I Have Never Understood Money

About what happens when we stop pretending that all contributions cost the same - and start counting in more currencies than money

I have never understood money. Not the way others seem to. It stresses me, sometimes even frightens me, and it enters conversations that are really about something else and makes everything else smaller. In the worlds I try to move in - the regenerative, the circular - I see how money both enables and at the same time locks us into old patterns.

I understand why society is built around money and the efficiency created by following a certain frequency. Salaries arrive at the end of the month. Taxes are paid once a year. The regular rhythm. But I have often moved at a different pace. Where money demands continuity, sharpness, foresight and accumulation, I have lived more in intensity and in-between spaces. When I am ready to talk about value, others have already moved on. Promises are broken. Debt appears. And we lack language for what happens in between - the human dimension of the transaction. Money is instrumental. What happens in the exchange is what is truly important and interesting.

Early in life I thought I needed two tracks. One where I earned enough, and another where I did what felt meaningful. They never met. What mattered rarely carried money. And what carried money rarely carried me. But if we are to find a more life-giving relationship to money, we need to start speaking about it differently.

Harsh experiences

I am tired of harsh experiences. Of giving time, knowledge, relationships and money to projects that others then move on from without looking back. Of ending up in contexts where I give without receiving anything in return, or where I am expected to give something other than what I actually feel able and willing to give.

I am tired of blaming myself. Of conversations that never quite conclude. Of the idea that if I just give the right things, the universe will return them multiplied.

I have been in too many rooms where shared enthusiasm slowly lost its color. We began with energy, ideas and trust - and ended in silence. Almost always at the very moment money entered the room.

Someone says, “We split it equally.” It looks simple and fair. Percentages on paper. But the same contribution does not cost everyone the same. Fifty hours can be a hobby for someone with a financial buffer and a risk for someone who does not know how to pay next month’s rent. The same yes can be light for one person and existential for another. This is where I have cracked a little. In those imbalances no one really talks about. When I have given time, knowledge, carried relationships and held contexts together without even being aware that I was doing it. When I have thought it will sort itself out, as if generosity were its own guarantee, blind to what was actually happening, and then woken up at night counting. Not just money but energy, who came up with what, who connected whom to whom.

The body knows that accounting. It tells the story. Now it is mostly tired. And alert. What I lack is money, yes. But also ways to say: this costs me more than it appears.

We enter with different portfolios

For those of us who do not make money from money, money is frozen time. An amount for an hour. But time is not neutral. My hour and your hour are not always the same. In someone’s hour there may be anxiety, debt, children waiting, uncertainty. In yours there may be security, a network, privilege, alternatives. We enter every collaboration with different kinds of portfolios.

One person enters with:

• Money and financial buffer

• Time without existential pressure

• Contacts in a specific industry

• Security to take risks

Another enters with:

• Knowledge in a specific field

• Experience from similar projects

• The ability to structure chaos

• No financial margin and small children at home or ill relatives

A third with:

• Premises and materials

• Local anchoring and trust

• A large and broad network

• Limited time

A fourth with:

• The courage to take risks when others hesitate

• The ability to see patterns where others see confusion and to articulate what is needed to move forward

• The capacity to hold space for other people’s processes

• No network to fall back on

We pretend all of this can be reduced to the same currency. That it can be compared. That “50/50” is fair simply because the numbers say so. But how do we value a network? Courage? Years of accumulated knowledge? And above all: does an hour cost the same for everyone? A larger portfolio is not just a list of assets but a map of what is actually at stake.

The overlooked currency

This is where exploitation slips in, the kind we - in the West at least - do not always want to see, but instead beautify and turn into admirable character traits. I believe many of us carry it without thinking about it, as a kind of blindness. That is why someone can hold left-leaning values and still feel compelled to play the game because everyone else does, while secretly dreaming of everything money could give them.

Two people can contribute the same thing - the same number of hours, the same task, the same delivery - but at entirely different cost. For one, it is safe. For the other, it is existential. One person can work unpaid for a while without major consequences. They have a buffer. They have a network to fall back on. They have time and space to experiment. Another risks their rent, their health, their sense of belonging by doing the same thing.

When we do not talk about risk, we create the illusion of fairness. When we acknowledge risk, something else emerges: relational fairness. This is where many collaborations fall apart - because we lack language to talk about what something actually costs us. And to examine which values we truly carry into collaborations, even if we claim something else.

Surplus and deficit

When we do not talk about deficit, we begin to feel ashamed of it. We pretend to be self-sufficient islands, while in reality we depend on each other’s surplus. I have started to see it as an exercise in honesty. What do I have in abundance that does not drain me to give? What do I lack that money cannot quite buy? When I answer for myself, I see that I have much others may not know about. And I lack things I have barely articulated to myself. All of this shifts over time and may need to be reformulated depending on circumstances, but what would happen if it were actually verbalized, early, in every new context we enter? What do you need, and what are you willing to give?

In the new contexts we want to build, the alternatives to the economic systems we are used to, money still finds its way in and becomes as much an obstacle as it can be an opportunity. I see it again and again. Projects that began with values of reciprocity still end with someone holding more power because they had capital from the start. That is how it works, especially because we lack language for all the other values circulating.

I am not saying money should not be a factor. Of course it is still necessary. But it can no longer be the only factor. In the current logic nothing else is worth anything unless it can be priced, and in regenerative circles money is often treated as something almost shameful, something one prefers not to talk about. What we need is to make all factors visible - time, materials, knowledge, networks and money - and value them in new ways, with a new logic. If money is the only thing we navigate by, it becomes inevitable that you work to generate, extract and accumulate. It shapes how generous you are, what you allow to emerge, how loudly you speak and who gets a seat at your table. When you let other values in, you begin to cultivate different kinds of cultures.

When we start speaking like this, something changes in the room. “50/50” suddenly becomes a question, not a principle. We can say: you are risking your livelihood here. I am risking almost nothing. It is not the same contribution, even if the hours look identical. It is much harder to drain someone you actually see. Exploitation becomes visible, and therefore harder. Imbalance can be flagged early, before the relationship breaks. Consideration is trained through visibility - when you know someone is risking their livelihood by contributing time, you begin to think differently.

Invisible work gains contours: the one who holds the group together, the one who makes sure people are okay, the one who carries local knowledge and relationships. Language redistributes power. When we count in more currencies, more people gain access to power. And what is visible becomes harder to exploit.

A practice, not a solution

Portfolio thinking is not a method you can get “right.” It is a practice in being different together. It requires the courage to say what you actually have - and what you actually lack. To say: this does not feel balanced. To say: I need something else now.

We will make mistakes. We will slip back. Someone will still feel used. Portfolios change. Someone’s security can collapse overnight. Someone else’s time can suddenly open up. What was existential in March may be manageable in September. But when we try to make the portfolios visible - when we train ourselves to talk about risk, balance and what is actually circulating - we move in the right direction.

It will feel strange. Imprecise. Uncertain. We will long for something clearer, something measurable. But that is precisely the longing we need to resist. It is there, in the pursuit of the exact, that we often freeze what is alive.

What is needed is not a fixed distribution. What is needed is an ongoing conversation: renegotiation, attentiveness, the courage to signal when something has changed.

Starting where you stand

Sometimes I think it may not be a new economy we need first. It may be exactly this. Being honest and saying: I want to contribute, but I do not want to disappear. I want to give, but not drain myself, and I want there to be movement back over time, in some form. To see injustice and notice when imbalance arises. Simply because nothing living survives that.

I can only dream of the day when those with a great deal of money do the same and genuinely want to share their surplus without demanding even more money in return, perhaps choosing to recognize other forms of value. Or simply asking for a little less in return.

You do not have to wait for systemic change. You can begin in the next conversation. Say: this is where I have abundance. This costs me more than it seems. This is what I need in order to stay.

This kind of portfolio thinking is not a solution. It is a language for keeping the conversation alive. A practice in seeing each other better. When we begin to count in more currencies than money, it does not only change distribution, it changes who gets to participate and who is able to remain.

The portfolio perspective is inspired by the method “Slicing Pie.”

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