What's the Value of Your Property?

While we were first conceiving Youtropolis, I imagined a safe haven where anyone could receive their own deed of land just for signing up. How valuable their land might become would largely depend on how they cultivated it. But together we’d forge a new land of opportunity that would shine a brighter light and offer a more equitable life to anyone who claimed it.

When I hear people say, “It’s not real land,” I wonder what they’re talking about. What I’m talking about is the land of YOU.

Aren’t you the most priceless property you’ll ever own? The most productive? The one that builds more equity over the long haul of years worked?

Think about how precious you are to others. Then consider if it’s even possible to grasp how valuable your mind is. Can anyone put a price tag on the gifts god has given you, the sum total of their bounty, your capacity to love, the intelligence infusing you that is shared with others? What about the endless ideas that percolate within you? Can you honestly say they don’t have any value—or deny the possibility that one idea may have the capacity to turn the world in a positive new direction and bring you more income than you ever imagined?

When I think of the land my home sits on and the soil that’s in my backyard, I know there’s a magical genius at work every time a new plant crops up I never planted. Even if a bird dropped the seed, the soil with all its inherent resources was intelligent enough to help it grow.

That’s how Youtropolis works. Opportunities rise up from the positive, magical soil that is cultivated and shared freely by all our members.

As we continue to grow, we’re seeing a positive new trend. City founders who’ve engaged in building alliances have formed supportive friendships online and off. They’ve come together to volunteer on community projects. They’ve created new pathways for personal development with the help of their tribe members—and personal wishes are being fulfilled.

For this reason, Youtropolis is fulfilling its promise as a land of opportunity where, little by little, anyone can rise up. Like farmland, your plot of land is yours to enrich, cultivate, and grow. Unlike farmland, what you produce will not depend on good weather, rich soil, or access to water rights. There are no furrows to plow, wells to dig, or oxen to harness. It will depend only on your goodwill mingling with the goodwill of others—the only fertilizer you’ll need—and it’s free.

With every challenge we’ve faced building Youtropolis, I’ve kept one thing in mind: America was open territory when the first settlers arrived. It was rough terrain with loads of promise, more than anyone could imagine. The pioneers who settled and plowed the land didn’t do it alone. They didn’t raise their barns alone. They didn’t explore or mine alone. They didn’t brave new territories alone. They didn’t pray alone. And they didn’t shape the greatest experiment in democracy alone. It was men and women, often settlers and natives alike, working together, side by side, to help each other, tend to each other, protect each other, and prosper together. It was a spirit of collaboration, unity, and common purpose that gave rise to a powerful new nation.

That spirit with all its richness is at work again here in Youtropolis every day.

We don’t waste time fretting over what one political party may do versus the other. Both enabled a corrupt system and immoral wealth gap so large no founding father would have tolerated it.

Instead, we come together to bring forth our best selves through our U of You. We work together to fulfill another’s wish through our Wishing Well. We collaborate to lift up a tribe member facing a personal challenge through our Futures Exchange. And we join together to meet tangible needs through our Recycle Bin. It all comes from our innermost resources including our goodwill toward others—and that adds up to what a land of opportunity should be.