Here Is My One Liner:

Off Grid Living News and the Adventures in Sustainable Living podcast is an online resource that is dedicated to providing all of the necessary tools, instruction, and training that are needed to give you the confidence and skills to live a simple, sustainable, self-reliant lifestyle.

The big question

Do you really know how to take care of yourself?

The majority of people in present-day culture no longer have any idea how to take care of themselves. This is the result of an enormous cultural shift away from self sufficiency and toward a dependency on an enormous infrastructure.

In developed nations, the vast majority of people live in urban areas and are dependent on a huge infrastructure for consistent access to basic necessities. This enormous infrastructure is so interconnected that no one has any real control over their day-to-day resources.

Consequently, the average person is simply not prepared to go even a few days without effortless access to food, water, electricity, and refrigeration. Furthermore, few people possess the skills and knowledge to provide those resources for themselves even if they had to, not to mention actually living off grid. 

The basic reality  is that as long as someone else is in control of your resources, they are in control of your life and livelihood.

Why Should You Care?

Most people live with their noses stuck to the grindstone, buried neck deep in debt with their lives in a perpetual loop between home and job. Most of us think this is the best way to provide some level of personal comfort and security. All the while we place complete confidence in our system of society to take care of us in a time of need.

I strongly urge you to not depend on the “system” to always take care of you. Do not sit and wait for the next great economic upturn. Do not depend on advancements in technology to solve your problems. Do not depend on unpredictable financial markets over which you have no control.

If you ever want to get off that cultural tread mill and produce some level of comfort and security, you are going to have to take control over your own life.

One of the easiest ways to do this is to learn how to manage your own resources. Ultimately this may mean simplifying your life and learning to think in terms of “needs” instead of “wants”. This may in fact require making some fundamental changes in how you think and live.

Ultimately the best security blanket is possessing the knowledge and skills to be self reliant and sustainable. 

The end result of taking steps to learn self reliance is much greater independence, personal freedom, and security for you and your family. It also means having a life with much less responsibility.

But, if you wanted to make those fundamental changes, would you know where to start? Would you know how to begin to live off the grid?

Why Should You Listen to Me?

Most people that write about living off the grid do so only after thorough research. I have been living off grid full-time since 1996. Self reliance is not just something that I talk about, it is actually how I live. A Persian poet once said, “When setting out on a journey, do not seek advice from those who have never left home.” My writing about living off grid and being sustainable comes from years of experience, NOT book research.  

My Unique Qualifications

• A life time of self sufficient living
• 27 years of living off the grid full time
• 25 years of experience in the veterinary medical field
• 25 years of business experience
• More than 40 years of gardening experience
• More than 30 years of home food preservation experience
• Extensive survival training
• Avid hunter and fisherman
• Expert butcher
• First hand experience building a log cabin from scratch
• Extensive construction experience
• Extensive knowledge in solar design and installation
• Enthusiastic cook
• Built my entire homestead from nothing
• Have made every known mistake when it comes to off grid living
• Fantastic sense of humor. 

The Man Behind Off Grid Living News

My name is Patrick Keith. I am 62 years old and I have lived off the grid since 1996.

I grew up in Georgia and Tennessee with two working farms in the family. None of us were strangers to hard work and it was a life where you learned to make the most of the resources at hand.

In those early years, I became adept at raising livestock, foraging for food, gardening, hunting, fishing and home food preservation. We processed and preserved most of the food we produced, rarely buying meat or vegetables from the supermarket.

We never really talked about self sufficiency. It was simply the way we lived.

Many years after moving to Colorado, I purchased 46 acres of raw land and started living off the grid.  I am still there.

If you want to learn more about me then read my full story in this post about Who Is Patrick, the Man Behind Off Grid Living News?

Or, if you want to watch the welcome video, scroll to the bottom of this page.

Why I built this website.

During my years of off grid living, I have made many mistakes. I’ve had some grand successes and some dismal failures. I have also had many adventures. The end result is that I have gained tremendous knowledge and now have the confidence and skills to take care of myself under some pretty extreme circumstances.

And I was off the grid.

Through many of my personal experiences, I have observed that few people possess the skills and knowledge needed to be self reliant. I have especially observed this during disaster or emergency situations.

What I have also observed in recent years is a movement toward off grid living that is building tremendous momentum. People want to slow down, simplify, and live a life with minimal interference. Yet so many people have no idea where to start and how to actually get off the grid.

After being off-grid for over 20 years, I think I just might know a thing or two about that. And that is why I built this site. Simply to serve a growing community of people that want to start a life of off grid living, be self reliant, have more personal freedom and security, with minimal interference.

But I don’t want to live off the grid.

After some extensive research, I realized there is a large community of people that simply are not comfortable with the pure off-grid lifestyle. This group of people either live off-grid part time (a weekend retreat) or they are much more comfortable with the idea of being what I call “off-grid ready”.

Off-grid ready is the concept of being prepared to take care of yourself in the event the grid goes down for an extended period of time. If you are properly prepared, your life will experience only a minor hiccup even if the grid goes down for weeks.

This site is also designed to serve this community of people that want to be self reliant. There are many people that want to increase their confidence and security not by engaging in the pure off grid living life but instead to make themselves “off-grid ready”.

What this site is NOT about

I have come across many websites that are geared toward survival, prepping, and end-of-the-world scenarios. Their business is selling equipment and supplies in the event there is a total collapse of modern society as we know it.

This is NOT the focus of this site. I do not dismiss the possibility of such scenarios. However, I would rather focus on preparing everyday folks for more common events.

When is the last time society completely collapsed? When is the last time our social structure turned into total chaos? Not in recent history.

However, when is the last time a major storm  took out the grid for days? When is the last time you felt the pain of the rising costs of food, utilities, and other basic necessities? I am willing to bet that has occurred very recently.

This is why I focus this site on the day-to-day needs of everyday people.

What We Are About

As of about 1985, humanity’s consumption of natural resources first exceeded the ability of the planet to regenerate those resources. As of early in this century, humanity was consuming resources at a rate of 25% greater than the available supply.

Perpetual growth and consumerism is a loosing game for everyone.

The obvious answer to this problem is self reliance and learning to mange your own resources.

Being self sufficient, not to mention off grid living, can be a daunting prospect if you do not possess the necessary skills and have no idea where to start.

Off Grid Living News is dedicated to providing enough information, training, and skills so that even a complete novice could visit with us and learn all that is needed to live off the grid and be self sufficient.

If off grid living is not your ultimate goal, then I can give you the needed skills to be self-sufficient regardless of your living situation. Where my knowledge and skills are lacking, I will provide links to experts and other educational resources to fill the gap.

Here is what you will learn from Off Grid Living News:

• Essential skills for self sufficiency
• A step-by-step plan for going off grid
• Tools and equipment needed for self sufficient living
• Food production including gardening and animal husbandry
• Professional medical tips and treatments for your backyard farm animals
• Food preservation methods
• Off-grid cooking tips and recipes
• What foods to always have around
• Housing options including design plans
• Off grid power solutions including solar, hydroelectric, and wind
• Best means of sanitation and personal hygiene while living off grid
• Essential survival skills
• How to manage your own resources
• How to live a comfortable debt free lifestyle
• How to live a self sufficient life with much less responsibility
• And much, much more

How will this be delivered

• Regular posts
• Off Grid Skills Newsletter
• Podcasts
• Videos and demonstrations
• Ebooks

If you are ready to …

• Get off the cultural tread mill
• Live with less responsibility
• Greatly increase you personal and financial freedom
• Simplify your life
• Be self sufficient
• Manage your own resources
• Live sustainably
• Live with confidence no matter what happens
• Work toward creating your own economy instead of being completely dependent on your job ….

… then sign up for Off Grid Living News and increase your self confidence by learning the skills of self reliance.