
GlowUp with Shaman Isis
GlowUp with Shaman Isis: An Edgy Podcast for Transformation and Higher Consciousness
Are you captivated by inspiring personal stories, hero journeys, and reflections on spirituality's place in modern life? Tune in to GlowUp with Shaman Isis, the bold and uplifting podcast by spiritual rockstar, 2x #1 best-selling author, and veteran podcaster Cynthia L. Elliott—aka Shaman Isis.
With her devilish style, straight talk, and angelic warmth, Shaman Isis shares stunning tales of her transformation—from a Tennessee orphanage to NYC PR diva to GlowUp Guru. She explores the raw, real, and often hilarious intersections of self-discovery, spirituality, and modern living through heartfelt solo episodes and riveting interviews with survivors, spiritual leaders, authors, and experts.
Shaman Isis is a fearless voice advocating for higher consciousness as the antidote to the mental health crisis—a message echoed in her first #1 bestseller, Memory Mansion. Dubbed a "female Kerouac," her self-love memoir is a refreshing call to reclaim your power and shine.
In GlowUp with Shaman Isis, topics like emotional mastery, unleashing your inner rockstar, and reclaiming your power take center stage.
Are you ready to GlowUp and rock your life?
Discover more at ShamanIsis.com or SoulTechFoundation.org.
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CITIZEN JOURNALIST
After a year of exhaustive reporting on the election and rapid evolution of AI, Shaman Isis is taking a break from her popular podcast, Citizen Journalist; those episodes are still available below.
Duration and frequency: The show shares 30-60 minutes biweekly
GlowUp with Shaman Isis
Farm to Future: State of American Agriculture with Shelby Watson Hampton
The untold story of American agriculture unfolds in this eye-opening conversation with Shelby Watson Hampton, a fourth-generation farmer, winemaker, and advocate for rural women. Did you know just 2% of Americans feed our entire nation? Or that women now make up 36% of all farmers—a number that continues to rise with each agricultural census?
From her family farm in Maryland, where she balances running a vineyard, winery, and wedding venue with advocating for agricultural communities, Shelby reveals how women are transforming the farming landscape. The traditional "work yourself into the ground" mentality is giving way to more holistic approaches that prioritize sustainability and mental health in an industry with one of the highest suicide rates in the nation.
Prepare to have your perception of farming shattered as we explore how cutting-edge technology is revolutionizing agriculture. Solar-powered "farm Roombas" scout fields autonomously while NASA satellite data informs planting decisions. Meanwhile, conservation practices like buffer strips and no-till drilling are helping preserve our precious topsoil—the six inches of earth upon which all human life depends.
Looking to connect with this movement? Check out Shelby's book "Grace, Grit and Lipstick," find your local soil conservation district, or visit a farmers market to support those growing food in your community. The future of farming—and by extension, our food security—depends on understanding and supporting this vital but often overl
Spiritual guru, two-time #1 best-selling author, and higher consciousness advocate Shaman Isis (aka Cynthia L. Elliott) is on a mission to turn the tide of the mental and spiritual health crisis with mindfulness practices, incredible events, powerful content, and motivational storytelling that inspire your heroes journey! Learn more about her books, courses, speaking engagements, book signings, and appearances at ShamanIsis.com.
Ready for a life transformation? Ready to bring your dreams to life? Then you will want Glowup With Shaman Isis: The Collection of inspiring books and courses filled with life lessons and practices that raise your vibration and consciousness.
Ready for a life transformation? Ready to bring your dreams to life? Then you will want Glowup With Shaman Isis: The Collection of inspiring books and courses filled with life lessons and practices that raise your vibration and consciousness.
GlowUp with Shaman Isis: An Edgy Podcast for Transformation and Higher Consciousness
Are you captivated by inspiring personal stories, hero’s journeys, and reflections on spirituality's place in modern life? Tune in to GlowUp with Shaman Isis, the bold and uplifting podcast by spiritual rockstar, 2x #1 best-selling author, and veteran podcaster Cynthia L. Elliott—aka Shaman Isis.
Discover more at ShamanIsis.com or SoulTechFoundation.org.
Follow her on social media at:
Hi and welcome to Glow Up with Shaman Isis. You guys, it is summertime in Florida and I am back for another episode of our fabulous podcast. If this is your first time here, glow Up with Shaman Isis interviews authors and leaders and entrepreneurs about their journey and what they're working on, and we talk about topics that are important to humanity, and today I'm so delighted to be talking about a topic that has actually been on my list now for a couple of months. First, let me welcome my guest. My goodness, welcome, shelby Watson Hampton to the show. Thank you so much for joining us today. Can you share a little bit about who you are with our audience?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited. The conversation we had before this was so amazing, so I can't wait to expand on it here. Yeah, so I'm going to give the quick. What a 60 second speech on me, right? So I, I live in Southern Maryland, which is about an hour South of Washington DC. We have a family farm, a farm with my husband and my aunt and my uncle. We have a vineyard, a winery and a wedding barn, which is a lot of fun and a lot of crazy, and I work a day job at a nonprofit that also works with farmers. And then I have my own little side hustle, of course, because everybody does these days building a community of women in rural living, like in country living farmers, ranchers, rural entrepreneurs, women who are in that space and want connection and, you know, a place to kind of vent occasionally, um, and figure out how we live our best version of this life, um, and yeah, and that's that's kind of what I do.
Speaker 1:It's so it's a lot of hats, but it's a lot of fun oh, I, I, I'm so excited because you, you, you work in like, several industries that are, to me, some of the most important that we should be having more conversations about as a country. So I mean between the barn and the weddings and the vineyard and the farming and the fact that you're working with farmers and as well as building a community, this is going to be such a juicy conversation. So before we started recording, we were having this amazing conversation about kind of where farming stands now in the country and some of the challenges that with a lot of people not really understanding the issues within farming. So can you just touch on on the kind of the industry and where it is kind of right now?
Speaker 1:I know that's a big question, but we can. We can keep going until you feel like it's satisfied.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I'm going to try to keep it fun and, like you said, juicy. All right, so let's start with some fun statistics. Okay, so picture the population of the U S, right, the whole country, like you're looking at the map. A hundred percent of the people that live in the U? S are fed by 2% of the people in the U? S. So farmers and ranchers and rural small businesses make up less than 2% of the US population. Of that 2%, 36% are women and that number has been rising every year.
Speaker 2:According to the USDA census, which goes out every several years, women are having a resurgence in agriculture. They've always been there, right? They've always been in the background. You think, typical farm mom, farm wife. She's keeping the house, she's feeding the farm hands, she's doing the chores in the barnyard, she's, you know, keeping the books, running to town and getting parts doing what she's doing. But a lot of times in previous generations and decades, those women weren't counted as part of the business or as part of the industry. Now they're being counted. And also now they're being counted and also now they're taking over family farms and they're coming up in the industry. There are more young women in 4-h and ffa than young men right now, which are some, you know, pre-college agricultural groups, um, and the rise of women in this business is is happening, and so with that, organically, comes a lot of other things that women bring to business right Intuition, gut instinct, maternal nurturing. We're seeing a change in the landscape and that's been really fun for me to watch.
Speaker 2:But at the same time there's a lot of hardship here. Farmers and ranchers are under a lot of stress with the tariffs that are happening. They're under a lot of stress with the changing climate and the weather. They're under a lot of stress with the lack of labor availability. Certain Americans don't want to do certain types of jobs, trying to find, you know, foreign labor. That's a big topic we won't get into right here, but it is something really important. And all of these tie into the larger American discussion of what's going on right now. And it's important because food security is really important for everybody in this country and the farmers and ranchers are the ones who are growing and raising this product.
Speaker 2:And I know you deal a lot with AI, which we talked about a little bit. That's another huge resurgence here. Farming is very technologically advanced. A lot of people don't realize that, but there's even several farming groups that work closely with NASA, and I sit on one of their boards. Yeah, it's called the nasa acres program, like acres because you farm in acres. It's an acronym, but it connects the satellite data with the farmers on the ground who are doing the work.
Speaker 2:Um, and there's a lot of technical advancements being made in this industry for conservation, sustainability, um, labor and a lot of the science that goes behind it. People don't know. You know, um, so ai has obviously integrated itself with that and, on the base level, you're having conversations about ai ethics with women like us who run a small business, and they're using ai for their copy content and for their social media and for their farm newsletter, and you know that's a great tool. But you also get into the question about authenticity, which is really important to today's consumers too, and like using it as a tool but not as your entire toolbox, you know, in your business and there's just a lot happening on all the levels.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's, it's. I think it's such a fascinating topic because it doesn't get the coverage, but it's, it's. You know there's the hierarchy of needs and food is way up there. It's, frankly, without it, we're kind of toast, and yet we don't really hear about it or talk about it.
Speaker 1:When I was growing up in Tennessee, there were farms everywhere, you know. There were horses and cows and all I mean. I saw it all. But even in school I remember a little bit like the classes where they would learn to fix cars and learn carpentry, hands-on craftsman skills. There was a huge percentage of the guys particularly that did farming and they were taught how to farm. The equipment was a part of the school, like equipment, and it was actually really supported, and so I would love to see us get back to a place where, as a country, not only do we as an average person understand the importance, the value, how it actually operates, but we support small farmers all over the country and we support people learning at a young age how to grow their own food and what that means and be able to value it as a skill set. Are you seeing a resurgence in the country of interest in farming?
Speaker 2:Yes and I love this. So where we are in Maryland, just right outside of DC, so we're in an urban area but there is pockets of rural country and that's where we're working in we have a huge new and beginning farmer surge. So new and beginning farmers are classified as someone who hasn't farmed more than 10 years and is getting into it kind of like on their own. So not your generational farmer who maybe came from their parents and grandparents, but you're talking a lot of folks right out of college or right out of high school and then second careers. Folks worked in technology or they were in the military or they were corporate for 20 and 30 years and they got burnt out and they're like I'm going back to the land, I want to throw myself into something that's more hands-on, and so where I work in my day job at a nonprofit, we have beginner farmer programs. We have grants for them. We work with the finance place that will also do like low interest agricultural loans.
Speaker 2:The USDA has beginner farmer rancher programs where you can also get grants and assistance, and every state in the country has an extension program. Typically comes out of your land grant university, so for us it's University of Maryland, so for us it's University of Maryland extension, but you can google the one in whatever part of the country you're in and you're listening to this, and they have programs just for farmers new, beginning, established, diversifying, organic, conventional and their stuff is free and so you can tap into that and help build your business. It's wonderful because there's a lot of interest, but it's very challenging because the top three barriers for these new and beginning farmers are access to land, being able to afford land and equipment and labor. So we run into that, you know, and so try to help people through that process and get more established. But we are seeing it and we need it.
Speaker 2:I'm going to finish with one more statistic on this. The average age of the farmer in the US right now is 58. They're going to be aging out, they're going to be retiring and there's going to be a massive gap in people who can come in and fill those shoes. So we have been trying to we as an industry, been trying to encourage people to get in and to break down some of those barriers to make it, you know, a better way of living and a better way of doing business.
Speaker 1:That's so interesting. You know, growing up in the 80s and 90s, I remember watching as capitalism ate up a lot of industry. I watched Walmart come in and take over. I watched imports increase dramatically and get crappier and crappier and more toxic every year, and I watched processed food take off and and so the small farmer really got kind of eaten alive, like many industries. It's just like Walmart killed all the mom and pop tool shops and hardware stores, I should say, and things like that. That's something that I watched happen to that industry. Are you seeing a resurgenceurgence kind of a return to? I mean, is it? Is it sort of taking back off again, or are imports still like eating us alive?
Speaker 2:um, so, yeah, what you're talking about in the 80s and 90s, um, it happened in the farming industry and it happened. It was like the go big or go home mentality. The go bigger or get out is actually what they call it. Go big or get out was was phrase, and so it was buy more land, buy more equipment, go more in debt, owe more to the seed companies, owe more to the equipment companies. If you're not making big enough, then there's no room for you here with trying to come back from that 80s and 90s mentality. We're making strides because people are committed to it bringing the middleman back, bringing the small farmer back, bringing the diversified and niche farmers back. Of course, we still need big ag and I'm not anti-big ag, I am pro-everybody ag. So we need the big guys to feed the world. Okay, right, what? 9 billion people on the planet or something like that. We need the big guys who can do it ethically and sustainably to feed the world. But we also need the smaller and the middle men who can feed their local communities and can do it on a smaller scale and create jobs in the community and create sustainability there and the actual feeling of knowing your farmer and knowing your neighbor, america's trying to come back to that. I think we're trying to rebuild community after being separated for so long. Um, and food and wine, I might add, and any other product that's agriculturally based is a great way to do that.
Speaker 2:But really quick, before I forget, um, I'm a huge book nerd, but there's a book. Okay, you guys remember the movie erin brockovich, right, julia roberts, erin brockovich. In the story she was like, small town woman went after the big chemical company. That was like. There's a book called the farmer's lawyer and it's by Sarah Vogel and it's she's basically the Erin Brockovich of the farming community and she took on the US government in the 80s and 90s when they were decimating family farms and foreclosing on them through an old USDA program, and she, she represented what they called the North Dakota Nine and it was nine farmers in North Dakota and her who, like, went to bat in a very David and Goliath story about big ag and big government. And I've never met this woman, but I'm a huge stan, so if you want something juicy, that's real, the farmer's lawyer.
Speaker 1:I've heard of her before. I think I remember that I've heard of, definitely heard of the before. I think I think I remember that I've heard of, definitely heard of the the case that you that you're referring to, Um, yeah, you know, uh, well, I, one of my big things that I beat a lot is that, uh, the drum I beat on a lot is that, uh, I have an eco fashion collection. I worked in fashion for a really long time and I got very frustrated because I was, I had an agency and I was working with all these brands and I worked with a lot of fashion writers and I just kept seeing that there wasn't a whole lot of effort to try to make sustainable clothing, because it was just all about profit, all about profit, and I think that's literally killed this. It's actually still killing this country. The capitalistic all-for-profit idea is so stupid because it's short-term gains for long-term destruction, and so you know, um, uh, you know I got really impressed.
Speaker 2:Good, oh sorry, that's really fascinating. I could talk on that for longer than we probably have I I another thing I do is I write um. I write editorials for agricultural publications, so a couple of newspapers and a couple of magazines and I did an article on, like recently, the recommitment to sustainable fiber and fabric that some folks are doing and how they're tying it to certain farms where they're getting, you know, their cotton or their wool or their angora or whatever they're using, and how that was coming up and why it was important.
Speaker 1:So I love that, frustrated, so I produced my own collection, which was the pain of two years. It took two years to produce a small collection in this country because of how challenging and how difficult it has been made, and to try to get away from going to Asia for all of it was very difficult. It really gave me this up close and personal like, oh my God, no wonder they don't do it, because it takes time, money, patience, engineering. You know, the design aspect of each piece alone is its own nightmare, and I think of our food in the same way. Like how much of our farming issues does. The imports, the fact that imports were allowed to just sort of get out of control. Imports, the the fact that imports were allowed to just sort of get out of control. I mean, I believe we should be an exporter of things and not a country that just that, just imports stuff from other countries and makes them rich while we're not making or selling anything.
Speaker 2:yeah, so ag imports and exports are a huge discussion. Um, yes, and we do a lot of both. We do export and we do import. Um, and those have changed over the years.
Speaker 2:I am by no means an expert in the trade of those products, but normally when you're talking like imports and exports, a lot of the stuff we're exporting is going to be grain, so corn, soybeans, things of that nature. Unfortunately, we bring in a lot of beef, like we bring in a lot of beef from like Argentina and Brazil, where there's a push right now to eat more local American beef, and we raise a lot of beef from like Argentina and Brazil, where there's a push right now to eat more local American beef, and we raise a lot here too. But we import a lot and that brings up questions on ethics and carbon footprint and you know buying local versus shipping something from overseas and you know what are their sustainability practices or their humane animal raising practices. You know, but a lot of stuff you see in the supermarket unless it says you know American raised or. Or you know, but a lot of stuff you see in the supermarket unless it says you know American raised or you know American made, it's coming from somewhere else. No-transcript.
Speaker 1:People have also been trained into cheap. This is another thing that annoys me. It's like the whole, like sheen and you know, get it but have no understanding of at their purchases and the vast majority of them are are about the cheapest thing and and we have to get to a place where we can plan forward and be willing to take the short-term pain of creating long-term health in our, in our industries. Is that you see the same thing in China?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you know, the conversation that comes into that too is when we talk about food access, which is really, for you know, accessibility to local, fresh and affordable food and you look at the millions of Americans that go hungry or having to use benefits like the SNAP and the WIC and the EBT, and and many of these folks are working hard and they're working multiple low-income jobs and they can't afford the premium price that a lot of places have to put on local food because the work that does go into it. Like I said, people have gotten addicted to cheap and I acknowledge the privilege that comes with, you know, being able to have enough income to buy the quality product that does cost more, because there are some families who cannot do that. There are some families who cannot do that. And that's a larger conversation, too, of where we are in this country when it comes to working class families and and you know prices they can afford and what things are being charged and the rate of inflation. And yeah, it's, it's it's so nuanced and it's complicated and it's all shades of gray.
Speaker 2:I think the best thing for folks is what it's kind of like do what you can when you can. You know, be a conscious consumer, but know that everyone goes through ups and downs. There might be times in your life when you can't afford to do that, but when you can, you know it's great. And not everything has to be based on money either. So capitalism does train us that way. But you know, sharing a farmer's Facebook post or posting about a farmer that you like on Instagram or sharing their product costs nothing. Even if you're not buying it, you know other people might be able to. You know, showing up at a farmer's market and greeting your farmers and you know just buying a couple of small things makes a big difference. Supporting community efforts to naturally engage sustainably is important, and there's a lot of resources out there for that too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would love to see. I'm a big fan of farmers markets. I would actually love to see farmers markets in every city across the country be financially supported by the country, so that.
Speaker 2:Oh God, wouldn't that be nice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it really would be. And you know it also gives people access to healthier food and a community environment in which to learn more about food and engage with their farmers. And community creates love, and love really is what drives the world forward. And it sounds silly to some people, but it's like no events in our towns and cities across the country that bring people into an area together has been shown scientifically to raise the, the to help, in so many different ways. I also say very spiritually, like it raises the vibration. That's my wording, but they measure it in different ways. Yeah, and another thing that I think is really important too is that you know, I'm so glad to see that we're going after the processed foods, but I think we need to parallel the going after processed foods and pharmaceuticals and all that with how are we going to actually create better?
Speaker 1:things in other areas, and one of them is our food. Soil is a topic that I have talked about for a really long time. I wrote about it in my first book, because a lot of people don't understand that a lot of our soil that keeps getting reused has been depleted of its vitamins and minerals. So it apparently, they say, takes one orange I mean seven oranges approximately to equate the vitamins and minerals of one that was raised when I was a child. Is soil a topic of conversation in the farming world? I mean, I'm sure it is.
Speaker 2:I mean, it's the conversation and full disclosure. My husband is a farm planner at our soil conservation district, so soil is a conversation in our household frequently. And there is actually another bug. There is a soil conservation district in every county, in every state. Find yours, ok. They do pollinator gardens, they give grants, they will come out and test your soil, they'll help you plant something in your backyard or if you're doing urban farming or rural farming. There's a soil conservation district in every county, in every state, and you can Google them.
Speaker 2:And there is a quote and I am going to forget. I can see this image of the quote and the gentleman who says it, but I'm going to forget his name. The quote and the gentleman who says it, but I'm going to forget his name. Uh, it goes. Most people don't know that we owe our existence to a six inch layer of top sale topsoil and the fact that it occasionally rains. It's like the entirety of the human condition is based on six inches of topsoil and the fact that we occasionally get rain um because you know, that's where we get our food.
Speaker 2:so, yes, um, I have several friends of mine who've gone through college and got their masters and their doctorates just in soil. That's what they do. God forbid you call it dirt in their presence. It's not dirt, it's soil. It has millions of living micro, microorganisms and things in it. Um, so yeah, um, so much I could say on it. It is the basis of life.
Speaker 1:It really is. And when it's in crappy condition, uh, the food's in crappy condition, which eventually leads to chronic illnesses and, uh, and issues within humanity, the cycle of of life. Um, I just lost my train of thought completely. I was like what was I going to say? So what are some surprises? Because you brought up a few things there, I think, about the soil, that I think some people will find surprising unless they're holistic or a healer or a farmer, that kind of thing. What are some other things about farming or the farm world or the challenges that people might find surprising, farming or the farm world or the challenges that people might find surprising.
Speaker 2:Well, let's jump off the soil thing and kind of go in that direction. So we're talking about the soil conservation districts. Their whole mission is to preserve soil, to preserve environments, to help farmers farm sustainably with the environment, and so they have what they call BMPs best management practices. So BMPs, like in our area of the country, are going to be brass waterways, so putting grass, that is to catch any runoff from the farm field before it hits a waterway like a creek or a pond or a river. Buffer strips for the same reasons, doing no-till drilling, which means you're not turning over the soil, so you're not drilling into it. Like when you think of an old-fashioned farmer plowing a field, you think of the plow turning the soil so you're not drilling into it. Like when you think of an old-fashioned farmer plowing a field, you think of the plow turning the soil over. A no-trail drill just does a quick little hole where it can drop the seed in. It doesn't actually turn the soil which helps prevent erosion.
Speaker 2:It helps uh keep carbon in there and carbon capture um. It helps keep runoff from happening. Um another bmp is like a pollinator habitat right we again.
Speaker 2:we owe a lot of our lives to pollinators too, Like the bees are out there doing yeah, the butterflies, the pollinators, so things of that nature, and a lot of farmers are doing this and people don't know about it and you don't know what it looks like. You're just driving by a field and you see like a grassy patch in the distance that isn't being worked and it's got like plot that might be a pollinator, plot that might be a grass buffer strip that's actually preventing. And um, one thing the farming world has been really, really good about over the last 20 ish years or so is investing money and time and resources into conservation. And so there is a saying in the farming world that farmers are the first conservationists for the first environmentalists because they work closely with the animals in the soil and they base their livelihood off of it.
Speaker 2:You know like they're feeding their livelihood off of it. You know like they're feeding their families off how good they can do this. And you don't want to deplete your, your family farm. You know you want to keep it as holistic as possible. Being said, you do need to do certain things. I mean, there are certain parts of the country where we're growing food that you know it does need to be sprayed, that that's going to be unavoidable. There are a lot of pests out there. But there's organic sprays. There's sprays that are very, very controlled you can be very careful with, you can do your best management practices, but it's constantly kind of a push and pull between, like, the latest and greatest science and a bit more or holistic approach, and so most people kind of balance that they straddle the line somewhere in the middle.
Speaker 1:Can you paint a little bit of a picture for our listeners about how AI could be utilized to support farming in America?
Speaker 2:She's like yes, I love it. It's funny because before AI as we know it, artificial intelligence ever existed. I mean ever existed, existed in the farming world. Ai refers to artificial insemination. Okay, artificial insemination is when you're breeding your animals and you don't do it live cover, you do it, you know yourself, um, which has been a best practice for a lot of industries over the years. Um, so now, when we're in the industry of ag and we talk about AI, you have to. You have to caveat artificial insemination or artificial intelligence, do what you will with that metaphor. I'm sure there's something Freudian in there, I don't know. But yes, ai, I think, is both a burden and a blessing. I think it's going to be like any technology we create it can be used wonderfully or it can be used horribly, and it's up to us as a human society, a collective, which you're working a lot on, to come to kind of the ethical parameters of this and how we're going to do it.
Speaker 2:But a lot of folks don't realize the science that goes into ag and has been for decades, like some of the most cutting edge science, is coming out of the agricultural industry. They call it like precision application, precision conservation, and so AI is wrapped all up in that too. So I was at a farming workshop just last week where a company came in that had created a drone for the land. So think of it like a Roomba. It was like a farm Roomba and it was, you know, like 10 feet tall and maybe like 16 feet wide, with a very small footprint, and it just had these two little wheels and it goes down the rows of the field and can look for weeds and pests. It can basically scout for the farmer, like see what's in the field, and take live video and picture and identify these things.
Speaker 2:And it runs completely off solar. It's got solar panels on the top, completely off solar, so no electric needed charges itself. It can be out in the field all year round. It's they super sturdy, um, it sends videos and things right back to the farmer's phone. The farmer can run it from a phone or an iPad.
Speaker 2:And it was funny because I was watching this thing in the field and I was like, oh my God, that's cool. And it turned around and started coming back to us and I looked up and the engineers had put eyeballs on it Okay, digital eyeballs on the front and it's blinking at you as it's coming back down the field and I was like, oh my god, it's a giant tamagotchi, um, and it's just looking at this thing and you're like it's cool, it's sustainable, it's it's, it's helping with the conservation, it's helping with the farmer's time and the fact that they don't have a lot of labor. And it's ai and here it is and it's you know. But then you also look at AI as like, oh my God, the robots are going to take over the world and what are we going to do? So I think, like any industry, it's happening. We have to have the conversations. There is no getting off this train right. Humans have committed to this, like the AI revolution is happening now and the people that want to stop it or go backwards.
Speaker 1:That never works right Like that never will. Yeah, yeah, so we have to figure it out. Yeah, god. And, and you know, before we started recording, we were talking and you had mentioned that 36% of farmers are now women, which I think is really cool. Can you talk about that for a minute?
Speaker 2:Yes, I love it so much. So women have historically been involved in family farms and family businesses, you know, since the beginning of time, but they weren't counted in the USDA agricultural census when you click the box for farmer. They weren't counted until a couple cycles ago. Farm or a family business they're not just feeding the family and doing the farm books and running to town for parts, you know, and picking their husband up and moving equipment. They're doing that and that's a big part of it. But a lot of women are taking over the family farm, getting into farming on their own, starting their own businesses. And, yeah, 36% of all farmers in the country are now women and the number goes up every time they do a USDA census.
Speaker 2:And you talked about, by the way, you said you're from Tennessee. I heard it's playing in there and I know you're in Florida and I was gonna say I wonder if she's like the West side of Florida. But I caught that little Southern bit there which I love. You were talking about growing up in Tennessee and how there were farm programs for kids. There still is a very active Future Farmers of America they go by just FFA now and 4-H in a lot of parts of the country and so you know kids get in that and they learn different farming practices and different skills and the right now in 4-H and FFA the girls outpace the boys. More women are interested in the industry than ever before.
Speaker 2:And what comes with that is women approach work and life differently, right, think maternal instinct, think women's intuition, think like multitasking and more of like a holistic 30 foot thousand view. What we're seeing coming out of this is a rejection of the way we've traditionally been told farms and businesses have to run, which in the farming community it's work yourself into the ground until you burn out or die. Okay, and that's why there's a huge farmer mental health crisis, which we don't have time to talk about here, but you can Google it the farmer suicide rate is one of the highest in the nation of any industry.
Speaker 2:And there have been groups working on that now for eight to 10 years. But women coming in are making a difference in the fact that this generation, specifically I'll say younger Gen X, elder millennial through the lower millennials right now are kind of in that age range. They're like I'm not going to do this till I, like I'm not going to work myself into the dirt, like I'm going to take breaks, I'm going to relax, my family will go on a vacation. Even though we're farmers, you know we'll find someone to come in and take care of the animals. That whole 24, seven, three, 65 burnout is a badge of honor is slowly changing and I credit a lot to that for women coming into the industry and realizing like this needs to be more holistically done.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think AI will really help with that. Yeah, wow, this is. I could just keep talking to you and picking that brain. Can you take a minute to share? Share a little bit about the vineyard and the the the wedding barn and all this lovely. You've got a million things going on, like so many of us these days.
Speaker 2:Yes, we do. Thank you for that shameless ability to pitch. I love your frankness.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we are Robin Hill Farm and Vineyards. You can find us online. We are actually women run and women owned. My aunt owns the farm and then my aunt, myself and both of our husbands own the business collectively together. So we're fourth generation. I'm raising the fifth coming up now. He was helping me clean stalls this morning before we got on this interview. Um, so we are open all year round. Basically, we take a quick break in january, but basically february through december and we ship wine. So you can find us if you want to ship stuff out. Um, we only sell wine on the property at our farm winery or through online, and we've won some national and international awards, which is kind of cool. That's awesome.
Speaker 1:Thank you.
Speaker 2:And so that's. My aunt and uncle are there full time. My husband and I are there nights and weekends. We work other full time jobs. I mentioned that he's in the soil conservation district. I work for an agricultural nonprofit that helps farmers market their products, connect consumers like, utilize resources. So I'm in the farming industry for my day job and then I have my own little side hustle called the farmed life, and the farmed life is online. You can find me on Instagram, on the website LinkedIn. The farmed life is what I started as a collective gathering place for rural women, women in farming and ranching. Entrepreneurial. Small town as a place to gather, share resources. Small Town as a Place to Gather, share Resources, find Connection, bitch and Moan occasionally, because we all need a little therapy every now and then, and I provide resources there and I feature a lot of other women. And out of that came the book that I wrote and published just about 18 months ago. That was actually number one in its category.
Speaker 1:Do you have a copy? You know what, literally, my mother came over last night.
Speaker 2:Um, that was actually number one in its category. Do you have? Do you have a copy? You know what? Literally, my mother came over last night and was like my girlfriend in my bunco club needs a copy of your book. Will you sign it? And I gave it to her.
Speaker 2:So I'm sitting here in my house with no copy in front of me, but I'm going to tell you the title. It's grace grit and lipstick. Oh, I love it, I love it and it's that's the full gray scritten lipstick. And then it's, you know, it's for the modern farm woman and her curious farm friends, like her farm curious friends. So not just farming or ranching women, but people who are interested to get a peek behind the curtain on this world we've been talking about in here. It shares some heartfelt stories, it's sure, some challenges, it's sure, some great statistics. I feature 15 other farm and rural entrepreneurial women in there, mostly in the US, but a few in Canada and what they do, and you can find them online and stuff, and it's been a lot of fun. So Grace Gritton Lipstick, if you want to find it, by Shelby Watson Hampton it is everywhere books are sold.
Speaker 1:I love it. You guys I'll put links in the text for the podcast so you guys can go check them out. Shelby Watson Hampton. Bestselling author, philanthropist, mom, wine producer. I mean just I love. I love the dynamicness of all of that and and a women's advocate. Thank you. Just an incredible mix of caring for the community, and we need that so much. So, thank you, gosh. Just an incredible mix of, uh, caring for the community, and we need that so much. Uh, so, thank you, gosh. Thank you so much for coming on the show.
Speaker 2:Um this has been so much fun and I feel so connected, Like we're going to be friends now I know we've already connected online, but like this is going to be stuff in the DMs. Okay, this is going to be like 3 AM, I'm thinking and I'm going to be like I got to text her.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, seriously, I felt. It felt like. I felt like talking to somebody I've known forever, which is awesome.
Speaker 2:I love that synchronicity and I do think that's spiritual and I do think that's a vibration.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I agree with you Speaking of spiritual. If you're not already subscribed to the glow up with shaman ISIS podcast, what are you thinking it's intelligent listening, where we laugh, cry and and share. You know the battles and talk about important topics that matter to the, to the future of humanity. We have entered the age of ai and the age of aquarius and it's a time of extraordinary change and we, as a collective, can manifest the future, uh, that we envision together, one that benefits, um, everyone and not just a handful of people and powerful companies. If that's the kind of thing that interests you, you might want to go check out those kinds of topics. If that interests you, you might want to go check out some of my books. I've got Memory Mansion, which is my memoir, unleash the Empress, which shares my spiritual practices, and A New American Dream, which is about how America can use the artificial intelligence to reignite the dream. And we need that. We need to use this fourth industrial revolution to put ourselves back on the map, because we've lost a lot over the last 20 years, because capitalism kind of sold us out, and that's just truth. It's not me whining, but we can't face our problems if we don't talk about them honestly. And if you love to come together with other people who speak the truth and want to build a beautiful future, then you have to join us.
Speaker 1:September 4th in Boca Raton, at the Countess de Hornley Theater, we are hosting the Soul Tech Future Festival, which is a benefit for the Soul Tech Foundation. That's my foundation to bring practices that create a beautiful lived experiences to underserved communities, everything from yoga and meditation to basic AI skills, to help people in underserved communities be able to succeed in this new world we've entered and, most importantly, to help turn the tide of the mental health crisis. So come join us at the SoulTech Future Festival. You can learn more about it at soultechfoundationorg and you can learn more about my work and books at shamanicistcom. And that took a lot longer to say than I was expecting it to, but you guys go check it out.
Speaker 1:I'm sending you love and wishing you all the most beautiful, beautiful summer. And Shelby, thanks again.
Speaker 2:You know I'm going to be talking to you. I think we have collaborations in our future and I love this. And thank you so much for thinking of me and allowing me to be on the podcast and to speak to your guests. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Oh no, I love it. I love it. Go be with that little one. Enjoy your weekend, shelby. Bye, you guys have a great week.