Asking isn’t easy

It feels a little bit premature to talk about the lessons I’ve learned during the Kickstarter (FYI: 3 days left to raise $195. Achievable but looming). Normally, I try to give myself a few days after any experience to settle down before reviewing and analyzing it. But there’s an ongoing lesson that I’m wading through right now, and I want to talk about it here.

Just like the blog title says, asking isn’t easy. It takes a considerable amount of self-esteem and a resilient ego to create something and present it to the world.”Look at this thing I made, universe! Everyone, stop your activities and pay attention to me!”. And your ego takes a real knock when the world, except for your immediate circle of wonderful friends and family, responds with a disinterested ‘meh’. But you soldier on.

On top of that, I’m now asking for the world’s support in cold, hard cash. Repeatedly. Every day. Confession: By this point in the kickstarter, I’ve run out of ideas on how to continue promoting it, other than “MONEY=YES. MORE!”. The lesson here is about planning your promotion well ahead of time, and having some of the promotional content ready to go live in advance. Coming up with a new sales pitch everyday is just a tad fatiguing.

And yes, there were days that I didn’t do any promoting at all. Some mornings, the prospect of harassing my friends and family for the umpteenth time was too much to handle. The last thing in the world that I want is for my circle of support to feel like I only love them for their money. While it’s nice to have money, I really love their unconditional support and enthusiasm.

At our regular Friday night board game night, I get questions about the book, about the kickstarter and about the next project on the horizon. I know that the crowd around the table are rooting for me and that is more important than anything else. So thanks Dan, Toad, Jeff, Andrea, Gord and Carol : you’re a great gang of nerds.

While I’m at it, thanks to Emily, Paul, Leanne, Nick & Kelsey, Roy, Brad, Jesse, Mike, Kevin, and every friendly face that’s given me encouragement over the last few weeks.

And as always, my number one fan, my love, the foundation of everything good I have built, my darling wife Kristen, thank you for believing in me completely.

To wrap up: Go go go! Less than 200 bucks left! Let’s finish this thing off! Yay team! (Here’s the link. GO GO GO)