Yes, I love you. And no, I do not want to join your abundance fractal or money mandala or gifting circle or sacred economy lotus. Why? Because to me, this is a reincarnation of an old paradigm game… now wrapped in spiritual language.

Here is how it generally works:

You are invited to join a group or circle. It might be called a gifting circle or fractal or mandala or loom or lotus… There are many names for these structures, but regardless of what it’s called, you are asked to invest some amount of money. You then recruit two or more people to join your structure. They become part of the group. These new people in turn enroll two or more others. Rinse, repeat. Eventually after a few cycles, you arrive at the center of the structure (at the top of the pyramid) and you get some multiple of your initial investment back. This is the core structure of the group: give value, recruit others, and after several cycles of recruitment, you receive multiplied value back. Value in the form of money.

A common structure is the “8-ball model” where you are promised a payday that is 8x your initial investment. If you want to know more about the math behind this, you can read about it here.

Some groups include sharing circles or other forms of non-monetary exchange, which are beautiful and wonderful… but these distract from the darker aspects of this so-called “gifting circle” structure. Here are the three main reasons why this money generation mechanism is not for me.

Issue #1: It requires PERPETUAL GROWTH

Perpetual growth is the basis of a system where one becomes two becomes four becomes eight and so on. It’s true that spirit and essence are vast and unlimited. But in the human bodies we inhabit, our material world is in fact limited. Our global financial and economic structures are built on a false premise of perpetual growth. When we have systems that rely on perpetual growth to function, we are driven to create something out of nothing. The only way we can grow wealth perpetually in a limited physical world is by taking what is naturally free and making it property. A privileged few acquire resources that are the birthright of all beings and then package and sell them to the masses. We turn rain forests into lumber. We tap mountain springs to bottle drinking water. The need for perpetual growth is toxic. With more environmental awareness, we are moving from “growth is good” to a sustainability lens. Slowing down the exploitation and exhaustion of natural resources is a good start. But it’s not enough. At the next level, the conversation needs to progress to regeneration. How do we give back as much or more than we have taken? In a limited physical world, something cannot come from nothing without a cost. The premise of perpetual growth ignores this law of nature by hiding the cost.

Issue #2: Energy is focused on ENROLLMENT

The energy in these kinds of wealth generation systems is focused on recruiting and enrolling more and more people, over and over, forever and ever amen. Once you become a part of it by giving money, you are motivated to work for survival of the system. Your emotional labor is enlisted to feed the system. You are engaged in the task of enrolling new members. You need to align people with a certain way of thinking. You have to convince joiners that this structure works. You must convert others to adopt your belief system. Energy is oriented towards convincing, not creating. Religions, politicians, and multi-level marketing programs have used this kind of viral influence since the beginning of time. It’s an effective and efficient way to get masses of people to conform to a set of beliefs and behaviors. Because of the way the system is set up, the group must double at every stage. The incentive is to bring people in. The system grows the way a virus grows. It is a living thing, but it has no purpose. Or, you could say its only purpose is to replicate and grow itself any way it can, as fast as it can. It is indiscriminate and directionless. There is no filter for the integrity or quality of creation with viral growth. In these systems, all that really matters is how many people you can recruit and how quickly you can get them enrolled into the system.

Issue #3: Financial rewards are based on POSITION

Financial rewards come to you based on the position that you occupy in the structure. Rewards are not based on your contribution to the greater good beyond – or even within – the group. This emphasis on position reinforces a patriarchal power dynamic. There is a pecking order. Those at the bottom (outer circle) work for the benefit of those at the top (inner circle). It’s about paying your dues. It’s about waiting your turn. Gains come from biding your time, not from expressing your truth, not from using your talent. If you play by the rules, when the time comes the system promises you will be rewarded no matter what you do. You work for a while feeding the system. And then you sit and wait for a payday. There is no animating force for continued creation. At some point in time when you achieve rank or seniority, you can become inactive or even harmful to others, and you will still get paid. This rank based power structure is what old-fashioned patriarchy is founded on and fueled by.

So then, what’s my point?

YES, I believe that LOVE is UNLIMITED and omnipresent.

YES, I believe ABUNDANCE is a mindset that YOU CAN CHOOSE.

YES, I believe life begins to flow with ease when we learn to SURRENDER and TRUST.

AND I also believe that…

Instead of supporting old systems that require PERPETUAL GROWTH, we have to develop new REGENERATIVE strategies.

Instead of putting energy into ENROLLMENT into group thinking, we must prioritize the LIBERATION of free expression.

Instead of valuing people for their POSITION in a fixed structure, we need fluid rewards for service and CONTRIBUTION.

If you are now already part of one of these structures, please know that this is not written to shame or to judge you. I love you and support you and I know you entered into this system with the purest heart and highest intentions. I sincerely hope it’s successful and fruitful for you. If you are now thinking about joining one of these structures and find yourself hesitating for some reason, I hope you will consider what I’ve written above.

All of the people who have invited me to join their money generation structures are creative, generous, and dedicated to giving their lives in service. This is not a critique of the beautiful people who are enrolled; this is a critique of a power structure and money system.

Please let’s keep our eyes wide open. This is not the sacred economy. It’s the old-paradigm exploitation of fear and scarcity. It is just cleverly hidden behind the spiritual gaslighting of mathematics-informed skepticism, and it plays on the spiritual aspiration of having an abundance mindset.

As spiritual teaching and concepts become more and more widespread, along with it grows its many distortions, manipulations, and misuses. My plea for us all is to look deeply and be discerning when deciding where to invest time, money, and energy… to check whether we are subscribing to forms that manifest old paradigm thinking, only now disguised in new age dressing.