Have you ever had the desire to just leave it all behind and move out into the forest? No mortgage, no debt, no bills! For this family, it was an easy decision.
At this point, the Berkinshaw family has been living off grid for well over a decade, in a beautiful and remote location of BC, and they couldn't be happier. It is certainly not a "simple life" like many may envision, but it comes with a completely different set of challenges. When you start a life off grid, and plan to rely primarily on the land to provide your needs, your days will quickly become consumed with all of the necessities of making that possible. Life is so easy to sustain in this day and age, because everything necessary for life is obtainable from a quick stop at the local grocery store. Our water just arrives when the tap is turned, in both hot and cold. Our power is available at the flip of a switch, and communication at the push of a button. In fact, it is all so easy that we have lost touch with what it takes to properly provide for ourselves, but it comes at the great cost of selling our time to others so we can purchase these same necessities that we as humans were once able to obtain independently. The flip side of the equation is of course comfort. The life that comes with a regular job, a regular home and a regular routine, is comfortable, and for many people that is what is most important. For me, I think it is robbing people of the opportunity to even know otherwise.
I approached this project with the vision of a story on "how to live off grid", but it was less than an hour of conversation with the family and I knew I wanted to do a story on the benefits coming from the lifestyle. The Berkinshaw family is a little different, one because they live remote and off grid, but also because they are mostly women. With six girls in a family of seven, you would expect the workload to be very biased, but they all share in the necessary jobs, and they are all very capable. Weather it is cooking, cleaning, fixing or hunting, everyone contributes and everything gets accomplished. It was really amazing to watch, because I don't believe they even understand how different and how accomplished they are individually. I found myself quite inspired throughout this whole visit, and I hope I can continue to learn and add these same values into my own life.
If you want to know more about the family, and how they have managed to create this lifestyle for themselves, you're lucky because they even have their own YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@UClt1rDdFd-VUX8VXmWummSQ
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