Crowdfunding My Book Process

Dear friends, family, and loved ones,

I have decided to crowdfund the book-writing process I find myself in.

Crowdfunding, in my opinion, puts us in contact with the phenomenon that no person’s purpose stands alone. The heart’s work is not remote or isolated, but interconnected.

So I find that it would help me, especially in this troubled time I find myself in, to receive your support as I attempt to plunge the depths of my heart to bring something meaningful forth.

Please read below if you are interested in this project. Thank you!

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I am writing to express a need that’s not so easy… but here we are. I find myself in a complex and quite stressful situation these days. I have recently relocated to Berlin, Germany.

While this move was premeditated and living here has been fruitful in several ways so far, the challenge for me has come in not being able to do the work I love (sharing embodiment practices, meditation, and facilitating healing spaces) until I get a work permit.

I’m currently in the application process for a German freelance visa which is a lengthy, slow, and complicated process. I will spare you the bureaucratic details.

The biggest hangup was that the next available appointment was not for another five months. Essentially, I have been unable to do any work here for the last three months and will have another two months until they accept my application.

While it has been stressful to figure out the bureaucracy here, I’m grateful to be supported by my partner and good friends. Further, this has provided me a lot of space and time for other elements of my work, contemplation and writing, to flourish.

This brings me to the book I intend to write and why I am seeking to crowdfund it.

This is a relatively new idea for me. If you had asked me some months ago about writing a book, I would have probably said “someday.”

Since I have an abundance of space at the moment, many things are flowing through me regarding what is alive, timely, and purposeful to write about. While I don’t have the full picture, it’s beginning to emerge. This is exciting, as I have only admired the artistic process from afar before this point.

So, I’m asking for help. Help to be able to relax into this creative process fully and bring something from my heart to the world.

Not only because I am in a stressful financial situation, but because the book I am writing is for us. It will be a contemplation of the many collective challenges we face. As I sure don’t have the answers, we will walk with the questions together.

The intention is that we may find new ways to look at the world and maybe even have some answers revealed to us as we walk.

Given this book is for all of us and I am only attempting to attune with what wants to be written, I feel that the energy you donate naturally expands the field I am able to write in.

For me, this feels like a true experiment to verify that the care of giving naturally expands what is given to. That the energy given can be transferred into something that feeds back to you (the giver), therefore the gift becomes the vehicle or catalyst for both of us to receive something greater than we could have on our own.

I would like to acknowledge that this is also scary for me, as the creative process then becomes somewhat public and shared with you. But this is what I feel the term “crowdfunding” means.

It’s not about giving someone financial means to go off and create their project alone. It’s about becoming a part of the project and making it bigger – not in the sense that it is materially bigger or reaches more people, but that it is more meaningful.

When you give with your care and resources you become an energetic stakeholder in what’s created. Then, we get to actualize that my purpose does not stand alone, that my purpose and your purpose intersect somehow.

I feel that our world needs to work a lot more in this way because we all have something to offer that no one else can. If we invest our energy in each other, seeing this potential, we will recognize our inherent interconnectedness with everything. The meaning we can draw from such is priceless.

So, with that, I thank you for being here to not only witness me in my vulnerability but also to hear what I find to be a major element of my purpose – to further uncover and shine light on the truth that “no human being is an island.”

To be more specific, the money you donate here will go to serve my basic needs during this process.

With my basic needs covered, I would be able to immerse myself in this work. Whereas currently, I carry the daily worry and also continue to search for ways I can sustain myself for the next couple of months. Hence, your financial support would create more space for me, internally and externally, to write.

The last thing I will say is that I intend to finish the book by the end of this year (2023). However, as I am allowing it to be an emergent process, I will not constrain the project with a deadline if it truly needs more time for ripening.

Truth be told, in full transparency, I have no idea what I’m getting myself into.

What I do know is that your support will help me dive further into the muddy waters, that we call the creative process, initiate me into being an artist, into being “a writer”, and maybe I find something worthwhile for us all.

I thank you for your love and support.

Wherever you may be in the world, I feel it. I wish you days of clarity but also the permission to be confused, gentleness but strength, and heartbreaking joy, as we continue our journey into the unknown in these challenging times.

I’m grateful and touched to have the privilege of being heard here.

Much love,

Jaden

P.S. If you have not been privy to my writing in the past, you can check out my substack newsletter here and find an archive of over 50 essays, short stories, poems, and letters.