What is 'Sisu'

written by

Aila Holley

posted on

January 21, 2020

This is one of the first questions I get about our farm.  "What is Sisu?"  Sisu is a Finnish word and concept that I grew up with.  There is no direct English translation but as it was explained to me by my father when I was a child and later my Finnish host families when I was a 4-H exchange student in 1999: Sisu is a determination, stubbornness and work ethic that will get you through just about anything.   It's grit, determination and guts.  

When we were trying to pick a name for the farm we wanted something that was personal to us but not our name, we wanted to have the option to expand or partner with others if we decided and not be limited by the name.  When my mom suggested Sisu it seemed so appropriate in so many ways.  Farming in the mountains of Colorado is not for the faint of heart.  Long winters, short summers, predation, distance from urban areas to connect with customers and obtain feed and supplies are a few of  challenges we've faced this first year.   


It also takes a fair amount of guts, determination, crazy and well Sisu to totally change career path and lifestyle in your late 30's with 4 kids under 8.  While we are back in the community where we both grew up, when we decided to take this new adventure on we were living in Los Angeles both working in TV production for 13 years.  We had some knowledge of farming, Asa grew up with sheep and pigs.  Later his family added the Scottish Highland cattle, which we had some distance knowledge of.  Two things that really drove us in this direction was seeing how the food we ate had such a huge impact on our health, I'll tell more of that story next week, and we had seen with our own eyes how you can create and restore an eco system when you heal the soil and work in sync with nature.  I'll share the story of our backyard garner in Los Angeles soon too.  We also knew that being back in a small community and closer to nature would give our kids more of the experiences we had had growing up.  

So that's what Sisu is and why we felt it was a fitting name for our farm.

Sisu

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