True Freedom

True Freedom

On the Homesteads we will practice Forest Permaculture where the forest remains relatively undisturbed and the timber is all to be left in place for the most part and the other potential forest products that can be used to make rainforest teas and handcrafted arts and other useful items are to be collected in a sustainable manner and then they may be used for trading with others.

This will provide an income for those who do the work of collecting the rainforest products and in these ways we will always have more than enough and some to share.

These products could include herbs, essential oils, specialty woods, nuts, fruits and other natural products that may produce more real income than we even need along with many things we may grow and produce for our own use without doing any real harm to the forest.

Sustainable harvesting of existing natural forest products makes rainforest conservation not only feasible but it is completely sustainable because the forest actually is worth much more intact than it would be all cut down as has been tried elsewhere and we will then become a living demonstration of Eco-Logical living. That is why most of the 49 acre Homesteads will be left looking just as they are, as if they had been completely untouched. The only part that we will be allowed to change is the bottom 5 acre Homesites on each Homestead, meaning those 5 acres which are closest to the old mountain road, will be deemed to be the Homesites. That is where the homes will be built, right in the middle if possible, and that will entail some cutting down of at least some of the Trees, not only to make room for the homes, but in order to provide some of the materials used in building the homes, like poles for the roof, and to make room for the sustainable gardens that will feed us all. Tropical Fruit Trees, and Nut Trees, will need some room to grow as well, and that is the area where all of that will be done, so that the people can live off the land, without having to venture too far into the wilderness, since everything we need will be just outside our doors.

Building with indigenous materials will make it easy to get started and it is only sustainability that will put true freedom within our reach and keep it there forever.

The community that takes care of its own land based resources and its own people needs to be focused on now because the whole world is searching for some answers and we are going to be the ones who have them.

Eco-Logical Footprints

Eco-Logical learning opportunities for the children could be created with sharing and exchange to help integrate the learning experience.

We will probably want to have a Global Media Center with library and high speed wireless satellite internet connectivity that will help us to coordinate our efforts and to make new friends from around the world.

Shared use and shared responsibilities are what will make it so easily more than just possible for us to thrive off of the exchange of nutrients and natural resources while keeping a close watch on our Eco-Logical Footprints. We do affect everything we touch only here that will become a good thing.

We are giving ourselves back to the land and back to the Earth and everything we are creating is to be left for the next generation of courageous visionaries who will be trained to take over full responsibility for this exquisitely beautiful part of the Earth that has everything we could ever ask for and more.

This is an opportunity to begin to walk the talk and to begin to learn how to work and live in the spirit of cooperative living. We will support all kinds of participatory decision making for those who can accept all the changes and who will take responsibility for themselves. Because sustainability begins in the home.

All decisions will be made by the Stewards Council which will be made up out of an equal number of people from each homestead and this could work by a three quarters Consensus Democratic process that no one person can block so that our progress can not be held up by one person.

Rainforest Integration

We can see that there is a natural place right in the heart of the chosen watershed that could be seen as being the prime natural habitat for the Howler Monkeys who have an amazing ability to live alongside human settlements as long as their needs are respected and they are given some protection from predators both human and otherwise.

Without our help the Howlers are susceptible to being hunted down to the point of extinction because they cannot be expected to just head for the higher ground like so many others have done just to avoid human contact altogether.

Once the low lands have been destroyed by logging and after all the forests have been cleared for farming there will be no place left for the Howlers to go unless we create a new vision of an abundant future for them right here in our own very midst because their chosen habitat does need to be protected where it actually is right now.

We will be expected to lead by example and to serve the people in the local native communities and to help in this way a lot of other fine folks from around the world who may want to learn from us what we are doing and to experience this community first hand so they can go back out into the world and start their own communities along the same lines.

Each of these will be like growing Trees that will grow up to become big Trees that will each be able to stand independently and then like a forest they will find a way to work together to protect their habitat and in this way we will change the world. This forest will be called the Emerald Forest.

This Emerging New Project is, going to need a lot of support and input from all over. We may even have to become willing, to hear from some new voices, from new friends, who do have some good ideas, if we are going to learn, how to live on this planet, in a way that really is more ecological, and more restorational, and so we do want to welcome any and all commentary, from all those who are interested, from all over the world.

We include everybody, who wants to be included. If you care, then we care. But there is a lot of interest and we do have to know where people stand on this.

We do have to meet those new people, who would like to get to know each other and come closer to the heart of the project. But this is going to require some investment, of all of our time and energy, to help make this thing happen.

The rest is all about the major contribution pledges, of only $9,884. along with the ordinary smaller amounts, of normal contribution levels, that would normally be expected from the membership, like about 35 dollars maybe, as often as once a year, for something this big, to get started right, with plenty of support, from the membership, which is also big, and that would reflect, more accurately, the real work that already has been done, and can be clearly seen, right there on the website, and in the journal, and in the email group.

It is time to return to the Trees, and to live among the monkeys, within the homesites, and within the protective larger homesteads, of 49 acres each, all laid out in a circle, around the one thousand acre core preserve, which is where we can live, and build our homes, but everything else outside of that, is to be protected, as it is not to be deemed to be as our own personal property, but it is to be seen as a combination of rights that have to be earned, and responsibilities which must be upheld. Among the rights lies the promise of the homesteads, and all the many benefits of being self sufficient and free, from having to work some job in town, and among the responsibilities, lies the care and protection of the land, in obedience to all decisions made in the consensus council, as well as all the preliminary rules, which are the basis for the project, such as that you cannot ever sell your homesteads, as those are only for us each to live on for life, as someone who is making as contribution, and who is all paid up, to date, and is in good standing, as an active member of the community and so who does need to have someplace to live, and some land that they can use, to build their own house on, and to grow their own food, so they can live very cheaply, while serving the needs of the community, which is necessary, for people to be self sufficient, because there are no jobs in Belize, and so that is why this land may seem to be very cheap, and so it might seem like this is just too good to be true, but it is not, because we are not just selling land, but we are creating a community. And that is made out of contributions of time and energy and money and people and tools and trucks. What can you contribute? Everything will need to be done, and we are the people who will have to do all that. We are the ones who will have to bottom line this whole project, and so we cannot just regard it, as something to be taken advantage of, and many sacrifices will have to be made, if we are to succeed in becoming self sufficient, and that is why each person has to be self sufficient. We need people to do all the work, because the Howlers cannot be counted on to handle it. But why would the people want to do all that work? Because they love the Howlers, and they really believe in what we are doing, and they want to support the cause. And that must be the case, because the pay is not going to be all that great. And that is only even there, because we do realize that the people will probably need to buy a few new things once in a long while. But no one should be coming here for the money.

We want to minimize our impact upon the land, so please don't think of this land, as something that you can develop any way you want, for your own personal advantage, as it is all to be collectively managed, and controlled by the community, for the greater good. This really is a community, and we will be sharing the control and the protection of the land as a group, who makes decisions through Consensus.

But in this way, we will be saving as much land as possible, because sometimes, when you ask for it, you get it, which is going to make a huge difference, for the Howlers, and the people and some of the other wildlife in the area, because we will be right there, to protect them, from poachers, and squatters, and developers and loggers.

Protective Homesteads around an endangered species sanctuary, is a whole new concept, that we must all try to learn about, just so that we can protect the Howler Monkeys in Belize, who may not otherwise have that much of a chance. Towards that end, we will lay out about as many full sized Homesteads as we can, all in a circle around the Core Preserve, and all along the old mountain road.

Each Homestead will be a one kilometer deep, and 200 meters wide at the center, at 49 acres plus in size, of wildly forested, and almost completely untouched lands, with lots of water coming down from creeks all around us, that we will be able to redirect, into our own water systems.

We may even be on a course that leads, deep down into the underground fresh water network, that are like rivers that flow in limestone caves, that pervades the Yucatan peninsula, which were sometimes held as being sacred places, of the spirits of the underworld, by the Ancient Maya Peoples.

The latitude of the Core Preserve, is something like 16 degrees and 29 minutes, and the longitude is something like 88 degrees and 56 minutes, for those who might want to look that up on google earth.

The elevation of the old mountain road, probably averages about 1300 feet above sea level. Each homestead will actually be about 656 feet wide and 3,280 feet deep, and there will probably be over 50 homesteads like that all in a circle.

That is just to protect the land that we enclose, that we plan to protect as guardians, and that is within all these 50 some homesteads, that we plan to protect as stewards, even though we don't plan to use, any more than 5 acres each, and that will help us to create a buffer zone, around the One Thousand acre Core Preserve, and some of the surrounding areas, of the larger Proposed Howler Monkey Preserve, which is prime howler habitat, as shown on the maps. All that land is to be protected, and used only with minimal impact to the forest canopy.

The larger preserve area, extends all around the Homesteads and the Core Preserve, and that includes the homesteads and the Core Preserve, within it, which whole thing will be exactly 7.7 kilometers long, and 5.2 kilometers wide, which is the equivalent of about 4.75 miles by 3.25 miles.

That will contain just about exactly 9,884 acres within the larger preserve, which is over 15 square miles.

That is very easily self defined by starting at a high point, that we call Truth Peak, at 663 meters, and that is marked on the topographical maps as 663, and which is a high lookout point of 663 meters high, that boldly stands guard on the southern most point, of the larger preserve area.

From there we just follow, the basic 30 degree and 60 degree lines exactly, from true north, to get the parameters, of the larger protected Howler Preserve area, and that is how it is legally defined.

We will have to build the old mountain road, that goes part way around the Core Preserve, so that each Homestead, will have access to their own Homesteads, which will all be facing right across the road, and down into the Core Preserve, which is a densely wooded valley, that has the Bladen Branch of the Monkey River flowing right through it.

Most of those 50 some Homesteads, will be shaped like wedges, that will probably be more like 300 feet wide, along the road on the average, so that is what the spacing will be like, so your nearest neighbors, might be about 300 feet away, on the average, in either direction. But no one will be behind you and no one will be in accross the street out in front of you, since that will be the 1,000 acre Core Preserve.

We do have some new maps up, and we do have the Belize Journal, and we do have one very clear map, of the homestead layouts, which will be shared, with those who can come to our next meeting.

Everything else is still in the planning stages, and so there is much much more to come. We can never do anything, before the time has come for that, and without the full cooperation, and the full participation, of most all of the people, who would benefit the most, who must become, way more than just willing, to support the whole thing, after it happens, with their own modest funding sources, because we need those who can support the project before it happens even more.

Nothing happens, and this will not be shoved forwards, until the people really have shown us that they really do want this to happen, and then begin to show up at the meetings, and here on the web, and to make contributions, and to show their support, on a much more appropriate scale, by bringing their own friends and family members into the circle of peace, that we have begun to create with all due respect, for all these small efforts to Save the Earth.

If it doesn't fit, we must acquit. But this may be one way, we may be able to be of some real service to the Earth, even if we don't have a lot of money, by creating the first real demonstration, of a truly Sustainable way of life, in EcoVillage Community, that doesn't have to cost that much, because living is so much easier in Belize, when you have your own place to live, and when you have the support of the community. But that is why we all must learn to say, quite humbly, that we live up in that house over there, instead of saying that house is my house. That is just the place where I live. That is what we tell the new people who may not yet have a designated place where they live. But this is a move away from some of these unnecessarily harsh levels of ownership, which is too self centric, and that divides the people, and it does not bring them together. We share the land. We share the community. The community, as a whole, decides about the character of new people, in terms of what they have contributed, and what they then really do deserve.

This is going to be a very inexpensive solution, for a whole lot of people, who want to live in a warm and ecologically friendly environment.

We might even take some pleasure, in the idea that we would be showing the way, towards a whole new kind of Self Sustainable Future, that all the people in Belize, and a whole lot of other places, could learn from us, as neighbors who we include, as part of our larger resource base of friendship and support, and in that the whole dream, of a new way of living as part of the Earth, could spread throughout Central America, and around the world, because this is not the most choice piece of land in Belize. We are showing that we can work with whatever is out there. We don't really care if it is not the very best.

We will have to become very resilient, as we build a real community here, and we are going to have to become mutually self reliant, as we are going to be beyond, almost all government services.

But for those who are ready, and can bring their own fair share, of energy and resources, we will become a demonstration, on the use of renewable on-site energy flows, and low impact ecological lifestyle flows, that only works, by the exchange of nutrients and resources, and natural housing, which can be very simple at first, and the integrated EcoVillage design flows, of volunteering and helping out with community service.

With a great deal of care, we will always work together, towards always minimizing, our Eco-Logical Footprints, and we might even like to think, that in this small way, and by sending out beautiful ripples, of positive visions of a possible future, for the howlers and the people, that we might even be of some service, to the good people in the local community. - T