Living Free in Tennessee - Nicole Sauce Avoid Burnout And Hard Word - EP 1079
Today, we talk about the homestead revenue stack as well as our usual Monday segments.
Featured Event
Sept 12: ETNHA Festival near Knoxville, TN https://steveandsandy.com/festival
Sponsors
Sponsor 1: DiscountMylarBags.com
Long-term food storage supplies that won’t break the bank.
Sponsor 2: AgoristTaxAdvice.com
Helping entrepreneurs, homesteaders, and freedom-minded folks handle taxes the smart way.
Tales from the Prepper Pantry
- Took a Sunday Down Day to redo short-term storage and move things over to Basecamp for long-term.
- Counted and organized: 41 mugs (yep, 41).
- Set up a food plan for the week.
- Making progress on air potatoes VS Chinese yam https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6L-1POLF3Q&feature=youtu.be
- Built a to-do list of things to gather for winter teas and herbal remedies.
Frugality Tip
Join the LFTN Stocking Exchange — because life is about more than just saving money.
Operation Independence
- Reached alignment with Tactical on building a double-purpose shed.
- Sold the old roofing from Basecamp (still have ridge caps available for sale).
Main Topic: Avoiding Burnout and Hard Work
If you came to hear how to NOT work hard on your homestead and still be successful you have come to the wrong place. We've been talking lately about the need for rest and recovering from burnout --- and then I realized on a walk that hard work is part of homesteading - so burnout is one thing, but hard work another = so where is the line between these two?
Many people hesitant to get out and about lately.
Stories of burnout are common → led to conversations about resets, weekend retreats, and monthly calls for homesteaders.
Giving talks on Build Abundance Not Burnout (like at SRF in October).
Realization: some come to hear “how to make it easy,” but building the life you choose is not easy.
Burnout comes from:
- Overcommitting and saying yes to everything.
- Lack of rest or intentional reset.
- Poor design → every task feels uphill.
- No tracking or systems → constant re-doing and searching.
- Trying to do it all alone without community.
- Expecting it to be easy and feeling defeated when it isn’t.
Design makes things flow, but doesn’t remove the work.
- Design for future you (20–40 years older).
- Example: rabbit hutch above garden bed → nutrients flow without transport.
- Design with profit in mind.
- Tracking matters (avoids wasted effort).
- Systems = less friction, but animals still need care, water lines must be buried, harvests preserved, fencing run.
Homestead Revenue Stack (Holler Homestead Example)
- Core Product – Sheep
- Service Layer – Airbnb experiences, tours, classes
- Scalable – LFTN Podcast, HomesteadSkills.academy, cookbook
- Community – Meetups, connecting people
- Add-ons – Holler Roast Coffee (became its own core product), laminated cheat sheets, small guides, dried herbs
- Game changer: Add-ons bolt onto existing work.
- Sometimes the add-on is another person → ties into Holler Hub model (spokes).
Each layer still involves hard work.
Smart design + add-ons keep that work from tipping into burnout.
Honest contrast: the grind is real, but structure turns it into momentum.
Hard work is baked into homesteading — there’s no escaping it. Burnout comes when that work isn’t designed well or isn’t supported. The Homestead Revenue Stack shows how to make your effort count: core products require grind, but when you design smart and bolt on add-ons (whether that’s coffee, guides, or community), the same work builds abundance instead of exhaustion.
Make It A Great Week.
GUYS! Don’t forget about the cookbook, Cook With What You Have by Nicole Sauce and Mama Sauce.
Community
- Follow me on Nostr: npub1u2vu695j5wfnxsxpwpth2jnzwxx5fat7vc63eth07dez9arnrezsdeafsv
- Mewe Group: https://mewe.com/join/lftn
- Telegram Group: https://t.me/LFTNGroup
- Odysee: https://odysee.com/$/invite/@livingfree:b
Resources