It’s the system. It’s not the food.

You would think that the basics of building a house and growing your own food would be a valuable skill learned in school. After all, it creates a level of self-sufficiency that would be useful anywhere in the world, used at any time.

Instead, agriculture has been slowly and systemically replaced over time with certain learning that serves no true value outside of the classroom.

It’s amazing to think that Foundational Black Americans (descendants of American enslaved Africans) possessed the most acute skills of agriculture but many urban, predominately Black communities are now labeled food deserts.

How?

I’m no farmer. But I know healthy soil, water, seeds, and sunlight grows vegetables and fruits straight from the Earth.

The skill that’s most vital to our survival is one that has escaped us, causing a perception issue of abundance.

I don’t know who went around and labeled certain communities food deserts, but there is much power in the tongue.

When we hear certain terms repeated, we come to adopt them into our vocabulary, and suddenly we are also labeling our communities as food deserts because a grocery store closed.

Grocery stores didn’t always exist, but markets have. And markets can be set up pretty much anywhere.

We’ve been convinced that there is lack where there is much abundance.

Many major cities own a lot of parcels that could be used to grow food for entire neighborhoods and towns.

Are cities really more concerned with making money from a sale of land than they are about their residents access to food?

What sense does it make to transport food thousands of miles from other states as opposed to cultivating a city farmer program, where you turn lots into troves of food?

Then you have a built in agriculture program where students could learn and practice the skills, in addition to learning the art of food.

Cooking.

Preserving.

These are our future farmers, chefs and bakers. Possibly even invent ways to grow crops not indigenous to our area. The possibilities are endless when we shift our thinking from lack to abundance.

We have plenty of land.

We have plenty of water.

We have plenty of seeds.

We have plenty of sunlight.

What many of us don’t have is time. And even that’s by design.

We need a full time job to keep a roof over our heads, and that leaves less time for growing, cultivating and appreciating what the Earth already gives us.

But the beauty of us all having a calling, is maybe YOU don’t need to grow the food, but maybe you support those who are called to.

Because their calling benefits the collective.

You’ll have access to all those fruits and vegetables growing from all the city lots. And for a lot cheaper than grocery stores.

I just paid $3.19 for a head of lettuce, and I’m telling you, I’m still hot about it.

There are real ways to address the illusion of food scarcity. We need those who are called to cultivate the land to step forward. We have the master farmers willing and eager to teach whomever wants to learn.

The future will belong to those willing to learn the old ways and carry them forward. The Earth has already provided the abundance.

Our task is to remember how to steward it.

The Mother Empire is a vision for a world rooted in order, balance, and harmony.

Observers discover.

Readers explore.

Citizens belong.

Apprentices transform.

Guardians steward.

If this work resonates with you, consider becoming a Reader (Free Subscriber) and receive new essays, ideas, and visions for building a world that makes sense.

Already a Reader? Consider becoming a Citizen (Paid Subscriber) of the Mother Empire.

Subscribe now