Resources Come From Right Relationships
In Episode 29 of The Intellectual Agrarian Podcast, we interviewed Noah Sanders from Rora Valley Farms, and author of Born Again Dirt. In the interview he shared what I now consider as one of my favorite saying:
“Resources come from right relationships.”
Not only is it a phrase that eloquently passes off the tongue, but it’s an insightful look at how the world truly works and a powerful mindset for those who apply it.
If you are familiar with the web of life, the soil web, or any visual network of the many interconnected relationships that create an ecosystem, you can readily see the application of the statement.
Whatever resource you use, it had to have come from a relationship in your life, a connection between you and another. The computer I use was purchased with money earned from a relationship between and employee and an employer, my ideas and conceptions are informed based on knowledge accumulated by the relationship of the writer and reader.
If there is a resource in your life, likely you can find a relationship from which it was inspired.
Food and it’s production, the ostensible topic of my Podcast, is a resource born of networks of relationships. The farmer cares for the soil, the plant, and the product, and the customer provides him with the economic means to continue his work. This doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of the soil itself, the numerous relationships between the nutrients and microbes ever present at work to produce the food we eat.
In his book, The Third Plate, Dan Barber puts it this way:
“The greatest lesson came with the realization that good food cannot be reduced to single ingredients. It requires a web of relationships to support it.”
But like the food grown, not all of the relationships are equal, and consequently neither are the resources developed from them. The farmer that doesn’t tend to his soil will find his crops continually worsening, the reader who reads bad authors will accumulate less knowledge, and an employer with a lazy employee is more likely to fire than promote.
This is why the phrase has the conditional “right” relationships. While you can still get resources from bad relationships, as is proof by the many sad people stuck in passive aggressive friendships and romantic entanglements, they have obviously poisoned the water hole along the way.
It’s said that a person is the sum of their five best friends, if that’s true, consider your closest friends. What’s your value add up to?
Being picky about who’s in your life isn’t snobbish, it’s high value. If you maintain a standard for your behavior, the behavior of those who you accept as friends you will find the total value of the group increased. The impact of these relationships cannot be emphasized enough.
The relationship of a parent and child has very obvious impacts on how you think, feel, and behave. It can set an initial standard for how you interpret the world, but it’s the friends you surround yourself with that guide it as you age and progress.
But this isn’t merely a matter of taking from those around you, extracting resources like an adult child. We have all met someone who fits into this category, who lives to be served and is disgruntled when anyone denies them what they want. They are like many forms of industrialized agriculture draining the resources of those around them until there’s nothing left to be taken.
If you wish to have sustainable, if not regenerative relationships it all starts with how much of yourself you are willing to give, to share what you have grown, learned, or built with those around you. “Pay it forward” is a phrase many of us have heard that describes the principle, giving something away, paying for the coffee of the person behind you in line, or something similar.
As an example, the guests who come on this show are literally giving away their time. They are willing to share from the knowledge and experience they have with the listener. True, sometimes they may have something to promote, but they come on the show knowing not to expect anything.
It’s a way they have chosen to give back, to share what they’ve learned with the broader audience.
In our personal relationships this can take many forms. It could be something as simple as paying for your friends coffee, picking up the check for the table, or sending a thank you card after getting a gift. Depending on your profession this could involve slightly more complicated giving, if you’re mechanical you probably have a friend who is woefully not. Speaking as a mechanically disadvantaged person when my friends are willing to share their time to help me with a car problem I appreciate it. Shout out to Stuart for all the help over the years.
There’s always something we can offer, each person has a gift or talent to bring to the table. There are two options in using it, share it or hoard it. If you hoard away your talent, become miserly with your skill and abilities the circle of friends and relationships you have will slowly shrink, until eventually, you’re all alone.
Contrast that with sharing your blessings, generously using your talent to help others. They may not have a lot, but if they are willing to share it with others they will be blessed in turn. The Scripture says to “cast your bread upon the waters.”
Some may feel as if they have nothing to share, nothing to bring to the table. Lacking in talents of any kind, how can they hope to share something with their network? The answer is two parts:
First, be aware that as long as you can listen, you can give. The number one thing that most people in this world are looking for is a sympathetic listener. If you can halt your thoughts and motives for even a quarter hour to take the time to share in another’s thoughts or feelings, you’ll have earned yourself a friend for life.
Second — We should always be endeavoring to build out our skill sets. You may not be capable at much now, but that doesn’t mean you have to stay that way. Look at the needs of people in your life and develop skills that compensate for them.
So let’s do a quick review, how can you apply “resources come from right relationships”?
- Remember that your resources come from the people around you
- Develop the right relationships that improve your resources
- Give back to that network of relationships, extend your resources to help those around you.
It’s a simple idea, but like so many simple ideas it has a powerful practice when implemented into daily life.
This originally appeared at The Intellectual Agrarian on 7/25/18 as “T. Time 07 — Resource Relationships”
