In 2017, I was living an easy life—not better, just easy.
I was living in a big house in one of the wealthiest counties in America. My wife and I drove luxury vehicles. I owned two vacation homes, and toured in rockstar tour buses. I had everything I’d ever wanted, and yet I realized it wasn’t what I needed. I would trade it all for a simpler life with my family. So, I did.
I quit my career, sold everything and moved my family into an RV, which we parked on 93 abandoned acres in Columbia, TN.
I honestly didn’t know what was next. I didn’t have a great plan. I just knew I couldn’t keep doing what I was doing—running, hustling, stressing, serving an industry that would eventually spit me out when it had taken all I had to give—while my family was at home creating forever memories every day without me.
I didn’t plan on becoming a farmer or learning to raise our own food, but that's exactly what we did. I had no experience with farm machinery, aside from a few times using a tractor when I was 12, working for a tobacco farmer in NC. I had no experience clearing land, developing property, or building barns and homes, but I spent every day for five years learning how to do just that.
I’ve learned a lot, but the purpose of this writing is not to focus on those details. I want to highlight a valuable lesson I learned as a byproduct of all this effort:
We are all spoiled.
Me included. No matter how difficult your day may seem, can you imagine telling your great-great-grandparents, just two or three generations ago, how hard your life is? They would be so envious of your “difficulties.”
I cleared about 20 acres of our property. It was hard work, using machines and chainsaws. In the beginning, I felt discouraged, overwhelmed by the relentless work. But one day, it hit me—my ancestors had to do all of this with just an axe.
From transporting livestock to caring for sick animals, we live in the easiest time in world history. Not better—easy. Our ancestors would have herded animals on foot or horse. I load them in a trailer and ride in the comfort of my diesel truck. We can search the world wide web for expertise, whether it’s natural remedies or best practices for caring for livestock, when not long ago a disease with a simple remedy could wipe out a person's entire livlihood. We have access to the best building materials and resources to provide a safe, dry, warm home. They can be delivered to our properties on flatbed truck while the gravestones have barely weathered at the feet of men and women who had to fell the trees, chop them, mill them, and build it with homemade tools. We are so blessed.
We have utilities like reliable power and clean water. We have central heating and cooling, which we can control with an app on our smartphones. Our vehicles are reliable and efficient, taking us to grocery stores where any craving can be satisfied, in or out of season. We have affordable clothing—not just to keep us clothed, but to keep us “in style”—all of which can be ordered online and delivered to our door in just a few days.
My grandparents had none of these things. They had horse and buggy transportation, never owned a car. They ate what they could hunt or harvest. One wood stove to heat the house and cook on. A barrel on stilts for a homemade outdoor shower. My grandmother had to make clothes for herself and her 17 children. My dad says he wore hand-me-down shoes and put cardboard in the bottoms to cover the holes. Not just because money was tight, but because access to basic necessities wasn’t as easy to come by. I pull boots off of my feet at the end of a long day that were specifically made for the task I use them for, and I put on a different pair for an evening out. God forgive me for the times I don't say THANK YOU for my boots.
I’m a creative, and I know that makes me a bit “weird.”
I ponder, analyze, and grapple with life in ways most people don’t. I get that not everyone sees meaning in the mundane. I recently described an egg as a miracle.
Before I moved to a farm an egg was just an egg.
An egg —a convenient, inexpensive protein that I threw in the cart with whatever variety of milk and bread I preferred that week. But that all changed when I decided to “grow” my own egg.
How to grow an egg.
Did you know you can go online and order chicks? Your post office will call you, and you just go pick up a box of day-old chicks. The chicks are the cheapest part of the endeavor. You also need to buy a brooder. We made ours out of scrap lumber left over from building the chicken coop—just one of the many expenses in our goal of producing our own breakfast.
Before the chick can be placed in the brooder, you need bedding, a waterer, and a feeder. You can’t use just any dish for water; the chick might drown. And you’ll regret using any dish for food when your chicks get in it and ruin it. It’s better to get something designed for them, so they can put their heads in, not their butts.
You’ll also need a heat lamp. On day one, you aim for a brooder temperature of 95°F. Over the next six weeks, you gradually decrease the temperature by 5°F each week, until they’re fully feathered and ready to go outside. That’s right—every day, for 6 weeks, more than once, you’ll be cleaning out the brooder, replacing water and food, and monitoring the temperature.
Chicks are fragile. They can die from accidental crushing, disease, dehydration, or something called “pasty butt.” It's a real thing. Google it. A farm breakfast isn’t for the weak.
But when your dreams come to full feathered fruition, and your chicks are ready for their new home, it’s a glorious day. The coop you built for them now houses your future breakfast buffet.
However, don’t get too excited—the eggs still aren’t coming right away. Breed, diet, and conditions all play a role, but most laying hens take 4.5 to 6 months to lay their first egg.
The day our first hen laid an egg—it was a big day.
We’d all put in our time—cleaning the brooder, replacing waters and feeders, even holding a lifeless chick and feeling that familiar newbie guilt: “Was it something we did?” We had invested more time and money in this project than we imagined possible. We were ready for breakfast.
Why doesn’t every high school diploma come with a note saying, “It takes six months for a hen to lay its first egg”?
When that egg finally arrived, we celebrated. We rejoiced. We ate it together—me, my wife, and our two kids. It was a miracle.
I could tell you similar stories about the chickens or turkeys we’ve raised for meat, or the first pork chop I put on the table.
When I placed that pork chop in front of my family, I proudly announced, “Only the hands of your heavenly Father and your earthly father have touched this meal.” God created that pig the day it was born. For 18 months, I fed, watered, and cared for it. I moved it to fresh ground for its sake and for the health of our land. I nursed it through bad days and chased it down when it escaped. When it was time for it to fulfill its purpose, I knelt with it. I carefully processed it so that none of it's sacrifice or mine would go to waste.
And when I sat out to prepare that meal, I did so with reverence. I made sure to give the meal my full attention, fearing I might ruin, in minutes, what had taken nearly two years to bring about. I placed the plates in front of my family and said, “Thank you, Lord, for providing this meal for us.” That prayer carried a gratitude it had never known before.
A pork chop is just a pork chop until you know where it came from and what it took to get it to the table. A store-bought pork chop feels distant, impersonal. But the one on my table? It was touched only by God and me. It never spent a day out of my sight.
Our ancestors knew this. We aren't many years removed from the funerals of those who knew the hard work that went into the basics—like eggs and pork chops—that we now take for granted. They’d envy us. But I envy them.
Let me be clear: I don’t envy the hardship. If I did, I’d sell all of my conveniences, cut off my power and water, and go back to candles and buckets. I’m not doing that. What I envy is the appreciation they must’ve had for conveniences we now take for granted.
I didn’t move my family out here because I thought we needed this lesson.
I didn’t realize we needed the lesson. You just don’t know what you don’t know. But now that I know it, I can’t unknow it.
We are ALL so blessed.
Modern grocery stores are a garden of Eden. Modern restaurants are amazing. Most of us can close our eyes, imagine any food, get on an app, and have it delivered to our door. It’s unbelievable what we have access to.
I’m not against convenience. I don’t raise all my own food, and I don’t feel convicted to do so. I buy food from the grocery store 20 miles away and eat at restaurants. There are plenty of options within a 15 to 30-mile radius that can meet any craving my family or I have.
I'm not against convenience. Convenience is not the enemy. Entitlement is.
All of these modern conveniences—juxtaposed to the effort it took for our great-grandparents to make breakfast—don’t seem to make us grateful. It seems to make us more entitled. We aren’t grateful for the blessings of the modern grocery store, restaurant, or food app. We’re frustrated when the checkout line is too long, when our favorite brand is sold out, when the restaurant undercooks our steak, or when traffic makes our 20-minute commute take 30. If the supply chain settles and prices go down, will we be content, or will we find something else we feel entitled to?
The first egg we got on our farm cost several hundred dollars and required six months of daily effort from my family. I’m grateful for that egg. It’s a miracle. But what I’m even more grateful for is the reminder:
Convenience is not the enemy, entitlement is.
Be grateful.
Grateful is the better way—not easier, but better.