The Lost Art of Sharing

Spring is finally starting to manifest itself here in the Midwest as well as the snow melts away in the 40 degree weather and rain has been coming down washing a lot of the salt off the roads.  I absolutely love spring as there is a general feeling of renewing everywhere.  One of the things I have been thinking a lot about is the lost art of sharing.  As children are growing up, we encourage them to "share their toys" as it's the nice/right thing to do.  If little Jimmy hogs a toy (even his own) when a friend wants to use it, they are discouraged from their poor behavior and often an adult will step in to facilitate the sharing.  The irony for me is that adults rarely share!  We have lost a lot due to the fact that we have become an individualistic and selfish nation.  Once upon a time, an entire community would come together to build each other up.  They would hold a "barn raising" where everyone would bring their own tools and sacrifice their own labor, often for days at a time, to help a neighbor out (building things such as barns, houses, etc).  In turn, often the favor was reciprocated.  I was primarily raised in an apartment and held this fantasy of community and sharing in house dwelling.  When we finally did buy our own house I was shocked to find that people were so cold and closed to outsiders.  I held a "housewarming" party to try and meet my neighbors, so I could be actively involved in my community and only ONE person showed up!  Now I realize there may still be communities like I referenced above, but I think they are fading fast. If your lawn mower broke down, how likely would you be to petition a neighbor to borrow theirs?  Perhaps chipping in for gas and maintenance, and possibly even taking turns doing each others lawns?  Instead, people just take a trip to Sears or other store and buy a new one.  Similarly, every winter I see those that are out breaking their backs shoveling snow by hand where there are one or two freshly snowplowed driveways only steps away.  Now it is one thing to simply talk about things such as this and a completely other thing to DO something about it.  So, I decided that I would go through things that I owned and never used (such as muffin pans, tablecloths, etc) and posted a general "free" ad on my facebook wall.  I figured not only would I be decluttering my house, but there may be friends that were in need of the very items I was seeking to dispose of.  Low and behold, ALL of the items I listed people snatched up!  The awesome part of this is that often this lends to a snowballing effect - sort of a "pay-it-forward."  When those friends go through their closets to declutter, they will possibly think of doing something similar.  Plus, when I give these items away, it forces me to get together with people I may not have seen in awhile and helps keep communication between friends open and alive.  In the same way I think we need to be more open about asking for things when needed.  Pride is often what keeps us from doing this...when it is more of a blessing to give than to receive!  Often the other person is more than happy to share what is theirs, and are unaware of your need because you don't ask.  A great case in point is that I was able to borrow an infant attachment to my double stroller from a good friend that no longer needed hers.  This was a great blessing to me, as a new one would have cost $40.  The key is that the more we share, the less we buy - which saves us money, time (you have to work to make money!), and the environment is less impacted as less products will need to be produced to fulfill the needs of the community.

Also, a quick update: We did get the slow flow shower head I had previously mentioned installed this weekend.  It was actually this model: http://www.waterpikecoflow.com/VBE-453/ it came equipped with the option for navy showers, which I was quite impressed with!  It basically had a button to push that would lower the flow to conserve water while lathering.  Although I didn't use this feature, I liked that you could hardly tell it was slower flowing than the previous model.  The only downfall is it was somewhat cheaply made and after just four showers in our household, it was already in need of re tightening as it was leaking and spraying everywhere!  I suppose if I were to buy it myself (as this was a gift) I'd definitely recommend getting a model that was better built, as you tend to get what you pay for.  =)

CSAs

Today I researched CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture).  One of my friends had recently signed up for the first time and was raving about how it was a great alternative to getting fresh veggies if you do not have a green thumb.  That definitely sounded like me as the only thing I've ever successfully grown is tomatoes and green beans.  So, I researched on http://www.localharvest.org/csa/ to figure out if a CSA would be right for me. Living in the Twin Cities I have access to many different CSAs so dug through about twenty websites.  Some were strictly vegetables, some had fruits, some sold meat (grain fed cows, chickens, turkeys, and even lamb) and one had desserts and breads.  The price for a typical share of a CSA was about $40 per week (about $500 total for 12 weeks) and included a grocery bag full of food.  You could also purchase half a share, and those were about $25 per week (about $300 total).  There was a great variety and most were organic farms.  Some even allowed you to work on the farm in exchange for the weeks food.  Although I thought CSAs were a fabulous idea, I decided to pass.  The reason being is that you are not able to pick what you get (there is a huge variety), and although it would be nice to try some new things that we may not know we like, I did not want to waste food if we did not like it.  Instead I think I'm going to try and commit to going to the farmers market at least biweekly in the spring/summer/fall months to buy fruits and vegetables from these same farmers.  If my family continues to expand (we currently are a family of four), I may look at a CSA in the future as there is typically less waste in larger families.

A follow up on my facebook adventures, I've logged in considerably less time as I don't feel pressured to "buy, buy, buy" anymore!  It's quite liberating!  However, every time I've logged in I see some shops posting to my wall.  I had so many that apparently some were hidden from view yesterday...so the temptation continues, but it's less strong than before and I've continued to hide and unlike those that pop up.

Overall, I've found greater freedom just by day two - more time with my family, more time in the Bible, less time on facebook, and more financial freedom as well.  It's a good day!

A New Beginning

Take a deep breath!  Life is about to get a whole lot different...  After deciding I truly wanted to make a change in my life, I realized I would need to start doing something more radical to change things.  First on the list involved Facebook.  I routinely checked facebook about 20 times per day, trying to see the latest deals as well as follow up on how my friends were doing.  Without realizing it, I was constantly bombarding myself with ads and "buy me" links.  First on the agenda today - hiding or "unliking" pages that encouraged my spending habits.  I unliked those pages I knew I had subscribed to simply to find deals on things to spend money.  I "hid" items that I truly liked (such as Oreo cookies), but that I no longer wanted solicitation from.  The irony is that I hid everything in view, backed out of it and when I went back in a few more popped up.  This just shows me once again how deeply entrenched I was.  Praise God that I feel I'm finally getting some breathing room!