Can We Build Wealth Without Building Empire?

Maintaining our sovereignty whilst being in connection.

💫 This summer I am finishing my book The Reluctant Capitalist, but I am now taking bookings for September:

👉 If you are ready to invest in your business you can apply for a free 60 minute call so we can focus on where you want to go and how I can help you get there.

OR

👉 Book a 90 minute Breakthrough Session so we can do a deep dive into a problem that has been slowing you down.

---

If wealth as we know it has been shaped by colonisation, by extraction, accumulation, and exploitation, then surely it’s not enough to simply make money ethically.

We have to ask harder questions.

📍What are we reproducing when we build businesses that succeed inside a capitalist framework?
📍What does it mean to build wealth in ways that don’t just avoid harm, but actively repair?
📍How do we make money without mirroring the very systems we want to dismantle?

These aren’t abstract questions. They show up in the everyday decisions of running a business:

– In how we price.
– In who our offerings are designed to serve.
– In how we define “growth” and “success”.
– In how we resource ourselves and our communities.
– In what we give back—and how we define “giving.”

Right now, at this moment, I am finishing my book The Reluctant Capitalist, that aims to answer some of these questions. It’s the culmination of a life’s work, study and thought into capitalism.

Through it I am exploring what capitalism is, how we got here, and how we can navigate a system that wasn’t designed with small solopreneur businesses in mind so that we may liberate ourselves from oppressive structures and frameworks.

This is NO small undertaking!

[Incidentally, if you are interested in exploring this more, I will provide a reading list at the end so you can dive into the writing of the people who have influenced my thinking.]

What I am really interested in is how we decolonise wealth and money. In other words, exploring the ways in which we use our businesses, and leverage the privileges we have, to make money in a system built on exploitation, without replicating those systems.

So many of my clients struggle with the notion of making money at all, fearing that they will unconsciously recreate the very systems they are trying to resist.

I work with them to meet that tension between profit and purpose without compromising either, building business ecosystems that benefit them and their wider community.

Because to decolonise wealth inside our businesses does not mean refusing to make money. Far from it.
It means making money in a way that is relational, redistributive, and rooted in care, for ourselves and others. Seeing those oppressive systemic structures for what they are, not pretending they don’t exist.

Consciously decolonising wealth and money asks us to move away from:

💸 Accumulation → toward circulation
📈 Extraction → toward reciprocity
🏆 Individual success → toward collective thriving

It might look like:

• Transparent pricing that considers accessibility and sustainability.

• Community-informed offers that are co-created in relationship, not in isolation.

• Paying collaborators equitably and inviting shared decision-making.

• Reparative redistribution, like giving a percentage of profits to Indigenous land back movements, mutual aid, or community care networks.

• Refusing urgency-based sales tactics that mirror the coercive energy of capitalism.

• Prioritising rest and healing inside our business models.

And most of all, it means letting go of the capitalist fantasy of scaling at all costs.

We don’t have to grow endlessly.
In fact, as Simone Seol says, the only thing that grows endlessly in nature is cancer.

🌀 Decolonising wealth inside our businesses isn’t about being ‘perfect’. This is complex work and it takes time to unravel.

Decolonising wealth is about being aware.
Willing to unlearn, decondition.
Willing to ask harder questions than “how much can I earn?”

Capitalism and neoliberalism have been predicated on the premise of extreme individualism.

As conscious and purpose led business owners, our work is to maintain our sovereignty as individuals, whilst understanding our interconnectedness with each other and with our environment.

It’s about building new ecosystems, not just new income streams.

I would love to hear from you. What practices are you exploring that feel like they move you toward decolonising wealth?

Thanks for reading

Marisa

Reading list:

Talking to my Daughter About the Economy by Yanis Varoufakis

Doughnut Economics by Kate Raworth

Capitalism and Slavery by Eric Williams

The Invisible Doctrine by George Monbiot and Peter Hutchison

Rest is Resistance by Tricia Hersey

---

💫 P.S. If you want to build real, ethical wealth, here are 3 ways I can help you:

1. Download my FREE Masterclass: Fair and Fearless: Ethical Pricing Strategies for Solopreneurs Who Want to Do Good and Make Money.

This free masterclass will help you to:

· Reframe pricing based on your financial needs, not on other people’s prices.

· Stop undercharging and overworking.

· Build justice and fairness into your business model in a way that helps others and keeps you resourced.

2. Magnetic Marketing Workbook

Join dozens of solopreneurs who have learned how to sell their offers directly from their marketing, without posting every day, selling out their values, or chasing trends.

3. Get 1:1 support designed for you and your business. Build a business that pays you well and reflects your values, without burnout or selling out. Apply for a free 60 minute call.