Opinions are the cheapest commodities on earth. Everyone has a load of opinions ready to be wished upon anyone who will accept them. If you are influenced by “opinions” when you reach DECISIONS, you will not succeed in any undertaking, much less in that of changing YOUR OWN DESIRE into healthy farming. Adapted from Napoleon Hill
We continually receive calls by farmers who have ‘hit the wall’ with their current farming practices. When we ask them what they are doing on their farm, we soon start to see how we could help them. They tell us of soil compaction, weeds and fair animal health that are evident on their farm and that they would like to see these problems disappear. However it soon becomes evident that they are unable to connect that what they are doing on the farm is directly related to these problems. When we say that we know that we can help them with their problems, they become quite excited. Sometimes they listen but other times they will simply not believe us. They talk of ‘someone’ they know who tried XYZ and it didn’t work or perhaps they have even used XYZ themselves and they saw no difference. They are often thinking in terms of ‘fixing a problem’ rather than getting to the cause of it. Unless a farmer at this stage is either desperate enough or open enough to listen, then it will depend on who they talk to next who will influence them.
These are the words that a wise man once told us when we sought advice on making a major decision.
“Don’t ask anyone what they think you should do, all they are going to give you is their old conditioning. You know in your heart what’s right for you. Make the decision and do it.”
Sadly, in our society we are not trained to make effective decisions or even to think. That’s why, when confronted with a decision, most people turn to the people around them and ask, “I don’t know, what do you think?” We have probably all heard the saying:
“I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody”.
You’ve got to live your life. It’s your life, it’s not ‘their’ life. If you continue to live ‘their’ life you’re nothing but someone else’s bunch of opinions and you’ll end up getting the same results as they do. It can be difficult in a small community sometimes to ‘do your own thing’ and be different. But if you look far enough outside of your community, you will find others with whom you can be in tune. Farming Secrets network also provides like minded farmers to work with.