The Problem With Pricing Today
Something in our collective relationship to money has been quietly unraveling. Not in the dramatic sense of collapse or crisis, but in the subtle way a seam comes loose on a garment: you can still wear it, but you feel its integrity thinning. Pricing, in particular, has become one of those seams. You see it in the fatigue that spreads across people’s faces when a sales page opens. You sense it in the way someone pauses before revealing what they charge. You feel it in the silent negotiation beneath almost every transaction — a negotiation not just about money, but about meaning, value, self-worth, and trust.
Fixed pricing claims to solve this tension by providing clarity: Here is what this thing costs. For everyone. Under any circumstance. But the longer you look at that clarity, the more you see its distortions.
A single price erases the uniqueness of the person standing in front of it. It ignores:
their lived reality,
their financial context,
the season of life they’re in,
their capacity to receive,
the actual depth of impact an offering might have on them,
and the resonance — the felt sense — of whether a number is truthful.
A price tag pretends that value is a static property. But value is relational. It emerges from contact. It grows or diminishes based on sincerity, timing, context, and what unfolds afterward. No static number can hold that.
Fixed pricing flattens life.
And yet donation-only systems, whatever their heartful intention, tend to flatten life in a different direction. They often:
reduce perceived seriousness or value,
create confusion (“What should I give?”),
remove the structure that supports responsibility,
amplify avoidance patterns,
and unintentionally encourage minimum contribution rather than truthful contribution.
They collapse not because generosity is flawed, but because responsibility is missing.
So we are left with two worlds — the world of fixed pricing and the world of donation-based pricing — neither of which quite honors the fullness of human reality. One is rigid. One is nebulous. One over-determines value. One under-determines it.
Between them something else has been quietly wanting to emerge.
You can trace this desire historically. Charles Eisenstein’s Sacred Economics describes how ancient forms of reciprocity gradually became flattened into monetary abstraction. Exchange was once embedded inside relationship — inside community, ritual, rhythm, trust. When money became detached from relationship, pricing followed. It became a mechanism rather than a meeting.
But the ache for something more relational never disappeared.
And today it surfaces as a question many people don’t articulate but constantly feel:
Why does buying or selling so often feel misaligned with who I truly am?
This misalignment is not personal. It is architectural. Our pricing systems don’t reflect the world we now inhabit — a world overflowing with complexity, nuance, unique contexts, and relational depth. People sense this mismatch even if they don’t have language for it.
2-way pricing is one attempt — subtle, practical, grounded — to repair this seam. To reintroduce relationship into exchange. To allow money to become less of a performance and more of an encounter.
It does not reject the existing economic world. It builds a bridge across it — a bridge between the world we know and the world we sense is possible.
The Essence of 2-Way Pricing
Before diving into mechanics, philosophy, or impact, it helps to begin simply.
At its core, 2-way pricing is a return to choice. Not the binary choice of “Do I buy this or not?” but a deeper question:
How do I want to enter this relationship?
Choice, when real, is dignifying. It awakens agency. It honors the person making it. Forrest Landry once wrote:
“Life is that which enables choice.”
If life itself is defined by the ability to choose, then restoring choice into the act of pricing — which has become one of the most automated structures in society — is no small gesture. It realigns money with life.
2-way pricing offers two distinct, equally legitimate paths:
1. The Fixed-Price Path
This path is clean, simple, and familiar. It is for the person who wants clarity. No reflection, no process, no deep inquiry around money — just a straightforward exchange. The fixed price tends toward the higher end of what is conventionally reasonable. Not because it is inflated, but because it reflects:
the seriousness of the offering,
the level of commitment typically required to engage deeply,
and the real economic value if no contextual adjustments existed.
For many people, this clarity is a kindness. It removes psychological friction and creates a stable anchor.
But 2-way pricing holds this with humility:
A fixed price is never the “true value.” It is always an estimate.
This acknowledgment alone softens the system. It introduces sincerity into a place where certainty usually pretends to live.
2. The Donation Path (with Responsibility)
The donation path is not the “cheap option.” It is the responsibility-heavy option. It requires the person to slow down and meet themselves:
What is true for me?
What can I genuinely give?
What feels coherent with my situation?
What amount honors both me and the offering?
This is why the donation path cannot be entered casually. It is not designed for impulsive under-giving, nor for guilt-driven over-giving. It asks for sincerity.
Both paths — fixed and donation — are equal in dignity. They simply reflect different ways of entering.
But the genius of 2-way pricing reveals itself in something deeper:
Pricing becomes a triadic relationship.
Not just:
buyer ↔ seller,
but also:
buyer ↔ field,
seller ↔ field.
The field — the relational truth between people — becomes a participant in the pricing moment.
This is not mysticism. It is interpersonal coherence.
When people choose a number inside this triad, something shifts. The transaction becomes a small expression of a larger reality: that our choices always affect more than just ourselves.
This is the essence of 2-way pricing: not a formula, not a gimmick, but a re-entry into relationship.
The Deep Architecture Behind the Model
If Movement 2 gave us the simple shape of 2-way pricing, we now step behind the curtain — into the architecture that makes the model coherent, alive, and transformative. Because 2-way pricing is not ultimately about money. Money is the doorway, not the destination. The real work lives in awareness.
Most people have inherited a deeply unconscious relationship to money. Not by fault, but by cultural lineage. Money is the place where fear gathers, where avoidance lurks, where shame hides, where entitlement hardens, where scarcity whispers its oldest stories. And because our pricing systems have been designed to avoid complexity, not reveal it, they quietly support this unconsciousness.
Fixed pricing reinforces the illusion that value can be known in advance. It pretends value is a property of the object or service itself — as if context, timing, capacity, and personal transformation didn’t matter. It over-determines value and erases uniqueness.
Donation-only pricing makes the opposite mistake: it under-determines value. By refusing to set any structure at all, it often leaves people in a void of responsibility. Without guidance, many fall back into avoidance patterns. They give the minimum or choose impulsively, not because they are unkind but because there is no architecture supporting truthful choice.
2-way pricing exists because both collapses are real — and because neither collapse is a personal failing.
As soon as we acknowledge this, something beautiful becomes possible: a model that neither dictates value nor abandons people to unstructured generosity. A model that treats pricing as a relational moment, not a mechanical one.
At the heart of this architecture lives a fundamental distinction:
Price is a number. Value is a revelation.
Price is chosen in a moment. Value emerges over time.
People often don’t know the value of an offering until:
they’ve lived with the material,
they’ve integrated the transformation,
they’ve applied it in their lives,
they’ve witnessed downstream effects,
or they’ve discovered new capacities that weren’t available before.
A single static price cannot contain that emergent reality.
And this uncertainty is not only on the participant’s side. The facilitator also does not know the true value in advance. Every offering is a living encounter, and its depth is revealed only through the people who enter it. Fixed prices, in this sense, are not declarations of value but acts of humility — estimates made from integrity, not certainty. 2-way pricing makes this mutual humility explicit: both sides step into the unknown with honesty rather than pretense.
So 2-way pricing does not attempt to calculate true value. It invites participants into a relationship with value — one that unfolds naturally.
This is why the moment of paying becomes less of a transaction and more of a small initiation. A moment where a person meets:
their financial truth,
their story about money,
their sense of responsibility,
their resonance with the offering,
their willingness to be in relationship.
This is not moralistic. It’s structural.
Fixed pricing collapses awareness by pretending to know value upfront. Donation-only collapses awareness by refusing to name value at all.
2-way pricing holds the middle: structured enough to support integrity, spacious enough to honor uniqueness.
It cultivates what might be called right relationship with money. Not “right” in a moral sense, but in the sense of alignment — the gentle precision of choosing a number that feels coherent in both directions: inwardly (to the person) and outwardly (in the relational field).
Calibration becomes the central practice. People learn to sense not just what they can pay, but what feels true — a subtle skill that often generalizes into other domains of life.
How 2-Way Pricing Actually Works
Having explored the philosophical and psychological foundations, we now return to the earth — to the mechanics. But here, too, the mechanics are alive. They are less like rules and more like choreography: structured movements designed to evoke awareness, coherence, and relational truth.
2-way pricing offers two primary paths of entry. The outer forms differ, but the underlying principles remain constant.
1. The Fixed-Price Path
This is the path most familiar to people. It is clean, quick, and offers psychological safety. But in 2-way pricing, the fixed price is held differently.
The number is set toward the higher end of conventional reasonability not as pressure, but as clarity. It signals:
the depth and seriousness of the offering,
the level of commitment typically required,
the true cost of producing and sustaining the work if contextual adjustments did not exist.
However — and this is crucial — the fixed price is named with humility. It is never framed as the “real value.” Instead:
The fixed price is simply one coherent doorway — an estimate, not a truth.
This subtle shift dissolves the pretense baked into most pricing systems. It acknowledges the complexity of value while still offering a conventional path.
For many, this is exactly what they want: a straightforward exchange without introspective work.
2. The Donation Path (with Responsibility)
Where the fixed-price path provides clarity, the donation path provides intimacy — a moment of self-encounter.
It requires slowing down. Feeling one’s situation. Meeting the truth of capacity, desire, resonance, and alignment.
The donation path is not designed for speed. It is not designed for convenience. It is designed for coherence.
Depending on the depth of the offering, the architecture shifts:
Deep Rooms (e.g., long courses, retreats)
A structured module on money, fairness, responsibility, and sacredness.
A three-number reflection:
Minimum → the sustainable floor.
Likely → the coherent midpoint.
Maximum → the resonant stretch.
Staged payments to reflect emergent value over time.
Coherence and resonance checks.
Medium Rooms (workshops, multi-session offerings)
A simplified reflection process.
One-number or compact three-number structure.
Gentle prompts to sense coherence.
Light Rooms (one-time sessions, simple products)
A single number.
Minimal reflection.
Clarity and speed prioritized.
Across all rooms, one principle holds:
The deeper the room, the deeper the pricing process — and the lighter the room, the lighter the touch. This proportionality is not arbitrary. It protects participants from unnecessary burden and protects the offering from unnecessary collapse. Deep rooms need structure because the transformation is profound; light rooms need simplicity because the exchange is simple. This is architectural elegance, not administrative complexity.
Across all rooms, one principle holds:
The deeper the offering, the deeper the pricing process.
This proportionality keeps the system elegant rather than burdensome.
Because value unfolds differently in different contexts, the choreography adapts. A retreat might transform someone’s life trajectory. A single one-hour session might simply provide clarity. The pricing structure mirrors this difference without moral judgment.
What remains invariant is not the form but the field: the active relational intelligence that meets people as they choose their doorway.
In many offerings, this field is not merely conceptual. The offering itself begins to function like a subtle organism — sensing coherence, repelling distortion, inviting sincerity. People often feel, without knowing why, when a number resonates or contracts. This is not mysticism; it is relational attunement. The offering is not inert. It participates. the active relational intelligence that meets people as they choose their doorway.
Resonance: The Missing Ingredient
If there is one element that distinguishes 2-way pricing from every other pricing system — including every donation-based system — it is resonance. Not emotional resonance. Not impulsive resonance. But the deeper form: the subtle, relational sense that a number is coherent for both sides.
Most pricing systems assume that only the buyer’s resonance matters — that only the participant must feel good about the number. But when pricing becomes relational, resonance must exist on both sides:
the participant must feel that the number is true for them,
the offering (through the facilitator or the field) must also feel that the number is aligned.
If either side does not sense resonance, the donation path does not open. This is not punishment. It is alignment. The architecture simply redirects the person to the fixed-price doorway.
This protects:
the participant from acting unconsciously,
the offering from distortion,
the communal field from incoherent contributions,
and the long-term ecology from patterns of extraction.
Transparency is essential here — not to shame or control, but to bring light into a domain often ruled by shadows. Light dissolves unconscious behavior. Light makes misalignment visible. Light encourages sincerity.
This is why even minimal visibility into the relational field (how many are entering, what typical ranges look like, how contributions distribute over time) has a psychological effect. It does not force generosity. But it makes unconscious under-giving uncomfortable. And it makes conscious, aligned contribution feel natural.
Here it becomes clear that 2-way pricing does not attempt to prevent abuse. Instead, it makes abuse difficult, visible, and unappealing. Extraction cannot hide inside transparency. Misaligned contributions surface immediately through resonance, not moral policing. The system protects itself not through enforcement, but through coherence. (how many are entering, what typical ranges look like, how contributions distribute over time) has a psychological effect. It does not force generosity. But it makes unconscious under-giving uncomfortable. And it makes conscious, aligned contribution feel natural.
2-way pricing restores something capitalism erased: the sense that we are choosing not as isolated units, but as participants in a field — that our choices ripple.
When people are aware of this, strange things happen:
people who are a good fit feel naturally drawn into the offering,
people who are misaligned feel gently repelled,
those seeking extraction lose interest,
those seeking truth feel magnetized.
This is why 2-way pricing often becomes a more elegant “funnel” than marketing ever could. Resonance sorts reality long before strategy does.
When people are aware of this, strange things happen:
someone increases their contribution because they see others giving less and feel able to carry more,
someone decreases their contribution because they see others carrying what they cannot,
someone chooses the fixed-price out of integrity,
someone enters the donation path with deeper humility.
This is not forced redistribution. It is relational redistribution — natural, emergent, uncoerced.
Resonance is the intelligence that makes the entire system cohere.
And resonance is never individual alone. The community becomes part of the pricing moment. Each person’s contribution subtly influences the field; the field subtly influences each person’s coherence. This co-regulation makes truthful choices feel natural — and dishonest choices feel strangely heavy or out of place.
What 2-Way Pricing Does to a Person
Pricing is usually treated as a technical question. But in 2-way pricing, it becomes a psychological encounter — a moment where a person meets themselves through money.
People often arrive with inherited scripts:
I must get the best deal.
I should avoid thinking about money.
I must prove my generosity.
I don’t deserve more expensive things.
I should minimize my impact.
I should pay more than others so I’m not a burden.
These scripts are rarely examined. Most people don’t even know they have them. But when confronted with a moment of real choice — when no preset price tells them what to do — the patterns surface.
This is why 2-way pricing is transformative. It interrupts automaticity.
Below are the expanded case scenarios — not caricatures, but recognizable human patterns. Each one shows what 2-way pricing does to a person.
1. The Opportunistic Saver
They enter hoping to pay as little as possible. When they encounter the reflection process, something unexpected happens: they feel seen. They realize the system is not asking for the minimum — it is asking for the truth. Some rise to meet the moment and contribute more than they planned. Others recognize they are unwilling to reflect and choose the fixed-price path. Either way, they grow: through sincerity or self-recognition.
2. The Avoider
They feel drawn to the donation path but dread engaging with money. They want the offering but not the inner work. The architecture reveals this ambivalence, gently. Many decide to take the fixed-price path with relief — not as avoidance, but as alignment with their current capacity. They learn something important: clarity can also be a form of self-honesty.
3. The Resonant Participant
This person enters with sincerity. They sense the dignity in being asked to choose. For them, the pricing moment becomes a gateway into belonging. They experience the gift of being trusted — and the responsibility that comes with it. Often they give exactly the amount that feels coherent, and this coherence amplifies their engagement.
4. The Over-Giver
This person’s instinct is to overextend — to pay much more than they realistically can, driven by guilt or a desire to prove worth. The reflection process interrupts this. They learn to feel into their actual capacity rather than their compensatory impulses. For many, this is the first time they experience generosity toward themselves.
5. The Wealthy Extractor
This person has high financial capacity but low willingness to contribute. They may attempt to use the donation path to underpay. However, resonance breaks the pattern: the field does not open. They either contribute coherently or enter through the fixed-price path. This subtle structural boundary teaches them that wealth does not entitle one to exemption from relational truth.
6. The Late Realizer
This person pays what feels true at the beginning — and only later, through the depth of the experience, realizes the offering was worth far more. The architecture allows upward adjustment. In doing so, they learn that value is emergent, and contribution can be emergent too.
7. The Frozen One
Choice overwhelms them. The openness of the donation path triggers fear of getting it wrong. But the guided process — especially in deeper rooms — teaches them to sense coherence gently. They learn that choice is not performance but discovery.
8. The Shameful One
They fear that choosing a lower number makes them small or exposed. Transparency terrifies them. And yet, the relational field reveals something different: no one is measuring their worth. The system holds them with dignity. For many, this becomes a healing moment — a reframing of belonging.
Across all archetypes, one thing is consistent:
Before naming a number, a person must meet themselves. And this meeting requires courage — not generosity. Sometimes the courageous number is higher; sometimes the courageous number is lower. 2-way pricing trains people not to perform virtue but to tell the truth.
Naming a coherent number reorganizes the psyche. It is a small moment of inner alignment that often generalizes outward: into boundaries, relationships, work, and self-worth. People begin to feel contraction when a choice is untrue — and expansion when it is honest. Facilitators sense this too. Misalignment is almost always palpable.
Across all archetypes, one thing is consistent:
2-way pricing becomes a mirror. People see themselves — perhaps for the first time in this domain — and grow accordingly.
What 2-Way Pricing Does to a System
If Movement 6 explored how 2-way pricing changes individuals, Movement 7 explores how it changes systems.
Even small shifts in how people relate to money have ripple effects. And 2-way pricing introduces several such shifts at once.
At the systemic level, 2-way pricing:
increases accessibility without sacrificing integrity,
reduces unconscious extraction, because resonance creates boundary,
invites natural redistribution, not through pressure but through voluntary coherence,
builds cultures of gratitude, since people feel their contribution matters,
repairs trust, both in facilitators and in communities,
weakens the isolation of the buyer–seller dyad, returning exchange to relationship.
Fixed-price systems tend to polarize groups: those who can comfortably pay and those who strain or exclude themselves. Donation-only systems tend to collapse into underfunding or guilt-based giving.
2-way pricing avoids both pitfalls by introducing multiple coherent entrances.
Wealthier participants often choose the fixed path — they value clarity and speed. More context-sensitive participants choose the donation path — they value resonance and reflection. Across groups, a soft redistribution emerges.
But the real systemic shift is cultural:
People begin to think differently about what it means to contribute. Money becomes less of a weapon or shield — and more of a relational gesture. Over time, this subtly alters how communities function. Gratitude increases. Extraction decreases. Coherence strengthens.
2-way pricing becomes a prototype — a small but powerful example of how economics could evolve when grounded not in abstraction, but in awareness.
Even when the system “fails,” it tends to self-correct. Transparency reveals distortions quickly. Resonance redirects misaligned choices. Extractive patterns lose energy because they cannot operate in the open. Coherent systems strengthen themselves over time.
Ultimately, 2-way pricing does not just create fairer transactions — it creates different kinds of people. People who make choices with awareness, courage, and relational literacy. And from such people, new cultures emerge.** — a small but powerful example of how economics could evolve when grounded not in abstraction, but in awareness.
Practical Examples Across Depth Levels
To ground the model in lived reality, it helps to see how 2-way pricing expresses itself across different types of offerings — from deep transformational containers to light-touch interactions. The architecture is fractal: the outer form adjusts to the depth of the room, while the underlying principles remain constant.
1. Deep Rooms (e.g., long courses, retreats)
These are multi-week or multi-month journeys, or immersive retreat spaces where transformation unfolds over time. Here, 2-way pricing becomes a rich, carefully guided choreography.
Participants are invited into:
a structured money-reflection module,
the three-number system (minimum, likely, maximum),
staged contributions over time,
and coherence/resonance checks at key transitions.
This depth supports participants in meeting themselves honestly. Many discover capacities or transformations they could not have predicted — and some adjust their contribution upwards later. Deep rooms reveal the fullest power of 2-way pricing as an emergent-value system.
2. Medium Rooms (workshops, multi-session experiences)
Medium rooms require structure but less depth than long courses. The focus is on creating a moment of reflective honesty without overwhelming participants.
Often, this includes:
a simplified three-number prompt,
or a single reflective question paired with one suggested number,
light guidance on coherence,
and a transparent fixed-price alternative.
Participants still feel the responsibility and invitation of the system, but without the need for a full module or staged payment design.
3. Light Rooms (one-time sessions, simple digital products)
Light rooms emphasize clarity, speed, and low cognitive load. Reflection is minimal because the offering itself is minimal. One number is often enough.
This simplicity protects the spirit of 2-way pricing from becoming burdensome. It also demonstrates a core principle:
Not every expression requires depth — only coherence.
Light rooms reveal that 2-way pricing can be elegant and minimal without compromising integrity.
Common Misunderstandings & How to Correct Them
Whenever a new pricing architecture is introduced, misunderstandings arise. These misunderstandings are not signs of failure — they are invitations for clarity.
Below are the most common misconceptions and the simplest ways to correct them.
1. “Is this a discount system?”
No. The donation path is not the cheap option — it is the responsibility-heavy option. Many people choose the fixed-price specifically because they do not want the reflective work.
2. “Is donation unreliable?”
Early on, donation may feel unpredictable. But over time, relational systems stabilize not through control, but through trust. Participants who feel trusted tend to act coherently. Transparency increases this effect.
3. “Won’t people exploit this?”
Some will try — briefly. But resonance acts as a natural boundary. Incoherent contributions simply do not pass through the donation doorway. The field redirects extraction without moralizing.
4. “Does this undermine value?”
No. Fixed pricing often obscures value; donation-only often collapses it. 2-way pricing reveals value as it emerges, often more accurately than any fixed calculation.
5. “Is this too complex?”
It is complex in intention, but simple in experience. Participants choose between two paths. The depth of the reflection process scales with the depth of the offering.
Closing (Integration + Philosophical Landing)
At the heart of 2-way pricing is a quiet, powerful recognition:
The right amount is not calculated. It is discovered.
Money becomes a mirror rather than a measure.
Because life itself unfolds through emergence — not pre-calculation. No organism knows its value in advance; no relationship reveals its meaning up front. 2-way pricing mirrors this simplicity: value is discovered, not predetermined. The model works because it follows the logic of life, not the logic of abstraction.
A moment of choice becomes a moment of truth. Exchange becomes an encounter — not a performance. . A moment of choice becomes a moment of truth. Exchange becomes an encounter — not a performance.
We begin to see that pricing was never meant to be a rigid abstraction. It was meant to be relational. It was meant to honor uniqueness. It was meant to evolve as value evolves.
2-way pricing is not a utopian blueprint. It is a practice — a living architecture that grows as people grow. A way of bringing coherence, awareness, and dignity back into one of the most unconscious domains of life.
If enough people experience this shift — if enough people learn to sense coherence, honor resonance, and give from truth — then pricing itself becomes a site of cultural evolution.
A small doorway into a different way of being together.