Poll(s) Of The Month : What Has The Most Intrinsic Value?

This month's (May, 2024's) poll(s) in the Mirrors For The Mind, Heart and Soul series

Hey everyone, in this month’s poll I would like to highlight (what I have come to recognize as) the universal truth of how learning to honorably forage and garden provides food for the mind, body and soul. I also wanna take the pulse of what others feel are things that have intrinsic value as I am a perpetual student and always looking to take a step back from limiting perspectives to re-consider a boarder more holistic perspective.

What has value and worth regardless of outward circumstances?

What can we rely on whether or not the flimsy human centralized infrastructures are functioning or not?

What retains the highest degree of value in any and all situations?

Homegrown Heirloom Cannabis seeds… Market Value in Fiat Currency: Approx 50 thousand CAD$ 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐕𝐚𝐥𝐮𝐞 (𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐜 𝐯𝐚𝐥𝐮𝐞) : Food security, health sovereignty, potential for gifting, trading and decentralizing the production of a powerful medicine plant in the northern growing regions. These seeds offer immense potential for myself and many others in northern climates to produce powerful medicines and nutrient dense food requiring very little effort in cultivation outdoors. Taking 5 minutes to harvest these seeds from a handful of large flowers (which grew on a self-sown female plant that I did not water once) means having peace of mind, hope and gratitude in the knowing that I have developed an heirloom strain (through co-creating/selectively seed saving along side the forces of nature) that is drought tolerant, disease resistant, produces an excellent spectrum of cannabinoids and terpenes, is capable of germinating outside in march (and continuing to grow) with intermittent minus 4 C temps (which means self sowing and producing effectively in our Canadian climate) and can provide not only powerful medicine (but also nutrient dense food) to many locally and future generations as well.

In a time when the supply lines (and prices) for synthetic NPK fertilizers are unreliable and unpredictable making the choice to create some of your own compost at home is an empowering way to take action in decentralizing and localizing the production of essential gardening/farming materials (and saving money too) .If you do not have a compost going yet, I highly suggest getting one going. Composting allows us to team up with Mother Earth's team of highly specialized alchemists (soil microbes, fungi and compost assisting insects) to turn waste into black gold so one can grow resilient crops that produce nutritious and delicious food. I provide in depth instructions for composting yard waste and food scraps into fertile soil in my book.

Time spent to turn two cabbages, some green onions, ginger, peppers, kombu/dulce, toasted sesame seeds, salt, carrots, radishes and red pepper powder into approx 7 liters of kimchi by hand : 2 hours or so Current Market value of 7 liters of organic unpasteurized kimchi where we live: approx 160.00 CAD $𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐕𝐚𝐥𝐮𝐞 (𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐜 𝐯𝐚𝐥𝐮𝐞): Having access to delicious, nutrient dense and probiotic rich food (and knowing I can make more when ever I want to using garden harvests, foraged foods and/or seasonally abundant locally farmed produce) resulting in increased resilience, immunity, longevity, peace of mind and increased inspiration/joy while creating kitchen- 𝐏𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐞𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬.

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Well, I think you may be able to discern which my choices in the above polls are based on what links I shared above and based on my past posts, but I am interested in what all of you think.

For me, the choice to grow heirloom crops, flowers and trees from seed is not only an investment that leads to exponential nutritional abundance that increases one's physiological health, it also nourishes the imagination, increases one's knowledge of those things which have intrinsic value, fills the heart with joy, gratitude and peace, all while providing poetry for the senses that serves to nurture the soul.

Unlike fiat currency, gold or gems, fresh homegrown berries, herbs, fruit and veggies have intrinsic value. The skills and knowledge you gain while growing your own nutrient-dense food is also something that has intrinsic value.. when we share this knowledge and seeds (literal and figurative seeds) this intrinsic value increases exponentially and (unlike fiat currency) is accessible by many.

These are some of the many reasons I feel one of the best choices any of us can make is to create/build some living soil where we live and plant good seeds in the rich Earth. In doing so, we invest in the well being of not only ourselves but we also to invest in hope for tomorrow through leaving this place a little bit more beautiful and fertile than when we got here

Hard assets (whether cash or gold or food stores anything else) can be stolen from you and events can be brought about by humans (or happen naturally) that (even in a best case scenario) would render your cryptocurrency inaccessible and useless for long periods of time (EMPs, CMEs and/or some kind of Digital ID/Internet Drivers license requiring biometric scans to access internet).

Knowledge, skills and experience related to food cultivation, foraging and preservation cannot be stolen from you however, and thus it has intrinsic value as it is applicable and accessible in any and all situations.

Every little bit of food you cultivate for yourself and learn to preserve not only increases your resilience, health and ability to boycott corporations in the here and now, it builds those skills and experience that have intrinsic value for the future. Those are the skills and choices that have the most power to starve the corporations and build a new way of living to leave them behind.

In my opinion, assuming one will always be able to buy food from someone else (because one is wealthy and/or lazy and does not want to get their hands dirty and work with the soil) is a choice to leave one's self vulnerable and is not a solid strategy for weathering the storm ahead.

Also, to me these are worth more to me than all the jewels, gems and gold on Earth! 

Paw Paw Seeds

White Pine Seeds

I would also argue that many of the seeds/beans shown in the pics above they are just as (if not more) beautiful visually. Also, you cannot eat gold, diamonds, sapphires or rubies... nor can you plant them in the ground and increase their value 100 fold in a single season, while also building precious soil in the process and simultaneously increasing your health/emergency preparedness. 

When these seeds shown in the picture above are combined with act of composting, it means you are contributing towards the fabric of an ancient living decentralized economic model. We invest our time and materials, and the ‘asset managers’ and ‘investment strategy team’ (comprised of myriad bacteria, fungi and decomposing insects) invest molecules of biological currency for us, storing those units of currency in the form of fertile soil. We can then withdraw from our account through using the ‘key code’ that is embodied in a living heirloom seed we plant in that soil (which unlocks it’s potential and allows us to withdraw part of our savings account in that living soil/seed bank in the form of life giving food, medicine, oxygen and poetry for the senses).

Composting is medicine for the land and medicine for the soul. It offers us a tangible way to connect with and give back to the living planet that sustains us all. When one looks at the act of composting through a more linear or utilitarian lens it is an act that facilitates the transformation of free materials into something extremely valuable and useful for emergency preparedness, saving money on grocery and medical bills.

However, those are just my thoughts and perspectives and I value hearing what all of you think so I look forward to discussing the subject matter that was the focus of the polls above in the comment section below.

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