This week I was catching up with The Fabulous Beekman Boys on the Discovery Network. I love fun reality shows like this. It is such a better form of entertainment than watching bitchy, spoiled housewives fight and do stupid stuff. The Beekman boys are fun, smart, loving, and deal with real-life struggles like the rest of us…. well that is if your real-life struggle includes trying to sell $1 million worth of soap!
It was easy to overlook in the trailer, but the season arch for the show is that the farm needs to bring in $1 million for Josh to be able to move to the country full-time. And all season Brent is working his tail off to make that goal a reality. What I got out of this story line was……
- Someone out there is able to sell $1 million dollars of damn soap!!
- There’s a demand for artisan goat soap in the market?
- I need a $1million business idea! ….probably won’t be goat soap, though.
Backstory
Before finding The Beekman Farm, the boys lived in Manhattan where Brent was a prominent doctor and Josh an advertising executive. To meet all of their financial obligations, Josh is still working in the city and commutes out to the farm on weekends. Prior to The Beekman, Josh and Brent were New York power players living a life of wealth, power, influence, and glamour (I assume). They ran with the likes of Martha Stewart and dined at some of the finest restaurants in the city before commanding the city’s nightlife. In Manhattan, Josh and Brent were living the life many of us can only dream of. Ambitious and intelligent, these boys where doing everything right to make it big in the Big Apple.
I’m sure, growing up, each of their respective parents had dreams of their little boy growing up and getting a top-knotch education so they could go off and become a doctor or industry executive. Oh wait – they both did that. Parents and society at large feed us these messages of what success and happiness are suppose to look like. We’re told that the only way to make it in life is to get a good education and then find a safe, secure job with a pension and good retirement plan. Yea, like those exist any more.
Creating the life you want to live
That fast-paced, Manhattan-socialite life didn’t seem so ideal once Josh and Brent found The Beekman Farm. They instantly fell in love with the idea of an up-state farm life in a quaint village like Sharon Springs. The fabulous duo traded in their town cars for tractors and began building a whole new life on a real farm with real goats, a real garden, and real chores. Unharnessed from the life they ware expected to live, these city boys are making up new rules for which to live their lives by — and they are doing it with such fabulous flair.
The Beekman boys have learned one of the most difficult lessons there is for an adult: create the life you want to live and set your own rules.
It’s so easy to accept the status quo and live your life according to the rules of others. These un-documented, ubiquitous ‘rules’ would have us all believing the silly notion that a couple of smart and ambitious gay men belong in a city, while a farm is a place for the more rugged and hardy individual. These ‘rules’ assume that it’s important to go to college and find a safe corporate job before settling into the suburbs to raise a family. These ‘rules’ that so many of us blindly accept, don’t leave much room for dreaming and imagination. We are given a vague plan for how to live life and are expected to go live it.
So many people are mired in routine of daily life that they never take the moment to look around and ask if they’re truly happy. It’s difficult to objectively look at yourself and consider if your job makes you happy or only makes you a paycheck. If you’re working for money, you’re working for the wrong reasons. I can’t tell you how many talented people I know who feel stuck in a career because it fits their education, their training, it gives them a paycheck, they’re frightened, or they’re lazy. What’s worse are the people who are doing a job because they think it is expected of them.
Thankfully, Josh and Brent did take a moment of pause to reflect on their Manhattan lifestyle and evaluate if it was what they wanted out of life. They decided that what was expected of them no longer was fulfilling and instead choose The Beekman. What I admire most about these guys is in their ability to make a major change and create the life they want for themselves.
Through their style, creativity and marketing backgrounds, The Beekman Boys are bringing new excitement to the town of Sharon Springs, a new awareness in support of local farmers, teaching people why eating in-season is best for you and the planet, and reintroducing the beauty of quality craftsman-made products back to a world so accustom to mass-production. They are using their skills and talents to better their lives and the lives of everyone they come in contact with. Instead of focussing on climbing the corporate ladder, Josh and Brent have adopted a much smarter and wholesome business philosophy — one of people helping people.
Stop for a moment today or this weekend and ask yourself if you are happy with the life you are living. Are you living a life you created, or one that is expected of you. Do you have enough time, money, and health to do the things you enjoy doing? Maybe we can help each other out and prosper together, much like the citizens of Sharon Springs thanks to Josh and Brent.
To create your own life, you need time + money + health. Let me help you get them.
Question
Are you working just to get a paycheck, or does your job make you truly happy? Are you living the life you choose or are you doing what is expected of you? Think about those deep questions and comment in the section below. Or, instead, just tell me if you think artisan goat soap is a good foundation for a business.
