Family Lives Without Money by Choice and Thrives

Family Lives Without Money by Choice and Thrives?

I ran across an interesting story but I believe it is filled with some misconceptions about a truth we can achieve. We can live without money or the burden society places on us. But first let me show you some excerpts of the story so you can follow along.

Family Lives Without Money—By Choice—and Thrives
By Beth Greenfield, Shine Staff

A Berlin family of three has been living on practically nothing but love and the goodwill of others for more than two years and counting—not as a victims of the rough economy, but as activists who are on a money strike to protest what they call our “excess-consumption society.”

“As consumers, we support the system, and we are all responsible for making a wasteful society,” Raphael Fellmer, 29, told Yahoo! Shine. “This strike is to inspire other people to reflect about our other possibilities.”

Fellmer, who said he’d held jobs since he was 12 years old, began his protest after years of working in hotels, bars, restaurants and various offices. In 2010, after graduating from college in the Hague as a European Studies major, he and two friends embarked upon a 15-month “journey of humanity” to raise awareness of environmental destruction and of society’s many wastes, including estimates that about one-third of all food produced worldwide (valued at about $1 trillion a year) gets wasted.

That trip involved hitchhiking from Europe to Mexico without cash, simply depending on the goodwill and excess resources of others. It carried them over more than 19,000 miles on more than 500 vehicles—including a sailboat that took the trio from the Canary Islands to Brazil in exchange for crew duties—and soon led Fellmer to meet his wife, Nieves Palmer, who became pregnant along the way.

Now the couple, along with their 18-month-old daughter Alma Lucia, are continuing to live nearly money-free in Berlin, where they do odd jobs and organizing work in exchange for living space, with roommates, in the Peace House Martin Niemöller, which contains various non-profits. (Though Fellmer uses no money, he said Palmer does use a little, mainly in the form of child support she receives from the government, which is granted to all children.) 

The article goes on to say more ( you can find the rest of the story here )

While it is true that I agree money has an ill affect on society especially on those manipulated by those who want to make money – "BUY BUY BUY" even if it’s bad for you because we need to get rich. And yes we can live without money – money is not the source of our happiness, peace or joy. But, remember ‘but’ usually means forget what I just said.

But with that said we need money, to be more exact – a form of currency. Whether we are using gold, paper or bartering we have a currency that is being used in order to buy and sell goods (services or products). I say this because I’ve been reading all these wonderful little articles about how people are living and thriving even though they do not use money – wait, but…

But what all of these articles go on to say is that thes epeople who are surviving with out cash are dependent on the kindness of others. Basically they are dependent on the people who work for money to supply all or some of their needs. There is a gentleman that is known by the nickname Solo – I mention him in my book: For Children how to become Rich Successful and do well in school.

Solo lives in the desert and has sworn off cash – he does not want to have anything to do with money and societies use of money. He lives in caves, hunts for his food and 
( wait for it…. ) Relies on the charity of family and friends. Again, if you rely on someone to provide you things that they purchased with cash – then you still need cash. Just because you didn’t earn that money and someone freely gave it to you – you still used it, were helped by … what? Say it with me: Money.

I agree, to many of us are hung up on trivial things. We have to have the $100 dollar pair of sneakers. The bigger the TV the better and every year we have to have something bigger, better and oh let’s not forget NEW! Yes, even if we don’t need it.

Don’t get me wrong – if you can afford it, by all means do as you wish. But like I said, money and things will not make you happy. All I am trying to say is that these articles about people who say they can live with no money at all – don’t believe it. Because if they could live without no money at all they wouldn’t need family and friends providing them the things they need that can only be gained by ‘paying cash’.