Why pay it back when you can pay it forward? 

12th of June 2021

Some years ago (about 2014 I think) I took part in an incredible experience called Masterkey Mastermind Alliance or MKMMA for short. I had to watch a few video’s and fill in an application form to be granted a Pay It Forward scholarship for which there were limited spaces. Once qualified, you were given a list of materials to buy/prepare for your half a year journey. You were later assigned a guide, had to attend weekly webinars, write blog posts ( this was a beginning of mine's ) about your experiences as well as many other daily tasks, including reading, meditating, listening to your own recordings, gratitude lists and many many more.

It was a full on 6 months long experience and most likely not for everybody, as all the tasks took good 3 or more hours every single day and it felt like being back at school, while I was also working full time. It was perfect for me at that time though. I have just ended my 15 years long relationship (6 years of it was marriage), found out that my mum had cancer and my whole world has turned upside down. I started wondering about the purpose of life and read even more books to help me understand it all. One thing led to another and I found myself applying for this unusual scholarship and being accepted for it too. 

To say it was a life changing experience would be an understatement. Apart from learning many useful skills which I apply to my daily life to this day, I learned about the idea of paying it forward. Once approved for the scholarship you’d be learning for free and after the 1st month you we were asked to pay it forwards, so next year another person could take part in this wonderful experience. We were given a choice of how much we wanted to pay, so overall it was affordable even if you didn’t earn much, but you could also pay more than a minimum if your situation was better. Whichever option you chose, what you got in return was worth infinitely more. I remembered thinking that it was such a wonderful idea. 

Throughout my life I have received help from many different people across the globe, at many different stages of my life and in many different forms. Some of them I will never be able to repay, because:

• I can’t remember their names,

• I don’t know who they are/never met them,

• I lost contact with them,

• They don’t want me to pay them back,  

• They passed away, 

• They do well in life and don’t need me to pay them back.

These and many other cases are just perfect for applying the Paying It Forward concept. We live in an energetic Universe and as much as most of us are attached to the monetary exchange for anything and everything, this is not exactly how the Universe itself works.  There is a flow in this Universe and what you give from the purity of your heart, returns to you tenfold. It very rarely happens that what you give will be returned to you through the same channel.

Here on read.cash for example I could return every tip I receive from person A back to them and they would then give it back to me. Does it make sense? Not for me it doesn’t. It works more like an exchange or a sale contract, where we give each other the same amount there and back and every time this amount is slightly smaller, as each transaction carries a fee with it. Instead I express my gratitude and then look for:

• People who are just starting and need my support much more than those people who supported me.

• An extraordinary content which is like a book that I can not put down, because I just have to read it till the end. 

• A very valuable content which includes helpful tips on topics that I find interesting or that somehow answered my question. 

• A meaningful comment to mine or someone else’s article, that touched me one way or another. 

I have a similar approach to sponsorships, although maybe not entirely. I guess another side of sponsorship is that it is a form of self advertisement, so it is worth appearing on someone else’s profile even though they sponsor you too. For the time being I decided to refrain from this and only sponsor people who are not sponsoring me. 

Pretty much the same goes for my noise.cash account. There were a few occasions that I looked at the entire list of my tippers and visited their profiles to drop a tip too. It was a very exhausting experience. Instead, I go to my subscription page and spend some time reading the content and looking at pretty pictures from all over the world. In times when I have more spare time, I will also go to the Explore section and look for some new, great content creators. Of course those leaving comments on my posts are in a whole different category. If someone takes time to read my ramblings and reply in a meaningful way, of course I also take time to not only reply, but also check out what they are about. There can be some nice friendships sprouting from this. 

Do you lack money? Give it away!

Counter intuitive as it sounds, when I really struggle financially, I take change laying around the house and give it away to people on the streets during my next shopping visits. There is almost 0% of a chance that this person will ever give it back to you and that is the heart of the idea of paying it forward and giving without the expectation of reciprocity. More often than not we give, because we expect something in return. We give to friends, family, co-workers and consciously or not we expect something in return. A helping hand when we most need it, a favour, their time and attention and then we get really disappointed when we don’t get what we were hoping for. Whether we articulated what we need or not is another story, because we often expect others to read our minds. 

The point is that we always expect something in return for whatever we give. When we give to a stranger in need however, we give and don’t expect the return of it. This way we send a signal to the Universe that we have more than enough to give. Energy loves to flow and we keep the flow going forward. Does it matter what the stranger spends the money on? Not at all. It’s their karma to carry, not ours.   

I understand that I might not be very popular with my approach, but deep in my core paying it forward just makes so much more sense than paying it back.  

Those of you who read my post ‘Who is fantagira?’ will know that I spent over 2 years in care/orphanage. My next, ultimate Pay It Forward step is going to be about becoming a Foster Parent myself. I will be honest  - this is quite scary and out of my comfort zone decision and the only reason why I am not freaking out yet is because I assume I will not be accepted for it. I don’t have children of my own therefore they could reject my application for this reason alone, but I will not know if I don't try. Well, time will tell. I will no doubt be updating you here whichever way it goes. 

Until next time 💙

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All pictures in this and all my other articles are taken by me, unless otherwise stated.