Vision Battlesword [00:00:00]:
You think that talking about the topic of money is triggering?

Courtney Johnson [00:00:02]:
I think it can be triggering to a lot of people, yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:00:05]:
Why do you think that is?

Courtney Johnson [00:00:06]:
Are we. Are we rolling? Yeah, we are. Why is it triggering?

Vision Battlesword [00:00:10]:
Yeah.

Courtney Johnson [00:00:11]:
Oh, my gosh. Because it's an imperfect system, and it's easy to. It's an easy scapegoat. And we all have so many money stories, and it's. It's easier to have to undo stories around something more product permanent, like love or truth or belonging. And it is much harder to unravel stories about something more imperfect, like money. So I. I think it's very hard work to do emotional mental unraveling of money stories in a way that.

Courtney Johnson [00:00:46]:
That serves you and serves your purpose and values.

Vision Battlesword [00:00:48]:
So you think money is imperfect?

Courtney Johnson [00:00:50]:
Of course, yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:00:51]:
Is there anything that's perfect?

Courtney Johnson [00:00:54]:
Yes. I think cosmic love, everything being is perfect, and we are expressions of that perfection. So you could say, in a way, this current snapshot of our world and Earth is perfect in its own way, and everything about it is perfect in the microcosms and the macrocosms. But if we're talking in a practical sense, our system of capitalism and the USA is obviously imperfect for the purpose of unity or equality or perfection. I recognize that.

Vision Battlesword [00:01:26]:
Okay.

Courtney Johnson [00:01:27]:
And also, I play in the capitalism sandbox pretty hard.

Vision Battlesword [00:01:31]:
Fair enough. Fair enough. Who are you? Courtney Johnson.

Courtney Johnson [00:01:35]:
I knew you were gonna ask this question.

Vision Battlesword [00:01:37]:
Who are you today?

Courtney Johnson [00:01:39]:
I don't think that I can answer that in this conversation through logic and human English words, but we were just talking about values, and I do believe we can describe, describe a little bit about a person via value. So I would like to share my most important value, and that is impact. Creating the most positive, empowering impact to the most amount of people I can on Earth. I believe that this is my purpose for being here. This is not something I chose. This is something that's, like, deeply ingrained in my bones, and I think that says probably a lot about who I am.

Vision Battlesword [00:02:23]:
Well, what is impact to you?

Courtney Johnson [00:02:25]:
To me, impact is empowering people to have sovereignty and expression and empowerment, giving people power, helping them understand that they have power and they have power of choice and they have power of creation.

Vision Battlesword [00:02:43]:
Yeah. It seems to me impact is almost a little bit of a neutral term, in a way, because I hear people say a lot that they want to have an impact in the world, or it's important to them to be making an impact. But, like, a meteor can make an impact, all sorts of things. A baseball bat can make an impact with a baseball. So it's sort of like it's one of these terms where we, we use it a lot of times with some kind of an assumption that it means something positive. But it's almost like we were talking about the word evolution a moment ago as well. And evolution, for whatever reason, is one of my highest values in the way that impact is one of your highest values. But then again, evolution doesn't necessarily.

Vision Battlesword [00:03:32]:
Things can evolve in many different ways in many different directions. Right. So it's almost. There's almost like a little bit of a neutrality to that, and we have to qualify it a little bit to make sure that we're being clear in what we mean. So I think the way you qualified, what kind of impact that you want to have, which has to do with increasing people in their state of empowerment, is very important.

Courtney Johnson [00:03:58]:
Yes. And I see that as positive. I love that you bring up that impact is neutral and we need to define the word because I want to talk about some of my money stories and my money beliefs. And one of those beliefs is that money is a neutral tool. It is an amplifier, just like a hammer or a meteor, and it will amplify the steward of it. It will amplify the steward's values, the steward's mission, the steward's impact. What do you think about that money being neutral? That a belief that you were hold?

Vision Battlesword [00:04:34]:
Yeah, I think so. Well, so you and I both reviewed our previous sacred conversation on the topic of money, which goes back about a year ago that I had that conversation with David Saage. And I said in that conversation that I think money is neutral. I think that the, the impact that money can have is related to our intention and is related to how we use it. You know, it's. It's a tool. That's the way I look at it. And I think it can be useful.

Vision Battlesword [00:05:09]:
And I think it also can hold us back in some ways, depending on what belief systems we attach to it and what actions we choose to take with it.

Courtney Johnson [00:05:21]:
Yeah, I totally agree with that. And it was a really great conversation that you had with David. And it went down the philosophical aspect of like, should we have money, like gifting economy, what's other avenues? And that's a really important conversation to have. And also we have to be grounded and face the reality that we are facing. So I'm not saying don't have those conversations. I think they're very important. What I'm saying is if we want to make the biggest impact based on our values, we need to deal with the rules of the Game of the sandbox we are in or make a new sandbox. And what I think that conversation lacked was a clear solution or call to action on how we can either play the game or make a new game.

Courtney Johnson [00:06:06]:
And I want to, to fill in and continue the conversation and offer some solutions.

Vision Battlesword [00:06:12]:
I love that. I'm so glad that you brought this up. And I've been actually, I have been waiting for someone to pick that, pick up that ball to expand all of those ideas. And I agree with you about that last conversation. It was very theoretical, philosophical for me. It was also very fun and interesting to pick apart the concept itself. But I also was hungry for, I still am hungry for kind of rolling up our sleeves and saying, okay, like well what do we do with this idea? And yeah, to your point, like, okay, well on the one hand we can criticize something that may seem problematic, but on the other hand, what solution are we offering as an alternative? And that's what I've been very interested to want to develop with people is this. People talk about this idea of a gift economy.

Vision Battlesword [00:07:09]:
Some people call it a resource based economy. We also use the term sacred reciprocity sometimes in the consciousness circles. But how do we action that? I'm curious to know and I think what you want to bring up, correct me if I'm wrong, is while we're figuring that out, what actions are we taking in the current sandbox and how can we maximize the benefit or the impact, create abundance, give rise to self expression using the money that we have today? Is that right?

Courtney Johnson [00:07:44]:
That is correct. That is what I'm here to talk about and what I'm so excited to share. So I would like to address a lot of those points. But first I want to share some of my other money stories and beliefs and see how they land with you.

Vision Battlesword [00:07:58]:
All right.

Courtney Johnson [00:07:58]:
This is probably my most controversial and opposite of the conversation that you had previously about money. And that is it can be good, just noble, heart centered and in integrity to desire money. Because you don't desire money just to have pieces of paper or to have numbers in your bank account that do nothing. There's always a reason that you're desiring money. And I loved in the conversation with David how he was saying that desire can often come from a place of lack or trauma. It can also come from a place of expansion. There is a shadow side and a light side to it. It amplifies what you already are.

Courtney Johnson [00:08:39]:
So for somebody that is putting a lot of good into the world and building their dream and helping others for Them to desire money is not for them to be selfish or just desire like meaningless paper that we just assign value to. It is, again, if you are in integrity and following your dream, it is 100% of the time. I want. I desire money for this, because of this, to pursue this, to amplify this. But I do think it's demonized as, like, oh, I wouldn't do it for money. Of course you wouldn't do it for money, because money's not real.

Vision Battlesword [00:09:14]:
So we agree that money's not real.

Courtney Johnson [00:09:15]:
We do agree that money's not real.

Vision Battlesword [00:09:17]:
What is it then, if it's not real?

Courtney Johnson [00:09:19]:
It's a. It's an agreement, It's a story. It's a connection of our world, our cultures, our economy. But it's not real. I know that.

Vision Battlesword [00:09:30]:
You know what? This is where we. This is where I think we have to start. Then what is money? What are we even talking about here?

Courtney Johnson [00:09:37]:
Yeah, I mean, in the basic sense, money is a exchange of value or an IOU on value. I don't like when people say money is an IOU because that kind of puts it into, like, slavery mode. And I know you talked about this on the last podcast. I see it as an exchange of value. I give you something of value, you give me something of value. What gets tricky is how do we quantify value? And there's a lot of, like, psychological aspects that go into that to where it's very hard to quantify and that it's a very imperfect system, but it's an exchange of value is what I believe.

Vision Battlesword [00:10:14]:
Okay, when you say money is an exchange of value, are you trying to say that it's a medium for exchanging value?

Courtney Johnson [00:10:22]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:10:23]:
Okay, got it. So it's sort of like it's a universal resource that we can convert one thing into another thing, like converting heat into electricity, for example. Right. We. We burn something, anything that creates heat to excite water, to turn a turbine and run the turbine through a generator that creates electricity. So we could say that we're kind of converting, you know, value or energy, in this case, from one form to another through that mechanism, through that transformation. So money is almost like a. Like a transformational technology for value.

Courtney Johnson [00:11:08]:
Exactly. That's a beautiful way to put it. Very eloquent.

Vision Battlesword [00:11:11]:
Oh, thank you.

Courtney Johnson [00:11:12]:
Transformation. Say that again. Transformation. Vehicle of value.

Vision Battlesword [00:11:16]:
Yeah, technology. Yeah, it's like a technology for transforming value from one form to another. Something like that. Okay, got it. But we also agree that it's kind of imaginary in a way, right?

Courtney Johnson [00:11:29]:
Yeah, in the same way Power structures are imaginary, or an institution is imaginary. There are agreements and parts and physical things that prop up the idea, but it's inherently not tangible.

Vision Battlesword [00:11:41]:
There was something that came up in the conversation with David too, that it was just like a blip on the radar of everything that we were talking about. But it felt kind of important to me. And it's something I've been thinking about a lot with regard to money, which is that money is less of a measurement of value than it is a measurement of influence. In a way.

Courtney Johnson [00:12:05]:
Yeah. Of perceived value. Influence or perceived value or maybe power.

Vision Battlesword [00:12:11]:
Well, follow me for a second and see if this influence thing makes sense to you. So what I'm saying is that if I have a million dollars and you have $10,000, so our relative influence, what that actually is a measure of is our relative influence in being able to direct resources. Do you know what I mean?

Courtney Johnson [00:12:38]:
Yes. However, I don't see this as like a stagnant number or thing, but more of a. Like a flow, like a river. I have a million dollar river, you have a ten thousand dollar river. And it's like you can put a cup in the river, take it out. Put a cup in the river, take it out.

Vision Battlesword [00:12:55]:
Right, right. But what I'm trying to say is that what, what the real world impact is of that asymmetry in our accounting is that if I pick up the phone or get on the computer and say I would like resources to go from here to there, I can move a thousand times as many resources as you can. So in other words, it's. It's sort of like, it's like a measurement of who gets to say, who gets to direct where resources will flow in that river. It's like I have. It's like I have a. Think of it, maybe I have like a paddle a thousand times bigger than yours for, you know, moving the direction of the stream or moving the direction of the current. That's kind of really what money is saying.

Courtney Johnson [00:13:43]:
Absolutely.

Vision Battlesword [00:13:44]:
Is if I want resources to appear here or there or anywhere or to be converted from one form or another, people will do that based on the number that I have in my account versus yours.

Courtney Johnson [00:13:57]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:13:57]:
Okay.

Courtney Johnson [00:13:58]:
That is correct. That is also very eloquent.

Vision Battlesword [00:14:00]:
Oh, well, thank you again. But yeah, so to me there's a deeper truth that's being revealed when we start to realize that that's what's going on and there is a relative valuation component to that. And then we can start to ask questions about like, well, why, why am I granted that much more Influence than you. You know, what value have I created that value in the world such that it somehow makes sense for that distribution of influence to favor me versus you or favor you versus me. So there's something. There's something deeply at the heart of value about this whole thing. And like how we value one person's contribution differently than another. And then we kind of use money as an accounting system to keep track of whose value is greater and therefore whose influence should be greater.

Courtney Johnson [00:15:03]:
Yes. That is a very accurate description on how the game works that we are living in.

Vision Battlesword [00:15:08]:
How do you feel about that game?

Courtney Johnson [00:15:10]:
I accept the game as that's the game. Okay. I can remove my consent. I can go live in, like, a moneyless intentional community if I wanted to. It would be hard to remove your consent. It's not a easy black or white answer. A lot of us are not consenting to the game, but we can remove our consent. And I've chosen to not remove my consent.

Courtney Johnson [00:15:33]:
I've chosen to dive into the stream, and I have chosen to figure out how to master the game because my highest value among all else, all else is impact. And I believe in my lifetime, if I can have that power, I can use it for good, to help others. I don't just believe that. I have proof that that has happened for me. But there are obvious exceptions. This is not happening for everyone. Some people come from money, and they have money given to them while creating no value. Some people create a lot of value.

Courtney Johnson [00:16:09]:
I started from the negatives. I didn't start with money. I didn't start with zero. I started deep in the negatives of value. I had taken too much. Again, I'm not saying this is a good thing. I'm not saying this is how it should work. But how I started my adult life is I had taken a lot without providing the value back, and that put me in the negatives, and I had to get out of that and then get on top.

Courtney Johnson [00:16:35]:
And it forced me to find ways to provide more and more value for the world. And as I learn and I make more money, I can direct that value back. This is obviously an imperfect system, and this is not fair, but this is the sandbox, and I want to win the sandbox.

Vision Battlesword [00:16:53]:
It sounds like what you're saying is that while you recognize that there can be outliers, meaning to your point about it being an imperfect system, it's not always perfectly true that the amount of money and therefore influence of directing resources that a person has is an accurate reflection of the true value that they've provided to the world. But in general, it's a pretty good, pretty good gauge. Like, in general, it works. Okay. There are some outliers. Sometimes people come into a lot of money and influence that they haven't provided value to naturally receive. Sometimes it goes the other direction. People put a lot of value into the world and they don't receive that kind of recognition in the form of that money.

Vision Battlesword [00:17:40]:
But 80, 20 rule, like your personal life experience bears out. Like, yeah, I took a lot and didn't give a lot back at a certain point. My money situation reflected that. Now I put a lot of value into the world. My money situation reflects that. Generally speaking, it's working pretty well. Is that kind of where you're at with it?

Courtney Johnson [00:18:01]:
That's where I'm at with it. And yeah, I desire to direct resources because I think I am smart, I am intelligent, I am powerful, I am, I'm loving, I'm kind, I am heart centered. And my desire is to help other people who are smart, kind, loving, heart centered to direct more of our world's resources.

Vision Battlesword [00:18:23]:
That makes sense. Yeah, I see where you're going with that. Okay, so you have a kind of a meritocratic view on things. Like you're, you're, you have a sense that there's a spectrum of values and let's say actions or ability to act in the world that you call smart and heart centered. Are there any other words that are associated with that? Trying to remember now.

Courtney Johnson [00:18:51]:
Heart centered and intelligent, I think are the most important values for directing resources.

Vision Battlesword [00:18:56]:
And heart centered in your vocabulary. What does that mean?

Courtney Johnson [00:19:01]:
It means you're leading your decisions with the heart. You're leading your decisions to help and empower other people. You're leading decisions based on what you believe is true and good, rather than leading decisions based off of scarcity or negativity or trauma. And of course, there's always yin yang, right? There's gonna be some of that. Even though I say I'm a heart centered leader, of course I have shortcomings and I'm not 100% perfect in that. But I do think a lot of people that are the resource controllers in our world are not heart centered. And most of the resources are being controlled by people who are the opposite of that. And I believe we can make a massive change in the world by flipping that.

Courtney Johnson [00:19:47]:
Imagine our whole world, the people with the most power and influence are people that are leading from their heart.

Vision Battlesword [00:19:55]:
Okay, so in general, your philosophy is that on the spectrum of more and less intelligent and heart centered that it would be better if we had a system that somehow rewarded those who were more intelligent and heart centered with more ability to direct resources and that it'd be okay if money is the arbitrary measure that we use to determine that.

Courtney Johnson [00:20:21]:
Yes, I'm glad you used the word okay because I cannot say it would be good, but I can say it would be okay for the game we're playing now. And I believe that starts with a choice. So there's a choice that you can make of I'm going to step out of this game. I don't feel comfortable. I'm not ethically aligned with this game, that's not for me. Or I'm going to play in this game because I know if I play and win this game I can have a greater good. That's my trolley problem.

Vision Battlesword [00:20:49]:
Okay, now I'm curious about these resource controllers that you're talking about. And you say that in our sandbox that we're in now, a lot of the controllers of resources are those who have a huge amount of influence and directing them are not necessarily heart centered. Would you say they're also not necessarily intelligent?

Courtney Johnson [00:21:07]:
I would say they are intelligent. I'm not sure. I've never met these people personally. I've never met our most powerful and wealthiest people in the world personally. But I can tell you the people I've met on a smaller scale, the millionaire, even small number billionaire entrepreneurs that I have personally connected with, most of them are really great heart centered people.

Vision Battlesword [00:21:32]:
Okay, well if they're not heart centered, let's just say some of them aren't. If they're not heart centered, what do you think their center is coming from?

Courtney Johnson [00:21:40]:
Probably fear, pain.

Vision Battlesword [00:21:45]:
It's really interesting because this piggybacks very closely on the most recent conversation I just had with Vic about integrity. And he has this strong sense, very similar to what you're saying, that people can be driven by their own sort of inner wounding or sense of inner lack or inner scarcity, meaning scarcity of their own self esteem for example, and things like that, and can be driven toward wanting to pursue what he calls money, fame and power, which is kind of closely aligned to what we're talking about here. And he also has the belief that there's a paradigm shift that we could make and it would be good to make to somehow help people to feel more motivated from a sense of inner abundance or a sense of inner fullness or healing or health and that that wouldn't diminish in his, in his mind. That wouldn't diminish our Drive or our motivation to still achieve, to do great things, to, you know, create beautiful art, to innovate in technology, even, you know, explore different stars and things like that, but that we could do it in a way that is less traumatic to the world, you know, to the planet, to the environment and to other humans, if our motivations were based more on what he calls healthy integrity. So I'm just curious if that resonates for you and kind of aligns with what you're saying.

Courtney Johnson [00:23:19]:
Yeah. What's coming up is a theory that I have around how people gain power and money and thus direct resources. I believe there are three ways. One, you inherit it, you were born into a very wealthy family and you have money and you're directing resources. That is a way. Second way, your trauma gives you the skills to become wealthy. You could develop maybe narcissistic traits from your trauma. And that might not make you an effective leader, but it would make.

Courtney Johnson [00:23:52]:
It might not make you a healthy leader, but it would make you an effective leader. You could maybe say someone like Donald Trump has both of those came from money and has maybe some wounding and narcissistic traits that has allowed him to be very successful. But there's no question that he has power. Right. Then there are the people that gain power. Money, influence, through healing, through bumping up against their limiting beliefs and pushing past them, growing their companies, growing their influence through healing work, which is most of the people that I encounter. So it's people in that third category that I desire to give them power and a voice and message and help them expand. So tension, I think tension is very important.

Courtney Johnson [00:24:38]:
And this is actually where I don't necessarily think value for. What's the value for value exchange called that you talk about sometimes sacred reciprocity.

Vision Battlesword [00:24:48]:
Value for value.

Courtney Johnson [00:24:49]:
Yeah. Sacred reciprocity. I don't think it is the best system because it lacks tension.

Vision Battlesword [00:24:57]:
Hmm.

Courtney Johnson [00:24:58]:
That's my belief. It might not. But I find that when we have tension, we open up new money portals and thus value portals. I will give you an example. There is a program that, like a self development program I'm doing that costed $8,000. And I was like, holy, $8,000, that's a lot of money. I'm gonna go, I'm gonna ask the universe for a money portal and I'm going to open up a money portal that can make me $8,000. Well, I got an idea.

Courtney Johnson [00:25:26]:
Sunrise content challenge. Put it out there, charge $75 for it. Get this many people, boom, in a week, I made $8,000. Great. Now I'm doing the program well, I can run the challenge again next month, and that's another $8,000. And the month after that, that's another $8,000. And there's 200 people on this program that I'm impacting, and they're bringing their stuff into the world, right? So I opened up this money portal, and I think a lot of times, and I think that sacred reciprocity doesn't have that tension of like, oh, my God, that's like, the most expensive thing I've ever paid for in my life. How am I going to do it? I got to level up in order to do that.

Courtney Johnson [00:26:00]:
Right. You might think of the example of maybe your friend is getting married across the country. To go there, to get a hotel, to get a flight, it's going to cost a thousand dollars. Instead of saying, oh, I can't do that because it's too expensive, you can think, all right, how am I going to make an extra thousand dollars this month? You do it, and then that keeps making you a thousand dollars. So you're open, but it's value because you're. In order to make a thousand dollars, you have to go give somebody value. But where I think sacred reciprocity lacks, this is what I think of money is different than what someone else thinks of money. So I might say, okay, that felt like $200 to me.

Courtney Johnson [00:26:34]:
And there's not necessarily a tension of you saying, no, this is what it's valued at. And that tension is making me level up and figure out a way. What are your thoughts on that?

Vision Battlesword [00:26:46]:
I feel like this is a big one to unpack. I think, like, there's a lot in there. One thing I want to say is I think there's a difference between sacred reciprocity and value for value as a system of transaction, let's say. So I think sacred reciprocity is like, kind of a real ancient and more philosophical or spiritual concept of meaning, what goes around comes around kind of thing. We use it like in. In this little Austin microcosm. People use the term to mean, like, a very specific way of getting paid. But I don't think that's like.

Vision Battlesword [00:27:25]:
I think there's. I think it's a much, much bigger concept. It actually comes from the study group that we're both in, you know, where this. This concept is coming up in the material sacred reciprocity, which has more to do with kind of paying it forward in a more general sense, karmic sense or spiritual sense, doing good in the world. Is its own benefit. And what you put out into the world is generally what you will receive back. It's good to be generous. It's good to be charitable.

Vision Battlesword [00:27:55]:
It's good to help other people without any expectation of reward. But you will be rewarded in the cosmic sense. What goes around comes around, and everyone sort of gets what they deserve. I think that's the general idea of sacred reciprocity, and I like it. You know, it makes sense to me. I believe in it. Value for value is different. And I think that's where we're kind of like talking a little bit about pricing and manifestation.

Vision Battlesword [00:28:26]:
But value for value just means I'm going to serve you first, and then I'm going to let you decide what you want to pay me for what. For what it is that you received. I think there's something. I really like it. I think there's something really interesting about it. I think it's pattern interrupting. But in general, that piece about tension that you're bringing up kind of, I think is the point where there is tension in value for value. But it, but it also.

Vision Battlesword [00:28:57]:
There's something about relaxing tension that I'm hopeful is like something that we can all be moving toward. Where I'm curious about what, like a less competitive, more cooperative feeling economy could be like.

Courtney Johnson [00:29:16]:
I'm curious about that, too. However, if we're focusing on playing in our sandbox in this conversation, I feel like that's a whole other, like, what could be, you know.

Vision Battlesword [00:29:28]:
Well, let me just say this. I think there's tension in value for value in the sense that it's the opposite tension. I think it's the opposite paradigm of more of a pricing model or. Or like that. I think. I think I understand what you're talking about with the tension you're. You're referring to, but it's. The tension is I actually, as a service provider or.

Vision Battlesword [00:29:51]:
Or as a provider of value, I am on the hook. I've. I've kind of put myself on the hook to deliver really good, really good product, really good service, whatever that is, because it's like, you haven't paid me yet, you know, and so there's something that I like about that where it feels more like a race to the top. It feels like more of an incentive and also sort of like making a bet on yourself to say, yeah, I want to prove to you how much value I have. And actually, there's no. There's no ceiling to it, in a sense that I may have priced myself, let's say, at a Hundred dollars. But because I intentionally don't put a price on it, I'm going to show up, do the very, very best that I can for you, and I want to exceed your expectations if I can. You may choose to send me $200 or $500, because that's the impact of the value that you received.

Vision Battlesword [00:30:53]:
So I could have actually limited myself. I could have actually capped myself if I only valued myself at $100. Now, the flip side of that, of what you're talking about, I think, is, let's suppose that I valued myself at $5,000, and then the other person, you know, may only be able to afford 1,000. Right. So it's sort of like, are we negotiating up or are we negotiating down? But there's still tension in the process. Either way, kind of. It kind of goes one way or.

Courtney Johnson [00:31:19]:
The other, I think not. Obviously, not every transaction we make, we want a lot of tension. Right. Like, you're right. We can kind of relax. Like, that would be nice. Right. However, some things having a money tension, I think can really level up people.

Courtney Johnson [00:31:34]:
And you're right. That could exist in the value for value exchange. Absolutely. Especially someone has a really big impact. They're like, wow, I want to give back. And that's where the tension is.

Vision Battlesword [00:31:45]:
Tell me more about the tension from your perspective. And what, Like, I want to know more about where that tension shows up and then how you feel it can be beneficial.

Courtney Johnson [00:31:55]:
Yeah. So where the tension shows up is when, for me personally, when I want to level up myself or when I want to support someone else's dream or when, then when there's some sort of reciprocity happening, for example, I want to make a bigger impact. I want to, you know, level up this part of my business and my mission, and I want to hire this person. And that's going to cost me $1,000 a month. Oof. Okay, that's. That's. That's tension.

Courtney Johnson [00:32:25]:
That's sticky, that's crunchy, that's uncomfortable. What am I going to do to provide even more value to the people around me that I'm providing $1,000 a month of value to my community? All right, I got to test some things out. I got to try. I got to go through this, like, evolutionary process of testing and failing and trying and doing this and getting ideas. All right, Locked in. Got the extra thousand dollars a month. Now I'm ready to hire this person. Great.

Courtney Johnson [00:32:49]:
They come on. It's awesome. I'm helping their dreams. They're helping my dream. Then I'm ready to level up again. Feel that tension. All right, now I'm ready to do this self development program. Now I'm ready to hire this other person.

Courtney Johnson [00:33:00]:
Now I'm ready to get this tool. Now I'm ready to upgrade my equipment. Feeling the tension, putting out more value. Go through the iteration, go through the suck, go through the finally get there, level up more impact.

Vision Battlesword [00:33:12]:
Okay, so it sounds like you're kind of, sounds to me like you're describing the transformational process.

Courtney Johnson [00:33:21]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:33:21]:
Right. So, and so you're kind of using the neutral as we've agreed on it, the neutral and imaginary tool of money or that technology kind of as a, as a game to create a game for yourself, to play, to motivate you. It's like if you're almost just looking at it as points, you know, I want to get a new high score, but how can I do that? And, but there's actually in this game there's real stakes, there's real like life consequences that you get to, to use as the, the motivating energy.

Courtney Johnson [00:33:57]:
Yes, that is entirely accurate. I have had so much expansion through seeking money because again, I'm not really seeking money. I'm seeking a bigger impact, a bigger stage, more people. You know, I would love to share what I actually do with money.

Vision Battlesword [00:34:14]:
Please.

Courtney Johnson [00:34:14]:
Okay, so 2024, huge year. My business hit. My business consistently made like $30,000 a month. So I was bringing in $30,000 a month, which I'm on track to do a million in 2025. Very exciting new level of game. Anyways, last year was like around 400,000, $30,000 a month. I pay myself. In 2024, I paid myself $10,000 a month.

Courtney Johnson [00:34:39]:
That goes to my mortgage is $3,000, my car, my health insurance, my food, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And $10,000 a month. That's $120,000 a year. That's a comfy life in Austin. I'm not like, woo, yeah, flying private jets, but I'm traveling, I'm doing the things I want, paying my mortgage, supporting people, eating healthy foods, going to, you know, all the things. $20,000 a month, that's left over. Do you know where that goes?

Vision Battlesword [00:35:04]:
Where does that go?

Courtney Johnson [00:35:05]:
To other people's dreams via my dream based business model.

Vision Battlesword [00:35:09]:
Yeah, that's amazing. So what does that mean though?

Courtney Johnson [00:35:12]:
Yeah, what does that mean? So I don't hire anyone full time. I actually think full time work is kind of like slavery vibes. I only hire people if I can. If we can mutually support each other's dreams. For example, I have a fractional chief operating officer and when I met her, her dream was to create a fractional COO business where she helps women level up and helps them with strategy and operations. Great. I am seeking that and you are seeking clients. Now I'm supporting her dream to the tune of $3,000 a month.

Courtney Johnson [00:35:44]:
And she is literally like living her dream, creating abundance, thriving, buying house, doing all these things. I got her clients, I mentored her, we have a great relationship. Somebody else, her dream was to work from home, remote and do admin tasks for leaders. Great, I'm going to help you set up that business. Helping her on her dream, mentoring her. I'm helping. I'm literally financially supporting her with a thousand dollars a month. She does my emails.

Courtney Johnson [00:36:10]:
Great. She's accomplishing her dreams through that. I'm all right. Then I have someone else. Two ladies in South America. Their goal was to have a marketing agency. That was their dream. They wanted to create beautiful graphics and edit videos, mentor them, get them more clients, help them set up their business, their dream.

Courtney Johnson [00:36:26]:
And now I'm supporting them. $2,000 a month. Even the tools I use, even the bank I use is somebody that I met that had this horrible accident, left Wall street, started his own independent bank. My bank fees go to him. Right? The tools I use, the analytics tool I use is a very heart centered business of a friend of mine whose dream was to improve the analytics of entrepreneurs. So I pay $30 a month. Every single dollar of my business is going to somebody else's dream. I'm not willy nilly like, oh, I just have to solve this problem.

Courtney Johnson [00:37:00]:
No, no, no. It's like an intentional dream based business model and it's great to theorize about like money, bad, whatever, like, or like money is not the right solution, whatever. That's not helpful. You know what's helpful is me spending $20,000 a month on other people's dreams so they can pay their rent, so they can buy houses, they can eat healthy food, so they can exercise, they can support their families. That's literally the only thing that matters to me. That's why impact is so important, because why? We can go in circles all day, but if we're not doing something, what impact is that having? Like truly nothing? It doesn't have any. Maybe it does, like in the cosmic sense, but it doesn't have an impact of helping people, that's for sure. So I desire to continue to grow and to continue to help them do the same thing.

Courtney Johnson [00:37:46]:
Like to continue to help them make their own webs and weavings of supporting other people's dreams. It is a completely imperfect system. I know, but this is how I'm playing in the sandbox today.

Vision Battlesword [00:37:59]:
What are you getting back? What value do you receive back from that $20,000 a month that you spend on it? Sounds like you're hiring other people to work for you, right?

Courtney Johnson [00:38:10]:
Well, I'm not necessarily. They're contractors or we're partnering, so it's not like I'm hiring them full time. They're not employed by me.

Vision Battlesword [00:38:18]:
I get that that's a very important distinction to you. I get that. But I'm just saying that you're paying them to do work for you, correct?

Courtney Johnson [00:38:26]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:38:27]:
So what value do you receive back to yourself or to your business from the value that they provide?

Courtney Johnson [00:38:33]:
Yes, I love this question. So the main value is that I get to stay in my zone of genius and they take care of everything else. So I don't do anything outside of my zone of genius. I don't schedule, I don't check my emails, I don't do my operations, I don't do my email flows, I don't do my finances. I stay in my zone of genius, which is like speaking and content creation.

Vision Battlesword [00:38:58]:
Sounds amazing.

Courtney Johnson [00:38:59]:
Amazing.

Vision Battlesword [00:38:59]:
Sounds like it's a win win for everybody.

Courtney Johnson [00:39:01]:
It's a win, win, win. A win, win, win that satisfies my deepest desire of impact.

Vision Battlesword [00:39:07]:
It sounds to me like you have cracked some kind of a code or hacked a system somehow to truly and deeply integrate the ideas of philanthropy, charity, living your own dream, which has to do with personally empowering others and helping them to unlock their empowerment of self expression and creativity and flourishing and all that sort of stuff while being completely compatible with the kind of traditional capitalist economics of running a business. Sounds like you've, you've like merged those two together in to a way that there's like no contradiction or conflict between what is helping you and your business and supporting you in creating the type of quality of life that you want to enjoy and not doing necessarily things that you don't want, don't enjoy, or you know, aren't your best, highest use of your own skills while simultaneously unlocking other people's ability to do the same in their life.

Courtney Johnson [00:40:15]:
That's correct, yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:40:17]:
Well, how. Sign me up. Like, how could, how could we get everyone on this program?

Courtney Johnson [00:40:21]:
That's, that's my goal. I would love to help people, especially in the spiritual community that have stories around money, that it cannot be ethical under any circumstances to see that maybe there is a way to play in the sandbox. That yes, it might have to have some negative impact, but you can still make it 80% positive. I believe that this structure and model can work if we are all aware of our dreams in pursuit of our dreams, like heart centered dreams. Like I truly believe the more people that adopt this model, like it can weave together like beautifully, maybe not perfectly, but at least get us 80% of the way there.

Vision Battlesword [00:41:02]:
Yeah.

Courtney Johnson [00:41:03]:
And this is probably what life without money is, right? People pursuing their heart centered dreams and having reciprocity to each other?

Vision Battlesword [00:41:09]:
I think so. I mean, it's hard to imagine it because we've never really lived in a world like that. And early in the conversation you referred to some sort of intentional community where we could go and live without money. And I was thinking, I didn't have a chance to ask the question, but I was thinking in the back of my mind, like, where does such a community exist? Can you, can you point me to one? Can you show me one? Like there might be a few examples of that at very small scales here and there, but truth be told, those, even those communities, I mean even the Amish use money, right? Like everybody ultimately, because you have to interface with the matrix. You have to interview your. You may be in the sandbox, but the sandbox isn't a playground. And the playground is in the park and the park is in the city and so forth. It's like you're never fully isolated or disintegrated, disconnected from the rest of the world that resources are flowing through.

Vision Battlesword [00:42:05]:
So I think there's a little bit of a self delusion even in that to say, I'll go here and not, and not play with money. The idea of Burning man kind of comes to mind, you know, about that kind of container. It's like, oh, we're going to go there and not play with money. It's like, well, there's a lot of money going in and there's a lot of money.

Courtney Johnson [00:42:21]:
How do we get there?

Vision Battlesword [00:42:22]:
Yeah, exactly. Right. So at any rate, long story short, it seems to me that what you have managed to unlock in your life, and I don't know how you know, how you got there. If there was some kind of like, I don't know, experience that like set you off on that trajectory or something like that. But at any rate, it seems like the unlock that you've created in your life is really deeply in alignment with your philosophy of, hey, why don't we actually go out and collect? Why don't we, the intelligent heart Centered folks actually go out and collect as many of these fictional dollars as we can so that we can then choose where they could be directed so that we can have the influence to shape this world in the direction that we would like to see it evolve. And so, hats off to you.

Courtney Johnson [00:43:15]:
Bingo.

Vision Battlesword [00:43:16]:
Good job.

Courtney Johnson [00:43:17]:
Play the game to win the game, to change the game.

Vision Battlesword [00:43:19]:
I want to methodically, point by point, go through and address and give you the opportunity to dissolve or break down those different stories that you were talking about that, you know, you feel that we, the consciousness folks, are bumping up against that are like self limiting us in our relationship with money.

Courtney Johnson [00:43:40]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:43:41]:
Does that sound like fun?

Courtney Johnson [00:43:42]:
Sounds like so much fun.

Vision Battlesword [00:43:43]:
Okay, let's take a quick break. Okay, so what are the stories that you know of about money that you think are holding us back from just being able to use a tool to our advantage to change the world for the better?

Courtney Johnson [00:43:59]:
Yes. One of those stories is that money is money somehow makes you less conscious. Money makes you less good. Money, you know, rejecting money is good and noble. That's a story that I used to hold.

Vision Battlesword [00:44:15]:
I love it. Let's break it down. Okay, so why do you think, why do people think that money is not good and noble? There's even a phrase which has gone around that says something like, the love of money is the root of all evil.

Courtney Johnson [00:44:33]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:44:33]:
Why do you think people think that?

Courtney Johnson [00:44:35]:
Because we have a lot of bad examples that are very loud. And I believe that people would change that belief if we saw more people doing great things with this tool. I would never say, wow, you have a lot of hammers. That is bad. You're like, what do you mean? I'm a house. I'm a home builder. Of course I have a lot of hammers. This is just furthering my mission of building homes.

Courtney Johnson [00:45:01]:
It's simply a tool. So I think that it is hard to dismantle that belief without good examples. I would encourage people to find positive examples because they are out there and there are so many in our community.

Vision Battlesword [00:45:16]:
But what's a negative example that people might see that gives them the idea that the love of money or the pursuit of money or even just having money is somehow.

Courtney Johnson [00:45:30]:
There's something about it being like, not enlightened.

Vision Battlesword [00:45:32]:
Huh.

Courtney Johnson [00:45:34]:
An example would be like the pharmaceutical industry. There is a clear corporate greed that is not in the best interest of people. And the money is very consolidated and also exploitative. However, you could say there is a shadow side and some light side. There's some yang in the yin because, you know, having A ton of money go into developing pharmaceutical. Pharmaceuticals has helped people's lives, has helped certain illnesses. However, I think the greed around it is a great example of money being used for negativity and has perpetuated negative systems.

Vision Battlesword [00:46:09]:
Right, Greed. Okay. Yeah. I think we're getting somewhere here, so. Because we've already figured out that collecting money actually really means collecting influence over people and resources. That's. Money is actually kind of a form of power in. In a way, really more than it's a form of value.

Vision Battlesword [00:46:31]:
What people might have seen or noticed throughout history is that when people are in a pursuit of money for. In and of itself, they may externalize negative.

Courtney Johnson [00:46:45]:
I'm gonna stop you. In and of itself. Nobody is in pursuit of money in and of itself. They're in pursuit of money via a negative negativity or a pain.

Vision Battlesword [00:46:52]:
Right, okay, good point. Yeah, thanks for bringing me back to that. I think people aren't in pursuit. Well, let me rephrase that. There could be a pathology where people actually are in pursuit of just the acquisition of money in and of itself. But you're right, what people really want money for is whatever it is they.

Courtney Johnson [00:47:14]:
Can buy with it or the comfort of it.

Vision Battlesword [00:47:18]:
Yeah. Okay. I mean, I think just having wealth can create a sense of safety, or at least having an abundance of money can create a sense of safety or comfort. True, but you're right, because we've already agreed that money is just a transformational technology for converting value from one form into another. What people are trying to acquire when they're trying to acquire money actually is safety, power, comfort, luxury, whatever it is that they can buy with the money. But when people see other people in pursuit of the acquisition of money, they may also notice that people sometimes can tend to become very mercenary when they're doing that. Meaning the negative externalities of the pursuit of money or wealth can tend to overshadow the benefits or the positives that people seem to be doing with their money. Meaning, to your point about the healthcare industry, if it looks like there's a huge conglomeration of companies and governmental agencies that are doing a huge amount of harm to a large amount of people while they're simultaneously getting richer and richer and richer, I think that's probably where people connect the dots between, oh, wait, the love of money is the root of evil.

Vision Battlesword [00:48:48]:
Like, because it seems like those two things go hand in hand a lot of times.

Courtney Johnson [00:48:52]:
Yes. To break it down, I think. I don't think many people have an intention to harm others. I think the intention of pursuit of money negatively is probably for comfort. Like, I need to build all of this up so I can feel comfort, or I need to build all this up so I have access to escapes. Like, what is the solution to that is healing? Like, anybody who's listening to this probably would not have that intention to, you know, or. Or maybe they could identify that intention. Oh, yeah.

Courtney Johnson [00:49:23]:
I don't know if this pursuit of. This pursuit of money is for comfort, like, how can I address that? So I'm coming at the pursuit of money and power in a way that's to make a positive impact.

Vision Battlesword [00:49:33]:
Yeah, I love how you're bringing it back to intention because that's, of course, one of my top core values in life. And also, I think it's really at the heart of this whole money conversation because, you know, as we're kind of talking this through, I think there's. There's multiple levels or layers at which, you know, there can be a very, very personal level where, you know, someone is wanting to acquire money and it has some sort of impact on them self, personally or with their close personal relationships. You know, maybe someone has a gambling problem, or maybe someone is just miserly and is stingy or like that. Some sort of pathology like what we talked about. Like they want to acquire wealth because they're trying to solve some inner problem. But I think the bigger picture conversation really has to do with the fact that money is an abstraction because of this imaginary quality of it. Because it's sort of this, like, universal resource that's like a chameleon.

Vision Battlesword [00:50:39]:
It's not any one particular thing. It's kind of like transparent or colorless form of value in a way. The fact that we put that between us and the other forms of value that we receive, or the way that we share value with each other, that can create a possibility of harm that we don't actually feel or harm that we don't actually experience that we're participating in. Do you see what I mean? Like, if we're putting like all of these multiple layers of translation and transformation between us and a harmful act, all we know is I'm spending money over here. But then nine steps down the path, environmental catastrophe is happening over here. Or, you know, people are being exploited in this other area or whatever. So I think that's kind of the rub with money is it's the abstraction of value in and of itself that can facilitate this kind of disconnection of us with the actual impact of our choices and our actions. Does that make sense?

Courtney Johnson [00:51:54]:
Yes. And that's Why? I think we need more heart centered entrepreneurs that are not going through those layers of exploitation and have ethical ways of producing the goods and services that they want produced.

Vision Battlesword [00:52:06]:
Yeah. And, and wouldn't it start with first even an awareness.

Courtney Johnson [00:52:09]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:52:10]:
Of what is, what is the actual consequence of my choice when I choose this cell phone or when I choose this food? I think that's a big part of it because. Because we've lost our literal connection with the resources that we are influencing when we make our monetary choices.

Courtney Johnson [00:52:31]:
Yes. I think a great, I'm, I'm very action oriented and I think a great action item you can do to explore that is to vote with your dollars. I think of dollars like votes. The more money you have, the more votes you have. So what, what do I do personally with my money? I vote for meat from a local rancher that I have a great relationship with and I know exactly where it comes from. I vote for like fitness classes from a great place. I vote for like wellness for myself and other people. I vote for natural materials that are ethically produced.

Courtney Johnson [00:53:03]:
I've, you know, I. So you're right, that can be a story that spending money is bad because it brings all of these layers that actually leads to exploitation or something negative. But it doesn't have to like you don't have to shop at those places. But sometimes, obviously like a phone, it's hard not to have that again in the world. And we can go back to. But impact again we're going back to impact, positive impact. Getting into the practicality, like start to bring that to consciousness of how you're spending money, how you're voting with your money. Are you voting for shitty labor practices and like low quality materials that are running the earth or are you voting for something positive? Unfortunately, to vote for things that are progressing life in our earth positively costs more money.

Vision Battlesword [00:53:50]:
I agree with you wholeheartedly and I think I'm just peeling back the layers of. And of course, you know, we're having a sacred conversation so things are naturally going to go a little philosophical if I'm involved. Right. But I'm just trying to peel back the layers of answering your initial. Not exactly. It was my initial question really about the point you were making, which is why do some people, maybe even many people have this negative association of money itself? And I'm sort of like peeling back those layers to try to get to the root of like, oh yeah, there is an actual thing here that money can do which is to disconnect us from the impact of our choices and so people may see that and then they may see that on a grand scale in the healthcare industry or in government policy or even in their own family. And the choices that people in their circle of friends or their loved ones are making that seem to be at odds with having a positive impact in the world. But I think all of that, there's something else that's a little deeper or rather there's something else that's not so analytical, that's more emotional about like the way people feel about money.

Vision Battlesword [00:55:07]:
And like, you know, just going back to that conversation that we both listened to that I had with David Savage, it's real clear that he's got like there's a heavy emotional content for him around the whole concept of money. And I think a lot of people have that, that there's something that feels dirty about it, that it's not, that it's not honorable. There's something, there's something dishonorable about even just using it if you have to use it at all. It's almost something a little bit shameful that you do just to get by. And that there's something. Yeah, there's something strange about that. There's some kind of cultural programming there. There's some kind of.

Courtney Johnson [00:55:49]:
Bringing up my conspiracy theory.

Vision Battlesword [00:55:51]:
Tell me.

Courtney Johnson [00:55:52]:
I. Okay, I know that this is very black and white thinking, but. But let's just entertain the idea that there is an equal and opposite force of good and evil or of like light and dark. And I think that we kind of go too far with like there's shadowy figure Illuminati. But let's just say. All right, let's just say that, that you're in power over. You're in power via fear. Via fear.

Courtney Johnson [00:56:18]:
That's creating a lot of yuckiness, pain, abuse in the world. And then there's this other community that's like we're leading from light, we're leading from love. How would you keep them down if you were the shadowy Illuminati figure?

Vision Battlesword [00:56:33]:
What I convince them that they don't want money, power or fame.

Courtney Johnson [00:56:36]:
Yeah, that's how I would do it too. Is that how you would do?

Vision Battlesword [00:56:41]:
Makes sense. And I haven't really thought about how I would do it because I'm not in that group. But yeah, there's something, there's something attractive about that kind of paranoia. But there's also something I think that could be very heart centered that could be coming from like. Yeah, I'll bet there is some negative programming that is intentional. If you're in power, you'd prefer that other people not want to pursue. Makes sense. At the same point though, I, I could see there being some intuition that people have, like David, like even myself and others that, like, there's some other way that we used to be able to do this and maybe that way is no longer valid.

Vision Battlesword [00:57:30]:
You know, maybe, maybe that way worked at a level of human population or human technology or stage of evolution or something that we have surpassed. And we're, we can't go back to that now because things are just too big, too global, too interconnected, too complex maybe. But I think there might be an intuition, a heart centered intuition that people have, especially spiritual people. You know, people have gone through that personal development work who have done more of that inner integration and healing and stuff that they might sense, they might have a sense that it's like, it doesn't have to be so cut through, it doesn't have to be so competitive. There could be a way that we could just trade, share resources, exchange value, exchange mutual support and safety in community, where we don't have to use this kind of medium of exchange, but where also it's not just the medium of exchange which we've agreed as neutral, but it's like the sort of suspicious nature of how we transact with each other in a way. You know, the negotiation, the haggling, the contractual arrangements. It's. There's something that David said that does make a lot of sense to me.

Vision Battlesword [00:58:50]:
When he was talking about trust and how he, he was encapsulating it all just in the concept of money. I think maybe it's not just money, but, but it's something about contract and accounting and transaction and things of that nature. But it has something to do with what level of trust and intimacy we have for each other. Because it's like, okay, me and you, there's a lot of value for value experiences that we could share where, yeah, we might use money as a convenience, or we might not use, we might not need to use money with each other to be like, yeah, would you do this for me? Sure, I will. Or would you do this for me? Okay, sure, like, whatever. Because we have a level of trust. Because we have a level of intimacy. See, we have that connection in our relationship, but with a stranger, I don't feel that level of comfort.

Vision Battlesword [00:59:39]:
So it's like, okay, yeah, like, show me the money. Sure, I'll do it for you. Do you have the money? Show it to me. Okay, great. Like, well, give me half now, then I'll do the thing and then you give me the other half. Like there's a level of suspicion that we kind of have now for each other. And maybe that just has to do with the level of scale. A population that we don't know each other with intimacy anymore.

Courtney Johnson [01:00:02]:
Yes. A couple of things are. One, I do want to share that a gifting economy and a trade economy are different. And I think a trade economy is a different level of consciousness than a gifting economy. A gifting economy is like man, everyone's got to really be working on themselves.

Vision Battlesword [01:00:19]:
What is it? What even is a gift economy?

Courtney Johnson [01:00:21]:
I've asked you give without any need to receive anything. And you rely completely on others just based on gifting. And it's your zone of genius, your unique gift. You're overflowing. Like you're overflowing an organization. And you can help other people with that. And that's. You give that out to the world completely for free with zero expectation.

Courtney Johnson [01:00:43]:
That's a gifting economy. Like what happens at Burning man and by the way, at Burning man with, I don't know, 40,000 people. It works well because everyone's agreeing in the container that we're going to do that and we're going to support each other and everyone is on a certain of level of consciousness to be there where they're opting in and consenting. And it works in that container.

Vision Battlesword [01:01:01]:
Well, hang on a second though, timeout. Because within the container of Burning man there's an also simultaneously another value which is radical self reliance.

Courtney Johnson [01:01:13]:
Yes, yes, yes, yes. Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [01:01:15]:
Are those. Do those two need to go hand in hand or. Okay, because like, this is. I'm so glad we're having this conversation. I hope you don't mind if we take a little detour into this whole gift economy thing, because I really want to talk about it. I've talked with a number of people, I've read some things and I keep asking this question of different people who seem to believe that they know what a gift economy would be like. And I have not yet ever received a fully satisfactory answer. Like one that really resonates for me, even though the impression that I get of that idea of a gift economy or maybe a resource based economy makes more sense to me if those are two different things.

Vision Battlesword [01:02:00]:
But anyway, I have this impression that that would be a good thing. But I have never yet been able to really sharpen up the explanation of what it exactly is or how it would work to my satisfaction. That I can say like, oh yeah, a gift economy is something that we should be aspiring toward. Because there's.

Courtney Johnson [01:02:21]:
You need to go to Bernie.

Vision Battlesword [01:02:22]:
Maybe I still have some kind of, you know, latent belief structure that, that my intuition kicks in and says, like, that's not going to work.

Courtney Johnson [01:02:35]:
Well, it definitely is not going to work. On our current level of consciousness with 8 billion people.

Vision Battlesword [01:02:40]:
Yeah.

Courtney Johnson [01:02:40]:
Could we rise to a level of consciousness collectively where that works and makes sense? Absolutely. I think that probably will happen.

Vision Battlesword [01:02:47]:
Yeah.

Courtney Johnson [01:02:47]:
But I'm dealing with what's in front of me. And yes, radical self reliance is such an important part of it because you have, you've taken care of your shit. You have your stuff together. And then in your immediate group, in your immediate camp, you have a lot of trust. You're relying on them for like food or whatever. And then the greater group of the 40,000 people, you're overflowing. And it's a very abundant feeling. Yes.

Courtney Johnson [01:03:08]:
I don't think we are to the place of that, but I do see optimism and hope that there will be a future better system. I don't believe that it's my zone of genius and purpose in life to invent that system. But I hope somebody listening to this does and is having those conversations. Maybe that's you and David.

Vision Battlesword [01:03:27]:
Could be. Yeah. Yeah. So like, okay, that makes sense to me because this idea of a gift economy, it would have to come from, it seems to me, if I'm just thinking through it logically, like resources. Do we, do you and me at least agree? Okay, we can get into infinite energy solutions and all sorts of different stuff. Let's set that aside for now. In the sandbox that we're currently in, which I love this frame, like I'm happy to be able to play in a sandbox with someone. Do we agree that resources are finite in the world?

Courtney Johnson [01:03:59]:
I don't believe that.

Vision Battlesword [01:04:00]:
Okay.

Courtney Johnson [01:04:01]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [01:04:02]:
So what does that mean to you?

Courtney Johnson [01:04:04]:
To me that means infinite abundance. That if I am back to money, I am making a lot of money. I'm giving a lot of money away. They're giving a lot of money away. And it is this web. I don't think money is a zero sum game just because I'm not talking about money.

Vision Battlesword [01:04:20]:
We've agreed that money is imaginary. I'm talking about resources, the physical, the physical tandem.

Courtney Johnson [01:04:25]:
I, I think that we have unlimited resources. But that's my intuition. I don't have evidence for that.

Vision Battlesword [01:04:31]:
But do you mean that in the sense of like the universe?

Courtney Johnson [01:04:34]:
No.

Vision Battlesword [01:04:34]:
Like on Earth, there's infinite resources right here on Earth.

Courtney Johnson [01:04:38]:
Yeah. I think there is regenerative resources that we haven't necessarily tapped into, or systems that we haven't tapped into that could provide unlimited resources.

Vision Battlesword [01:04:49]:
Unlimited? Are you, are you actually saying unlimited or what you're really saying is that there are resources that are so massive that they, they might as well be unlimited in terms of our capacity to consume them?

Courtney Johnson [01:05:02]:
No, I'm saying unlimited as in regenerative.

Vision Battlesword [01:05:05]:
I see.

Courtney Johnson [01:05:05]:
Yeah. So I guess that would limit. Because it could only be X plants or widgets or whatever. Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [01:05:12]:
Okay. Okay, good. Yes, we're on the same page. I agree with you then. I believe that the world is extraordinarily regenerative. I believe that we have only tapped a tiny, tiny, tiny fraction of the capacity of this physical world and universe and the energy available in it, as well as the technology and natural resource that's available. And I agree with you on that score. We're, we've got a lot, we've got a lot of headroom.

Vision Battlesword [01:05:43]:
There's. There's a lot of ceiling. But at the same point, locally speaking, okay, within the confines of this house, there exists a certain amount of furniture, there exists a certain amount of books, there exists a certain amount of whiteboards and markers. Like, we can count them. There's so many. So, like, this house has a carrying capacity of however many people. 20 people, 30 people, whatever, before, like, okay, you know, all the whiteboards and markers are in use. You know, all of the plates and dishes and silverware.

Vision Battlesword [01:06:17]:
There's. All of the furniture is occupied. Like, it's full. So from, from that perspective, a gift economy requires that in order for people to be going around giving gifts to each other all the time. That. To your point about radical self reliance and Burning man, my needs are met and I have more. My needs are met and I have extra. So here's some for you and if you feel like giving some to me, I would gratefully receive.

Vision Battlesword [01:06:46]:
Sounds great, but that's to, to my mind, not like what it looks like normally in the sandbox.

Courtney Johnson [01:06:56]:
Correct.

Vision Battlesword [01:06:57]:
Okay. And so like, when people talk about a gift economy back in tribal cultures or tribal civilizations, it's stuff. I'm not so sure that's really what it was. I don't know that. And, and not, not everybody necessarily says that. Some people do. I think in some cases it's a sort of a. What's the word?

Courtney Johnson [01:07:19]:
Like utopia.

Vision Battlesword [01:07:20]:
Yeah, like a, like a utopian or, or a fanciful. It seems to me that what those tribal civilizations and cultures were doing was not a gift economy, it was an integrated economy. Meaning, you know, it's A. If it's a family grouping or a number of families, saying individuals, somewhere from dozens to hundreds, everybody's not thinking in terms of, like, walking around giving gifts to each other all the time. They're just thinking in terms of making a living together, getting their needs met. And we're all in this together, meaning as a social animal, as a tribal creature. Like, exile is death back in those days. Right.

Vision Battlesword [01:08:04]:
It's like, really, really hard to survive as an individual, primate, human. So we're all in this together, which means, like, your success is my success and our success is grandma's success and her success is baby success and all of that sort of stuff. It's just. It's just integrated. It's not like. It's not a gift situation. It's not sacred reciprocity. It's just, you know, I gotta do for you so that you can do for him, so that he can do for her, so that she can do for me.

Vision Battlesword [01:08:35]:
It's like, it's. It's just like an ongoing system. It's regenerative. Yeah, it seems to me in that way. So I don't know if the word gift economy is really the right terminology for what it is that we're talking about, if we're trying to talk about what a different system looks like that transcends money. But I think coming back to the original question of why do we sometimes have this emotional attachment, a negative attachment to the idea of money and, like, where does that come from? I think it's possible that some of it comes from, like, intentional programming that's meant to keep a certain type of people disempowered. I think it also could come from just some kind of ancestral memory of, like, it used to be a different way and we didn't really need this thing. And it kind of felt more natural and it kind of felt more like loving and supportive in a way that could be surfacing in people's consciousness or.

Courtney Johnson [01:09:35]:
Maybe it's a way in other dimensions that we can feel that that's more aligned or something with us. And, like, you could go backwards. You could also go forwards. Like, we could feel the future and be like, feel the tension between now and the future and, oh, we want it to be more integrated because, yeah, it doesn't feel great to have to fight for your basic needs and survival.

Vision Battlesword [01:09:54]:
Right.

Courtney Johnson [01:09:55]:
Doesn't.

Vision Battlesword [01:09:56]:
Right, right. Right. And that's kind of what it feels like. I think that's an intuition that's that many people have. I think I can have that too. That that's kind of what it feels like in the sort of competitive, capitalist, so called capitalist, more like free market, meritocratic system that, that sandbox. It's, it's, you know, it's, it's like even in the memes of our culture, it's dog eat dog, you know, it's grind, grind, grind. It's, it's all of these different phrases that come up to basically say, you know, hey, it's, basically it's me against you.

Vision Battlesword [01:10:33]:
It's like we're pitted against each other for the competition, for these scarce resources. And I think people would love to transcend that into something that feels more abundant for everybody.

Courtney Johnson [01:10:42]:
I don't, I don't have that belief at all. I used to, My belief is it's easy to make money. Money comes to me very easily, and money flows from me to other people very easily. My belief is I'm a channel for ease and abundance. It's not hard to have my basic needs met and it's not hard to support other people and having their basic needs met. When I started believing that, that started happening for me. So I'm curious as an experiment for the listeners, maybe go delusional and, and program that into your mind for a month, see what happens, see if that could be true.

Vision Battlesword [01:11:15]:
It sounds like a, sounds like a great experiment. I, I'm just, I'm just giving voice to, I think, the, the stories of our culture.

Courtney Johnson [01:11:23]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [01:11:23]:
That a lot of people have heard and that a lot of people believe.

Courtney Johnson [01:11:27]:
And yeah, like I said, I was, I, I, that was my belief a few years ago.

Vision Battlesword [01:11:32]:
Yeah. I wonder what it would be like if everyone suddenly flipped the switch and came to a belief that actually resources are not scarce, actually there's more than enough for everyone. And actually I can be fully supported. I can have all of my needs met and then some, and I'm totally free to just express my maximum value to this world. That brings me joy.

Courtney Johnson [01:12:01]:
That comes down to my three core values. The. Yeah. Abundance for everyone, creating an impact in order to self express and create more.

Vision Battlesword [01:12:12]:
So your three values are impact, self expression, and abundance that you have written on my whiteboard right now?

Courtney Johnson [01:12:17]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [01:12:18]:
Okay. So some of us seem to think that money is bad or dirty or that it's like not honorable. We've dispelled that by saying that money is neutral. It's just a transformational tool to convert or direct resources from one form or place to another, and that it's likely that the carrying capacity of this world is far, far, far greater than Even we haven't even scratched the surface of the resources that are available. And, and the only limitation, at least you know, insofar as what you and I believe, Courtney, is that the only limitation to accessing those resources is our own ingenuity and imagination and the personal effort that we'd like to put into adding value to the world and to each other. Is that right?

Courtney Johnson [01:13:13]:
That is what I believe, yes.

Vision Battlesword [01:13:15]:
What else is. What are the other stories that are people are bumping up against that are holding them back from just having as much money as they want?

Courtney Johnson [01:13:23]:
I have to suffer to make money.

Vision Battlesword [01:13:24]:
I love this one. Tell me more.

Courtney Johnson [01:13:27]:
Yeah, a lot. I. I also used to believe this. I had to suffer. I had to work really hard. I had to have a one to one outcome of like really put in an hour, five hours of work to get that, five hours of output. But I've detached my input from my output via leverage, which has amplified the ability for me to provide value while money comes with me. While I do nothing.

Courtney Johnson [01:13:51]:
I can create value one time, for example, maybe I'll make a PDF resource on how to make a website and that helps a lot of people. And I make that one time, this instructional guide. And I can distribute that forever or as long as it's relevant. I can distribute that 10,000 times and I don't have to rewrite the guide 10,000 times. I make it once I distribute it 10,000 times, I can have $10,000 come back to me. So that's detaching my inputs from my outputs and that's also giving me scale, which gives me leverage, which allows me to help way more people. So the more you can add leverage to what you're doing and make it more accessible, thus having a bigger impact that detach that and that makes it less hard or tumultuous or suffering to make money. Sometimes it can be hard, sometimes it can be suffering.

Courtney Johnson [01:14:37]:
It does not have to be, and it does not have to be all the time.

Vision Battlesword [01:14:40]:
Okay. Why do you think people believe that?

Courtney Johnson [01:14:43]:
Because examples, there are examples of that. Most of our families, we probably saw our parents suffer to make money and to give us our basic needs. You know, we have stories of I had to work all day to give food up, put food on the table, and that that was true for them. It doesn't have to be true.

Vision Battlesword [01:15:02]:
Do you think people don't have to work to put food on their table?

Courtney Johnson [01:15:05]:
I think they do have to provide value to others. And I do think they have to go in the direction of their dream or you can go in the direction of fear, but I choose to go in the direction of their dream. And also, if you are pursuing the direction of your dream with an intention to create abundance for yourself and others, most of the time that probably will feel like joy. There will be some tension that you have to bust through to expand, but you don't have to suffer and suffer and suffer.

Vision Battlesword [01:15:31]:
Yeah, well, I think that's a really important distinction. And I even notice the reframe that you put on the question that I asked you, which is, don't people have to work to put food on their table? And you immediately reframed it to, well, I think that people have to provide value to each other or have to provide value to the world. And I think that's just such a. This is almost so natural to us that I think we should call attention to what it is that we just did. Right. Which is taking the work out of work or taking the suffering out of the idea of work. And as you know, like, my big philosophy is about how can we transform this idea of quote unquote, work into just all different forms of play? And that I truly believe that and I've truly experienced in my life how much more productive and more creative and actually more abundant, more value that we can both create and receive when we're operating from the spirit of play or doing something that we truly enjoy, or being in a state of flow versus when we're, you know, doing something that we have to force ourself to do or that we feel like we're suffering or it's exerting an effort against kind of like our inner will or inner nature. So I love how you reframe that into providing value.

Vision Battlesword [01:16:54]:
But on the other hand, I want to come back to is providing value in. In all of its different forms. Is it always fun or can it always be fun?

Courtney Johnson [01:17:04]:
Fun? I wouldn't use the word fun. I think enjoyable, transformational. Yes. But the tension for me is what makes it fun, that it's flow and ease and, oh, there's a roadblock and you got to smash it in the video game and then keep going and then there's something else level up. That's the game that we probably all consented to doing and being here.

Vision Battlesword [01:17:28]:
Got it.

Courtney Johnson [01:17:29]:
The game of expansion of consciousness.

Vision Battlesword [01:17:30]:
I see what you mean. Yeah. You can imagine somebody playing a video game and getting really intense and really passionate and even frustrated at times, like, oh, I can't believe I just ran into this obstacle again. And like, what am I going to do? But it's like you're playing a game, you're still having fun, you're not suffering. And so you can also look at it like exercise. You know, doing physical practice or doing a workout, it could feel very intense, it could feel very challenging. You know, your muscles could feel very sore. You can be stretching yourself, you know, a little bit beyond your limitations.

Vision Battlesword [01:18:01]:
But that doesn't have to feel like suffering is the point that you're making. You can feel tension, you can feel challenged, you can feel even a little uncomfortable. But suffering is, is kind of like in a different category. There's another thing you're bringing up here, which is talking about leverage and the kind of work that you do, the kind of play that you do. A lot of what you do is, is very service based and it's very digital based. And in both of those areas, kind of similar to money, I talk a lot about physical resources. And you bring it back a lot to money, which I think is interesting because there seems to me that they're different in kind, where resources to me feel very physical, tangible and finite. There's so much of them, at least in one particular local area.

Vision Battlesword [01:18:52]:
But money is like completely infinite. Like we could create as much of it as we want. It's a literal fiction in that way. And so I guess bring me back to thinking, thinking it from the perspective of other people who do different types of. Who add different types of value to the world other than creating content or working in the digital world or providing services. Even in services, there's at least time could be a constraint to how much of it you can produce or create. But people who actually make practical things in the world, people who grow food, people who build houses, people who provide sanitation, all different things like that. Is it always the case that people can disconnect their inputs from their outputs or introduce mechanisms of leverage in the same way that you do?

Courtney Johnson [01:19:44]:
I believe it is always the case that you can have a resource or a portal that introduces leverage. There's three types of leverage. People. You can either teach a lot of people. So I'm gonna go, I'm a farmer and I'm gonna go and teach a lot of people, or I'm gonna produce a high volume, or I'm gonna employ a lot of people as leverage, right? Or applying technology. I'm going to use this robot that's gonna harvest my crop for me and I won't have to put in as much effort. Media and code are other forms of leverage. So media is using the Internet to get in Front of more people, which is what I do.

Courtney Johnson [01:20:21]:
Code is same, pretty much same thing. But I'm going to program these robots or make this app that actually does this portion of my work for me that separates my inputs and outputs in this portal or on this task. And then money is a form of leverage too. In our economy, you can use money to grow more money via the stock market investing. So those are some, some forms of leverage. I think Lucas is a great example. He is a surgeon and he has disconnected his inputs from his outputs not in his day to day surgery job, but by teaching other people what he has learned and helping other people. So it's a small portion of it, but it is a portion that gives you a little bit of room to breathe and supports your basic needs.

Courtney Johnson [01:21:02]:
And then the rest is even more play.

Vision Battlesword [01:21:06]:
What would you say to someone or what advice would you give someone who is in that state of being constrained by the idea that money equals suffering? Or that like in order to get money it's necessary to suffer?

Courtney Johnson [01:21:21]:
I would tell them to find examples like, you cannot. It's so hard to change your beliefs if you don't have a normalized example of somebody doing it. You need to find someone, even if that's someone on the Internet, even if that's an example or an archetype of someone. Find an example and see that it's possible. And then your brain will see it's possible and then you can do it too.

Vision Battlesword [01:21:41]:
What other stories are holding people back from being able to just have as much money as they want?

Courtney Johnson [01:21:47]:
Oh, that money will change you.

Vision Battlesword [01:21:50]:
Oh yeah, that's a good one.

Courtney Johnson [01:21:53]:
Yeah. And. And it will. And it could go two different ways. If you are coming from a place of fear, it could amplify that. If you're coming from a place of love, it can also amplify that. Money will absolutely change you for sure because it gives you more power and thus gives you more resources and thus gives you more direction of those resources for other people. But it can assist in your evolution going back to like there are people who their pain causes them to be successful, make a lot of money, and other people whose healing causes them to push the boundaries, be successful and make more money.

Courtney Johnson [01:22:25]:
So what I would say to that is it will change you. It could change you in two different ways. Is neutral. How is the direction of the rest of your life going? That's how it's going to change you.

Vision Battlesword [01:22:36]:
Do you think it has to change you?

Courtney Johnson [01:22:37]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [01:22:38]:
Okay.

Courtney Johnson [01:22:38]:
I think anything changes you. Like any growth is going to Change you. Like saying like is I want to get in shape, is that going to change me for the worst because I'll be vain? Well, if you're doing it out of a place of I hate myself, I hate my body, whatever, yeah, that might make you vain. If you're doing it from a place of I want to be the best version of myself, I want to get fit, it probably is going to change you in a positive way. There might be a mix too.

Vision Battlesword [01:23:00]:
Maybe where I need to get a little bit more clear is what we mean when we say change you. So I think what a lot of people might think if they're, if, if they have a limiting belief around something like money will change you. Or if I, if I, if I got too much money, it would change me. They might think it, it will corrupt me in some way. Right. Or like it will change my personality. It will make me, I don't know, greedy, selfish, uncaring, hedonistic, lazy. I don't know what the change that people could be afraid of would look like exactly.

Vision Battlesword [01:23:35]:
But could you imagine, let's say that some, through some chance event, I suddenly came into a billion dollars. Me personally, vision battle, sword billionaire. Do you think it would change my character?

Courtney Johnson [01:23:51]:
First of all, I don't think large swoops of money are necessarily a positive thing for a lot of people. I think an iterative approach is what's going to happen because if you do come into a large sum of money, you're going to have the same behaviors. You're going to have the same positive and negative behaviors. So it would ample, if you came into a billion dollars tomorrow, it would amplify the positive aspects of you and it would also amplify the shadow aspects. If you are kind of iterating and reflecting at every milestone of making money a lot easier to not be overwhelmed and to course correct if you need to, if you're being conscious about it and intentional. So yeah, I wouldn't advise someone to come in and do a large sum of money without having the reflection at each step. I mean, I don't know. I've never come into a large sum of money.

Courtney Johnson [01:24:37]:
I just, that's my assumption or intuition.

Vision Battlesword [01:24:41]:
Sounds like you're poised to be a millionaire. So do you suppose that having a million dollars will change change your fundamental nature?

Courtney Johnson [01:24:50]:
Not my values. Yeah, fundamental nature. No, I think my, the fabric of my fundamental nature is my values. The trajectory I've been on is it has expanded me and expanded my ability to give to others and to become a better version of myself. So I assume that will keep going. Now, there is probably a point where I'm like, all right, I'm good. I don't know what that point is, but you can also give that to yourself. Like, okay, money also doesn't have to be this infinite thing.

Courtney Johnson [01:25:18]:
I can say, you know, I'm actually going to stop making money when I hit this point because I want to put my effort into something else. Like, that's probably what I'm going to do. I don't think that's necessary or needed, but I'm probably going to want to do another challenge, like play another game once I won the money game, you know, and to me, winning the money game is having all of my needs met, coming in passively while still providing value to others. Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [01:25:42]:
Well, it reminds me of what you said at the very beginning of the conversation. One of the very first things you said about money is that it's an accelerator. It's an amplifier for whatever, for everything else. So that seems right to me too. Having money or coming into a lot of money, let's say, won't fundamentally change a person's character. It's just going to amplify whatever that character is. Yes, at the time. And do you think that how you come into money is important or, or makes a difference to what the impact of that money is to a.

Vision Battlesword [01:26:19]:
To a person, like how it affects them? Suppose that long lost relative that I didn't know leaves me an inheritance of a billion dollars. Suddenly I have a billion dollars out of nowhere that I didn't work to earn versus I work, you know, added value for five years, built an extraordinary business from my own innovation and exited it, and now I have a billion dollars. Do you think that's like two totally different money propositions in terms of the effect it has on a person?

Courtney Johnson [01:26:49]:
Probably just because, again, I've had transformations at every step of growing my own money and income, but I don't have the personal experience of getting a large sum of money all at once. So I. I don't think I can speak to that. But I. I would say that would probably be disorienting to your worldview, trigger your nervous system, and could be good or bad. I'm not, but I'm really not sure.

Vision Battlesword [01:27:13]:
Yeah, it seems to me that it would be different. You know, it seems to me that if you at least have an inner sense that you made your money versus having merely received it, I think that's got to be somewhat different in the sense that you would go through A personal transformation in the process of creating the value to receive the money as compared to not creating any value and receiving money.

Courtney Johnson [01:27:41]:
Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, I'm curious about that. I don't have a strong opinion or thought, but it is a good thought exercise.

Vision Battlesword [01:27:49]:
Is there any sense in which coming into money can change a person's character for the better?

Courtney Johnson [01:27:56]:
Oh, absolutely.

Vision Battlesword [01:27:57]:
Okay.

Courtney Johnson [01:27:57]:
I believe that's happened with me. There's been so many battles I've had to address, parts of myself that I've had to look at that I was scared to look at because of the amplification of money. And even in my business model, just coming into a place of now reflecting back to others, giving to others and mentoring others. I've had to do a lot of self development. But honestly, creating a business and growing my own money has been one of the most transformative things I've ever done in my life. It's like challenge every single belief. I have amplified me in so many different ways, challenged me to level up in so many different ways and consistently reevaluate. But I think that is key to consistently reevaluate, see where you are like self reflect of where you're doing well, where you're not, whatever and course.

Vision Battlesword [01:28:47]:
Correct. Yeah. As we talk this through, I think I'm kind of starting to see a little bit about why people would be worried that money will change them. Because there are a lot of examples. I think it's almost a cliche in some respects where, when people sometimes, when people especially see this with celebrities from time to time, or even people who win the lottery or whatever come into money and then they kind of like their life kind of spins out and unravels with this, you know, I don't know when it's sort of like when you suddenly have the ability to satisfy any need, any want, any desire, any even fantasy that you could possibly have. People's shadows can. Can go a little crazy with that. It's almost like a.

Vision Battlesword [01:29:35]:
Like a kid in a candy store kind of example. It's like, oh my gosh, I can have all the candy I want. And then you make yourself sick because you don't have that. Like, you're not. You don't have that maturity. You don't have the self control, you know, the discipline you maybe don't have. You haven't cultivated the kind of inner compass or value system, you know, maybe it's also an aspect of personal development, spiritual development, whatever. And so people can like kind of go off the rails when there's no limitation to how they can influence and direct resources.

Vision Battlesword [01:30:07]:
So that makes sense. So I think that what we're talking about here is it's not that money in and of itself is a corrupting influence per se, but it's more like with great power comes great responsibility sort of thing.

Courtney Johnson [01:30:22]:
Yes. It's like if you woke up tomorrow and you were famous and everyone knew your name, like, it would be like, what the fuck? And like your shadows could come out for sure. Yeah, I mean, I, I wouldn't recommend that path based on what we're talking about, but I. I'm glad you brought it up because I do think those are two totally different things. Iteratively giving value, self reflecting, growing your responsibility and maturity around money and your emotional intelligence around money too, versus coming into money in one fell swoop, which is something I see a lot of people, like, I'm going to manifest a million dollars tomorrow. I'm like, well, it's not a good idea.

Vision Battlesword [01:30:56]:
Careful what you wish.

Courtney Johnson [01:30:57]:
Careful what you wish for.

Vision Battlesword [01:30:58]:
Yeah, well, yeah. And so it's just, you know, what we do is explore these concepts to just try to help ourselves and help other people to wrap their minds around why do I believe or why might I believe that money will change me? And is that really true? Yeah, could be. Are you ready for it? How much money do you want to have and how fast? You know, is an interesting question. Maybe people could ask themselves. Themselves when they're manifesting abundance or something like that.

Courtney Johnson [01:31:29]:
Yeah, I see. I think it's difficult for people to manifest money because of all these stories. We have all these stories, money is bad, it's evil, blah, blah, blah. I gotta manifest a thousand dollars to make rent this month. That's competing in your consciousness from its bad. It's evil. So you're manifesting something bad and evil, and that's really hard. And then you're in this shame loop and you feel shame accepting it.

Courtney Johnson [01:31:50]:
That's hard, right? It's really difficult.

Vision Battlesword [01:31:52]:
Right? Yeah. This is so helpful for me, this whole conversation, because I think what we're really trying to do is we're trying to come into right relationship with this abstraction, with this concept, this, this tool. You know, it's like there's a right relationship here where we've got this healthy balance of we're not overly mercenary, we're not cutthroat, we're not deceptive, we're not manipulative or overly competitive in terms of how, like, how we approach money. Because I think there's a pathology and there's a dysfunction on that side of the house. But also, we're not ashamed of it. We value our. We have a sense of our own value. We're not afraid to be seen.

Vision Battlesword [01:32:39]:
We're not afraid to request what we feel that our time, energy, skill set value is worth. And we, like, we want to be sincere in that exchange. Like, we want to be valued, we want to receive, we want to be abundant. We feel like we deserve it. And we also want to give appropriately contribute and offer something valuable to other people and overall to the world to make it a better place. So I think that's what the, like, heart of our whole conversation is really centering around is like, finding that mean between the extremes where we've got a healthy relationship with money. We're not kind of diluting ourselves in terms of what it actually really is. But we're also not throwing the baby out with the bathwater to say, oh, okay, well, you know, let's all just go back to a barter system or try to have something called a gift economy that we can't even really truly define.

Vision Battlesword [01:33:38]:
You know, we've got this tool. It works pretty well. And the degree to which it works well is actually really more based on our intention of how we choose to engage with it.

Courtney Johnson [01:33:47]:
Yeah. One thing you brought up that I think is so important is relationship. It is a relationship. Money is an entity. It is an entity with the light side and a shadow side. And you can develop a relationship with it. You can talk to it, you can express with it. You can get mad at it.

Courtney Johnson [01:34:03]:
It is an entity. Like, I invite you to consider exploring that.

Vision Battlesword [01:34:08]:
How do you talk to money?

Courtney Johnson [01:34:09]:
Well, every Monday morning, I have a money date, which is an intimate date. Like, I. I have a date with money. And I'm like, I talk to money. Hey, what are we doing? What? But it's kind of, like, sexy and exciting. What are we doing this week? Oh, it's like, oh, you're really illuminating this shadow. And I feel shame and guilt on this part. Oh, but, like, this is fun and spicy.

Courtney Johnson [01:34:30]:
I can help out here. I can do this thing. I can grow you. Almost like I'm tending to a garden. And this is my Monday morning money date, which is just me updating my money spreadsheet, going through any money task of, like, I'm going to send that Venmo. I'm going to pay that bill with gratitude. I have a lot of practices around it. Like, yeah, I'm paying a bill.

Courtney Johnson [01:34:47]:
I'm like, I'm so thankful for My electricity. Oh, my gosh. Everybody that provided this is awesome. All right, Money, I'm going to use you. So thankful. I have lights in my house. Yeah. So I fill up my money spreadsheet.

Courtney Johnson [01:34:58]:
I pay my bills. I do all my things on my money date. I talk to money. I address my concerns with money. It's like a partnership.

Vision Battlesword [01:35:06]:
I love this. I think this right here is the money shot of our conversation. This is so good.

Courtney Johnson [01:35:15]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [01:35:15]:
Like, to personify it, you know? Yeah. I'm not even going to address it. I was going to say there's some people who could probably really have a lot of resistance to what I'm about to say. But you know what? That's okay. Listen, anyway, to personify the concept of money and to actually develop, like, a personal relationship with it, I think that could be an amazing tool and strategy for a lot of people to heal their relationship with it. That's beautiful.

Courtney Johnson [01:35:48]:
Start by writing a letter to money, and it's probably going to be like, dear Money, fuck you. You've never been there for me. I hate you. You're awful. And then read it back. If I talk to a partner like this, how would they approach our relationship? Right. If I talked to you as a friend and said, I hate you, You. You've never been there for me.

Courtney Johnson [01:36:04]:
You probably. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. That's a lot. Right? But if I approach you, I was like vision. I feel like that time you weren't really there for me. Can we talk about it? Can I share my beliefs that were maybe keeping you away from me? Can I? You know, when you're coming into it from that energy, then you're like, oh, you're like, yeah, I. You know, you were saying you hated me, so I didn't want to come over because you hated me. And I can do good things for you, but, you know, when you start getting into that, you can see how that might unfold.

Vision Battlesword [01:36:31]:
I love it. I love it. Yeah. That is a beautiful crystallization of, like, everything that we've just gotten done discussing. So is there anything else that you want to say about money?

Courtney Johnson [01:36:45]:
No. That feels very complete. I'm really glad we had this conversation. It was great.

Vision Battlesword [01:36:49]:
Yeah.

Courtney Johnson [01:36:49]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [01:36:50]:
I really enjoyed it, too.

Courtney Johnson [01:36:51]:
Yeah. I'm. I'm really curious to hear people's thoughts on this as well. And, yeah, I would just love to invite more conversations. I would love to hear from more perspectives, like David's as well. Your perspective, other people's perspectives. I think that this is a conversation that's just really important that we start to surface it, we start to talk about it, unshame it, just bring visibility to it. And that will empower, empower us no matter what the choice is.

Courtney Johnson [01:37:16]:
No matter, like, I'm going to play in the sandbox or like, oh, this is empowering me to build a new sandbox or to think about how we could change whatever the conclusion you are coming away with. This is just conversation, I think, is the most important part.

Vision Battlesword [01:37:29]:
I agree. I agree. I think this is a conversation that's long overdue, and I think it's really rich and really exciting and we've got a lot of potential to transform our overall relationship with money. And I want to. I think that you, Courtney Johnson, might be the epitome of conscious capitalism.

Courtney Johnson [01:37:52]:
Oh, thank you.

Vision Battlesword [01:37:53]:
I think that I. I believe I have never met someone that embodies that phrase. Thank you as much as you.

Courtney Johnson [01:38:01]:
I appreciate that.

Vision Battlesword [01:38:04]:
Well, thanks.

Courtney Johnson [01:38:05]:
All right.

Vision Battlesword [01:38:05]:
This was beautiful.

Courtney Johnson [01:38:06]:
This was so wonderful. Oh, my gosh. Loved it.