“Money is like water. It can be a conduit for commitment, a currency of love. Money moving in the direction of our highest commitments nourishes our world and ourselves. What you appreciate appreciates. When you make a difference with what you have, it expands. Collaboration creates prosperity. True abundance flows from enough; never from more. Money carries our intention. If we use it with integrity, then it carries integrity forward. Know the flow—take responsibility for the way your money moves in the world. Let your soul inform your money and your money express your soul. Access your assets—not only money but also your own character and capabilities, your relationships and other nonmoney resources.”
― Lynne Twist

“We have come to believe that men and women who do not work harder than they wish at jobs they do not particularly enjoy are bad people unworthy of love, care, or assistance from their communities. It is as if we have collectively acquiesced to our own enslavement.”
― David Graeber

It’s hard to reason about money when it has a kind of theological position in our culture. My old stories about money fall into a few categories. Maybe you have entertained some of these ideas yourself.

Being liked or accepted

If I seem to have money, I will be subtly ostracized or mistrusted by others
If I appear to have a low income (or even an ‘average’ income) I will not seem credible as a consultant/job candidate/human
If I speak of struggling with money, people may believe (or find out) shameful things about me, like I am dealing with emotional struggles or I was fired from a job
If I charge for my time at a rate that reflects my worth, I will be rejected or seen as greedy

Fairness

If I receive less money than other people with similar levels of education/experience/power/hierarchical role, it’s not fair
If I speak about struggling with money, I am being insensitive to people with more systemic disadvantages than mine
I have had many advantages so I should make a lot of money
I have had many challenges so I’ve been kept from making money
Fair pay is the same thing as getting what other people get for the work
Non-male founders get ridiculously little investment

Worth

If I receive more money than other people with similar levels of education/experience/power/hierarchical role, it’s a sign of my worth or negotiating prowess
My personal work is not valuable enough, not good enough
How much money I can raise is a reflection of the potential of my startup’s success

Safety

I should always be in an upward earning trajectory
If I don’t make enough money, my life will fall apart
You need at least a million dollars to be able to retire
Having a job, a house, a retirement account makes you safe
I can’t afford to take time off
I can’t have a vacation if I’m not working

Identity

I should be doing things for money that reflect ‘who I am.’
What’s holding me back from doing what I love is that it’s not a good way to make money
Finding a way to make money and do what I love is difficult or impossible
If people see all my sides then I will be too something to be hired
The person who I’m in relationship with should make enough money
Good people don’t care about money
Good people don’t neglect their responsibilities by being financially unstable
If I were a ‘real’ founder I would be making a product that investors were lining up to fund
I can’t do creative work without having enough money to take the time to do it full-time

Competence

If I worked harder I would make more money
If I made more money, my life would be better
I need to find a benefactor
I don’t have the credentials to make money
All I need to do is get over my fear of being visible and I will make money
I can’t find a job even when I lower my standards
I shouldn’t pay someone to do something for me if I could do it myself
It’s naive to think you could make money without sacrificing your principles
Great founders fundraise and bring in large capital investments as a result of their storytelling skills and clear business acumen

It took many years to wrangle with all of these stories and to realize I was operating with faulty priors in the first place.

When it comes to money, there are many ways to get out of right relation with myself and with others. As with any wisdom I have discovered, there are lots of ways to refute what might feel true to me, lots of ways to prove that the wisdom is wrong because there are people for whom the wisdom doesn’t apply.

Wisdom that speaks to me continues speaking, often in layers, often with my own objections layered on.

Wisdom related to money tends to activate me and other people and leads to many objections. Money often proxies for value among us, even in situations that such a metaphor doesn’t hold up well.

In conversation with Peter Limberg from the Stoa / Less Foolish we’ve explored the idea of Alivelihood, framed as “How to make money while doing what makes you come alive?“

Right now I believe that at some point a choice is required to commit to aliveness. For me, any kind of strategising doesn’t support this, it only gets in the way. In other words, aliveness as I experience it starts in the body, in the choice to listen to what is there for me in the interplay of breath, blood, being. The truth rests and abides. It doesn’t need to lead to making money. It does need the conditions to be able to be nourished, literally and spiritually. At times I hear people say having this nourishment is a privilege or a right. To me, it is a choice.

There are a lot of ways this can feel unskillful to express. Do I think it’s easy for people who are financially struggling to make this choice? No. But it’s also, at least from what I’ve observed, quite hard, at least as hard, for people who do have resources.

Making this choice doesn’t mean, “now I am alive all the time in everything I do.” Very few people I have met get to even 50% aliveness without making many choices, without being constantly in the practice of choice, without bumping up against all the deadening we are culturally conditioned to.

What I’m experiencing is that being alive, listening to the body, being willing to be slow leads to more discernment about opportunities. There are certainly people who have found material success by grinding and hustling, and sometimes it feels very alive for me to work hard, to work a lot, to press up against exhaustion. But it does not feel alive to be in fear about the repercussions of not making enough money. It seems more like a situation where, when I keep returning, keep doing the things that feel like they have a positive impact on the world, ways of supporting that show up.

In the conversation with Peter, I came up with a list of heuristics or ways of approaching money that emerged from a time when I went through the (unintentional) experience of having no money, no housing, and no income. I had an amazing transformation when I saw that I remained loved and cared for and that my main job was surrender.

How to be alive while making money

Taking action

Know my worth isn’t about money
Act from love, not fear
Know that I’m OK, loved, where I need to be
Believe that it’s possible to have what I need without having to be something that isn’t aligned
Welcome fear as an opportunity to see where faith is leaky
Ship things – get things out into the world not just in my head
Know that I am going to die no matter how much money I have
Welcome the possibilities in uncertainty
Be willing to live without convenience or comfort if doing so makes aliveness possible
Put connection first, be in right relation

Letting go

If opportunities to make money arise that align with my values, don’t turn them down
Don’t under-charge for my work or discount myself
Don’t prioritize free work over paid work
Put my full self into the paid work I do, even if it’s small or not ‘important’
Don’t let ego get in the way of being honest about my needs and my availability
Don’t spend my free time sucked into things that don’t create value for me, i.e. scrolling, shopping, or participating in social media except as very necessary (but still have fun and read and take in information that feels valuable or thought-provoking)
Notice when I want to blame, make excuses, or get into grievance
Address any dishonesty, mistakes, or dis-compassion
Amend situations where my actions impede others’ opportunities to live in their fullness

Any prescription that says, ‘this is how you make money’ feels like it takes me in a direction away from my source of aliveness.

Instead, the more I can feel into the interconnectedness of everything, the more it feels like my best bet is to be in trust, neither trying nor resisting earning money. There’s an underlying abundance that only gets distorted by trying to claim some of it as “mine.” As a tech person, I love the metaphor of open source, of cascading open-ness. The world is not headed in a direction that has any security other than what I can find in my own body and my connection to the world and the people with whom I’m in relationship.