To Learn, To Do, and To Become

This past Christmas our family adopted a new motto.  As we have worked toward our goals of self sufficiency, we have been seeing the world we live in differently.  For many years, as we were presented with the latest and greatest, the new and the innovative, and the cannot survive without mentalities.  We have worked hard to earn our living so that one day we could have nice things.  We looked for ways to scrimp and save in lean times; mostly furnishing our home, and clothing our bodies, with anything available as second hand.  As we would continually receive new to us, and occasionally properly new, items in our home, we would use them and then squirrel them away to be used again when the need arose.  With a growing family, we wanted to make sure our needs were met.  It hadn't yet occurred to us that these were often opportunities for us to collect things that we didn't actually need.  Our home began to fill to overflowing with much more than we needed, or could manage.

As we looked around us, the thought of going out and purchasing more stuff that would simply add to the clutter of our already cluttered home was feeling like too much.  We were constantly purchasing more bins, in order to store more things that we rarely used anyway.  We needed a change.  It was time to de-clutter our home, but more than that it was time to find a focus on what it was we really need.  

One day, after a lot of thought, Henry introduced the idea.  For Christmas we would only ask for something to help us learn something new, a project for us to do, or the means to a goal for what we wanted to become.  

Our oldest son wanted to learn how to make movies through video editing.  Our oldest daughter wanted to progress toward starting a tea and cupcake shop.  Our second son wanted to learn to make video games, like his dad.  Our third son wanted to learn to build things.  Our little girl wanted to learn where baby bunnies came from, and raise bunnies.  Our youngest is still to young to know what he wanted, or at least to communicate it to us.

Christmas morning was a little different.  Instead of the toy that the kids had picked out from the yearly adds, there was something for each of us that encouraged us to learn and grow as individuals.  There were books on various subjects, tools, seeds, and even a bunny.  Despite the obvious lack of toys for our young children, ranging in age from 1-11 years, everyone was excited.  We all had direction, and motivation; the ability to gain knowledge was before us, rather than yet another myriad of ways in which to leisure away our time.

This has become one of the most meaningful changes in our lives to date.  The ability to look forward, as we are provided the information and tools that we need to progress in our personal goals, has completely changed our perspective.  We no longer feel the need to fill our empty spaces with things that we might need one day; we are working toward our interests and our goals.  Put simply, we are bringing things into our lives that will help us to learn, to do, and to become.