What’s “Poorganic”?

Ever since my blogging conference last weekend, I’ve known I needed to write this, but I’ve been putting it off.

Because I was afraid.

See, lots of other bloggers that I met at Relevant naturally assumed that The Poorganic Life was a “real foods” blog, so I had to take a minute to try to explain that . . . . it kinda is and kinda isn’t.

When I came up with The Poorganic Life as a name, I tried to explain the term “poorganic” in the About page, telling you some of the poorganic things that I discuss and using tasty words to keep it fun, and light, and enjoyable.

But truthfully, I’ve been keeping a little bit of a secret.  The problem is that I know what I THINK “poorganic” means, but I’m afraid to actually say it because then I’ve really set myself up to look like a hypocrite.

But, it’s time. It must be done—even if it means that scores of you go scurrying off to less crazy blogs, I have to be upfront about what’s going on here.

Poorganic (Adj)-Having the characteristic of being deliberately and freakishly frugal, natural, nourishing, and contented.  Poorganics are people who have the SPECIFIC GOAL of living BELOW their financial ability with the expressed purpose of sharing the saved money, time, and excess with others.

Thus, The Poorganic Life, will be a life in which my family and I attempt to model this type of existence.

We will keep on blowing raspberries at social climbing people who continuously upgrade.

We will find enrichment and contentment in God’s blessings as we wallow in His grace.

We will give our money away when it seems stupid and financially foolish.

I know. I know. It sucks. I could put up a dozen Bible verses that would make me sound really awesome at this point for attempting this, but I’m not gonna do that. I already feel inadequate and overwhelmed enough.  Putting this in actual words scares me quite a lot.

Maybe you don’t see how is this problematic for me?

It’s just . . . sometimes I don’t want to do it.  I don’t want to be simple, OR frugal, OR natural OR give my money away when God asks me to. But this blog is my accountability and my challenge to do what I believe is what God has designed for us all to do. Since it is actually HIS stuff in the first place.

Oh snap!

Now I’ve gone and done it. I told you that I think God means for you to live this crazy way too, pretending to be poorer than you are and giving the extra away to serve God. Now I’ve stepped all over your American dream, your emergency fund, and your entitlement. And mine.

“WT Heck!I thought this was a food blog. !” You say. “Is she gonna try to make me feel guilty for not being poor?”

No. I won’t try to make you feel guilty; I hate false guilt.  That is not the point at all.  And I wish this was just a food blog. That would be way easier.  Sometimes when I’m so tired of this that I almost light my coupons on fire, I have to sit down and write an easy post about grass-fed beef.  I’m a very reluctant poorganic.

BUT . . . there is one nice thing about poorganics.  It’s totally enrichingly abundant. (Did I just make up the word enrichingly?) It is not about following a meal plan, or a tithe plan, or a budget plan. It is full of blessings that you didn’t earn, grace you didn’t deserve, checks you weren’t owed, and food you didn’t buy.  Miraculously, what grows organically out of this crazy lifestyle is an amazing, mind-blowing connection with our Provider, who supplies all our needs. Check out the provision stories tab to see what I mean.

Maybe I’ll give you just one eensy weensy verse to show you that I didn’t make this stuff up.

So, despite my cynicism, anybody want to be a Poorganic? 😉