We are ALL so much MORE than what we Write

We are a work in progress. WIP as we say in the biz. We are not just one thing, like a writer or a cook or a cleaner or a mother. We are more. This is the resoundingly loud lesson I learnt in 2023.

We are more than our failures. However. Wait. I believe that our failures are what lead us to our successes. They are the pain that push us to win.

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We are so many people all in one. I learnt that this year. That it is OK to take offence to being labelled. Branded. Cornered. Sorted Out. Understood. Fuck That. You and me, my darling - we are eclectic. Multi faceted. Snow-flake-like. We are all the things - some of our skills and talents come naturally and some come with so much hard work and stumbling about. Lots of good honest work. Lots of face plants. You and I my friend, my reader, my darling, lovers of minds and hours and cookies, my beautiful people; We are all so much more than a year.

And it’s failures. Oh, Lordy, it’s challenging failures. I love a good failure.

Here we are in that lull before the New Year is rung in by the faithful (not me I will be long tucked into my bed). Time slows a little just before New Years. We are gifted a few days to think. It is a fine time of the year to look back and sideways and forwards and upside down. And examine this one year. A finite time fit to be tied. Today, I look back at this year and make a list of my gentle successes and my gorgeous failures. I bet you can write a great list too. You succeeded at much more than you realise.

Because we are all so many things.

Did you know I am a photographer too? You may have noticed all the images that come with TKG Take Ten. So, today I am going to show you some of my favourite images of 2023; trickled in amongst my words. I tried to narrow it down to twelve - all sequential as to the seasons all from 2023 but I stopped counting. It was too much fun!

This is a once a year post! We can do whatever we want right? Off topic. Off brand. Off to the side. Pictures for a change. You can see the seasons of the farm - as you scroll.

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When someone says - so, what do you do?

How do you answer that? Honestly I feel a fraud half the time.

But these are some of my most successful endeavours, the fraudulent ones, so I will own what I do.

🐞 - I take photos but nobody taught me how to take photographs so I am an artist with a phone? My old Nikons are gathering dust now.

🍊 - I write on my blog every morning except Sunday when I write a Letter to you here. Nobody taught me to write but I am a writer. I think I am a writer.

🐞 I grow my own food. I did not formally study to be called a gardener or a farmer but I garden and farm all year long. So I am a gardener and a farmer. I feed people.

🍊 I write about sustainability and stories of the old fashioned ways. Nobody taught me how share my sustainability message but I am a teacher using these stories as a vehicle. So am I a teacher?

You are many things too. I love that about you.

I have been doing all this stuff since I was a child. If we look back to what we loved when we were 9 or 12 or 18 or 45 or 50 years old. There will be a thread running right through the lot. I am merely knitting those threads into a tapestry.

How people perceive us simply cannot be all we are. We are more than what they see. Our hidden spaces. Our dark thoughts. Our silent prayers to unknown gods. Our yearnings. Our forgotton hidings. The hurts. The wild successes. The surprises and miss-steps. The smack in the head. The impulsive kiss. The lost children. The glorious successes of this year. And you my darling. All these are who we are too. And they are all seeds of success.

What have you silent
Been doing, my dear friend
Since you were a child 

Is it your great love now?

Another poem

Don't fight it too hard
Fail at it then fail some more
Success comes from falls

See? I am not a poet but I can write poetry. Badly! Instead of being so bloody minded about righting wrongs. And fixing our mistakes. Laugh a little poem into life.

Don’t forget those fails. But let’s count our blessings. Count our successes. Count them. Write them down. Write down all that stuff you did. That good stuff. Look at this list a while. You have had so much success.

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And a lot of our success is born from a fall.

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Today is a good day to LIST your Successes.

Then note the failure that bore that success.

Let me explain. I made a spreadsheet - that may sound excessive but one of my successes this year was in teaching myself how to use spreadsheets well.

There are four columns in my success spreadsheet.

📌 Column One - The Success in 2023

📌 Column Two - How to build on that success better in 2024

📌 Column Three - And Then What - what comes next

📌Column Four - The Failure that bounced this Success

Here are two examples:

Success Number One:

The Success: I built Letters to my Mother here on Substack with two specific strands: Letters from the Kitchens Garden Farm (storytelling) and TKG Take Ten (ambient video).

Build on it: I need to continue being consistent with posting, keep experimenting to maintain freshness and find new ways to let people know I am here.

And Then What: I am not yet sure what to write in Column Three. Where can we take this from here?

The Failure that got me Here: Was in trying to set up a website to sell workshops on sustainability. It cost me a lot in time and money but never really worked. The site was convoluted. I lost my flow. In the end I just hated setting myself up as an expert. I want to work with you to design your own sustainable lifestyle. I don’t want to lecture you on how to do it. I want to tell the stories. So I came to Substack and created The Letters.

And I love it and I love that you are here too.

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• The Success.

• Build on it.

• And Then What.

• The Failure that got me Here.

What do you think?

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We are more than just this one thing. We will be able to list a pile of successes. Dig up a ton of failures. All delicious. We must be allowed to turn corners, go off the rails, investigate the clanging in the corner, fall in love with the wrong people, take our selves into the storm. We have a dozen categories to succeed in. Of course I will fall on my face every now and then.

"To err is human, to forgive divine." so, Forgive Yourself.

Success Number Two:

The Success: I continue to live a life that mitigates the damage I do to the planet and share my methods.

Build on it: I write about this over at thekitchensgarden.com

And then What: The list is endless.

Organic Crops. 
Chemical free food. 
Pre-cycling. 
Grow some of your own food
Re-wilding.
Carbon co-pay. 
Repairing. 
Find your People
Restoring. 
Talking. The talk some more. 
No single use anything
Mentoring. 
Resisting plastic. 
Buying local. 
Carless days. 

The Failure that got me Here: I failed to thrive eating conventionally grown imported food and felt woefully guilty about the amount of trash we were personally leaving behind. I changed my lifestyle in 2011 and have been building on this ever since.

That will do for the moment.

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Pick your battles.

We literally cannot do everything. We cannot succeed in every category.

We are all so different. Have different opinions. Different loves. Play different games. Write different stuff. Succeed in different ways.

But remember this: no-one has the right to abuse you or shout at you or write bad shit that is designed to hurt you or your friends. Flick those people off your plate. Let them deal with their own failures. They are not invited to our success party. They are not our people, darling.

How is your list coming along?

Let’s just look at a few more farm images, while I think. I love a good think.

I am writing my 2023 Success List at the same time as talking to you.

I am not one of those single minded people. I am a multi tasker. (I trained myself to be like this - time and motion -it is one of my successes). At any minute I will be up from the desk through the door, down the corridor, throwing some more wood on the fire, putting the kettle on, tipping seed out the window into a bowl for Mr Flowers (the peacock who has way too many pictures taken of him). I will move on mid sentence. Sometimes without even making the decision to walk away from my writing. But I always come back to you. Another interesting thread in the tapestry.

I took this shot of Mr Flowers (below) yesterday at feeding time. Bringing this ballet of multi coloured threads through the seasons of the little sustainable farm to an end for today.

Now - back to my list. You too? What is on your agenda today?

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Often it is the struggle. The hard march. The mud. The lies. The disappointments. The blame. The horrible guilt. The bad choices. The glorious wrong turns. The wild shameless week you should forget but never will. These are the things that we can leverage. Bounce off. Use. Failure is a trampoline. To use for success. Bounce high, my heart, my love, my friend.

Our failures lead us to our successes.

They are the foundation.

Love them. Learn them.

I hope you found tons of fun in 2023.

Come on 2024. We are ready. Show us what you’ve got!! 🥊

So tell me. Honestly. Do you have a success from this year that you can share? In the comments? 90% of my success list is not for sharing so I do understand. But comment anyway. I love the comments.

Love ya

Celi

PS This is a reader supported publication so thank you so much for reading. 🦋 Hugs to my new Paid Subscribers; Your support is putting the sustainable in my Sustainable Sunday,🐷 feeding the rescue pigs and paying me a little for my writing time means I can keep making these vids and writing the letters for a LONG TIME!

🐞Huge Smiles for our NEW readers, I look forward to getting to know you.

The Letters are often a journey into the past, always entertaining, sometimes even educational! 🍊 Make sure to subscribe so a letter will wing it’s way onto your inbox every Sunday.

© Oh and by the way - these images have NO copyright attached. You can steal them. I really don’t mind. If you print them or publish them again just give me the credit (Cecilia at the Kitchens Garden) - I leave it to you and your conscience. Trusting people is so much more fun than suspicion and fear.

These are all taken with nothing but my iphone and my un-educated eye!! 😂

You could have taken them yourself if you were stood in my shoes.

PSS. Often I can record a voice-over for you but not today - the internet out here on the farm is RUBBISH today! A failure I will turn on it’s head, I am sure! 🙃