I used to hate money. I hated it because I had lots of things I wanted to do that would “add value” as people would like to say, but none of those things had established ways of earning income, or when they did, they required such a degree of standardization that they no longer allowed me to be myself . At the same time, much of the work that people do actually contributes little to society or even hurts society while they are praised for “contributing to society” Those who expect more from themselves are often considered “lazy” or with their head in the clouds because they don’t want to suck it up and do something they hate and fool themselves into thinking they’re helping society or “adding value” .

I no longer hate money, because I see it for what it is. It’s energy that’s been tied up in a system. It’s a manufactured substitute for trust that we are lacking in each other. When you see it this way, you can easily understand and empathize with why people hate it and also see why to do away with it would be a denial of where we are at as a society. Hating our limitations is no way to overcome them. We need to own where we are at in order to improve. It’s not a necessary evil, it’s just where we are at. Hating money will only give more power to the greedy, the only thing that can take power away from money and give it back to people is building trust between individuals and communities. You may feel no need for any of that, but I personally feel that’s the general direction we need to go in to get past a lot of our current problems.

Now that societys ideas about money are changing and loosening up, I actually have an opportunity to make money doing what I love, so “bring it!” Is how I feel. I’m excited to get rich and share that wealth with others until there are pockets of people who can get their shit together enough to grow and share abundance without money, which I don’t really need to happen in my life time, as long as I can help trust between people grow with my work.

I do believe in a gift economy but I don’t feel any need to force it on others, that would be hypocritical.