Eco Winter Warming Tips

I recently wrote this piece for the Caroline Springs Community Update, where I write a monthly article, so thought I would share it with you all as it is very topical for those of us in the Southern Hemisphere.

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Now that we’ve already had our first snap of cold weather here in Melbourne and natural gas prices are up, petrol prices are up, electricity prices are up, it won’t be too long before you and I see these rises on our energy bills. What can we do to keep warm and where possible save a little money, some valuable resources and GHG emissions this winter?


Use the Sun

Passive solar heating can be utilised in most homes. Where you have north facing windows and it is a sunny day, open up the blinds or curtains and let the sun in. You will be amazed at the amount of warmth that the sun can deliver in winter. Just before the sun sets at night, close the curtains to keep the heat in your home. Think of it as free energy from a warm winter friend.


Layers

It might seem simple to say but when you are in the house, layer up! Get a singlet on, then a t-shirt, then a cardigan or jumper. The temperature of your room does not need to be tropical and Hawaiian shirts are not an eco-fashion statement in winter. You can keep the heat in and close to your body by having layers, and as Shrek would say, like an onion!


Keep the draughts out

If your windows don’t quite fit the frames, cling wrap round the edges to keep the draughts from whipping in and close the gap. Or you could use bubble wrap and tape it around the window frame and make a temporary double glazed window. Same with the doors – get a draft excluder fitted to the bottom of the door or if you are being frugal to the nth degree then roll up an old towel tightly, duct tape in two or three places to keep it together and lay it at the foot of the door. Old school tech, but it works!


Price Compare, but be aware

Prices are zooming up. However, you might want to have a look at a few energy price comparison sites online. Try sites like www.goswitch.com.au, or www.switchwise.com.au. These simple steps could save you $100’s off of your energy bills. While you are at it, don’t forget to enquire about the GreenPower rate and see if you can get that thrown in as well. Also remember that the devil is in the detail, so look at what you are signing up for.


Eat well – eat warm

There is nothing that says staying warm like a lovely big bowl of thick soup or a “stick to the ribs” stew or casserole in the winter months. Cooking from scratch not only saves you money and helps you stay healthy; it keeps you in the lovely warm kitchen and eating hot food. Delicious minestrone, cooked in my pressure cooker warms the cockles for a big crowd of people at my home.


Summary

So before you turn up the thermostat, have a think about the bill that you will receive in a few months time. It may help you remember and act upon these tips which will help you keep warm and save you money in the coming colder months of winter. Stay warm and wise!

Podcast 20 - Interview with Darren (green-change.com)

I had the pleasure of interviewing Darren from green-change.com for my latest podcast.  We talk about what motivated him and his family to begin to live a sustainable lifestyle, why they moved to a larger property in Jamberoo NSW, and a great insight into raising pigs from piglet to freezer.

Please join me in listening to the sixth interview in the "Interview with a green blogger" series of podcasts.

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Being Different - Cross post from SGFC

I am different.  Yes, really different, but I hope it doesn't stay that way for long.

However, I know that I am not alone.  Slowly growing within the consumeristic heart of western culture and society, there is a special kind of person that is different from the mainstream.  Sometimes they are hard to spot, but with a bit of careful observation you can pick them out from the crowd.

You will see them shopping in op shops buying clothes and other essentials.  You will catch them on weekends in their gardens growing their own food.  You will find them in their kitchens cooking meals for their family.  You will see them mending and repairing, reducing, reusing, and recycling items around the home.  You will find them talking about the antics of their chickens instead of talking about weekend football or some other trivial pursuit.  You will notice their friendly demeanour, and note that they give endlessly of their skills and knowledge.  You will finding them buying local produce and goods.  You will find them using less resources in their lifestyle.  You will hear them enjoying life and not have a nagging feeling in their gut that something is missing in their life.

In fact, these people are you.  I can see you out there as our audience, changing your lives, being different from the rest of society, every single day of the year and living life to the full.  Having fun and finding the courage to be someone different who stands up for the future of humanity and all creatures on the Earth in each and every action you take towards your simple, green, and frugal lifestyle.

It feels good to be different is a small way, however what would please me much, much more was if everyone lived as if the welfare of Mother Earth, Gaia, Mother Nature, or whatever label you put on this big blue-green marble we live on and call home.  I yearn to see the day when we are all the same.

Being different is maybe good in the short term, but a big green groundswell that reaches a tipping point is far superior.  Change at the community level is the only thing that will make a difference in the long run to our environment which without we do not stand much of a chance.  It makes me laugh when I hear the term "Save the Environment".  As I know full well that the environment is not something separate from humans, what that term really means, and has a bigger punch in the process is "Save Humanity and all other Species on the planet".  It has a better ring to it, and a worthy goal.

So lets take the "different" and make it "the norm".  Reach out to your local community and share all the different things you do in your sustainable lifestyle, and I bet you my best laying chicken, that you will make a difference to someone's life!

Who is up for the challenge?

Of Note...

There are a few things of note to mention today that may interest you.  I realise that I have not been blogging much of late, but recovery will do that to you.  Once again, I have the urge to write and share.

On Wednesday, I cleaned out the chook house.  Not a very exciting thing to do, but necessary for the health of my feathered girls.  All was going well until I tried to lift the roof back onto their roosting/nesting box, and I over exerted myself and set my recovery back a week.  Both Friday and Saturday have been quite painful starts to the day, but after moving around a bit, the pain settles down with the help of some mild pain relief.  I need to learn quickly to accept the offer of help when given, and be mindful that Rome was not built in a day!  I learnt yesterday morning that I cannot lift 20kg bags of chicken feed yet, so I enlisted the help of my good friend and neighbour Rick who accompanied me to the stock feed store. Thanks mate.

Yesterday afternoon, I hosted a cheese making demonstration for the Melton Sustainable Living group.  I love presenting, and showed 5 people how to make two cheeses, 30 minute Mozzarella and Ricotta.  I managed to make the Mozzarella in 45 minutes which was an improvement on Friday's effort of an hour, and Ricotta in 15 minutes.  I gave away samples of both to each participant, and used the remaining Mozzarella on our home made pizza last night.  Delicious, and it melts so well.

After saving up my pennies, I finally purchased a second rainwater tank, which arrived on Friday.  It is a slimline 2100 litre tank that will be fitted in the carport area.  My friend and neighbour Rick, will be helping me attach some guttering to the carport over the next few weekends, and I will plumb up the tank and connect some irrigation work to it.  Nothing like water security to put a smile on your face, but why it is wrapped in a mountain of plastic is any ones guess.  What a waste!

Also, even though we have had a cold few weeks, which as been kind of nice during my recovery time, we have still had some tomato bushes on the go that were gifts from nature.  We harvested quite a haul of yellow currant broad ripple and Tommy toe cherry tomatoes.  We used some on home made pizza last night, and I will be adding the rest of them to a lasagna that I am making tomorrow.  Fresh tomatoes in late Autumn?  Nice!

The chickens are still not on the lay yet.  Only one of the new ISA Browns and both Pekin bantams are laying (occasionally), which leaves 6-7 other hens not producing at all.  The cold snap has confused the heck out of them.  All their feathers have grown back from the moult, so I have increased their protein intake by supplementing half of their normal grain diet with some layer pellets.  Hopefully that will kick start them, as we are totally over the zero, one or two egg a day allowance they have been giving us.  I miss fresh pasta which requires 4-5 eggs to make.  We are surviving on stockpiled pasta from the start of the year so that we can keep to one of our goals.  Hopefully we will be flush with eggs in the next few weeks as they pick up their game.  Note that the laying chooks have a bright red comb and the non-laying chooks have a dull pink comb.  This should change when they recover from the moult.

Good Chooks!

Barren Chooks!

I planted some broad beans and three varieties of peas on the 5th of May with a lot of help from Kim, but because of the cold temperatures, they have taken ages to sprout.  The some peas have poked their heads out of the ground overnight, but the broad beans are still to come.  I planted Purple podded, Sugar snap and Snow peas with lots of trellis for them to climb.  I love fresh peas.

One final thing.  I found out yesterday that an article that I sent off to Grass Roots magazine way back in January has been published and appears in the next issue which is available in newsagents tomorrow!  I am already receiving emails from subscribers of the magazine as they must already have received their copy.  Looking forward to having a look at the final edit when I get my own copy tomorrow, just in time for my birthday!  I am very proud to have my first paid writing gig in Australia's longest running sustainable living publication and it has given me a great boost of self-esteem.  Just what I need right now!

Quick 30 Minute Mozzarella

One cheese that I have been procrastinating about is Mozzarella.  Don't ask me why, I just was!  The Mozzarella recipe listed in Ricky Carrol's Home Cheesemaking book had quite a few precautions as did her instructions on her website, but I figured that now that I had a few cheeses under my belt (an understatement I suppose?), I should be able to rescue any potential disaster.

The ingredients are simple.  All you need are the following;

Four litres of full cream milk.  I chose one that was 3.4% butterfat.

A microwave bowl, 1 and a half teaspoons of citric acid mixed with a half a cup of unchlorinated water.  A quarter teaspoon of non-ionised salt, and a quarter teaspoon of rennet mixed with a quarter of a cup of unchlorinated water.  Don't forget to sterilise your utensils or give them a spray with vinegar and dry.

Heat the milk to 15C (55F) then add the citric acid solution.  Stir well and continue to heat.

Heat to 30C (88F), then add the rennet solution and stir well for 30 seconds only.  Keep heating during the milk to 38-40C (100-105F) and the curd will begin to come away from the edges of the pot.  This happens in about 5-8 minutes.

However, this is where disaster struck (no more photos until the end).  Because I used pasteurised/homogenised milk and the book recipe did not mention the addition of calcium chloride to make a firm curd, I found that is was weak and sloppy.  The recipe calls for scooping the curds (not cutting) into a microwave bowl.  I couldn't do this as it was loosing too much protein due to the whey being really cloudy and it started turning into a sloppy mess.  I decided after a few scoops to cut the curd into 2.5cm cubes (1"), which saved the day.  The whey went clear and yellow and I managed to drain it all through cheese cloth.  I did some research afterwards and should have left the milk to heat a few degrees and a few minutes longer more before scooping.

I then followed the rest of the recipe.  I drained as much whey from the curds in the bowl and then put it in the Microwave for 1 minute on High.  I drained the whey again, then into the Microwave for another 30 seconds on High, drain and form into a single mass, and back into the Microwave for a final 30 seconds.

I then added the salt and started kneading quickly like bread dough until it was smooth and shiny and it could be stretched like Taffy .  Kim took over as the Tank Man turned up (another post topic), and rolled the cheese into five balls and then put them in a big bowl of cold water for 30 minutes.  This helped the cheese to have the same consistency throughout.

We then took it out of the water and have already eaten one ball sliced onto crackers, topped with tomato and freshly cracked pepper and salt.  Delicious!  Apparently, it can be stored covered in the fridge for a few days, but don't think it will last that long.  We are putting it on home made pizza tomorrow night!

The New England Cheesemaking supply company site has the full recipe and a better step by step guide which is a little different than the book version of the 30 minute Mozzarella.  This web version includes cutting the curd and leaving it a little longer before draining.

You can also add lipase at the same time you add the citric acid solution which should give it a stronger flavour and leave it for 20 minutes before adding the rennet.  I am going to give this a try tomorrow during a cheesemaking demonstration that I am holding for the Melton Sustainable Living Group.

Whilst the taste is nice, it doesn't have a full flavour that I have tasted in Italian made Mozzarella.  The lipase should fix this up and give it some grunt.

There is nothing quite like fresh Mozzarella!  Why did I wait so long to make it, I will never know.

Podcast 19 - In The Navy

We all have a past that comes up every so often, and mine was 20 years of service in the Royal Australian Navy.

Yesterday, I was interviewed by my niece Ashley for a history project about war in the 20th century.  She approached me due to my service in 1990 at the start of the conflict in the Persian Gulf.  It is quite a good interview, and at the very end I try and make a point about the reason for the conflict, besides the obvious liberation of Kuwait. I could have gone a bit deeper, but I didn't want to spoil her project!

Also, I do not glorify or promote war nor conflict.  It serves no purpose, so I just tell it how it was like at the time during this part of my life.

Anyway, enjoy the podcast.

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I certainly have had a full life so far!

Garlic Grows Well

I did a head count yesterday.  If all goes well with the growing season, I will have 129 bulbs of garlic in November!  This vegetable is just so easy to grow.  Just stick it in the ground, water, and harvest 6 months later when the tops die down!

So from the original two bulbs of garlic that I bought from Diggers club three years ago, I harvested about 20 bulbs in the first season, 50 bulbs in the second and, well you can tell what will happen next.  Just by saving a few more of the fattest bulbs each year as seed for the next, you will never have to buy garlic ever again.

With these two puppy-chinos guarding the crop, I have no doubt at all that it will be a bumper one!

Quince Paste

Any Cheese maker worth his salt should be able to whip up a few accompaniments for their cheese, so I gave it a go.

I read somewhere that Quince paste was a really good complimentary flavour that goes with most cheeses.  Having never tried it before, it was a bit of a gamble, but one that paid off in the end.  The flavour is sensational, and I would recommend this fruit paste to anyone who is wondering what to do with a few spare quinces.

I found a recipe from Taste.com.au and followed it exactly.  It worked fine, except that I added a full cup of water at the start because it looked like it was going to boil dry!  Pretty easy process.  Peel, core, chop, then stew.  After the chopped up quinces turned to mush, I blended them in the food processs whilst hot and then returned the fruit to the pot and added the sugar. 

So that I could capture the long 3.5 hour process, I took photos at 15 minute intervals.



I just love the way it changes colour during the cooking process. 

Then I lined 6 ramekins with plastic wrap and ladled in the paste, and when it cooled a little, we folded over the wrap to protect it as it set.

I left them on the kitchen counter overnight and we had some for lunch with a piece of ash coated brie and castello white cheese.  Unfortunately, these are not my creations, but will be getting stuck into cheesemaking next week.

The taste was great and it really brought out the flavour of the cheese.  A great accompaniments indeed.  Not quite sure how to store it, but we have it in a sealed container in the fridge.  Hopefully it will store for a while, at least until I get a Caerphilly made and ripened!  I can just taste the sweet and salty together, yummy.

Can anyone help and and let me know if I can freeze Quince Paste?  Comments welcome.

To My Mum

I love you!  Have a fantastic day.

You Can't Keep Me Down For Long!

Only 5 days out of hospital and I had the local press around for an interview and photo shoot!

This time my local eco reporter Meg, was doing a series of articles about sustainable living, more specifically people making things themselves.

The photographer arrvied at about 1230, and we took lot of pictures of cheese and me in the kitchen.  I had everything set up as if I was making some, and also had some Wensleydale, Pyrenees with peppercorns, and a 10 month old Parmesan on display.  It was a good set, and I hope to get some of the photos for the blog.

After the cheese session, we moved out to the chookhouse, where the obliging Barnevelder, Jennifer and I plus an egg from one of the ISA Browns stood in various poses for the camera.  Jen the chook was very good and even held her head still for at least a second, and if you have chooks you will know what I mean :-)

About half way through this shoot Meg turned up for the interview, so we wrapped up the photo shoot, and headed inside to my study.  The interview lasted about 40 minutes, and should appear in part at least in two separate articles I believe, over the next few weeks in the Melton Weekly.  I will post the link when it is published.

When everyone left at 1430, I looked at the cheese equipment and decided that instead of putting it all away again, it was too good an opportunity to make a simple cheese like feta.  So I did!  As it only requires 20 minutes stiring, I knew I could handle this time on my feet.

During the process, I found that the curds did not set firmly enough as I must have not added enough calcium chloride to the milk at the start.  I had to compensate by bagging up the cheese initially and hanging it over a large pot like thus:

This way, I can let it drain slowly, without loosing lots of protien due to the sloppy curd.  The whey is draining clearly, opposed to cloudy if I had have pressed it as per normal.  I have left it like this for two hours, then will put it into the normal square mould to finish it off for another two hours.  Then into the brine for 24 hours and leave it for a few days before eating!  Necessity is the mother of invention.

Anway, time for a rest me thinks.  Today has been a big one.

Failure Is An Option

When it comes to food gardening, failure is an option, and usually not by choice but by lack of knowledge.  What I mean by that is we gardeners, even the more experienced ones fail in the line of duty but it doesn't really matter because at least you are giving it a go!  Let me explain my motivation behind this post.

Kim was approached by the Homeshop man who delivered some groceries to us yesterday to join the Sustainable Living Group, specifically to learn how to grow his own food.  The reason he had not started as yet, because 'he was afraid of failure' (his words), and didn't what to stuff it up.  I thought about this for a while and reflected on his reasoning.  Then Kim beat me to it and handed him a membership form and schedule and told him to come to the first meeting!  A step in the right direction, and the first step in his journey.  He won't what hit him.

Fortunately most human learn by our mistakes, and because of western societies success in eliminating the extended family unit, we have to learn skills that were mostly passed down from generation to generation all over again from scratch.  So failure, or trial and error as I prefer to call it is inevitable when you learn a new skill..

Gardening is no exception.  When I first started out, I didn't really have anyone around me to learn the skills from directly who knew the local conditions, so I hit the library for suggestions.  Books are good to get the basics of organic gardening, but you have to ensure that the planting timings and knowledge that they are imparting is right for your local area.  So many organic gardening books hail from the UK and USA, which for our climate here in Australia is totally out of whack and no use to us at all.  The best beginners advice I found were from books from the Diggers Club which are written for Australian conditions.  But as I mentioned, books are only the begining of the journey.  If books don't help, hit the blogsphere.  Gardening bloggers love to help out with tricky problems.

At the start of every great journey is the first small step, which is often the hardest thing to do.  The way I see it is that if you start off small, you don't loose much if it all goes pear shaped, and it is quite easy to start again.  I suppose that is the way I did it when I first begun.  By only have the advice from books, I planted small amounts of everything, and mainly from seedlings bought from a nursery.  That way I knew that if something didn't grow like the book was telling me, I would have time to figure it out.  Nature is very forgiving like that.  Plants grow slowly over days, weeks and months.  If you are observent, you always have time to correct mistakes in your vegie patch or fruit orchard.  

During the first season, that worked for me.  Because I had small amounts of lots of different types, we could figure out what vegetable we really liked to eat, which types would grow well given the conditions we had, and what techniques we could use in the next season to make things better.  On the flip side, if I was planting for survival mode, then I would have planted a larger amount, especially if what you plant is all you have to eat.  I hope that when TSHTF, you are well knowledgable by then!  Better to be prepared and have the skills now, than to wait until prices go through the roof and scarcity hits hard.

Anyway, the morale of the post is that we all fail at times when food gardening, and it is a lifelong journey of discovery and adventure, which is why I love it so much.  The joy of actually growing your own food and cooking with it can not be overstated.  It is just an amazing feeling, and never gets tired with me. 

So if you have still yet to start growing a small patch or balcony garden, remember that there will be failures, there will be tears, but heck, it is worth it in the long run.  The sense of satisfaction is second to none!

Curing Olives

I have been wanting to try this for years, ever since I tasted home cured olive at my mate George's house when I was about 12 years old back in my home town of Loxton.

I have three very small olive trees, but I have yet to produce my own fruit as they are just not mature enough.  Combined with the fact that I just love olives whether they be green or black, I just needed to get my act together and give it a go.  I have noticed many places around our town that have olive tree laden with fruit, and they were just sitting there going to waste, which seemed like a crying shame to me.  What to do?

Well first I had to learn to cure olives before I approached anyone for their surplus.  So when we visited Talbot Farmers Market, I visited the olive man and asked him if it was easy enough to cure olives.  He rambled on a little but I got the gist of it, and it was enough to whet my appetite and seek other curing recipes.

I purchased 1kg (2.2lb) of Sevillano Olives and took them home.  After a bit of research I found that there were a few ways to cure olives, one in brine, one in water then brine, and one in lye.  I chose the one in water and then brine method as the Sevillano olives are mostly green all the way through, even though they look black, which is a bit deceiving for a beginner like me.

So here is how I went about curing my olives (click to enlarge photos).

Firstly I disregarded any with bruises and blemishes and threw them in the compost bin.

I separated what I thought was the green from the black, as the recipe calls for different soaking times.

Next I used a sharp knife to make a cut lenghtwise on opposite sides of each olive to quicken the soaking process.  Try not to cut into the pip.  The soaking process removes most of the bitterness from the fresh olive, and anyone who has tried to eat a raw olive will attest to its horrible bitter taste.

So in clean and sterilised spring clip jars, I placed the black and green olives (black at the back and green at the front jars).  Then you simply fill each jar to the brim with tap water and then clip down the lid.  By ensuring that some water leaks out when you clip it down it is fairly certain that all the olives are entirely immersed.  Change the water every day, which is easy with this type of jar.  Just release the tension on the clip and drain the water.  Then fill up again to the brim with tap water.   The recipe I used said that you soak black olives for 4 days, and green for 6 days, however I found that both were too bitter still for my liking and discovered that the black ones were really green olives in disguise!  I soaked mine for 14 days until I was happy that most of the bitterness was gone.  If you get a little bit of scum on top of the water some days, don't dispair as this is normal.

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Above is the final olives and you can notice that during the soaking process the blackness of this type of olive turned green.  So on to the next stage, which is the brineing.  

I added two thirds of a cup of salt to 2 litres (~2qts) of water and heated it until disolved.  Then transfered to a pyrex jug to make it easier to pour into the jars.

Fill your jars up with brine to just covering the olives. 

Some may floats still, so to make it impervious to air, cover with a little olive oil.  About 5mm will suffice, enough so the oil is a single layer floating on top.

Then seal the lid with the clip.  I left about 1cm clearance so that there was no spillage when I sealed it.

My recipe called to leave these jars for 5 weeks.  After waiting period that they are ready to eat.  Time will tell.  I will sample some mid June and let you know the verdict.  Apparently they can store for up to six months like this in the brine, but they last even longer if stored in olive oil.  I don't think that they will last that long if they taste yummy.  Ben also loves olives, so it will be a fight to the last one!

Next year, I will ask around and barter for a 10kg bucket of olives from friends and see how we go from there.  Until next year.

On Happiness....

Whilst in hospital (which went well), I had a lot of time to think about stuff which is always a good thing in my opinion.  I had time to relax (a little), and time to think about the path ahead.  In this post, I am going to attempt to describe some of my thoughts in some kind of cohesive way.

All sorts of emotions arose which are part of the normal human condition.  Things like; fear, anxiety, uncertainty, disorientated, agony, relief, elation, and happiness.  Note that I put the emotions in a specific order which are actually in order of occurrence. 

Friday, I was fearful because I did not know what the outcome was going to be.  When I was waiting on the bed in pre-op, I was full of anxiety until I talked to my surgeon who helped alleviate some of my fears and angst.  A few minutes before I was rolled into the theatre, I thought, 'What if they don't find anything and it is all in my imagination?'.  This was uncertainty kicking in.

A couple of hours later I work up and for a second or two, I had no idea where I was and what just happened.  I can't remember much at all for the next few hours.  Disorientation.

Then the local anaesthetic wore off.  Agony is the only way that I can describe it, but I knew that it was all going to get better from here on in.

From here on in, only positive emotions came my way.  Relief with the first visit to the toilet to check on the boys and that it all worked.  Elation that the operation had been a success and that the surgeon had found a significant protrusion which proved that I wasn't imagining it all.  And finally happiness, which was for a good many reasons.

Happy because I was well on the other side of the operation.  Happy because all of the nurses were fantastic and had hearts of gold. Happy because I knew that I was loved, and was missed.  Happy because I was in safe hands.  But most of all, I was happy because I took the time to reflect back upon the last few years of my journey and I realised how much I had changed for the better, and how much happier I am now compared to the days of old.


Relationships are fuller. Family bonds are stronger.  I have a sense of purpose and strong life goals, etc, etc, etc....

Then I realised that if I asked anyone around me what they really want, then the answer would to be happy.  Now, because happiness is a main driver in every humans life, we should be able to measure it, right?  We can measure economic growth, and resource consumption with Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and various other market driven mechanisms, so why are we not measuring happiness?  Case in point is that we here on the radio and TV every day how many people died in that day, the multitude of disasters that occurred to humanity in the last 24 hours, what the latest stock market index is, or what the dollar is trading at in relation to other world currencies.  All these statistics and indices, but you don't hear about how happy people were that day. It just does not seem right to me.

If we all strive for happiness in our lives, why would we not want to know the local, national or even the global Happiness Index is?  I know I would want to know, because if it was low you would want to improve upon it.  Well it just happens that there is one country in the world who does indeed base its decisions based on the happiness of its citizens.  That country is Bhutan.  Here is a video about what occurred in Bhutan.




So the king decided the hand over the power to the people.  Nice and it obviously made them very happy. 

Now some of you may think that the people in Bhutan may not know what they are missing?  Well, who really cares.  Does any of the material crap that we have in our western style lives really make us happy?  I don't think so.  How does the new iPhone feel in your hand compared to say, a hug from a loved one and being told that you are loved?  How does paying the astronomical mortgage that new McMansion feel like compared to say, having the comfort of a modest home and minimal mortgage (or none at all) with enough land to grown your own food, make your own electricity, and have bugger all in the way of outgoing expenses? Do emotions such as greed, envy, and jealousy really even compare to giving, love and happiness?

Well, in my opinion, there is no comparison at all.  The old adage, 'Money can't buy you love' can be extended to 'Money can't buy you love and happiness' even though modern societal values and marketing practices are based upon consumption which is driven by money.  I am not saying the money is bad, some is necessary to survive, up to a point.  Once the lower levels of Maslow's hierarchy of needs are met which do cost some money, the rest of the levels like Love & Belonging, Esteem, Experience purpose and meaning, and self actualisation don't cost anything at all.  Notice that this is a hierarchy of needs, not wants!  Nowhere does it mention a flash car, house or job to make you happy.

Maslow's hierarchy of need

So where is this post leading?  Well, nowhere further really, just the realisation that even though I am in some pain at the moment, I am happy. Very happy indeed, and it took an epiphany and a change in lifestyle to achieve it.

Please, take the time to reflect on your own happiness, and let me know if you believe that happiness is your main driver in life?