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That’s right; I am now a resident of Norway!
Telemark is my home county. I moved here from
the UK last year (mid 2015). Wow what an
adventure!
As much as I love Britain and its nature, over
the past years I began to feel like a wild bear
in a cage; particularly with there being no
right to roam in England or Wales. What’s more,
for a long time my dream has been to work
towards being as self-sufficient as possible.
Realistically, I didn’t feel that this could be
achieved in the UK, at least not without lots of
hassle. And so, for my personal freedom and
sanity, moving to another country was the
logical option in my mind.
Apart from the epic landscape and freedom,
Norway is home to one of my best friends: Torjus
Gaaren of
livingprimitively.com . He is a true expert
in wilderness living skills. I saw what kind of
life he has, and thought, “I want that too!”.
Torjus has taught me an incredible amount of
skills, which are needed for living off this
land. For that I am very thankful. By combining
these things with my existing skills, I have
already made huge steps on my path towards
self-sufficiency.
I could go on for hours about all the things I
have done and made in the last year. However I
would rather sum things up with the lessons and
realisations which have been most profound to
me; many of which are actually psychological:
Some realisations & lessons from
my time in Norway so far:
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Community and friends are everything!
This is the case in so many aspects, and is
not to be underestimated.
-
Share what you have without worry that you
won’t receive back in some way. Giving is
receiving as they say…
-
As expected, self-sufficiency is not an
easy life, but it is a fulfilling life.
I have felt many times that no matter how
worn-out or uncomfortable I am (e.g. cold
and wet), deep down I am still happy and
feel that I wouldn’t rather be doing
anything else. There is actually a lot of
happiness to be found in hardship…
-
In the beginning, if you are not used to
this life, there will most likely be
times which are very psychologically
challenging. Any weakness in your mind will
be trying to convince you to give up and
return to the comfortable life… The trick
is to push past this. It can sometimes
take days, but one day you’ll most likely
wake up and feel optimistic again. You will
be stronger for going through these mental
tests and your thresholds will be pushed to
higher levels.
-
Hardship makes you stronger.
-
You don’t have a God-given right to anything.
You have to make your reality...
-
Determination will get you to where you want
to be.
-
In
life I have learnt to Instinctively try to
follow my 'path'. In terms of direction and
lessons, I have learnt to trust in the
universe to bring to me what I need. My
experience in Norway has confirmed this.
-
Living this way of life which is so in touch
with nature makes you realise how far we
have come from what is natural for us
physically, mentally and spiritually.
All people used to live off the land a
relatively short time ago; our modern way of
life is a mere scratch at the end of a
time-line of human existence.
-
It is easy to underestimate how much food
you need to hunt, gather and grow.
-
Animal parts which most modern people refuse
to eat are actually the best parts, both in
terms of flavour and nourishment.
I am talking about things like: liver,
kidneys, spleen, brain, tongue, nose,
hooves, bones and very fatty meat. People
are seriously missing out! In fact, if you
are a hunter-gatherer and you don’t eat
these things, you will probably die before
long.
-
In order to overcome fears, you have to
face them; for example, believe it or
not, I used to be quite squeamish about the
idea of gutting and butchering animals. But
since just getting stuck-in, I now really
enjoy the task! To overcome a fear is
incredibly rewarding!
-
You cannot live off protein and greens
alone, you need plenty of fat or
carbohydrates too (I choose mostly fat),
otherwise you’ll become ill from protein
poisoning. For example, if you catch a ton
of fish, if they don’t have a good amount of
fat content, then you can’t survive off that
alone.
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