Asking for (impossible) things is my new favourite hobby
Between 2018 and 2023, I ran a business called Eli Trier Communities where I helped the people I dubbed “Quiet Revolutionaries” with networking and community building.
Every week I wrote a newsletter called The Sunday Letter.
This is one of my favourite issues…
The Sunday Letter | Eli Trier Communities | Issue 017
"Daring is doing. Daring is asking something outrageous despite your chances of failure and rejection. Daring is going out on a limb by believing in something that no one else understands, and if all fails, daring is trying again."
- Bibi Bourelly
Hey lovelies
One of the most fundamental parts of community is give and take. A beautiful flow of mutual reciprocity that nurtures everyone.
As Julie Wolk says in her submission for the Redefining Community project, "Just like an ecosystem, your business thrives in a diverse web of interrelated beings helping each other out over the long-term."
However, for a lot of people (particularly women - myself included), the 'take' part of this equation gets lost. Our feminine conditioning gets us tangled up, and we struggle to take, to ask for help, to state our needs and to speak up when they aren't being met. We can't even take a simple compliment, preferring to bat it away like a wasp at a picnic.
I have been making a conscious effort over the last few months to break this habit in myself, and oh my, it has made life so much more fun and pleasurable!
I started by taking compliments, receiving them with a smile and a thank you instead of my usual tirade of exactly why the person complimenting me was sorely mistaken.
Then I moved up a level to stating my preferences. For example, when someone asked, 'where shall we meet', I would suggest a meeting place that suited me, rather than my default answer of, 'I don't mind, wherever's easiest for you.'
I've slowly challenged myself to learn how to receive gracefully, and I'm understanding more and more that asking for help is a gift to the person you ask. It's a gift because it shows that you trust them, that you value them, that they matter to you. It gives them an opportunity to be your hero.
Giving feels good! We all know this, which is why we give, give, give all the time. But have you ever stopped to think that by only giving you're depriving someone of the pleasure of giving to you?
I'm now on level 10: asking for impossible things, and it is so much fun. It's almost easier to ask for impossible things because it's really hard to get attached to the outcome.
The most wonderful thing about asking people for impossible things is that sometimes they say YES.
Want to work with someone amazing but can't afford them? Ask if they have a scholarship programme or a payment plan they don't publicise. Want that super high-profile person to share your latest blog post? Tell them about it and ask for a share. Want to be on that insanely popular podcast even though you only have 46 followers and have only been in business for five minutes? Fuck it, why not ask? You never know when someone might say yes.
Whatever it is that you want, even it seems completely impossible, try ASKING for it before you list all the reasons why you can never have it (oh, and just to clarify, I mean ask the actual person who can give it to you, not just the universe).
And when they do say yes, accept and receive graciously - don't tell them how wrong their yes was and how they'll regret it.
Look at it this way, the more you get the more you can give - woohoo!
Happy asking, my loves.
Until next time,
Lots of love and gratitude
Eli xx
Where next?
Visit the Records Office for more blasts from the past! Discover more of my writings on community building, my old freelance illustration work, and my diary of setting up my art business.
Alternatively…
Visit the NOW page to see what I’m up to at this exact moment in time!
