Letter To My Mom.

Uncategorized | March 9th, 2013

So my mom recently set up a project on the fundraising platform, Indiegogo. Her goal is to own and live on a small goat farm. She doesn’t exactly know how to go about it, or where to start, she only knows that a farm life is the life for her. She’s been reading up on shit and doing a lot of research for some time now, and just launched her project about a week ago. Here’s the community Facebook page she made for Punk Llama Farm – “Organic With Attitude”.

If nothing else, her logo is super fuckin’ cute…I’m gonna make some buttons out of it, because I really like it.

More so, I encourage you to go to her funding page and at the very least, buy a brick to support her cause.

I love my mom a lot, but we did not come from a world where dreams were anything worth, well, dreaming. I’m the first to accomplish as much as I have in my family, and it was like they all pushed it on me…my mom, my uncle, my gramma, and others…you’re the smart one who’s going to make something of your life. All of their failed hopes and dreams that got stomped on along the way transformed into telling me to push forward and never look back. There was a lot of repercussion from this. I remember my gramma once told me that if she knew this is the path I would take, she never would’ve have encouraged me to live my own life the way she did…good thing is by the time she started sending mixed messages my way, the seed had already been planted, and it’s a good thing too.

So I was up, unable to sleep last night, and it went into the wee hours of the morning, and I was looking at my mom’s page, and trying to think of some words of encouragement I could give her without tearing her down or ripping her project apart without meaning to. I’m generally a very blunt person, and sometimes telling someone to harden the fuck up and move on with their life isn’t the best delivery, even if it’s what they need to hear. So I started typing her a letter about her project, and then from there, I started pouring out my heart, and I finally realized by the end of it that all the pain and hurt I used to harbor against her is finally gone. Completely. It’s hard to teach what you don’t know.

I wanted to post it here on my blog after I wrote it, but  at the time, it was a private correspondence between my mother and myself. Then around 9:am, she made it public knowledge and posted it up on her Facebook notes.

The most inspirational letter I’ve ever read.
by Kat Kerns on Saturday, March 9, 2013 at 9:00am ·

Some other thoughts and ideas I thought I’d throw at you…as far as your farm goes…you only fail if you quit. That is the ONLY way you fail.

Which means…whatever comes in from it, save it, hold onto it, and don’t let it be spent on anything but your dream, no matter how big or small the amount is at the end.

Also…what would you be taking with you to your farm? Serious question. I know you guys have been getting rid of stuff slowly, but if you start putting everything into categories by asking yourself questions, it will make the process much easier.

For every item you look at in your apartment, ask yourself, “would I take this to the farm?” If your very first thought/answer is no, then sell it(if you can, if it can’t be sold toss it out), and put that aside with the money you get from Indiegogo. Your dream can be a reality if you will it to be. Every item you say “no” to, but keep is one more item that stands between you and making your dream a reality. For every “no” that lingers, make it your enemy…and what do we do to our enemies?

“crush your enemies, see them driven before you” 🙂

When I got back from my first long tour, the first thing I did was pull every single stupid box I’ve been carrying around since I was child, empty it out into the middle of my room, and started sorting.

If I couldn’t take it on tour with me and if I wasn’t going to use it during the few months I’d be home, I sold it or got rid of it in some way or another. I do this every time I get back from tour.

The goal is to not own a single thing that doesn’t have a solid, functioning purpose. If it’s art, but I can’t hang it…it’s gone. If it’s jewelry that I’ll never wear, it’s gone. If it’s clothes I haven’t worn in a year, it’s gone. Especially if I can’t wear it on tour. Other than a few dresses saved for nice dinners, my closet is full of functional clothing only.

How to get over the emotional attachment to these items…

Selling something you’re attached to: I’m not losing this, I’m gaining a farm.(Once you focus on what you are gaining, instead of the loss, then the mindset is that selling it is a good thing, and you’re not getting rid of it, you’re turning it into something that means more to you.)

Giving something away: Find someone you know for a fact will appreciate it. (When I got rid of all the items in my hope chest to move to Florida, I drove them down to Portland and gave them to my friend who needed the extra kitchen stuff, I also gave her my butterfly and angel wings, because I knew that of all the people I knew, she would love them the most. This way the negative feeling of loss is replaced by the feeling of doing something good for another person.)

Throwing something away: If you couldn’t sell it, you couldn’t think of any one who would really appreciate it, the world of Craigslist wouldn’t take it, and it has no use or purpose on a farm, then how much value is it really adding to your life?(In this case, don’t give it a second thought, just throw it out and take a deep breath, then pat yourself on the back for getting rid of one more thing that was standing in the way of you and your dream.)

So now, I am a slave to my dream. The best way to become your dream is to live them out in every aspect of your life, and then one day, you open your eyes and realize that HOLY SHIT! I’m living what I wanted.

Everything takes baby steps, and change takes time and is hard.

If this is your life long goal, than never give up and always keep pushing towards it. I’ve been walking my path since I was 7, more seriously at 14, and now at 29 I am finally 120% in it after years of people telling me to get a real job and find something stable to fall back on. Fuck them. I have bled for this, I have sweated for this, I have almost been arrested and almost died more times than I can count for this, and I just got started. This year, Europe is mine.

I believe in you mom. I know you can do this.

Life will always hand you shit, turn it into the fertilizer that grows the garden of your dreams.

I break down almost every single day that I’m not on the road, and then I often break when I’m on the road as well. Sacrifices are a part of life on so many different levels.

A farm will be hard too. Your animals will die, your crops won’t yield some years, and the rain won’t always come on time. But you will live through those days as well and see it through to a day when the harvest is plentiful.

There is no real change as far as hardships go, the only difference is what you’re struggling for.

I love you, and I honestly believe you can do this. We are not shit. You are not shit. You are a beautiful soul with a huge heart, and a chest full of dreams dying to be unlocked and let go to explore. I know this because you instilled it into me. It’s because of you I fight so hard to succeed…you did this. You made this. You are a huge part of my success.

Despite every mistake you and grandma made in my life…you both managed to instil a ray of hope that has grown into a burning light and my fire will engulf the world. For this I love you, and for this all hatred I ever felt for either one of you has gone away, because I finally understand what life would be like without that planted seed. If you could somehow manage to plant such a seed inside of me despite the world we were born into, then there is nothing stopping you from planting a thousand more.

I love you. Go. Be. Do. Live. Dream. Succeed.

I am in your corner, cheering you on.

Your daughter,

Becka

After I hit send, my brain was spinning with more thoughts and ideas…what was only supposed to be a few short sentences to my mom turned into a huge letter. From there, I went to my Facebook page…and since that’s a long entry too, I will continue this in a separate entry.

I made this for my mom, because she loves Arnie and the Conan movies.

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