Telling Your Story
It's highly likely that I am not the only person using 2020 Vision as a title for something this week—sermons, blog posts, news reports, business plans, and well, you see where I am going with this. The title isn't very original but has a lot of meaning on so many levels.
I haven't had 2020 vision, possibly because I started wearing glasses in fifth grade, and before that, my eyesight was probably not great, it's just that I didn't know it. I hated those glasses. I hated being teased about them. I hated everything about them. But suddenly, the writing on the blackboard in school was crisp. I could see individual leaves on trees and read road signs from a distance. As much as I hated those glasses, they were the tool that let me see the world more clearly.
It's too bad that 2020 vision doesn't apply to looking forward into life's circumstances; we would certainly plan differently if it did. We might think we've got it all together, but life doesn't tend to come at us as we think it should or how we planned it.
I am taking time between Christmas and Epiphany to do a couple of things—number one is to relax and enjoy the glowing lights and decorations and holiday because I just didn't seem to have time for that this year. I've got a couple of books to read and enjoy and am slowly working through them, one at a time. (Emphasis on slowly, because we are cleaning and emptying the basement and upstairs of Mom's house. I come home from that, get a quick meal together and done, sit down in my chair, read a couple of pages and am snoring in no time at all. I may be enjoying these books for a long, long time.)
Secondly, I am taking some time to plan out some serious things I need to accomplish. And just for accountability's sake, I will let you in on the two biggies—lose 50 pounds and tame the mess monster in this office and on my desk. (And I don't just mean tame it, I mean to mercilessly whip it into permanent submission.) There are other things like planning and prepping for work and writing related things and schedules, which are a lot more fun and interesting than exercise and eating salads. But all of it needs some attention in the next week.
I am also concentrating on letting go of things that are not in my control. For example, I can't control how amazing Reese's Peanut Butter Cups taste, but I can work (a LOT harder) at controlling whether to put it in my mouth or not.
We can't control the price of lamb in our markets, but we can control when we do lambing in order to hit the markets when lamb is traditionally high, and that is what Mr. Berens did for 2020. That timing piece alone could add up to 50 percent more income in those lamb checks.
You can't control the price of commodity products you raise like corn and soybeans. But you do control what crops you plant, and perhaps it's time to mix it up with an emerging crop like teff or hemp or popcorn or raspberries or whatever you can make work with your situation. Maybe you can direct market some livestock for a better return or share a large equipment investment with another farmer.
This is where you must put on your 2020 vision goggles. Research, question and research some more. Refine what you are considering into small, bite-sized pieces, step into the vision and give it a try. Something good just may come from it!
Here's to 2020 vision. May we all have it, along with a happy New Year.
Bev Berens is a freelance writer and FFA parent from Holland, Mich. She can be contacted at uphillfarm494@yahoo.com.