How to stay Motivated when Homesteading Sucks (Extreme Cold) VLOG

Nothing good comes in the world from being happy and cozy. Alex Holland. We've got ice and I think some poop in this. Trough heater can't keep— quite keep up with it all the way up here. It's so cold. This one doesn't even have a trough heater. It's too far from home. So cold. The cows haven't even come down here and stepped over this and free themselves because they don't move far from their hay. They don't move much when it's cold. They just kind of hunker down and grin and bear it. Straighten these up, Gideon. Let's go check, make sure that baby lamb from yesterday stayed in and survived. Oh no, I'm so glad I came out here. That Alex Honnold quote, it's been on my mind very first thing in the morning each day. If you don't know, Alex Honnold is the guy who free soloed El Capitan. Austin, show them our footage of El Capitan. We've been there. Climbing that is a feat, let alone with no ropes. Just recently, Alex climbed Taipei 101, which is one of the tallest skyscrapers in the world. They did it live on Netflix. We wanted to watch that, but before we did, we watched his movie Free Solo, which is the documentary of him climbing El Capitan. He said nothing good in the world comes from being happy and cozy, and this was 9 years ago. He said that sort of theme has been on my mind lately. I've been homesteading for 20 years, and if I'm being honest, happiness isn't there. I'm not happy. I'm learning that's not necessarily a bad thing. We'll double-check the pigs' water, but I'm pretty sure would have been more frozen than that if this trough heater was working. Sorry, it would have been frozen more than that if the trough heater wasn't working. Now let's get this shot. Walking along, checking the wires. Okay, but it's— I'm learning we're after the wrong things if we're after happiness, because you're gonna arrive, you're gonna be happy for a fleeting moment, and then it's going to be gone and you're back on the treadmill. Nothing good comes from being happy and cozy. Goodness is, is what we're after. Now I'm not saying we should all go free solo. I would actually not recommend that whatsoever. Here's what I'm saying. Do you think I want to be out here? It feels like 3 degrees. My left hand is completely red and starting to go numb. This morning when I woke up, I don't want to get out of bed. It's cozy, but I get out of the bed. And not only do I get out of the bed, I go train first thing in the morning in the dark. Here's a replay. Of course it was dark when I did it though. Check on the newest one. There was somebody born yesterday and they fell out. There it is. It did just fine. Nobody's shivering. Our patch job worked. Nobody fell through. We'll show each one. I'll have you bring it up and show it to the camera. You want to do that? You guys want to do that? I want to see each— I didn't know you named them all. Another The bad thing about happiness is it's a selfish pursuit. Only you can enjoy it. Contrary to good, or compared to good, good is likely something— if you're doing something good, somebody else is probably benefiting from it as well.

This is Coconut.

Nice.

This is Dookie's twin brother.

Maybe to play or relax while the spouse is cooking dinner and handling the kids. The good thing to do would leave your happiness behind and help with that, right? Serve, be useful, and then you find a contentment because you're fulfilling your purpose and service and you're benefiting somebody else. This is one of the best things about the farm. Who's this?

This is Flurry.

Look at Flurry. Hold her up a little more and look at these— look at these legs.

She's a very—

dotted legs. So cool. Great thing about the farm is You have to get up whether you want to or not. Oh, look at this patch.

This is Coco. It's so—

you guys see that brown patch?

He's— don't hold him like that. He's Coco.

And look at the coconuts on the ears, I guess. Little tiny coconuts. The best thing for us and our health is to keep moving whether we want to or not. For our spiritual, emotional health, this is useful.

Beans.

Why do we call him Beans?

Because it's a funny name. He's cute. His name is, um, S'mores.

I see.

Because he's a little bit of brown on his neck and he's white like a marshmallow.

I see. Their water's thawed. All right, we come check food, water, shelter, security on the animals whether we feel like it or not. Huh, it might be working. It might be working. So this means when it gets really hard hard, we need to lean into the good of why we're doing this. Doing this is good for your, yourself. Hopefully none of these are cracked. I'm gonna do with all these eggs the way we do it too, regeneratively. It's good for the land. That's good for the heart and soul right there. I'm here to tell you, don't worry if the The glamour has gone away. The happiness has gone away. Just check and assure and dig deeper into a deeper why as to why this is good. You need to know why this is good. Pursue goodness, not happiness. Austin, play that again, subtitles and all, clapping or something after it. Let's emphasize that point. Pursue goodness, not happiness. Training back? Yes. Does it make you happy?

No, it doesn't.

Is it good? It's good. You're supposed to say no. What?

Why am I supposed to say no?

It's not necessarily the pursuit of happiness, it's the pursuit of goodness. Well, it gives me what I want.

It's my goals.

Yeah, so it makes me happy. I like it. Okay. All right, y'all know during a workout it's not all kicks and giggles, is it? But we're willing to do hard things, good things for the results. You boys ready? No. Okay, next good thing, we are going cold plunging. I'm not talking about this good thing. Hang on one second. I think so. How do you do that and do that so fast? I'll show you the most important good a man can do, and that's serve those ladies. And then I'll get to this crazy cold plunge we're gonna do. It's 19 degrees. We're going to Pisgah Forest. We're going to Pothole Creek, Looking Glass Falls, and Sliding Rock. It's how you beat the crowds. Here you go, lady. You ready for a viral video? Yep. You think it'll go viral? It better. I mean, these are pretty epic spots. New mom's going sledding with the little ones. It works better with yellow and red socks. I don't have a matching shirt. Shut that door! Spencer, you don't want to go with him?

No, he's staying with me. We're gonna sit by the fire.

That's gonna make Mom's day. That's gonna make her day.

Oh, he's looking at Josiah smiling.

You're gonna say, I didn't know he was sitting up, and I'll say he isn't. Bye-bye. Say goodbye to your mother. Bye-bye. I love you. Bye-bye. Thanks for helping at home when I'm gone. Austin's going with— he's seeking discomfort. We might lose Austin. Where's he at? Where's that voice coming from? You got camouflage swimsuit? No, we should. Are you gonna do this, uh, in your birthday suit? Yeah, if you want to really be uncomfortable. Come on now, you're good at staying by the fire and holding the baby.

That's right. So everybody else can go freeze their—

Yeah, thanks. Thanks for taking the hit.

I'm enjoying not freezing my butt off.

Okay, good. We're on our way to the first cold plunge. You know, the question then becomes when you're doing something good and it's hard, when do you quit? And which good do you do and how do you know when that's when pain is telling you to stop and when you're just to push through it for the sake of goodness. And which goodness to do? There are a lot of questions. I certainly don't have the answers. One thing I think about often though is the Salvation Army's motto. What is it? Or slogan? Doing the most good. Good reasons for quitting Homestead are not because I would just rather binge watch something or do this other more comfortable things. And I'm a big fan of people quitting if they must. I mean, homesteading should serve us. We should not serve homesteading. There's a difference. It should serve our bigger core, our bigger purpose, our bigger meaning. But we should make sure we're dropping something because we're going to do something else that is the most good and not necessarily the most comfortable. Now Adam, you've never cold plunged before. Never. Nothing like going to the top for your first cold plunge. It's about as extreme as it gets, huh? Or to the icy bottom.

We'll see how it goes.

Never cold plunged before? No. This is like Sam and John. Your son's never mountain biked before, did the 100 miles with us. This one was maybe a quarter of a mile in, so the trick is going to be warming up right after. What's the goodness in this? Well, there's beneficial aspects of cold plunging. We're having an adventure with my boys, being sporadic, and helping make them a film. Where's your other pothole? This one right up there. Oh, you're way to your shoulders! How you feel after that first one, boys? You got the other two in you? Yeah, we got it. I filmed that one. Somebody had to film it. This next one, I don't think I have a choice. Huge waterfall, Looking Glass Falls. Y'all ready? Down, boy. Spot number 2, Looking Glass Falls. Huh? Sure, come on out. I'm trying to— this was my house. Oh no, he's not going to do it. I wasn't going to. Adam's up for it. You guys aren't going to do it. All right, I'll do it. Adam's just in shorts anyway. It's about getting over there. All right, come on, Jonah! I wish I'd brought something to wear on my feet, like an old pair of tennis shoes. Because it's really the feet that are too much. Cannot feel my feet, my fingers. That was tough. The treacherous rocks over to it, being in the cold. My feet are numb right now. Hey, we're back! Oh my God! You're so cold. I'm so cold. Your gloves are so cold. I only did one plunge. It was too much. No. It was a lot more intense than we thought. That's what they said. Yeah, so y'all are really struggling.

Hey, we're relaxing.

I'm happy. I'm happy for you. I just want to go get in the sauna myself, but we got to make sure these guys got water. Oh shoot, I hope we didn't ruin our trough heater. Shoot. It's been unplugged. It's been plugged in and there's no water in there. You think that water line to the sheep is free? It should be. Did it work? Why is water not coming out of this anymore? Our lines were frozen, but we have one hose for this purpose, just to keep it empty so it doesn't freeze. And then we just— we have to manually fill it up, but it's not buckets. How are they doing out in the field? They're good. They got 3/4 of a trough. Are you sure? Yes, it's full. I want to get in that sauna. But I really feel like I should help Lily with supper tonight. Burgers, you got to do the patties just so, uh, I can play interference with some of the other kids. Those look perfect. I have a buddy who asked for some advice. He's doing a 5-day fast. I gave him some advice and then I said I'll join you. I'm at 48 hours. Tell them what's hap— tell us what's happening at 48 hours, Rebecca.

36 to 72 hours.

Just tell us the autophagy part.

You're in peak autophagy zone. Cellular cleanup is at maximum efficiency with significant regeneration occurring.

It's just fun. It's part of the experience. Well, I finally made it to the sauna. Interesting though how something like the sauna, which is also Well, so good for you and can be stressful. I mean, it's hot. It is 200 degrees in here. This is, this is how I relax. Well, nothing good comes from being happy and cozy. I'll take it. See you tomorrow. Happy day.