Recently, a reader left us a query in Tinypass, our membership platform, and included this comment:

“I paid for a subscription to support the writer and I think she has enough support at this point so she doesn’t really need mine.”

Yikes! She thinks that “us” really is an US, a small army of efficient soldiers keeping things going, and that “the writer” is living a stress-free, nicely-balanced life.  It made us realize that we/I/us have created a rather grand, and very nice, illusion: that Improvised Life is wealthy and chugging along just fine.

jean harlow eating chocolates Dinner at Eight

Most likely that illusion comes from our not saying where we’re at and what we need (We hate asking for money. If we had the wherewithal, we’d give all our content away, as we did for years…)

Support from our members helps GREATLY but doesn’t yet pay the freight of the site’s upkeep. We keep finding ways to buy the site time, in part by creating some great products to sell. But they all take $$/time/energy/stamina to develop…

The reality is: For Improvised Life to keep publishing, we need the financial support of the many readers who stop by daily.

Het Leven
Het Leven

If you like what you find here, if it shifts your thinking in a good way, and adds value to your life, please become a Friend with Benefits and join the effort to keep building Improvised Life.

McKewon Art Studio of Petrolia, ON
McKewon Art Studio of Petrolia, ON

And for all our loyal Friends with Benefits, a heartfelt THANK YOU for being there.

We/I/Us DO feel curiously wealthy when we receive emails like this:

“Everyday you inspire or enlighten or make me laugh or pay respect or embellish my life or simplify my life or give appreciation or stroke my curiosity  or save me money with your explorations of resourcefulness and thus respect. 

THAT is our gold!

If you’ve found illumination, joy, or inspiration in this post, please consider supporting Improvised Life. It only takes a minute to make a secure donation that helps pay our many costs. A little goes a long way towards helping Improvised Life continue to live ad-free in the world.

Support Improvised Life ♥

9 replies on “Improvised Life’s Illusory Wealth

  1. Ditto to whoever wrote the published comment!!
    There have been countless times that I have looked into resources that you provided and double that for inspiration provided.
    I reference back issues of Improvised Life when in search of ideas and look forward to reading your blog daily!
    Helen S.

  2. Nothing remotely like treasure-trove of a website has ever turned up in any of my internet rovings. I will continue my subscription. Thanks for all that you do! On a separate note, it is a bit odd to hear of all the things “we” discovered and that something took “our” breath away, etc, without knowing who “we” is. Would it be possible to share a bit more of who lies behind the “we” without compromising privacy, of course?

  3. Ditto and ditto. Your blog is my favorite, the one I choose to read when there’s only time for one.

  4. I am a Friend with Benefits and was just thinking the other day about how much value and inspiration I get on a daily basis from this site. So, thank you!

  5. There are two blogs I support monetarily-yours and Brain Pickings. You are putting good energy into the universe and we are grateful!

  6. The value here for the money is . . . incomparable. If you don’t find it to be so, then don’t subscribe–and miss out on more than three weeks’ worth of value in every month. But if like me, you do then subscribe. I find Sally’s musings, thoughts, ideas, discoveries, and more to be more valuable to my life than anything I have ever gotten from anyone else. What you do, Sally, is beyond remarkable. And I am happy to contribute my portion for it.

    Thank you!

  7. When I read Improvised Life this morning, I was so surprised by the reader who assumed he didn’t need to pay anymore. Anyone who lives here or anywhere for that matter knows we have to pay for subscriptions and most media. This is not the early Internet of 1990s. We don’t get media for free on-line and if we do its from a company that gets paid by advertisers which you don’t have. Knowing you don’t have advertisers makes me think that you are not beholden to anyone and there is an honesty that’s not in much media.

    Improvised Life does what can’t be done by many media outlets. In other words, you have the freedom to write and create. We, as the public has the freedom to read and get to share in your creativity. Internet doesn’t mean it just appears. It takes hard work and people (not computers) to create and write. It also takes great creativity and thought to put a site up. Are the NYT or magazines free? Naivety on the part
    of those who think it just appears. Improvised Life is extraordinary and keeps becoming more so each time We all read it. Thank you for creating and I (we) are more then happy to pay for a subscription.

    Thank you,
    Fern Berman

  8. Note also to the reader who thinks that TIL has enough money, in addition to all the creative value that this site delivers, it costs hard money for the servers and platforms needed to put content on the web. Which means The Improvised Life, not only needs to get paid for all that amazing work, but that Sally/TIL is laying out money so that we get to enjoy this content.
    Thank you Sally, and the small amount you ask for from us is more than reasonable for all the good you create and put in the world.

  9. Yes, I’ve mulled over outlining the base costs of supporting Improvised Life: monthly server costs, various apps for which one pays a fee, not to mention utilities, materials, AND a part-time assistant without whom it would fall apart. That’s without my many long days a work creating content, photographing, find or processing photos, doing projects, writing….

    It is all balanced by the pleasure and meaning of creating content that seems to resonate with so many people, and the feedback from the incredible Improvised Life community.

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