MEND Season 2 - Episode 33

Financial Capital with Bari Tessler

"Money is like love; it kills slowly and painfully the one who withholds it, and enlivens the other who turns it on his fellow man."

~Kahlil Gibran

This week we delved into a realm that was, admittedly, uncomfortable at first, and seemed perhaps counterpoint to the intention of this season.  It was, however, written into the framework that we have chosen to follow, so we forged ahead into the realm of Financial Capital. The resulting talk we had was far more inspiring and cohesive with our motivations that we would have thought even possible.  Bari Tessler, is a Financial Therapist, a Mamaprenuer and the founder of the Art of Money, book and year-long program described is “Financial Therapy for your Soul”.  

A large part of Bari’s work is helping people understand how money connects to our bodies and our emotions.  For her there is a direct connection between Financial Literacy and Emotional Intelligence. 

We spoke about our relationship to money…as women, as products of our educational and cultural system, as member in a partnership, and as mothers….and the importance of understanding this relationship.  She offers us a glimpse into the work she does with others by offering some advice and gems of wisdom when dealing with the ebbs and flows of our financial story.  She even manages to bring in a bit of Zen Buddhism and discusses how we can work through our own Money Koans.  

This is a money talk like you have probably never had.  So pour a cup of tea, grab a pen and paper for notes…and enjoy.  

MEND Season 2 (Episode #26)

What is it Worth...   Re-Claiming & Affirming our Value in a Dollars-driven World.

Welcome back to season 2 of MEND.

As you can see, we're shifting things around here a bit.  

Moving from the local landscape of a dwindling & tumultuous underground industry into the bright light of the larger world around us.  

At a certain point, this local cannabis industry shifted it's values to re-align with those of the dominant culture.  Rather than the former objective of utilizing the money gained from cannabis to bring other forms of value into the world - things like schools, art, music, community outreach and such.... Eventually, we settled into the good ole, black-and-white, cut-and-dry margins of the almighty profit margins.  

At some point we seem to have forgotten that this was just ONE way to bring value to the world. That money was but one way to move our ideas, values & dreams out into this Life.

And so that is where our sights are headed next.

We are thrilled to explore this topic of the different ways we can and do create wealth and value in our lives and our communities.

To start this season, we sat down with each other to dig deeper into the 8 Forms of Capital as we are coming to understand them, offering a general overview for each so that we have a shared starting point of how our guests are working and creating wealth in these realms.  

This is going to be an inspiring, (hopefully) perspective-shifting season.  We’re going beyond the stories to the “practice” and application of these ideas, this wisdom, and the many ways in which we can all bring something to the table.     

In many ways, perhaps the current cannabis industry has failed to live up to the initial values it was instigated on.  But we want to acknowledge that we can do better.

We can shift the conversation.

We can tip the scales.

And here are some stories, diatribes & ideas on where to start.

Enjoy! 

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Big Thanks to Ethan Roland and the visionary team of Appleseed Permaculture who first put words to this framework, and mapped out these ideas for us all to drop into and explore.

And an equally open-hearted shout-out to Sam Sycamore of the Good Life Revival Podcast - who first hipped us to these ideas - and shared them in a way both eloquent but inspiring us to ACT.  Deep bows.