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I Believe that Self-Indulgence Begets Self-Sufficiency
There’s something about the pictures of empty grocery shelves that fills me with a combination of dread, sadness, but also hope. Nothing makes people think about self-sufficiency and survival like having their food source threatened. After all, we can survive if we can’t eat, and convenience has allowed us to have so many delicious foods that even just 100 years ago were a luxury. Think about it! Bread wasn’t even sliced until 1928. It changed the face of bread-baking and now we have so much of it that grocery stores end up throwing unpurchased loaves away!
Supply Chain Self-Sufficiency
The COVID-19 pandemic changed the way we view a lot of our access to convenience. With the supply chain disruptions still being felt two years later, homesteading skills are on the rise. People have realized that their access to convenient food is threatened. Just the other day a friend of mine shared pictures that she took for a family member who just couldn’t believe the shelves were as empty as she claimed.
It’s shocking. It makes us feel afraid and threatened, desperate to do anything we can to preserve our access to our food. Without food, we cannot survive!
Not only that, but the lack of supply and increased demand is helping to push up inflation, making it more and more difficult to afford the necessities, much less anything that you could consider an indulgence.
And here is where my personal belief that permitting self-indulgence will increase self-sufficiency.
Self-Indulgence = Self-Sufficiency
Convenience is a driving factor in our lives. We’re constantly looking for ways to streamline everything that we do so we can ‘fit more hours into our day and have a little more time to rest and relax. So the idea that the self-indulgence of convenience would lend itself to self-sufficiency isn’t all that far-fetched. After all, you’re not saving time or energy if you get to the store to buy a loaf of bread and there’s no bread on the shelves. But if you’ve taught yourself how to bake a loaf in your bread machine and keep all the supplies – flour, sugar, eggs, milk, and yeast – on hand at home, you don’t even have to travel to the store you can do it all at home in a matter of five minutes.
A loaf of bread is a necessity. A bread machine though? Not so much. But by having one on hand, you can create self-sufficiency. You don’t need the store for bread anymore. You can do it all yourself.
Same thing with an electric grain mill for making the flour yourself.
They are an indulgence. But they absolutely encourage self-sufficiency.
Building Self-Sufficiency by Identifying Self-Indulgence
Sit down and write out the things you do in your home that could be called indulgent or convenient. All of them. Even if they’re only small things that we’ve come to see as common and every day. Take a few minutes to look at that list and think about what you would do if those were taken away from you.
- What would you eat?
- How would you cook?
- How would you do laundry?
If you didn’t have access to your favorite foods, your favorite snacks… if you couldn’t get fresh fruit or vegetables. What would you do?
These alternatives will help you build your self-sufficiency. If your family eats bread, you’ll keep the supplies on hand to make bread and invest in a bread machine. You’ll tailor your garden so that it becomes able to feed you in addition to being a wonderful hobby.
Self-indulgence breeds self-sufficiency. It has to because in the end, we want freedom and frankly, we want good food.
