Right Livelihood

Does your livelihood
align with your values?

A livelihood is a “a means of securing the necessities of life.”

Right Livelihood is a Buddhist concept. It sits within the Eightfold Path of Buddhist ethics alongside Right Speech, Right Action, and Right Effort (etc), and generally refers to doing work that doesn’t harm other beings.

Right Livelihood does NOT refer to a one-size-fits-all, single correct way to earn a living, as defined by some external authority. (For the record, that’s not really how Buddhism works.) Rather, it suggests that each of us can consciously choose a livelihood that aligns with our values.

Some of the questions that have guided my own exploration of Right Livelihood:

  • What do I value?
  • How much is enough?
  • What is necessary in my life?
  • How can I get what’s necessary without harming other people, animals, or the planet?
  • What constitutes meaningful work, and why / when does this matter?
  • How much do I agree with commonly-accepted definitions of success?
  • What will it take to pursue my own vision of success?
  • What beliefs and assumptions — conscious or unconscious — inform my attitude toward money?
  • What systems and conditions make it harder for certain types people to make choices around money and work compared to others?
  • How might I contribute to making these systems more equitable for all?

Much of my career has focused on supporting individuals, nonprofit organizations, and social enterprises as they work through similar questions. May the tidbits shared below inspire your own exploration of Right Livelihood. _/|\_

What I believe about money

I believe: …that money was designed to work for human beings, rather than the other way around. And I mean that in terms of the actual historical context of money’s origins, not in the capitalist, our-money-should-earn-money, passive-income sense. My own relationships with money and work are constantly evolving. There’s always more to learn, and I…

My favorite money people, organizations, and resources

Here are some of the people and organizations that have inspired me most in my Right Livelihood journey: Vicki Robin’s book, Your Money or Your Life, sparked the beginnings of my own Right Livelihood journey back in the early ’90s. (I wrote more about that here.) Unbeknownst to her, this book also launched the entire…

What’s your Printery?

I love everything this video reveals about this man, his vision, his spirit, his work in the world… Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr, please take my money! https://vimeo.com/382994332 You will not get a degree You will not go into extraordinary debt You will print all day, every day You will clean type Wipe up ink Smell…

Using group agreements to encourage participation in classes, workshops, and meetings

Have you ever participated in an intimate class or group meeting that broke down in some way? What happened? How did your level of engagement shift as a result? Maybe one participant spoke more than anyone else and you mentally “checked out” because you knew you’d never get a chance to contribute. Or maybe someone…

How to charge on a sliding scale

I don’t think I’ve mentioned lately how much I love Hadassah Damien, curator / writer / technologist / activist and “femme punk big sister of financial real talk” over at Ride Free Fearless Money. One of the coolest things on her site is a really thorough explanation of how to charge on a sliding scale……

(My other) Scott is back: an ode to my favorite business pundit

My commitment to television is poor. The notable exception was with Game of Thrones, though even then my attention was spotty: I watched a few episodes of seasons 1-2, binge-watched every episode from seasons 3-5 over 3 weeks to get caught up in time to watch season 6 in real time, started back from the…

Expensify this

My day job, as you’ve probably noticed by now, involves making YouTube videos for a small business audience. At a small business software company. Expensify, another small business software company, just won that game with their Superbowl ad: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bU3fit1MFKY When my colleague Luda shared this with me last week it had fewer than 500 views;…

How to raise money for your business – a couple presentations from the archives

I recently discovered a couple recordings of talks I gave when I was in my Finance for Food prime, traveling throughout North America to give keynote presentations and teach workshops on raising money for food businesses. My book had already been out for a while by then, so I’d had the opportunity to figure out…

My personality throughout my existences (and a new guide to business financing!)

A ritual often performed at the Auckland Buddhist Centre includes the following lines: My personality throughout my existences… I give up without regard to myself For the benefit of all beings. I’ve been thinking about my various existences because the company I work for just published a really useful resource, A guide to financing your…

When the medium limits the message

Here are three offerings that really drove home the whole “the medium is the message” message for me this week. I’ll share more of my own thoughts in separate posts; here, I’ll let the artists speak for themselves. One: Hannah Gadsby’s Nanette [this is just the trailer, you can read more of my thoughts on…

Every weekend can be a three-day weekend: my journey to a four-day work week

As of this week, I officially work Tuesdays through Fridays. Standard eight-hour days, but only four of them. Every weekend is now a three-day weekend, and I am thrilled! This wasn’t a decision that I took lightly, and the process revealed a few surprises. It took several months from the time I started thinking about…

What’s your crystal shop? A lesson from The Alchemist

Tonight I’m thinking about the crystal shop in Paolo Coelho’s book The Alchemist. It’s been over twenty years since I read the copy I “borrowed” from my cousin Matthew (!!!) so I’m a bit fuzzy on the details, but here’s what I remember: the protagonist is on his journey (the Hero’s Journey, the monomyth), and at…

Your Money Or Your Life: one of the most influential books of my life

I finally had a chance to read the new edition of Your Money Or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence, a book that had a huge influence on me when I first discovered it back in the late ’90s. With this book, co-author (and now friend!) Vicki…

How to evaluate a fundraising opportunity

A friend of mine in North Carolina is working on what sounds like a really awesome climate change video, and he recently asked me for fundraising advice. Here are the key points of the conversation, which I hope will benefit other people who know they’ll need money in order to launch an ambitious creative project.…

Digital Desk + Analog Desk + Day Bed = My Ideal Creating Space

My new workspace arrangement has completely transformed my room from a place I rarely used to a place I can’t wait to come home to / spend all evening / all day getting creative / hanging out in. Ever since Scott helped me set it up, I’ve had these words from a Jean LeLoup song…

Dean Fidelman finally getting the kind of attention he deserves (and not only for StoneNudes)

I met photographer Dean Fidelman while living in Yosemite National Park in 1999, and for years I invested everything I had—physically, energetically, spiritually, and financially—into his StoneNudes project. This attempt to build a something that would financially support a complete immersion into art, nature, community collaboration, social activism, and a life well-lived sparked a sense of…

When should you hire an accountant?

When I was running my publishing company, I used my (sadly, rather inept) accountant exactly five times: once to set me up on my accounting software — a disaster through-and-through — and once a year for the four years to do our taxes. If I had known then what I know now (businesses that use…

Focus on Five – a system for practicing a more balanced, contented life

You’ve probably seen at least one version of this advice floating around the internet: “Three Hobbies” has always bothered me, for two reasons. The first is that for those of us running our own businesses, the distinction between a hobby and a business is super important. If you want to write off your business expenses…

Presentations of self

As soon as I posted my last video it occurred to me: what I said was sort of true, but not nearly a COMPLETE representation of my experience of identity growing up. I thought about deleting the whole thing, but then I realized it was actually quite interesting to think about why it bothered me…

Trasitions and Transformations

I am infinitely grateful for the three years I spent on the staff of RSF Social Finance, a financial services organization that seeks to revolutionize how people relate to money. Leaving that job was one of the most difficult decision I ever made! But I was literally bursting with the book I was ready to write, so…

Whose job is it to motivate millennials?

Millions upon millions of people have watched Simon Sinek’s video, Millennials in the Workplace. And quite a few have already written up their responses. Here’s mine. TL;DR version: if in fact you have the benefit of being choosy about which company to work for, it’s your job to first figure out what your purpose is,…

The Women’s March, Sheryl Sandberg’s silence, and Leaning the F*** Away

Someone at work recently posted the article Lean Out: the deafening post-November silence of Sheryl Sandberg on our internal social network, posing the question, “Do you do what you think is right, or do you do what is right by your company?” Here are some excerpts of the article to get you up to speed,…

Xero Gravity Podcast

I hosted the Xero Gravity small business podcast from episode 21 through its final episode 98, when I shifted my focus to video. What a joy to interview such fascinating, insightful people! I’ve posted some of my favorite episodes below, or you can: Listen on iTunes Listen on SoundCloud Browse episodes on the Xero Gravity website It’s…

Lydia Daniller – Finding your sweet spot

Listen in iTunes Female pleasure is still largely a taboo topic in most societies, which is exactly why Lydia Daniller knew she needed to use her voice as an activist and storyteller to speak up. Driven to educate, inform and destigmatize, Lydia launched into a truly ambitious project: a sexual pleasure research website called OMGYES.…

Timmy O’Neill – To infinity and beyond

Listen in iTunes You’re climbing a gigantic cliff face, it’s 2,300 metres to the summit, and there’s no guarantee you’ll even get to the top… this sounds hard enough as it is, but imagine doing that without the use of your legs… Timmy O’Neill’s outlook in life is shaped by conquering what others would call…

Creative people, get your finances together!

Listen via iTunes The life of an artist is typically all or nothing and so is their taxable income. As such, many accountants don’t have the patience to guide creative clients through the motions of each financial year. Introducing Paco, founder and director of the HellYeah Group – a boutique bookkeeping agency aimed at creative…

Accounting 101 with Liz Mason

When you’re a startup, you only have about a billion things to think about. So it’s understandable if accounting isn’t top of mind. That’s why I worked with Liz Mason from High Rock Accounting to produce this 37 minute online course, designed to provide the accounting basics you need to know to become a successful…

Raising capital without selling your soul: interview on the Small Food Business Podcast

It’s always a pleasure to serve as a guest on other people’s podcasts. Back in November, Jennifer Lewis interviewed me for the Small Food Business podcast series. They released the episode today, saying: Many of us start our small businesses with a broader mission or vision for what we’re hoping to achieve beyond just dollars…

Nonprofit fundraising with Kishshana Palmer

I recently worked with Kishshana Palmer, an experienced non-profit executive and consultant, to produce what was possibly the most engaging nonprofit fundraising education session I’ve ever had the pleasure of witnessing. Check out fundraising for nonprofits on Xero U! Kishshana not only knows what she’s talking about — she’s a Certified Fundraising Executive who has helped…

Good Food, Great Business at the Commonwealth Club

Want to learn more about financing your business, working with co-packers, marketing for increased sales, working with retailers, and more… from a group of kick-ass women who really know what it takes to run a successful food business? Listen to this Commonwealth Club recording of a recent event titled Good Food, Great Business: How Food Startups Take Good…

Finance for Food on the radio

As executive director of Finance for Food, I was interviewed by a number of radio shows that wanted their listeners to know more about how to raise money for socially responsible food businesses… and values-based business in general. While not all of the stations have kept their archives available for listening, the live links below…

TEDxManhattan talk: Money’s Many Shades of Green

The capital markets space has changed a lot since May of 2011, when I gave this particular talk, but the main concepts are still the same. Bottom line? Get really clear on your values BEFORE you set about raising money for your business, and then find financing partners who are aligned with those values. And…

Designing a career: an adventure with Mair Dundon

Creating a work life that makes sense and pays well is a task that most of us spend a majority of our lives focused on… Instead of having a single path, we design a WorkLife that can change and grow right along with us – a constantly renewing resource that is fueled by our life…

We know what we know

Last October/November, I caught that horrible cold/cough that was going around… and it stuck around for more than five weeks by the time I finally got over it. My friend Mike knew exactly why I was sick. The day before I woke up with the telltale tickle in the back of my throat, Mike and…

Repotting: right in my wheelhouse

At some point during my journey home on Friday/Saturday, I came across this article about repotting your career. Though the article itself is flavored with a rather Stanford-y perspective that doesn’t totally align with my own way of looking at things, I appreciate both the horticultural metaphor, and the author’s tips for switching things up professionally in…

Rising again

At 6am, insomniac in the Penn Stater hotel in State College, PA hotel (which means it’s really 3am to my body, still in Pacific Time), I finally rose from the bed and resurrected this blog. I think this is version 3.0? I’m not sure. Shutting down and letting go of those old blogs go was…