There are so many alternative-payment businesses when you start looking! This week I came across this one...a restaurant with a unique twist on the PWYC model. 

Karma Kitchens do not own their own restaurants. Instead, they partner with an established restaurant whom they pay a fee of about $750 in order to take over their space for one meal once a week. This fee buys them the food, use of the space and use of the chefs. 
On the chosen day, a pack of inexperienced but eager volunteers descends on the restaurant to prep, serve, clean, and essentially run the restaurant.
There are no prices on the menu. When guests finish their meal, they are presented with a bill of $0.00 along with a small card telling them that their meal has been paid for by the previous guest. They are informed that they now have the option of paying whatever they can afford or would like to give...the money they donate will go towards the next person's meal. Not technically accurate, for if you donate $2 it doesn't mean that the next person will only get $2 worth of food - in fact, it is really just a PWYC model, no strings attached. 
However, there is a difference, and it's a mind shift: by emphasizing that you are not donating for what YOU receive but for what someone ELSE receives, and by reminding you that someone else has given for you, there is an increased spirit of community and sharing that is unique to these 'restaurants', often spiraling into spontaneous gift-giving, sharing, and donations.

Karma Kitchen is hosted in many cities around the world, in different ways. One is hosted daily, many are monthly, and some are one-time. There are currently Karma Kitchens operating in: 
Berkeley, CA; Washington, DC; Chicago, IL; Hayward, CA; Ahmedabad, India; Bangalore, India; Delhi, India; Mumbai, India; Pune, India; Surat, India; Jakarata, Indonesia; Tokyo, Japan; Kaula Lumpur, Malaysia; London, UK; Grasse, France; Singapore; Baroda, India; Dubai; Ubud, Bali

Any profits made on top of costs are donated directly to other gift-economy projects. There are no salaries, and no money is kept.

Articles:
Serving Up Trust and Generosity (Washington Post):http://www.washingtonpost.com/…/…/05/05/AR2010050502040.html

Karma Kitchen Has Selflessness on the Menu Article (SF Chronicle - intro by Deepak Chopra):
http://www.sfgate.com/…/Karma-Kitchen-has-selflessness-on-t…

A Restaurant With No Checks (CS Monitor): 
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1025/p20s01-ussc.html

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Karma Kitchen official website:
http://www.karmakitchen.org/

Karma Kitchen also provides an official Start-Up Guide for partnering with a restaurant in your own area:
http://www.karmakitchen.org/index.php?pg=start

If you are someone who has every been 'unemployed', self-employed, who has pieced together various small jobs, or chosen a different way of engaging in work...or if you are just interested in the possibility of what society would or could look like as technology and automation replace the work force, find yourself half an hour of uninterrupted time and sit down with a cup of tea!

This article is a lengthy but fascinating exploration of where things could head: "The possibility seems significant enough," says Thompson, "—and the consequences disruptive enough—that we owe it to ourselves to start thinking about what society could look like without universal work, in an effort to begin nudging it toward the better outcomes."

If you're interested but just don't have the time to read it all, here's a breakdown so you can skim ahead to what interests you:

p.1-13: the history and facts supporting the diminishment of work, why it has comes to this, and what that looks like
p.13-17: the psychological effects on the individual of not having meaningful 'work' (wow did these ever resonate!!)
p.17-25: what a world of less employment could look like ...how can we find meaningful work without formal wages?
p.25-32: how it would affect culture, society, and politics, and what are some out-of-the-box steps the govt could take to promote an engaged, creative, community-based society in the absence of work?

Rather than disheartening, I found this article incredibly inspiring and meaningful. Here's to reporters who are willing to brainstorm and imagine the beautiful possibilities!

Here is the link:
http://www.theatlantic.com/…/…/07/world-without-work/395294/ 
(download as a PDF in order for the pages to match up with my indexing)

Yesterday I hastily made myself a sandwich, yanking food out of the fridge, rummaging for utensils in a crowded drawer, throwing my garbage toward the trash can...and then I stopped, looked contemplatively at the knife I had just used, thanked it, then carefully and gently washed it and placed it in the dry rack before resuming my mad rush through the day.

Thank you Marie Kondo for that moment. I haven’t even read your book yet.

This summer someone recommended that I check out “The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up: the Japanese art of decluttering and organizing”. Doesn’t seem like hot summer reading material, does it, yet the book had FIFTY holds on 4 copies at my local library. So I did some digging and found an excerpt online (Chapter 4... http://tidyingup.com/excerpt), which maybe I shouldn’t have because now I feel I feel I might need to BUY this book. 
...ironically...since one of its main topics is about getting rid of things.

So why am I mentioning this on a blog about photos, beauty, nature, and inspiration? What relevance could a book about cleaning possibly have here?

Well, here are some of the titles that jumped out at me when scanning the table of contents:
• Selection criterion: does it spark joy?
• Tidying is a dialogue with one’s self
• Storing socks: treat your socks and stockings with respect
• Komono (miscellaneous items): Keep things because you love them—not “just because”
• Photos: cherish who you are now 
• If you’re mad at your family, your room may be the cause
• Reduce until you reach the point where something clicks
• Follow your intuition and all will be well
• Appreciate your possessions and gain strong allies
• Put your house in order and discover what you really want to do
• An attachment to the past, or anxiety about the future
• Do you greet your house?
• Your possessions want to help you
• Your living space affects your body
• How to identify what is truly precious
• Being surrounded by things that spark joy makes you happy

If you’re intrigued by how beauty, purpose, gratitude, presence, respect, and love can be a part of how you interact with the objects in your life, please check out the link above and read about Marie’s minimalist, meditative approach to organizing her house and daily routine, or read this lovely article by someone who tried out her approach:http://www.marthastewart.com/…/konmari-trendy-new-organizin….
I am certainly not advocating that everyone become a minimalist, but as I go through a period in my life where I am consciously questioning which possessions I need and what I can let go of, I am struck by the gratitude and respect that Marie shows for each item in her environment. Whether you want to purge your possessions down to nothing, or whether you want to renew your relationships with the world around you, this book brings new insight and joy into “being in your space”.

And for an opposite (yet oddly similar) approach, check out the ebook “The Life-Changing Magic of Cluttering Up: A Meditation on Meanings in Messes” by Kenneth Evans! Same concepts – more mess. :)

Over 100 pay-what-you-can cafés have sprung up over the US since 2003. In these cozy restaurants, one can sit down to a meal of quality, locally sourced food, either by paying the suggested price, paying less, volunteering one's time, or overpaying so others can eat.

The F.A.R.M. Cafe (Feed All Regardless of Means), Healthy World Cafe, S.A.M.E. Cafe (So All May Eat), Panera Bread, Bon Jovi's Soul Foundation...the numbers are growing as people try to find new ways to make healthy food accessible to all in a way that does not discriminate or centre out. 
At Healthy World Cafe in York, none of the diners knows who paid the full amount, who worked in the kitchen for their meal, or that the piano player plays every day in exchange for his lunch. There is no guilt in paying less. There is no applause for paying more.
And it works.

Denise Ceretta opened one of the first of these cafés in Salt Lake City in 2003. She now runs the One World Everybody Eats Foundation, helping others replicate her pay-what-you-can model. “I think the community cafe is truly a hand up, not a handout,” Cerreta says. "You can maintain your dignity."

Judith Manshanden is starting a similar movement in Amsterdam with her GEEF! (Give!) Cafe. See her TED talk below for how the pay-what-you-can model creates connection and trust between people, and how this altruism is part of our DNA and helps our species survive.

These places aren't just in the US and Europe. When you start looking, you find them everywhere. 
In my own hometown of Hamilton, ON, I came across the 541 Barton Eatery and Exchange (also known as the Button Cafe). Here, meals are sold at cost. Breakfast might run you $3. When you go up to pay, you have the option of adding one dollar buttons onto your bill. The buttons you buy go into a jar which the area's homeless (and anyone else who needs to) can use as currency to buy meals. (http://m.thespec.com/…/4724170-buttons-at-541-barton-are-ma…)

However, as Judith Manshanden points out in her TED talk, you don't need to start your own restaurant to spread the benefits..."The pay-as-you-can business model is merely a tool. It is the intention behind it that makes the real difference." All businesses and all of our interactions can benefit from the intention, she says. How?
1. Trust that people will respond to you in an honest way. 
2. Dare to be vulnerable. Be the first to give. 
3. Let go of the assumption that other people are only after maximizing self-interest. They're not.

Here's to bringing sharing, giving, and trust back into commerce!