Principle: Membership Is Free

What this means in practice

Membership is free. It comes from one thing: the choice to say yes to these principles. That choice is the whole requirement. Payment stands entirely apart from Membership.

In practice, this means you affirm the Commitments and you are in. That is the whole door. Your background, your beliefs, your income, and your tradition stay yours alone; the door asks only for your yes. You choose the name you want to use here, you say yes, and the community is open to you.

It also means every place in the community is the same place, whatever a person gives. The person who gives and the person who has nothing to give stand on the same ground. The Commons App is a separate paid product, and a person who buys it belongs here exactly as before. Your giving is invisible to everyone.

A passage

Not nakedness, not platted hair, not dirt, not fasting, or lying on the earth, not rubbing with dust, not sitting motionless, can purify a mortal who has not overcome desires.

Source: The Dhammapada, v. 141-142, F. Max Muller (Sacred Books of the East, Vol. 10), 1881

A question to sit with

What would it mean to belong somewhere without having to earn it or prove it?

A practice to try

Think about what brought you here: the moment you felt drawn to this community. That pull is the whole requirement. Sit with it for a minute. If the Commitments are still ahead of you, read them and see if they match what drew you.