How I Totally Stopped Using Money

In the society we live in, everybody needs money either directly or indirectly. It’s a fact. From birth to death, money is a necessity. To provide our family’s basic needs (food, shelter and clothes), we all need to have money. 

And these things are enough for us to know that money is very important. And by deeply understanding this fact, I decided that I’ll never ever use money in my entire life anymore.

Contradicting? Then let’s go back on when and how the money system started. 

Most of us are aware of the “barter system” that was used in the past centuries all over the world. This was the time when the monetary system was not yet invented. For those who aren’t familiar with it, check it here. It's basically a trading process that were done by having one group exchanging their items with products which were brought by another group which they agreed on as having equal value. And this was how people got the things that they needed which weren’t available or produced by their own group.

Another thing was that during the old times, the services rendered by laborers were paid in kind by their “lords”, not money. They received shelter, food or clothes as payment for their work.

This was how a payslip looked like.

That’s exactly what life was until the monetary system was put in place. And once the concept of money started, people began using it to buy goods and stuff that they need. And also, people started receiving money as salaries for their jobs. 

So what did exactly change when the monetary system was put in place? The answer is, logically, there’s none. 

On the technical aspect, there were lots of differences as money standardized trades and payments for services of the people. It made the measurement of the purchasing values of human work and all kinds of products easily quantifiable.

But in essence, what had changed in the system is only the means. To explain my point further, money is simply the physical representation of the value of work or service you have rendered.

Think about it. The physical money basically equates to the value of the work that you do. It’s not the actual money but it is the value of our work that we are spending. If you look at it this way, it might help you spend money wisely. Imagine this, worth of hours of your labor in exchange of something that you only just wanted but is not really that important. Let's say 8 hours of hard work in exchange of a baseball cap that you fancy but later on will just be kept away in the closet. Is it really worth it?

That’s how I stopped using money. I compare almost every purchase I’m doing with the amount of work I’m about to pay for in exchange of that item. Before I spend on something, I always ask myself, is it worth the sweat, tears and time spent on hard work? 

This thinking worked for me in controlling my expenses. You can try it also. Or if you’re doing it differently, hope you can also share it thru the comments section below. 

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