During COVID, I was exposed to the very terrifying reality of so many people losing their jobs. They had lived in rented apartments all their lives, bought from grocery stores, paid electricity and gas bills, and sent their kids to expensive schools. Missing a paycheck was like a death sentence to them. If you go to such a person and tell them they can live without money, they would not take you seriously—and rightly so. Their model of life revolves around money. My idea of a cashless commune centers around the core principle of showcasing that life without money is not only possible but actually quite amazing.
Yet, I started to think—what could I do? The obvious solution is to have a lot of money and help them all out. That’s how it usually works; however, this requires someone to make a lot of money. The other solution was to look at how these same people could live, survive, and thrive without money or with very little money.
Think about orphanages, widows with little to no skills for a modern workforce. Think about old people, think about the handicapped and people suffering from mental and physical ailments who simply cannot earn. Include in this a class of people who are not interested in the pressure of doing what’s available in the market as job options—where do they all go? How do you sustain them all?
This basic question—what do we need as humans, what do I need to live—made me think of a cashless system. Every time I have a full stomach, the next thought I have is about having friends around me, listening to good music or making something I like, walking in the wild with people I love, dancing, enjoying sunsets, sunrises. None of these require money. In fact, in the pursuit of money, a lot of people rarely do any of the things I just mentioned.
So, in my idea of a commune, money doesn’t just take a back seat—we put it in the trunk altogether. In the commune, we work. We work for ourselves, we work for each other, we work for our passions, we work because we love life and love doing it.
Think about it: life is free. The soil brings us fruits, grains, and everything we need to nourish ourselves. We breathe free air. We can build our shelters from trees and mud. Think of old native tribes—they were essentially living cash-free. Yet they thrived and some of the are living example of an alternate system that nourishes our body & soul, together.
Related reading: Meet Daniel Suelo, or reflect on wealth and human worth.
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