A Maternal Economy: Making the Intangible Tangible by Caryn MacGrandle

In meditation this morning, it occurred to me how a vital ingredient to the paradigm shift is making the intangible tangible.

I am speaking of the work that you and I do.

I have put nine years of tireless work into my computer app, working daily and spending my personal funds to the tune of about $100,000. With new features that I added this year, the business plan is sound. I just need about ten times the registrants. In other words, I’m 100 feet shy of an 8000 foot mountain. And about to run out of money.

I sent an email out to my supporters telling them of the situation, and I receive a half a dozen replies from women in similar situations. They have poured their money, time and soul into their work but have not been able to pay any bills from it.

I have spent almost a decade hosting Women’s Circles, and I actually recall an instance where one woman told me that the Circles had changed her life in immeasurable ways. 

“$5?”

“Sorry, I don’t have $5 on me to help pay the hosting fees.”

Do they not understand the irony of these conflicting statements?

These women do not have a lot of extra money. They are living close to the bone like me.  But they do spend money.

They spend money on Starbucks coffees and clothes and smartphones. 

It is time we understood the value of what we choose to spend our money on.

And if you do not have a lot of it, then it is even more important.

Where your money goes, your love and attention goes. Make sure you are supporting the right things. 

Buy books from incredible independent companies like Girl God and Womancraft Publishing even if you do not have the time or energy to read them at the moment. 

Buy their books. 

Every author puts their heart and soul into their books, and it is a privilege for me to have them in stacks around my home. 

It is a privilege and a belief in this new world we are making.

Buy their courses. Stop expecting them for free. Like Home to Her who has just released a course on Sacred Feminine Wisdom. 

Want to take the course but can’t afford it? Reach out to her and ask. “I’m a single mom raising two kids. I’m interested but cannot afford this, could I pay this instead?”

I know these women. They are not doing these things to get rich. They are doing these things because they have been called. And they listened.

The internet has been free up until now for two reasons:

• Large oligopolies like Apple, Google, Facebook make their money off of sheer numbers.  You are a commodity. They use your personal information to sell you things. You cannot even speak to someone at these companies.  They are large, impersonal and doing a lot of bad in a lot of ways.
• It has given us all ‘voices’. Voices to those who up until now did not have public stages, and this has been a worthy endeavor, but the shadow side is that there is a plethora of misinformation.  And a plethora of feces to wade through to get to the good stuff. 

We must support those who are putting the time and effort into research, those with integrity, those in line with dearly needed Sacred Feminine qualities.

I’m preaching. I try not to preach these days. Forgive me. We all know this. But sometimes I think we need to be reminded. 

I have been a bit frustrated because due to my app, I see all these amazing incredible organizations and women doing what seems to me are: the same things. 

I have gotten frustrated because I have had the thought that we are all off recreating the wheel and if we came together and worked together more, we could maybe make the whole damn car and actually go somewhere.

But this morning, I flipped that thought, too.

How absolutely wonderful and delicious that we are all off doing the same thing in different ways. 

Surely this is how we change the world.