Gardeners - restorers & extenders of the Earth
Establishing Clean-Green Organic Living Food Systems that provide Healthful & Accessible Food Security for Current and Future Generations
For Communitarian Union Associates, the path to Right Livelihood takes root in gardening – specifically, in cultivating organic, clean-green LIVING FOODS that restore and nurture people, animals and the Earth. Beginning in the seventh year of association, those who have successfully adopted the lifestyle and love-style of DEEP UNION, now prepare to make gardening their central focus to actualize the vision of perpetual peace achieved through practical LOVE-IN-ACTION to create shared prosperity.
Toiling to produce Living Nutrition that includes fruit, soft leavy greens, nuts and seeds, along with edible seaweeds is the foundational activity of ‘common’ wealth worker owned and operated, collaborative provisioning enterprises that ensure long-term food security for the network of communitarian unions, across the globe.
The CRITICAL ROLE of committed skilled GARDENERS to ensure continuance of PEOPLE, ANIMALS & EARTH
Adopting the role of GARDENER as the foundation of a RIGHT LIVELIHOOD career, embodies a proactive response to food insecurity, animal abuse and exploitation as well as multiple ecological crisis that erode the quality of life for both people and animals, while also addressing the loss of biodiversity of both animal and plant species.
By engaging as gardeners, communitarians move beyond consumerism to become active stewards of the Earth’s life-sustaining resources. This approach holds three fundamental benefits:
- Restoring Earth’s Natural Balance: Gardening, especially when practiced with organic and sustainable methods, regenerates soil, preserves biodiversity, and reduces environmental impact. By growing clean-green food, communitarians who engage in Right Livelihood Production and Distribution projects, contribute directly to healthier ecosystems, creating spaces that support quality of life and liberty for both humans and animals alike.
- Providing Clean and Nutritious Food: As the population grows, food security remains a critical issue. Practicing and teaching Gardening helps to ensure that this vital skill is transferred to as many people as possible to ensure current and future generations are able to access safe, nutrient-rich healthful LIVING NUTRITION. By cultivating food locally, communitarians reduce reliance on long supply chains, which are vulnerable to disruption and often come ladened with a heavy carbon footprint.
- Building Connection and Stewardship: Gardening is also a personal and communal discipline that fosters resilience, and a sense of connection to the Earthly & Cosmic Elements of Sun, Stars and Cycles of the Moon. By centering Right Livelihood activities around gardening, communitarians learn to work collaboratively and practice patience throughout the changing seasonal cycles; all the while cultivating a deeper appreciation of their dependence on combinations of generous bestowals from the natural world, such as rain, sunshine and beneficial insects including bees, butterflies and even fruit bats whose contributions to the pollination of fruit trees and other flowering plants is invaluable.
In short, gardening is the pathway through which associates develop practical skills that align with communitarian values, fulfilling their duty to live sustainably while contributing to creating and maintaining built and natural eco-systems that sustain the life, liberty & happiness of all.
Growing Together for a Sustainable Future
Beginning in the seventh year of association, gardening becomes the core practice of Right Livelihood, symbolizing an associate’s maturity and readiness to contribute on a deeper level to communitarian union missions. At this stage, Associates have developed a foundation of eco-social values and skills, enabling them to apply these attributes in practical and meaningful ways. Moving into this phase is akin to a rite of passage, marking a shift from learning to leadership to competently contribute to the stewardship of collaborative provisioning production and distribution resources and facilities.
However, Gardening can never be considered a static skill. No matter how long we have been involved in producing clean-green organic Living Foods within backyard and community Kitchen Gardens as well as Permanent Agriculture Food Forests, we are never done with learning. Instead, this essential, yet nonetheless undervalued occupation, must be embarked upon as a lifelong journey that expands with experience.
Each year brings new challenges and opportunities for growth, requiring ongoing study, and experimental collaboration. Through the seasons, Associates learn to adapt, respond to ecological changes, and find innovative ways to increase productivity and resilience. This evolving practice mirrors the communitarian ideal of lifelong dedication to both personal Growth and Group Development.
The profession of Gardener is a lifelong journey that requires continuous learning, adaptation, and improvement. Communitarian Union Associates are encouraged to see this practice as an ever-evolving vocation where new techniques, ideas, and discoveries enrich their knowledge and deepen their commitment to sustainable living. This dedication to lifelong study cultivates resilience and adaptability, qualities that are essential in a rapidly changing world.
Ongoing skill-building in the areas of organic horticulture and viticulture, along with permanent agriculture food foresting, goes beyond technical knowledge; it also involves understanding ecological cycles; primary self-sufficiency goals; varying local and regional union-specific internal needs; together with consideration and longer-term planning to cater for broader integration of wider-world demands.
Each new insight strengthens an associate’s ability to contribute meaningfully to the collective, underscoring the communitarian ethos of perpetual growth and progress.
Through apprenticeships, workshops, and shared projects, associates refine their gardening skills over time, becoming more effective stewards of the land and resources they collaboratively tend. This commitment to mastery transforms gardening into a living testament to the communitarian principle of eco-social collaborative union, a demonstration of unity and purpose that speaks to the merits of this evolved lifestyle.
Collaborative Provisioning: creating ‘Common’ Wealth Through Gardening
Right Livelihood in the form of gardening, also encompasses the ONE CLOAK TENET of COLLABORATIVE PROVISIONING – a practice that sees Associates toil together to create ‘COMMON’ WEALTH industries founded on pooled and shared resources. At its core, the RICH BY ASSOCIATION – share economy is grounded in the belief that wealth – in this case, the abundance of the Earth, belongs to everyone.
Food security is a vital part of planned and participatory governed systems of collaborative provisioning, installed by Communal Unions to protect the collectives from food scarcity, price instability, and other external pressures. By growing food together, laying down stores, and establishing efficient distribution (according to need), Associates ensure that no one within the Global Network of Local and Regional Communitarian Unions, is ever left without the basic life-supports of food, water, shelter, clothing, transport or access to health and dental care, vocational education, or entitlement to proper rest and recreation.
In addition, founding the Communal Unions on resource sharing, sets the stage for planned participatory governance of common purse provisioning that sees each Associates contribution, benefit the whole. Through collaborative well-organized production calculations, the garden becomes a physical embodiment of shared wealth – a source of nourishment and security that everyone who contributes to the productive Kitchen Gardens and Food Forests’ establishment and maintenance, can draw upon.
Moreover, collaborative provisioning through gardening provides a model for other areas of communitarian life, demonstrating the power of collective effort and shared purpose. By pooling skills, knowledge, and labor, Associates contribute to a food system that is both resilient and regenerative, underscoring the possibility of a society built on cooperation rather than competition.
Toward a Vision of Perpetual Peace Through Shared Prosperity
The ultimate goal of the communitarian KITCHEN GARDENS and PERMANENT FOOD FOREST projects consists of more than achieving food security or sustainability; it is a VISION that perpetual peace born of shared prosperity is attainable by living by the principle and practice of LIVING SIMPLY underpinned by ETHICAL CONSUMPTION to CONSERVE – RECYCLE, RESTORE & REPURPOSE.
By growing clean-green organic food, the collaborative unions create a source of security that frees us from dependence on exploitative systems and profit-driven economies. In addition, the network of communitarian unions reclaim autonomy and reduce the economic and social stress that fuels inequality and discord. In this way, communitarians make gardening a revolutionary act—a reclaiming of Earth’s resources for the benefit of all.
This ideal of “sharing all with all” creates the conditions that fosters harmony by dismantling the barriers of scarcity, competition, and exclusion. The garden is both a literal and symbolic space of shared abundance, a place where individuals come together to toil – to defeat waste and exploitation of people, animals and the planet, to share, and nourish health and longevity. By emphasizing collective wellbeing, communitarians demonstrate the transformative power of an evolved eco-social model that has the capacity to lay the groundwork for a peaceful, just, and sustainable society.
As communitarian Associates mature into stewards of this model, they showcase a lifestyle that is not only viable but deeply fulfilling. Their work serves as a beacon for those outside the community, showing that AWOL – another way of life, is possible. Through collaborative gardening, Associates embody the values of respect for life, liberty and happiness – of people and animals, together with responsible stewardship of the Earth’s life-sustaining resources and shared success, advancing a world where shared prosperity is accessible to all.
LEGACY GARDENING: cultivating Sustainable Food Systems to ensure the health & happiness of Future Generations
Through dedication to gardening, Communitarian Union Associates create a legacy that extends beyond their own lives. By participating in practical On The Ground Everyday Revolutionary activism, communitarians contribute to seeding the world with eco-social values that ensure future generations will inherit a healthier, more harmonious planet. This legacy is more than just a physical garden; it is a testament to the strength and unity of networks of principled eco-social unions, actively toiling to forge a path to Rising Above Poverty through collaborative provisioning enterprises that produce and distribute (according to need) the essential life-supports of healthful food, clean water, comfortable clothing and secure accommodation, along with shared access to electric vehicles and the best of preventative health & dental care.
Through this life-centered work, Communitarian Union Associates illuminate a path forward, sowing seeds of peace, prosperity, and interconnectedness that will nourish and sustain both Earth and humanity for generations to come.
