The healing journey of a widowed, unschooling badass in Delaware.
I’ve been very active with jiu-jitsu and full sun gardening the last few days and it has worn me down. Sleep has been difficult and my Wim Hof Method breathing has been challenging.
I’m hoping for a good night of sleep so I can return to my Isaiah study (as well as more jiu-jitsu and soccer:-).
From fairies and the Fall of Man, to geopolitical and domestic intrigue, a gardening project gave me a lot of time to listen and learn.
EDIT: I forgot that I started listening to this fantastic conversation between Joe Rogan and Jimmy Dore!
I became a radical unschooler when I realized that learning outside school parameters is the norm, not the aberation.
Whenever I am curious, I independently seek knowledge. My job as an educational facilitator is to guide my sons on their journey and provide opportunities and resources.
I use “radical” a bit tongue-in-cheek. It seems to me that if you believe in something, you commit to its fundamental principles and act them out until you encounter a flaw. Then, you figure out if the flaw is in the principles, or your understanding of them.
Unschooling appears to be a complete learning system, whenever I find myself considering a certificate or other stadardized metric, I reevaluate the value and decide whether it is worth compromising the unschool principles. I rarely find it necessary, so I’m radically committed to this learning lifestyle.
My sons are 13 and 15. Ten years ago, we started homeschooling without a driving philosophy, it was a practical decision. Being a curious person, I discovered and dove into deschooling and unschooling. Through experimentation and meditation, I found these approaches to be most valuable in fostering an environment of physical, mental, and spiritual health.
Home education has radicalized me as a follower of Christ, an anarchist (although I give in all the time when I’m asked to license my business or pay my taxes), and an unschooler.
Like actual Christian Anarchy?
So it went like this:
When I came home to care for my sons (<1 and <3) fulltime, I was an ideologically captured Neocon addicted to 24/7 cable news/c-span. I turned the TV off whenever they were in the room, which, helpfully enough, they always were.
Obama’s presidency challenged my deepest beliefs in foreign policy. He continued and accelerated the Bush wars, but I was supposed to oppose those things now. The anti-war left disappeared and it was only proper to support interventions in Lybia, Syria, Yemen…
I was wavering, so I tried to figure out how I would explain all this to my sons in a clear and logical way. I couldn’t.
In 2014, we started homeschooling and I sought out podcasts to inform myself about how to go about it. I found an episode of the Tom Woods show on the subject. Maybe it was Lenore Skenazy or Ana Martin, The Libertarian Homeschooler. Either way, I loved the format of Tom’s show and started to connect with libertarian thinking.
There was nothing special about me and my wife, but we were educating our children, something we had been taught that only government (or a fancy, government-approved “private” institution) could do.
I remember sitting outside by our fire pit after the boys were in bed and sharing my new, “radical” libertarian thoughts with my wife. We had agreed on a conservative upbringing for our children, I wasn’t sure how my, “If we can do this without government, what else can we achieve?” would hit. It did. She seemed to already be ahead of me and we started leaning into a voluntarist mindset.
As a father, I stayed with the principle that I must live the same truth I try to instill in my children. The stakes were getting higher and I was searching for foundational truths.
I had become hooked on the Tom Woods Show and in addition to being a homeschooler, historian, and libertarian, he’s also a Catholic. He doesn’t produce a ton of religious content, but as someone seeking deeper truths, I was fascinated.
In 2016, he interviewed Jordan Peterson and I discovered Peterson’s lecture series on Genesis. Through a Bible study group and a lot of meditation, I found Christ in my heart in 2017. We were baptized as a family that September.
This was the same time frame I quit voting (the 2016 Republican primary was my last) and became interested in anarchism. Michael Malice remains a huge influence on that subject. While he doesn’t take a Christian perspective, he did introduce me to the ideas of Tolstoy and other Anarcho-Christians.
Politically, I’m comfortable with being identified as an Anarcho-Christian, however, it’s more accurate to call myself a follower of Christ. If a political position doesn’t fit in that matrix, I’m not going to accept it as my own.
Isaiah 24:1-3 RSV — Behold, the LORD will lay waste the earth and make it desolate, and he will twist its surface and scatter its inhabitants. And it shall be, as with the people, so with the priest; as with the slave, so with his master; as with the maid, so with her mistress; as with the buyer, so with the seller; as with the lender, so with the borrower; as with the creditor, so with the debtor. The earth shall be utterly laid waste and utterly despoiled; for the LORD has spoken this word.
Isaiah 25:1 KJV — O LORD, thou art my God; I will exalt thee, I will praise thy name; for thou hast done wonderful things; thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth.
Isaiah 25:7-8 RSV — And he will destroy on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death for ever, and the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth; for the LORD has spoken.
This is a prophecy for all the world.
It’s hard to escape the clarity that everyone on Earth will suffer before God finally defeats death.
Jesus said the Law was handed down to show us that we can’t follow the Law. We can’t live in a negative, not fully. We must live in Love. When you love God, yourself, and those around you, you are driven to treat all of those entities with care and respect.
Isaiah 23:1 KJV — The burden of Tyre. Howl, ye ships of Tarshish; for it is laid waste, so that there is no house, no entering in: from the land of Chittim it is revealed to them.
Isaiah 23:17-18 KJV — And it shall come to pass after the end of seventy years, that the LORD will visit Tyre, and she shall turn to her hire, and shall commit fornication with all the kingdoms of the world upon the face of the earth. And her merchandise and her hire shall be holiness to the LORD: it shall not be treasured nor laid up; for her merchandise shall be for them that dwell before the LORD, to eat sufficiently, and for durable clothing.
God humbled those in Tyre who worshipped material wealth over spiritual health.
The city was populated with Christians multiple times in history, but currently lies barren. It is unclear whether the restoration that was foretold has already come and gone, or has yet to be.
From the chiropractor, to helping a neighbor’s dog, to helping a neighbor’s cat, to hours outside with home education friends new and old, to jiu-jitsu for both sons, to this beautiful soccer field for me…it was quite a day.
I’ve started a list of videos I’ve watched during my reading of Isaiah. While the audio commentaries on Blue Letter Bible are my main resource, these talks have been very helpful.
Isaiah 22:11 KJV — Ye made also a ditch between the two walls for the water of the old pool: but ye have not looked unto the maker thereof, neither had respect unto him that fashioned it long ago.
The people and rulers of Jerusalem knew that trouble was coming. An Assyrian attack was inevitable. They denied the invaders their unprotected cattle by feasting on them. They built a brilliant tunnel from a well outside the city walls to a reservoir on the inside.
They forgot something in their preparations…God.
God created us to be creators like Him. To create is to honor our own Creator. The hazard lies in forgetting the Creator and thinking that we are the source of innovation and inspiration.
It becomes easy to worship the product of our industry. It becomes easy to worship ourselves as designers and builders.
When we forget the source of our abilities, we forget our proper place in the Universe. Without orientation, we become lost and invite disaster.
Isaiah 20:2-3 KJV — At the same time spake the LORD by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, Go and loose the sackcloth from off thy loins, and put off thy shoe from thy foot. And he did so, walking naked and barefoot. And the LORD said, Like as my servant Isaiah hath walked naked and barefoot three years for a sign and wonder upon Egypt and upon Ethiopia;
Isaiah protested the unwise alliances Judah was forming by walking around the royal court in (depending on the interpretation) little to no clothing for three years.
He did this at God’s behest.
One sermon (perhaps Jon Courson on the Blue Letter Bible app) recommended a metaphorical lesson in living out loud as a follower of Christ.
I see this as a call to share these posts in more places and to renew my dedication to sharing the Word.
