Surviving and Thriving in Collapse, Part 4: Reflections on Collapse

Here in Western Pennsylvania, we have been working to get our spring crops in the ground. We had a very long and cold winter (yes, the groundhog was right), but about two weeks ago, the weather broke, the soil warmed, and things like peas, kale, and potato starts are ready to go in.  This past week, I was working on a long potato bed. These are potato varieties that are sold locally, and that we’ve been experimenting with to see which has the best storage and the best yield.  We stored the extra seed potatoes in a root cellar barrel over the winter and have been working to prep and plant them in the garden, cutting all the eyes up and planting them in the warming soil.  As I worked these potatoes into the rich soil, I was struck by the feeling that everything is different now.

Before, when we planted a potato crop, if our crop failed, it was a disappointment, but it wasn’t a big deal.  In times of stability and abundance, we could go to the store and get 10 pounds of organic potatoes for a reasonable price, or if we were still in season, we could head to our farmer’s market and perhaps arrange a bulk order of potatoes. But as I placed each potato chunk into the soil, I sat with a growing set of intense emotions: anxiety, fear, trepidation, and resolve. This time, it felt as if this crop failed; it may be harder to replace, or it may not be affordable to do so.  This year’s planting of potatoes felt more “real” than any crop I had planted before.  With my swirling emotions, I walked away from the potato patch and into the woods.  I didn’t want to put my anxiety and fear into the potatoes. I took a walk on the land, where the spirits of nature reminded me that this situation is larger than me, that I don’t control it, and that all any of us can do is take care of ourselves, our communities, our lands, and our loved ones (human and non-human alike).  I needed to focus on what I could control, which at that moment, was planting potatoes and tending to the needs of the homestead. I took a deep breath, and then I went back and planted the rest of the potatoes.  And since our new summer weather pattern is horrible heat and drought (which is sad as our “normal” climate is quite wet and cool), also prepared the bed for deep mulching and for drip irrigation to hold in as much moisture as possible.  I prayed over the soil, thinking how much had changed since I started learning to grow potatoes when I was a child, or even when I was earlier in my homesteading journey, 10 or 15 years ago. Those were the good times when the ample summer rains were always available to water your crops, and crop loss due to drought was unheard of. Who knew that planting potatoes, such a usually joyful experience, could hang so heavy.

And it’s not like I’m being crazy or unreasonable in my concerns about my future food security.  Food prices here in the USA are way up from where they were a few months ago, and they keep going up.  I think my grocery bill on average has gone up at least 30-40% since January, especially on produce–and it’s hard to know if this is actually from tariffs, from price gouging, supply and demand, or whatever else. It is easily up 100% or even 150% since before the pandemic. As someone who lives in a rural area, I now regularly see many empty shelves when I enter the store and a lower quality of items as a whole.  This has always been the case compared to cities, but it is noticeably different, even from a few months ago. I see a lot of my neighbors and friends tightening up their belts and either starting a garden or expanding their existing garden. Lots of people are doubling their gardens this year, and I highly recommend doing so if you can. People where I live are learning to do without a lot of things, do things cheaper or differently, and are no longer spending anything they don’t need to spend.   And this is probably good in the long run, even if it is a hard transition: this is exactly what we all need to be doing in order to help save our planet, so there’s a part of me that is relieved to see many new people reducing consumption, planting new gardens, and learning to do things differently.

And I’ve been talking to others on the journey–many of us are experiencing moments just like these.  Moments of normal things you’ve done for years and years, that should feel so ordinary, and yet, are no longer ordinary in these collapsing times.  Everything we do has a weight to it, a gravity, that pulls us down or gives us pause because things are different now.  They mean more than they ever did, and they shift from something elective to something necessary.  And then, you have to reorient your relationship to it.  Perhaps you have your own stories to share, and I would certainly welcome those in the comments!

In fact, I’ve been experiencing this situation in lots of different ways. Various activities that I used to do because I’ve chosen to live a more resilient, sustainable, and regenerative lifestyle have moved from the place of a “hobby” or a “lifestyle choice” and into “survival.”  I remind myself that this is the way my human ancestors lived, and I’m alive because they were successful.  And that I’ve been building this skillset my whole life, and my partner and I have lots of experience with taking care of our own needs. And I also remind myself that knowing that things were going to collapse is part of why I’ve made a lot of hard life and career decisions to ensure I can afford to live on a larger piece of land, live somewhere rural, and live the way I do.  The real orientation shift is shifting my brain from preparing for collapse to living in collapse.  And that’s taking a lot of processing and getting used to.

I also think about how often I was mocked or had an eyebrow raised by professional colleagues or more sedentary friends or family over the many years of my own resilient and sustainable journey.  I can hear so many of their snide or condescending comments, “it’s too much work” or “why would you live this way” or “well, you do always seem to have dirt in your fingernails.” And the crazy thing is many of them are still saying these things, but you can see a bit of a conflict in their minds in the place of the haughty certainty.  That shift began during the pandemic and it is continuing through the collapse of the US.  Now those same people are starting to see hard realities about collapse set in.  But perhaps they aren’t letting themselves really accept or grasp the situation.  And thus, they are still not doing anything to help themselves. And in this conversation, they say, “oh, I’ll just come to your house if things get bad.” And I gently remind them that I’m here to help them on their own path to resiliency, that my land does not have the carrying capacity to support more than currently live here. I share that the hard work and effort that my partner and I put into our garden and homestead is not for someone else’s benefit. I talk to them about how much food they could grow even in their small backyard lawn, they could raise some rabbits or chickens, and how doing so would allow them to give up their $150/month gym membership. As I say these things, they grow quiet. Some take a long look at me, because they aren’t really ready to face the fact that we are collapsing and that they actually need to take personal responsibility for themselves and their own needs.  Or maybe a week or so later, they come back and ask me about the best crops to plant for high yields and the best way to start their backyard garden, and then we can talk potatoes, perennials, and permaculture.

And this conversation–the exact conversation I’ve had about four times in the last month–shows me that there are still a lot of people holding their breath and hoping the collapse is going to go away, or someone is going to save them. Or people feeling completely lost and anxious, as everything they knew is crashing down around them.  The more they believed the myth of progress and drank the Kool-Aid, the harder it is to accept. But the evidence is there–the climate data, the historical data, the current trends all speak to the same reality–the collapse is only going to get worse. And the way we all make it through is to accept it, to take personal responsibility for ourselves, our needs, and our loved ones as much as we are able so that we can create a better future.  So that we are in the place of building that new world when the bottom falls out, and helping other people do the same. And, we realize we cannot do it on our own–we create communities of people with lots of different skills and resources so that we can support each other.  We create strong networks of our friends, family, and neighbors so that as things get worse, we can depend on each other. And we have the hard conversations like the one I describe above to help more people start the journey.

A collapsing society–and in our case, accompanied by a collapsing ecosystem–means that literally everything is upended and has to be re-negotiated.  All of us have to find our own way–and that begins by accepting what is happening and making meaningful changes to provide for our needs. And most of us still have to somehow negotiate the insane schism that we experience on a daily basis. This gets back to the label of the “collective insanity civilization” that I use to describe modern society, which certainly has been taken to new heights in the USA as of late.  So while I’m thinking about potatoes and collapse, I am also supposed to show up for work and pretend like nothing is happening.  I’m supposed to just act like a little good cog in the machine, earning my paycheck (which isn’t worth nearly what it used to be), and just put a smile on my face while pretending like everything is fine.  For me personally, that’s the hardest thing of it all.  To walk into my job and when people ask me, “How are you” and I bite my tongue to avoid my actual reply, “I’m struggling with the collapse of the planetary ecosystem and the fact that it is 90 degrees in April today.” That’s the situation with most people I know who are on this path: we are all trapped in the machine, trying to navigate that and also getting our big gardens in and trying to prepare.  The lyrics from the Beatles’ Eleanor Rigby always come through my mind in those kinds of moments, “Eleanor Rigby, wearing the face that she keeps in the jar by the door.” I feel you, Eleanor.

But even despite the challenges of the collapse, anytime there is significant and lasting change, it is a chance for us to rewrite ourselves and reorient our relationships to everything.  This is what I wrote about extensively in my earlier posts on the collapse.  The tower is crashing down, and all of us have a chance to create something new.  And a good amount of that is in our own mindsets, thoughts, and shadow work we need to do. This kind of self-work is a survival strategy in turbulent times. We have to find meaning in the instability and in the fact that we will invariably have moments of anxiety and fear.  We have to find meaning and purpose in a world that is going to grow harder and worse, and not better.  We have to live in the moment and find our joy and happiness.  And we have to process all of the things we are experiencing, and give ourselves space and care to do so. For me,  this is a chance to deepen everything that I know to be true and that I have committed myself to throughout my life. The truth is, modern life isn’t working for most of us anymore.  It certainly isn’t working for me, not one bit. And as I watch this collapse unfold and experience the anxiety of the upheaval, I also see this as a great opportunity to deepen my relationship to the land, to teaching others about the land, and to co-creating a better world with the land and all of you. Rooting myself in the things that are tangible and real: potatoes, herbs, chickens, geese, mushrooms, community, and friends–helps me and strengthens me for the work to come. I have to remind myself of those things regularly and continue to affirm what I do and why I do it.  And I have to take time to smell the roses, to enjoy my hands in the soil, to spend quality time with my geese, and to take care of myself.

And honestly, one of the best things that’s happened is something I began talking about in Sacred Actions – abundance and scarcity.  Until recently, we lived in a time where literally everything was abundant all the time if you had the money for it–and now, we live in a time of growing scarcity of the things that we used to take for granted.  And shifting that model means that everything has become more meaningful.  I have a lot more gratitude for even the simple things in my life, perhaps things I used to take for granted.  I recognize the places where, despite all of my best intentions, I was still excessive or wasteful, and I am now aligning that with my deeper values.  And so, taking this time of collapse to pause, reflect, and deepen the practices in some new ways.  That is ongoing work, but it is good work.

All of this has made me consider my relationships to everything.  The people in my life and those who help support me on the journey vs. drag me down or demand everything of me with nothing in return.  The local land, and how I can continue to be a good human being, bringing the enchantment of nature into everyday life, and learning how to best ancestor I can possibly be. My relationship to the garden, to the land, to the homestead. My relationship to myself. My relationship to the rain, light, wind, and soil.  My relationship to the communities to which I belong. And building those relationships are meaningful and that will root and sustain me through this chaos.  I take a breath and be grateful to be alive.  And just maybe, I put in a larger patch of potatoes.

This is all of what I’ve been thinking about and feeling in the last little while.  How are you hanging in there? What stories do you want to share?