Finding My Voice Again

Sovereign Living is back, and she arrives with a fresh face, a new identity, and a rootedness in real sovereignty. This project was born in the summer of 2010 out of my desire to learn, and teach others what I learned, about the process of becoming politically sovereign. I had just come out of 3.5 years of very intense political activism (Ron Paul, 10th amendment activism, fusion center education, and police accountability work). I had been arrested twice for free speech issues (charges were dropped and settlement found in first, and I was acquitted in trial in the second), and I was called to get back to the land, grow roots, and heal from my traumatic experiences as a front-line activist.

At the time I had a vision for a Martha Stewart Living type show where I would be the host and teach people how to do things like slaughter and process home raised chickens for meat consumption. I saw sovereignty as a way out of centralized institutions like banks and food supply chains, and I was determined to accomplish this and teach others what worked. I didn’t know at the time that this was an incomplete view of all that sovereignty entails.

The concept took on a life of its own as I partnered with who would become my first husband, and it morphed into a docu-reality show, chronicling our lives as we learned how to homestead and get out of centralized institutions. The show became instantly popular in our niche community. We had several television production teams reach out to partner with us, and we began screening the early episodes at conferences across the United States.

What wasnt shown on camera was the deceit behind closed doors, the infidelity, the financial misappropriation, the codependency, the explosive anger, or the lies. Hints seeped out through my on camera interviews, but people heralded us as the liberty couple of the decade, and put our relationship on an unnatural pedestal. My friends and family one by one stepped away from me, seeing me change in devasting ways, and unable to reach me and help me find a way out. At some point I accepted my self made prison and surrendered to the hell I was existing in.

When we lost the farm (landlord sold the property), the project died along with our marriage, and my entire sense of identity. I didn’t know at the time that true fundamental sovereignty was more than a political decision, but a spiritual one. The death of Sovereign Living’s first incarnation was actually the birth of a new Way of Being for me. I couldn’t see it at the time because my vision was clouded with the grief of surviving an abusive relationship, the shame of hiding it from the world, and a desperation to protect my children from a level of toxicity that was so grotesque I couldn’t even process the circumstance in which we were living.

It was going to get very dark before I could find firm footing again. With the support of my beloved community and my loving family, I was able to extricate myself from the situation, at least partially, and I began my very long tedious process of healing. This incarnation of Sovereign Living is founded from a place of vulnerable authenticity. After having my voice stripped from me, I have decided to share my story once again from a new perspective, as a way to close the chapter of my previous life full of pain and suffering, and step into my path of living in harmony with my self, family and community.

What to expect — slowly, at the pace of real life, I will revive my podcast called “Life Untamed”, publish blog posts here at Sovereign Living, and release my book that I began writing in 2010 called “Memoirs of a Radical”. When you suffer abuse in an intimate relationship the two things that disappear very quickly are 1. Your voice 2. Your creativity. It’s a slightly terrifying experience to open up in this way, and I want to say THANK YOU for witnessing my journey and hearing my story.