This piece first appeared at LewRockwell.com.
If you live life with a certainty that everything you need will definitely be provided for, then you live differently than if you are always telling yourself the story, “There just isn’t enough money.”
Such An Important Distinction
Our side in this battle often takes a miserly attitude toward money, while the other side is excessively well funded.
Admittedly, they use other people’s tax receipts as well as other various means of coercion, intimidation, corruption, and graft as a means to fund their behavior.
Fauci, as an example, receives the highest salary of any federal employee and has a secretive and significant network of corruption and influence that leaves him and virtually all around him entirely compromised in his official capacity.
Are We Supposed To Imitate The Tyrants?
This is not to suggest that our side needs to do the same, in fact, you will see me argue that we need to take a very different approach. However, our side does need to figure out how to pay the bills that will allow us to build effectively. We also need to stop obsessing over what is lacking, rather that focusing attention on the abundance around us that could make so much more possible when delivered with the right approach.
Some Religious Folks Miss It
And despite all the religious people on our side, our side sure knows how to make an idol out of money. We sure know how to make mammon into a god. So many place money above their principles.
Two Methods At Our Disposal
Thankfully, we have, at our disposal, two wonderful and developed methods of funding that do not involve the type of evil so practiced by those on the other side of this battle — voluntary charitable giving and entrepreneurship.
Charitable giving looks like this:
A person sees a reason to support a charity. That person voluntarily supports that charity by sending a donation.
Entrepreneurship looks like this:
A person desires something offered by a business. That person voluntarily makes a purchase in exchange for money.
Both models are currently used and are being used effectively. But not everyone fighting this fight get what is going on. If someone is a one-man-show working a 40 hour a week job, there is one kind of level of quality and output that can be provided. If someone has reliable income to hire staff and reliable income to invest in that business, that person can do so much more and with predictable quality.
A Numbers Game: We Need More People Motivated To Do More
Now is not a time when we want people doing less. Robert Kennedy’s Children’s Health Defense employs the charitable approach. Peggy Hall’s The Healthy American employs the entrepreneurial approach.
I can hardly think of two better people that should be supported in their efforts, and thankfully there are some thousands out there like them, fighting the good fight as they organize and help others.
Yet, how often I have heard from people that Peggy Hall charges too much for her help, or that Robert Kennedy charges too much for his fundraisers.
Bullocks, I say. And anyone who speaks such nonsense in front of me gets an earful.
The Only Squabble I Have With Peggy Hall And Robert Kennedy
The only squabble I have with Peggy Hall and Robert Kennedy about their prices is that they don’t charge ten times as much as they do now, because they both provide far more value to the world than they ask for in return and would still be doing so at ten times their currents prices.
Recognizing this, you can maybe understand my frustration when people complain about any hero in the freedom community selling them something.
You have to recognize how that complaining wears some heroes down.
I buy generously. I but gifts generously. I give generously. I even give money to organizations unsolicited. If anyone ever sees me conducting myself in any other way, I would like you to please call me out on this and hold me accountable.
I don’t want to wear the heroes down. I want to do the very opposite. I want to lift them up. I want them to quit their day jobs and put everything into defeating the mandates, especially doing the work that edifies them and that they are called to do. I want them to look at the community around them and say, “They have my back and I know if I deliver, they will continue to have my back.”
The Enemy Is Generous
That is one attitude to take toward supporting the people advancing your views in the world. And it is a very common attitude among those who advance the health mandates and who advance all manner of other ills in the world. It is less common on our side.
Perhaps Each Of Us Could Be More Generous, And For Good Reason
It is a perspective that our side too could benefit from. We must begin to stop pretending goodness is only ever allowed to be a voluntary activity, and we must make room for goodness as a full time pursuit. We must make room for and welcome the idea that everyone on our side needs money to pay the bills. We must let those around us come to recognize that we have their back.
Those trying to continue the corona communism are advancing the most evil set of ideas that have ever taken hold of this land. Agreeing in any area of your life with the health mandates means welcoming that evil into your life. And while the most religious among us are so enraptured with counting every penny, the most evil in our midst are the ones following the wisdom of the Bible.
Which Energy Do You Bring With You To Life — Are You An Exacting Accountant Or A Magnanimous King?
It was the accountant of the twelve apostles (Judas Iscariot) who miserly counted every penny and criticized those who showed abundant generosity. In sharp contrast, the wisest king of antiquity, one of the great figures of the Bible, did the exact opposite. His special blessing included the following:
“And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even on the sand that is on the sea shore.”
The first part is widely known: the wisdom. The largeness of heart part is less talked about. One commentator describes this largeness of heart with this:
“Small-hearted people — stingy, fear of lack, not enough to go around, and any petty irritant gets to them – they always have to say something.
“Large-hearted people: God’s supply will never run dry, there is so much room in your heart that there is always room for more, always room for wisdom, for understanding, for the goodness of God.”
The Opposite Of Largeness Of Heart
Having grown up in the world of Chicagoland politics and having had political operatives come at me since I had a single digit age, I am particularly resilient to these attacks. But I know not everyone is. Let me give you a taste of what your favorite heroes get in their inbox when they stop giving everything out for free and start charging money so that they can build.
Here is a note from a golf course architect to me, related to a very successful recent launch I had. He responded to a series of emails from me in which I calling on the reader to be bold in their opposition to the health mandates.
“Allan, why are you asking for money? When I met you in the park in (city redacted) you seemed legit but starting this group and taking money from people….. So disappointed in the project and Allan Stevo.
“Is that BOLD ENOUGH for you?”
Ostensibly, this gentleman charges for his services as a golf course architect.
Here’s another from the same man, let’s call him Carl Spackler.
“Who’s doing your marketing Alan? Anthony Robbins or Tom Ferry? So disappointed in these emails… Let me help you as I have the secret and you have to pay for it…”
Here’s another still from Mr. Spackler.
“I don’t understand… I need to pay to join a group of like individuals? Sound like a scam to me Allan. I thought you were a straight shooter when I met you at the (redacted city) Park…
“Very disappointed in your money grab from fearful people.”
Of course, he is entitled to his opinion and if the offer is the wrong fit, that is a perfect reason for him to not be involved in it. But it is not that disinterest which is so troublesome to me. It is the vitriol with which it is delivered.
Why not just unsubscribe and never have to hear from me again?
Because that’s not what he wanted.
Or better yet, why not pick up the phone and ask me why my team and I are offering paid products?
There could possibly be a good reason that we are doing so.
That, however, is not what this reader wanted either.
This reader wanted to tear someone apart: namely me. He wanted to pettily pick at my flaws — which is not a hard activity, since I have many to choose from.
I have wrestled with tougher scrappers though good Sir. I find mild amusement in your anger and at the same time, I accept the truthful aspects of it — that I am a very imperfect, poorly trained, and generally unwilling salesman realizing how very badly under-funded, under-staffed, and under-active the good guys in this battle are. So I stand here and choose not to let my many flaws hold me back, but to give my best and to seek to constantly improve, but there’s not much that gets under my skin, certainly not a prickly email.
The Thing To Do
I will take your emails and publish them far and wide as an example for those in our community who seek a largeness of heart — as an example of how not to walk through life — but out of respect for you, I will leave your name and identifying information out of this.
And at the same time, I know how debilitating such emails are to some readers reading this and trying themselves to stick their necks out in life. Never let emails like this phase you. Not for a second. You are right over the target when you are getting emails like this — the more the better, in fact. Please do not be silenced by your trolls. There are people out there who hate you and there is good reason for you to consider it a compliment to be hated by some.
After all, if a gruesome cast of villains such as the latest Chris Cuomo figure, and the latest Andrew Cuomo figure, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, and Gavin T-1000 Newsom all came out tomorrow at press conferences and praised the work I had done over the last two and a half years, wouldn’t you kind of find it insulting to me, or perhaps even think less of me?
I would.
One-Tenth Hate You
In one of my daily words of encouragement, I wrote a note to my email list which started with a reality of life, and which probably won’t sound very encouraging, but I believe that email ultimately was: approximately one-tenth of people in any organization hate you and hope to watch you fail.
You may never know who they are, but you just need to brace yourself for that reality and not put your complete faith in those around you. Have a contingency plan. A little vitriol against you should be expected, even from people you were sure were your best buds. That vitriol is one of the surest ways you know you are speaking the truth.
If you think this to not be true, you should see some of the emails I get. The golf course architect is a tame one.
I think I did a good job addressing this reality in that RealStevo.com email and painting the extensive influence you have, even in that seemingly dire situation.
An Unhealthy Relationship With Money Degrades So Much In Life
Rather than having a healthy relationship with money as a tool for empowering good in the world, there is an almost schizophrenic love-hate around money that I see among the good guys.
It goes something like this:
“Those who do good must do it for free AND charging money is slimy AND I charge money for my work, BUT that is only because it is work, rather than something I love. IF it were something I loved, or something that helped people, I would never charge money.”
And with that — a very commonly held perspective — I have come to understand that the people who should understand the free market the best are some of the most economically illiterate people out there.
In a free market, profit is proof that you are helping someone. Instead of accepting a job for a pay check, the goal of work time needs to be “Do that which you love and do it so well that people want to pay you.” So many people who speak a good game around the topic of boot straps, live a woe-is-me life around their career that makes it seem as if they were some kind of indentured servant with only 14 more years left to work until they have finally paid off their passage to the new world. In one of the freest times in all human history, that is the kind of nonsense a person spouts and not only do they tell it to themselves, but they go around telling others, “I can’t afford that.”
You find a way to afford your priorities.
That’s the truth.
At least the successful people who achieve their priorities do.
There are an awful lot of corona communists making sure their priorities are being funded right now, and to my great dismay.
We Have The Most Effective Tools, But …
Our side has effective tools at its disposal, but so many are too self-defeating to use them.
That is why the enemy so often wins when it comes to money — there is no shame around using money to advance the enemy’s values. In contrast, our side treats a sales pitch or a donation request like the person asking has just been caught putting a whoopee cushion on mother superior’s chair before pre-algebra class and needs to be scolded into a guilt filled submission for the remainder of his sorry life.
Thankfully, these vitriolic folks with a disempowering view of money are in the ultra minority of people who write me at any given time, and I suppose many other leaders in the Liberty movement consider them in the ultra minority.
Much more likely are notes like these (received the same days as the golf course architect). They reflect a largeness of heart — not because they like what I’m doing, no that has little to do with it — but because “there is so much room in your heart that there is always room for more, always room for wisdom, for understanding, for the goodness of God.”
Here is one:
“Mr. Stevo, Your emails are amazing that you have sent these last days. I only found you recently on Lew Rockwell. I read your book only several weeks ago. I wish I had found you earlier in 2020. You are an inspiration. I am excited to be a part of this project.”
Or this one:
“Hi Allan, previously bought your book, just joined up for the family plan. I talk about your work with friends all the time…. i would love to get you on a zoom call that I do every week with other Purebloods.”
Or this one:
“I was thrilled reading all about what you are doing. I am un-vaxed and never even considered giving in, nor will I ever.”
Another person liked what I was doing so much she offered to come work for me.
But even if those emails would never have come through, it would not matter. There is so much that can be gained from even just the trolls if you let yourself be that person who rolls with the punches. It is their silence that would truly be their harshest rebuke of you.
You’ll Notice I Didn’t Mention Government As One Of Our Effective Tools
The tyrants have government. They spend trillions. They employ millions. How many times I’ve seen a group of four or six people entirely disable the will of government and leave tyrants reeling.
The tyrants have bureaucracy, both governmental and quasi-governmental, the deep state and all its apparatuses included. How many times I have seen a one or two-man team make a laughing-stock out of the most well-funded, heavily staffed governmental apparatuses.
The tyrants have the instituions they have taken their long march through. Have you seen some of these knuckleheads that have been elevated to positions of power? Using half a brain cell, I have seen them get outwitted.
Our tools are so much more superior than any of their tools — our tools actually work. They don’t require tyranny to whip them into functioning. And they really do a good job.
Do You Know What A Fun Time We Can Have?
We have tools that work — charitable giving and entrepreneurship. They are small, light, fast, supple, sleek, quick to adjust, and don’t forget, velocity is the most important component of power.
They, in contrast, have a 5,000 pound rust bucket from the 1870s that has had every new expensive gadget added to it for 150 years. The rust bucket is once in a while in the right place at the right time, but never intentionally. It is always years late to events that matter, always either delivering in such wastefully massive or such misery underwhelming quantities, seldom of good quality, almost never with a smile, while trying to get 83 different special interest groups on the same page.
Do you get what a piece of junk tool they have at their disposal and which some of us stand in awe of?
We have tools that work. They have tools that don’t. Do you know what a gift it will be to ourselves and the world once we get out of the way and let some of the blessings flow through those tools we have?
It will be very special.
And that could start in your life today.
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Alan 😎Awesome Dude! Difficult topic to analyze but you handled it very well. As the Lord says ‘Give & You Shall Receive’ 😊
Good message, Allan, well written.