 years old. I just love chickens...little dinos as they are.
This spring I plan to buy chicks from a hatchery and sell the eggs next fall. I have a fence around the barn and the perches are still secure.

I have had gardens here and know I will do this again and am now interested in cultivation again. Reading my gardening books again and watching youtube videos is inspiring. I would love to have some roomies who are into similar ideas.

[youtube]https://youtu.be/xoTGECeLvwA[/youtube]

[youtube]https://youtu.be/_3rRf32IGLY[/youtube]

I am recalling what I learned about biochar and soilhttp://globalwarming-arclein.blogspot.c ... cture.html

"it is a soil structuring element." yes, at the very least, charcoal is a structural material that is used to build and organize an open, porous, expanded arrangement out of tightly packed soil particles. charcoal itself is mostly empty space -- it's hollow inside -- which is why it is so light, fluffy and easily windblown. being full of holes, charcoal naturally causes soil to lighten up and become less dense.

but more precisely and functionally, the carbon in char is in the form of absolutely huge molecules -- hundreds, if not thousands, of carbon atoms interlinked in complex mega-molecules -- tinker toys gone wild -- massive carbon mesh matrix. these huge complex carbon mega-molecules that form charcoal's empty cellular lattice frameworks are used to bundle and aggregate tightly packed soil particles into even larger supra-structures. this physical rearrangement and organization at various scales creates open spaces in the soil, softer tilth, making soil easier to work, better able to breathe, better able to absorb and release water. this physical change due to char is a great relief to heavy clays such as african and amazon rainforest soils, but also works a similar benefit to sandy soils.

further, plants are mostly water, and their physical structure is mostly microscopic plumbing -- pipes, tubes and ducts to move water around. charcoal's microscopic pores are teeny tiny sponges to soak up and hold water in soil, conserving and managing the soil's moisture supply. the soil can soak up and hold more water when it gets wet, it can stay wet longer, and will slowly release water back to the soil -- and thus to plants and other soil biology. since water is the first ingredient required to build a living cell, this water management is a great service to all soil life -- and the farmer.

but better yet, charcoal has electric properties -- partly from embedded minerals, but also from cracks, fractures, folds, warps, rings, and other anomalies of the complex carbon matrix. charcoal has hundreds, if not thousands, of electrically charged sites which can attract and hold other atoms, without actually forming inter-atom bonds. and charcoal's vast internal microscopic pores means it has hundreds, if not thousands, of times more internal than external surfaces to attract and hold other ions -- not only cations (+), but also anions (-) such as nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur, and boron. technically, this electric attraction is called "ADsorption"."

Going for high production gardening as a Earth Empathic farmer:

[youtube]https://youtu.be/y--Z4DZ6PQU[/youtube]

I don't have access to land now. I live in a tiny little terraced house in an ex mining village. It was one of the very cheapest houses in Britain at the time I bought it in 1998.

My determination to own my own home, when I had just enough cash to do it, meant a big move from the area I knew to a place where I'm an outsider and just a little bit home sick

norman wrote:I don't have access to land now. I live in a tiny little terraced house in an ex mining village. It was one of the very cheapest houses in Britain at the time I bought it in 1998.

My determination to own my own home, when I had just enough cash to do it, meant a big move from the area I knew to a place where I'm an outsider and just a little bit home sick

Hi Norman,
Best wishes for continued expansion to your perfect home place. I wonder if you have seen "vertical gardening"?

[youtube]https://youtu.be/4HLho4vcJac[/youtube]

I should be cleaning house today but came across so many synchronistic bits and pieces online. I AM GOING TO KEEP BEES. Honey is a medicine and of course keeping bees helps the earth (and bees) increase pollination! I had a hive of bees before but there seemed to be so much maintainence and they swarmed and then I lost the hive. I came across the Warre hive method

Warre' Bee Keeping

http://warre.biobees.com/

"ADVANTAGES OF WARRE HIVES

Warre hives are ideally suited for the beekeeper looking for a low-cost, low-maintenance hive design. In our mind the Warre hive is the ultimate design for natural, chemical-free beekeeping, and we’ve had tremendous success with our own Warres with little to no maintenance. They are perfectly suited for remote outyards with infrequent visits, whereas a horizontal top bar hive would require bi-weekly to monthly management to ensure sufficient space."



plans from here http://warre.biobees.com/plans.htm

[youtube]https://youtu.be/1KVn-NZTfus[/youtube]

I found this book Beekeeping For All online:

https://thebeespace.files.wordpress.com ... or_all.pdf

The MEDICINE of honey aspect is really important

From here: http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ecam/2012/410406/

"Honey is known for centuries for its medicinal and health-promoting properties. It contains various kinds of phytochemicals with high phenolic and flavonoid content which contribute to its high antioxidant activity [58–60]. Agent that has strong antioxidant property may have the potential to prevent the development of cancer as free radicals and oxidative stress play a significant role in inducing the formation of cancers [61]. Phytochemicals available in honey could be narrowed down into phenolic acids and polyphenols. Variants of polyphenols in honey were reported to have antiproliferative property against several types of cancer [62].

4. Honey As a Natural Immune Booster

Honey stimulates inflammatory cytokine production from monocytes [63]. Manuka, pasture, and jelly bush honey were found to significantly increase TNF-α, IL-1β, and IL-6 release from MM6 cells (and human monocytes) when compared with untreated and artificial honey-treated cells () [63]. A 5.8 kDa component of manuka honey was found to stimulate cytokine production from immune cells via TLR4 [64]. Honey stimulates antibody production during primary and secondary immune responses against thymus-dependent and thymus-independent antigens in mice injected with sheep red blood cells and E. coli antigen [65]. Consumption of 80 g daily of natural honey for 21 days showed that prostaglandin levels compared with normal subjects were elevated in patient with AIDS [66]. Natural honey has been shown to decrease prostaglandin level, elevated NO production in patients with a long history of AIDS [66]. It was reported that oral intake of honey augments antibody productions in primary and secondary immune responses against thymus-dependent and thymus-independent antigens [67].

These studies suggest that daily consumption of honey improves one’s immune system.

5. Honey As Natural Anti-Inflammatory Agent

In routine everyday life, our cells may be injured by irritants from outside or within our bodies (by microbes or nonmicrobes). Cellular/molecular injuries result in inflammatory response, the body defense mechanisms in trying to rid of the irritants. In general inflammatory responses are beneficial and protective to us, but at times, inflammatory responses are detrimental to health. Honey is a potent anti-inflammatory agent. Infants suffering from diaper dermatitis improved significantly after topical application of a mixture containing honey, olive oil, and beeswax after 7 days [68]. Honey provides significant symptom relief of cough in children with an upper respiratory tract infection (URTI) [69]. It has been shown to be effective in management of dermatitis and Psoriasis vulgaris [70]. Eight out of 10 patients with dermatitis and five of eight patients with psoriasis showed significant improvement after 2 weeks on honey-based ointment [70]. Honey at dilutions of up to 1 : 8 reduced bacterial adherence from 25.6  ±  6.5 (control) to 6.7  ±  3.3 bacteria per epithelial cell () in vitro [71]. Volunteers who chewed “honey leather” showed that there were statistically highly significant reductions in mean plaque scores (0.99 reduced to 0.65; ) in the manuka honey group compared to the control group suggesting a potential therapeutic role for honey for gingivitis, periodontal disease [72], mouth ulcers, and other problems of oral health [73].

A case report of a patient who had chronic dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa (EB) for 20 years healed with honey impregnated dressing in 15 weeks [74] after conventional dressings and creams failed. This illustrates the usefulness of honey as an anti-inflammatory agent. Chronic inflammatory process has risk of cancer development.

6. Honey As Natural Antimicrobials

Everyday we are exposed to all kinds of microbial insults from bacteria, viruses, parasites, and fungi. Honey is a potent natural antimicrobial. The most common infections humans get are from staphylococcal infection. Antibacterial effect of honey is extensively studied. The bactericidal mechanism is through disturbance in cell division machinery [75]. The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) for Staphylococcus aureus by A. mellifera honey ranged from 126.23 to 185.70 mgml−1 [76]. Honey is also effective against coagulase-negative staphylococci [77]. Local application of raw honey on infected wounds reduced signs of acute inflammation [78], thus alleviating symptoms. Antimicrobial activity of honey is stronger in acidic media than in neutral or alkaline media [78]. The potency of honey is comparable to some local antibiotics. Honey application into infective conjunctivitis reduced redness, swelling, pus discharge, and time for eradication of bacterial infections [78]. When honey is used together with antibiotics, gentamycin, it enhances anti-Staphylococcus aureus activity, by 22% [79]. When honey is added to bacterial culture medium, the appearance of microbial growth on the culture plates is delayed [80]. Mycobacteria did not grow in culture media containing 10% and 20% honey while it grew in culture media containing 5%, 2.5%, and 1% honey, suggesting that honey could be an ideal antimycobacterial agent [81] at certain concentrations.

Honey is also effective in killing hardy bacteria such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa (PA) and could lead to a new approach in treating refractory chronic rhinosinusitis [82]. Daily consumption of honey reduces risk of chronic infections by microorganisms. Chronic infections have risk for cancer development.

There are three main mechanisms by which infections can cause cancer. They appear to involve initiation as well as promotion of carcinogenesis [52]. Persistent infection within host induces chronic inflammation accompanied by formation of reactive oxygen and nitrogen species (ROS and RNOS) [52]. ROS and RNOS have the potential to damage DNA, proteins, and cell membranes. Chronic inflammation often results in repeated cycles of cell damage leading to abnormal cell proliferation [53]. DNA damage promotes the growth of malignant cells. Secondly, infectious agents may directly transform cells, by inserting active oncogenes into the host genome, inhibiting tumour suppressors [52]. Thirdly, infectious agents, such as human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), may induce immunosuppression [52].

The effectiveness of honey is best when used at room temperature. Heating honey to 80 degrees for 1 hour decreased antimicrobial activity of both new and stored honey. Storage of honey for 5 years decreased its antimicrobial activity, while ultraviolet light exposure increased its activity against some of microorganisms [78].

Honey also has been shown to have antiviral properties. In a comparative study topical application of honey was found to be better than acyclovir treatment on patients with recurrent herpetic lesions [83]. Two cases of labial herpes and one case of genital herpes remitted completely with the use of honey while none with acyclovir treatment [83].

7. Honey As Possible Agent for Controlling Obesity

Obese individuals are at risk to develop cancer. There is a close link among obesity, a state of chronic low-level inflammation, and oxidative stress [84]. Obese subjects have an approximately 1.5–3.5-fold increased risk of developing cancers compared with normal-weight subjects [24–26] particularly endometrium [27, 28], breasts [29, 30], and colorectal cancers [31]. Adipocytes have the ability to enhance the proliferation of colon cancer cells in vitro [32]. The greatest risk is for obese persons who are also diabetic, particularly those whose body mass index is above 35 kg/m2. The increase in risk is by 93-fold in women and by 42-fold in men [37]. One of the most common cancers noted in community that has high diabetics and obesity is colorectal cancer [42–45].

In a clinical study on 55 overweight or obese patients, the control group (17 subjects) received 70 g of sucrose daily for a maximum of 30 days and patients in the experimental group (38 subjects) received 70 g of natural honey for the same period. Results showed that honey caused a mild reduction in body weight (1.3%) and body fat (1.1%) [85]. Beneficial effect of honey on obesity is not well established thus far.

8. Honey as “Fixer” for Chronic Ulcers and Wounds

Increasing numbers of antibiotic-resistant bacteria has made simple wounds become chronic and non-healing and as such honey provides alternative treatment options [86]. Honey absorbs exudates released in wounds and devitalized tissue [87]. Honey is effective in recalcitrant surgical wounds [88]. It increases the rate of healing by stimulation of angiogenesis, granulation, and epithelialization, making skin grafting unnecessary and giving excellent cosmetic results [89]. In a randomized control trial, Manuka honey improved wound healing in patients with sloughy venous leg ulcers [90]. Honey was shown to eradicate MRSA (Methylene resistant Staphylococcus aureus) infection in 70% of chronic venous ulcers [91]. Honey is acidic and chronic non healing wounds have an elevated alkaline environment. Manuka honey dressings is associated with a statistically significant decrease in wound pH [92]. Available evidence in meta-analysis studies indicates markedly greater efficacy of honey compared with alternative dressings for superficial or partial thickness burns [93]. Honey is an inexpensive moist dressing with antibacterial and tissue-healing properties suitable for diabetic foot [94]. The average cost of treatment per patient using honey dressing is much cheaper with conventional dressing [95].

9. Honey As Natural Cancer “Vaccine”

Synthetic vaccines like BCG or polio vaccine work by preventing vaccinated subjects from contracting tuberculosis and poliomyelitis. Honey has the element of a “natural cancer vaccine” as it can reduce chronic inflammatory processes, improve immune status, reduce infections by hardy organisms and so forth. Some simple and polyphenols found in honey, namely, caffeic acid (CA), caffeic acid phenyl esters (CAPE), chrysin (CR), galangin (GA), quercetin (QU), kaempferol (KP), acacetin (AC), pinocembrin (PC), pinobanksin (PB), and apigenin (AP), have evolved as promising pharmacological agents in prevention and treatment of cancer [62]. The antioxidant activity of Trigona carbonaria honey from Australia is high at 233.96±50.95 microM Trolox equivalents [96]. The antioxidant activity of four honey samples from different floral sources showed high antioxidant properties tested by different essay methods [97]. Dark honey had higher phenolic compounds and antioxidant activity than clear honey [98]. The amino acid composition of honey is an indicator of the toxic radical scavenging capacity [99]."