Barter: verb; the exchange of goods or services for other goods or services without the use of money.
Why have we gotten away from one of the most amazingly simple and perfect concepts that is bartering? I mean, we all have something, be it a thing or an ability that the next guy might not have, but he wants it…and vice versa. It’s the perfect business model, without the added complexity of involving business. I have a thing, you need a thing, you have a thing, I need a thing; let’s exchange things. Perfect. Done. Everybody feels like they’ve benefited without feeling depleted or financially taxed.
I’ve recently started baking sourdough bread loaves. Yes, I know, I’m late…the Covid sourdough frenzy didn’t get me. What got me was looking for ways that I can pivot to provide my family with healthier foods. Little pivots, little benefits, little by little. What does that have to do with bartering, you ask? Well, I’ve started exchanging loaves for things like home raised chicken eggs, garden grown produce, and help with strategizing on other ways to tweak our habits to get better. So, I’ll call it a win that I get to make my son’s school lunch sandwiches on homemade bread, give him farm raised eggs for breakfast, and share ideas with like-minded friends on how to keep moving towards better health.
Yeah, keeping up with all the things; the fillers, the chemicals, the artificial ingredients, where our meat comes from, where our produce comes from, all the absolute shit that’s on the market shelves, and how to navigate it all to provide food that’s nourishing to our family’s bodies and our minds is an overwhelming (to say the least) endeavor. I’m not even going to get into the state of big farm/big food in this post. That will come later.
Baby steps. Little tweaks. Small pivots. You’ve got this. We’ve got this! When they coined the phrase “it takes a village” they weren’t kidding. A village of information and support and experience. We need to support each other. It’s tough out there, let’s take care of each other in whatever ways we can. One of the baby steps that I’m taking is to barter.
But how do I barter, you ask? Here’s an example: Bob does a great job of growing tomatoes and thoroughly enjoys gardening. Janet has a gray-ish thumb and doesn’t have a great space in her yard for a garden. Bob sucks at cooking. Janet loves to cook and has recently gotten decent at baking sourdough. Bob likes sourdough. Janet loves tomatoes and will find a use for every last one, no matter how many she has on hand. Janet: “Hey, Bob! I’ll trade you a loaf of sourdough for some tomatoes, if you’re interested?”. Done. Bob and Janet just had an exchange that they both felt really good about.
Humans bartered well before there were green pieces of paper with an arbitrarily declared value attached to them. What happened to doing that?!?!? Some people are good at growing shit. Some people are good at fixing shit. Some people are good at creating shit. Most people aren’t good at ALL the things. Monopolize on your strengths, don’t fixate on your weaknesses, use your connections, BARTER!!!
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