People often ask: “What is the hardest thing about living without money? “What did you give up to do this”?
I usually give a fairly benign answer like “I hate handwashing” or “I miss hot running water”. I have not, to date, been completely honest about what I really gave up and what I miss the most. I don’t think I’ve been honest with myself until now.
I gave up my relationship – my lover, my companion, my man.
I threw him to the wind as soon as I had this overwhelming desire to stop screwing the planet. I didn’t think he could fit in with my new life. I made an assumption that he wanted something vastly different – would not be supportive – so he had to go. I didn’t actually ask him at the time. I just sent him away after 7 years of life together. Only now, after three more years of coming and going from my moneyless world, he is gone.
I miss him terribly and wish there was another way. I regret the way I behaved. I regret pushing him away and being so damned independent.
Sure, I could not have continued in my life as it was. Sure, I needed to make some drastic changes. I read about this ‘moneyless living’ thing and I was off, bulldozing my way ahead into a new world – a world, ultimately, without him.
It’s done now.
It’s too late for anything to be repaired or recovered from this relationship. I have learned my lesson the hard way. I am impulsive and it’s to my own detriment at times. I have a very strong inner ‘warrior’ who gets all up in my face if I don’t trample my way through life in some quest to ‘fix’ things.
This has been my sacrifice.
He is what I miss most in my moneyless life.
The rest is easy and fun and good. I still have my Amy close by and I have great friends. I have a place to live and food and clothes. I am doing well.
I have broken my heart though. That is my own doing. I can’t go back now. I will learn to be softer, gentler, slower and not run riot over the feelings and lives of those who I love.
I’m incredibly sorry, my darling man.
You knew. I didn’t listen.
PS. To satisfy my dear friends I would add that I’m perhaps being too hard on myself and ‘it takes two to tango’!
jolowimpact 
Las relación con las personas es lo que le da sentido a la vida
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Las relacion con las personas es lo Que le da SENTIDO A LA VIDA
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Lo Que le da SENTIDO A LA VIDA.Es la relacion con las personas.
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yo no escribi estafadores
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Beautifully said Jo, and so raw and vulnerable.
Big huge hugs.
It’s a hard way to learn, but each day you know more about YOU.
XX
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Thank you and I hope so…..
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Hahaha (re the PS) –
PS. the PS sums it up nicely- but I understand that radical insight in our own behaviour and past actions can be experienced in an extreme sometimes – however it will eventually even out. At some point we all know that we have to forgive ourselves, no matter what – we have absolutely no choice in the matter ❤
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Eventually…….
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Thanks for being brave and honest. I can so relate to your state of being… If it makes you feel better. Anyone who is meant to be with you will come back in at any moment when you truly let them go… I believe… heart break is the heart breaking open … So it can be free to love everyone. 🙂 Including and especially YourSelf… Take care xx
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beautifully said and thanks
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Your honesty is beautiful. I can relate in many ways. Here’s what I’ve learned in this:
Funny, it was a broken heart from a broken relationship that woke me up to learn to be free of attachments/possession. Loss of possession is heartache. But, then again, giving up money and possessions also isolated me from intimate relationships. I figured anybody “worthy” would come around and join me in this lifestyle, and, if not, okay – I was free of attachment. I’ve always been open to intimate relationship. But, the truth is, no real intimate relationship has come around. I feel I’ve had lots chances of relationships in this lifestyle, IF I were straight. But I am gay, which hugely decreases those chances. So, yeah, it looks like I painted myself into a corner. But, I hear what you are saying, that it really wasn’t a choice because of conscience. Like you, I couldn’t sell out my conscience for a relationship. People have often told me I did this as a fear of relationship. I’ve considered & wondered that, but, now, honestly, I don’t feel that’s true.
But now is another chapter: I have sacrificed my wish to fully live without money to take care of my aging mother even as I myself age – which also decreases chances of relationship even more. Sometimes my heart aches deeply, BUT ONLY when I think about what I don’t have! My heart doesn’t ache when I CHOOSE to not think about what I don’t have. I realized this again thinking about my dear and beautiful friend I loved so deeply who killed himself a few weeks ago. I live in choice.
This is what I would tell people who joined me living moneyless on the road. Invariably, people start talking about how they miss chocolate or coffee or cake or whatever, like it’s a typical fun game to talk about what we miss. I tell them they have just made their moneyless walk miserable. They could choose to make this fun and powerful by simply choosing not to think about such futility!
The mind that chooses to not thinks about what it doesn’t have is the mind of power, the Present Mind, the mind of reality, not delusion.
Yeah, you notice, Jo, that people love to ask you what you miss. It’s often the first question. I tell them I miss nothing. And that is the honest truth. If I try to answer that question or think I must answer it to make them happy, I start missing things. Because it isn’t the things I don’t have that make me discontent! That very question itself is a temptation to try to pull my mind away from the present. That question itself is our culture of attachment & discontent & debt.
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Wow! Thanks heaps for those words, Daniel. I have found that I have rarely missed anything since living this way and would kinda’ force myself to come up with the ‘running hot water’ answer. This pain of loss of him in my life is a whole other thing and would have been the same if I had money. It’s just the loss that’s a normal part of life and I will get through and be fine. I made my choice – I chose this life. I cannot see myself going back to another life so forward I go……….
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Dear Suelo, I feel the pain for your loss, and celebrate all the times you have already spent with your beautiful friend. All that beauty and you still say no one “came around”. I think we are blessed its just we are too focussed elsewhere looking for something to fit into our preconceived template of who and how its going to be. I’m so not picking on you merely looking at a mirror. Please nourish the present in whatever way it presents it’s self to you. It’s what makes us shine in the end. Blessing to all three wonderful souls.
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I think that every single thing that happens to us has a purpose. All of our choices brought us exactly to the experiencies we need do live. Sometimes there’s too much pain and sometimes there’s too much fun. But it’s all part of our journey, although we do not understand it.I’m sure life will make things get better. Thanks for sharing this amazing (but not easy) journey with us! Best wishes!
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Thanks Bruna. Totally agree!
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Hi Jo,
Having stumbled across a news article and following the rabbit trails I have just spent the morning reading about your journey.
I have had aspirations of doing similar, although not completely money free as the possibility is there for some things that are not readily available and may require a ‘new’ purchase, new solar cells, replacement batteries, things like that.
My dilemma is very much like yours, a wife and family who would not cope as well, and maybe harbour resentment. I thank you and applaud your honesty in this.
Have you thought about futureproofing your food supply somewhat. Pickling and preserving foods for example. Drying fruits and veges and other methods? I have a couple of ideas that aren’t hard to build but may require some scavenging of discarded materials. Please feel free to contact me and I’ll forward you my drawings.
All the best,
Ralph
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Thanks Ralph. So far I’m just focussing on growing food. Don’t want to get too much into preserving/storing yet but maybe down the track. Hope your journey goes well. Cheers, Jo
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” I have a very strong inner ‘warrior’ who gets all up in my face if I don’t trample my way through life in some quest to ‘fix’ things”.Totally relate to this but will heed the lesson Jo. Youre doing a great job educating people in sustainability. Have you heard of Fleet Farming an initiative in Florida. A great way to bring people together and provide food and excess is sold at matkets by using peoples front lawns to grow veges. Very clever. I know youre not into making money but you could put funds towards getting the message out there. Wish you all the best Jo and I hope you find someone to share your journey if that’s something you want. 👍🏻
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Dear Jo, by opening your heart you shine even more brightly. It a prerequisite, by the way, to sharing it again…wait a minute, you already do. You have incredibly supportive people in your life and that is certainly something more valuable than chocolate, hot water whatever.
Yeah moneyless and living close to the earth is very hard to read about and not have in our lives. Once you think about it deeper and deeper you or I come to realise that all this stuff is a pretty shallow stuff to settle for.
Thank you for sharing that sunshine.
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Thanks for the lovely words. 🙂
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I like reading about your journey. Another (Suelo) brave soul stepping out of the comfort zone. Much respect. One of my favorite songs (Moody Blues: New Horizons) comes to mind when I read about your journey and sacrifices. Perhaps you have already found your peace of mind and that is the great accomplishment. Best wishes!
“I have my hopes to comfort me
I got my new horizons out to sea
But I’m never gonna lose your precious gift
It will always be that way
’cause I know I’m gonna find my own peace of mind
Someday”
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Someday……
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Hi Jo,
I’m curious as to if you have your own land to do all this on or are you sharing land with someone else when they are the owner of that land?
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Hi Rodney. I am living in a friend’s yard atm. I help her out and she helps me out so we have a win/win. Hope that helps.
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Beautifully said…we become wiser as our awareness of ourselves grows…
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I hope so, Chrisy.
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