4 years and 4 days ago, I drove back onto the dirt roads of West Texas.
The Beef Initiative was just a vision.
(Ledge of Palo Duro Canyon – Llano Estacado)
I had just returned from several months of working harvest through the heartland of America. I drove in from Kansas after finishing the seasonal North Dakota wheat harvest. The crew was transitioning to commodity corn here in Texas.
Oh, how much has changed—and how much has stayed the same.
Just a few days later, I’d be shaking Justin Trammell’s hand and releasing my research findings on Substack in the middle of the night. These were insights drawn from both a lifetime in agriculture and several years of researching the United States from a different perspective.
These perspectives can only be delivered and seen with your boots firmly planted on the ground—or from the view of a pickup truck.
(Wheat husk outside of Mott, ND, August 2021)
What I found over 4 years ago is what a nation is finally starting to realize:
Our nation is sick!
(Industrial shift in medicine, food, and money)
And I’m not being dramatic or positioning myself to sell you anything.
I’ve seen it, I’ve lived it, I’ve suffered it, and I’ve healed from it.
Now, I’m ready to tell a story I’ve wanted so badly to share with the world for over 4 years.
When I say I’ve seen it, lived it, suffered it, and healed from it, I’m not alone.
I’ve spent years facilitating both a personal mission and a national movement that is rooted in one purpose: to go out each day and save children’s lives.
What better purpose in life than to have the knowledge and skill set to build solutions—both personal and industry-wide—that lead to healing and growth?
From metabolic health being the number one drain on our national healthcare costs, to our soil not being able to support another quarter-century of modern agriculture as it stands, to our children being diagnosed with fatty liver disease.
(Let the Poor Court the Rich by St. Augustine used in the essay: Harvest of Deception)
And the independent rancher? He doesn’t have the financial tools to grow his next herd or the leverage to even feed his family year after year.
There is a global industrial shift unfolding. I’ve seen it, lived it, suffered it, and now we’re going to showcase it so a nation and millions of individuals can start healing from it.
In these 4 years, I’ve traveled almost twice around the world:
4 continents
2 hemispheres
172,474 domestic miles driven
26 conferences/events – held/attended
The source of the solution can never be fully understood until the source of the problem is clearly identified.
This is something I’ve known my whole life. It’s in my core belief system. This belief was stewarded through the seasons of being raised in a place where the harvest is something sacred.
Our nation has an opportunity to reflect on what we’ve sowed—both individually and collectively.
Over the years, I’ve been praised, judged, ridiculed, and compared. I knew going into this journey that I’d have to be strong-willed, transparent, confident, humble, and fully clear about my personal “Why.”
I ask you, as individuals and as a nation, to stop validating the deceptions that have caused the very issues we face today.
(Texas Slim at Beef Initiative Micro Summit – Ethical Farmers in Australia)
I promised myself that I’d stop validating the deceptions I’d uncovered. I now absolutely love living in the truth of the last 4 years, and I finally get to share with the world what that truth looks like—and hell, even tastes like.
Four years ago, I made a promise to the man staring back at me in the mirror: he would make sure that the children inheriting what we’ve sowed as a nation would at least be given a fighting chance, just as we were.
The reflection our nation sees today is a nation that has lost its innocence in the most crucial way.
The innocence of a child, able to play with strength and confidence in a culture they can believe in and thrive in.
I ask you to take an afternoon and revisit the Harvest of Deception. Up until 4 years ago, it was the accumulation of a life’s work and understanding of a nation. Four years later, well, I have a different story to tell.
For this I know: it’s so simple, it’s complicated. And those with ears will hear, those with eyes will see, that our nation is indeed sick—and that one person has decided to facilitate a new harvest and a new vision.
I Am Texas Slim. Are YOU?
The Harvest of Deception is upon us.
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