Reckoning with one’s own privilege can be an overwhelming experience for those of us who enter in this work of community participation. I felt this sense of déjà vu while reading We Need To Talk: A Memoir About Wealth, by donor organizer and #HalfMyDAF cofounder Jen Risher.

Like Jen, I also grew up in a modest, lower-middle-class family. From an early age, I knew I was out of step with the material wealth I saw around me. Raised in a tony suburb, I came to understand wealth as something that came with its own language – one that you needed to at least pretend to speak if you wanted to get ahead.

Jen’s particular journey is distinct from mine – as an adult, she and her husband quite literally struck it rich as early Microsoft employees and suddenly had to contend with an unimaginable financial windfall – but the core question in We Need to Talk about what stories we tell ourselves about money is deeply familiar. Particularly for those of us with other privileges committed to a broader vision of economic justice, how we relate to money becomes a fundamental part of how we see ourselves in this work. For me, it’s been an ongoing dance: if I’m in the room but don’t feel like I belong, how do I create change?

I provide this personal context because the best way to understand writing like Jen’s is to put yourself in her shoes. Our relationships with money – how much we have, why we have it, how we feel about it, what we think about other people who have it, and how we use it (or, crucially, tell ourselves we “should” use it) – color the change we can make with it.

Jen’s #HalfMyDAF campaign addresses an essential question for her: what steps can be taken to avoid hoarding wealth? #HalfMyDAF, which Jen and her husband launched in 2020, mobilizes donors with donor-advised funds (DAFs) to donate at least half of their value between March and September each year. Those who participate are eligible to have their donations matched, increasing the impact for nonprofits. To date, #HalfMyDAF has moved more than $70 million out of DAFs and into communities. And while there is still a long way to go to tackle the billions sitting in DAFs today, #HalfMyDAF represents an important start.

Read the full interview with Jen Risher at Proximate.