Eliminating Money

image courtesy The Candor

There have been a lot of financial stresses in my life lately, and today while standing in the kitchen wondering what on earth would sit well on my flu-rampaged stomach the thought came to me (not for the first time), of how nice it would be to just eliminate money all together.

Fair warning: I am still somewhat in the grip of aforementioned flu and will not be held responsible for my vocabulary or the lack of it in this post. I had to try four times before I could properly spell “eliminating” in the title.

You would either have to be a complete and total bum, or someone incredibly motivated, strong, and intelligent. I’m just imagining how completely lovely it would be to 1) have everything I paid for (i.e., not owe rent OR a mortgage every month), 2) skilled enough to provide most of my own food, 3) know enough otherwise skilled people to trade for other necessities, and 4) not be dependant on big companies for things like electricity and internet (electricity = solar, internet = ??).I can’t imagine how much WORK that would all be. I can only begin to imagine it, and even just that brings me back down to earth with a hard bump, because I was just looking in my kitchen cabinets complaining to myself about how long it would take to make some rice as opposed to ordering a pizza. I haven’t always been like that. When I was growing up it was enforced, not by my choice, but I can see now that eating at least from pantry stores if not straight from our own garden saved us a good deal of money and was healthier for us as well.

I think what I really want (not most want, but it’s high up on the list) is to be as self-sufficient as I can possibly be. I hate depending on anyone else and I especially hate being essentially held captive to high bills on freaking everything because, well, that’s our standard of living and there’s only one company that provides that service to this particular area. Grrrr.

I realize this is a pipe dream that is mostly born of frustration. I wouldn’t really want to cut myself completely off from the world (I’d go insane worrying about what the hell was going on). It would all have to come back down to that ever-elusive state of being – balance. Harmony, beauty, balance. Also when it comes right down to it, I don’t want to spend all of my time being a farmer, even though yes, I love being on the land, listening to the plants and the trees. My first love is helping people, and I want to continue to pursue that through medical avenues. But that in itself would work well in a sustainable-style life.

The problem being how much goddamn money it takes to get there in the first place. It feel like a brutal merry-go-round that I can’t even try to win for already losing.