Hello Reader,

On the snowy afternoon of January 30, 2021, I sat on the back porch of our cabin in Western North Carolina. A heron stood in the middle of the pond despite a windchill of 28 degrees, facing the elements.

While I admired that stubbornness, I was feeling sorry for myself. The pandemic had eliminated every client I had lined up. For months I'd been convening virtual roundtables and one-on-one interviews with ecosystem builders from around the world. I wrote constantly: to keep my mind occupied, to feel some sense of productivity, maybe even to write a future that didn't exist yet.

But nothing was working. Blog posts, newsletters, social media. Zero traction. And I felt that silence deep in my stomach.

Between self-doubt and self-pity (they make a good pair), my heart sat heavy and tight in my chest. What once filled me with joy and hope had become a journey that I no longer could find the next step for.

Had I bet on the wrong horse? Was ecosystem building just a giant waste of time? Had I devoted six years of my life to building thriving communities only to find out none of it mattered to anyone but me?

In a movie, this is the moment the devil appears and offers you a trade: your soul in exchange for success and validation. In that moment, I would have taken the deal.

But in reality, I went to bed sad. Woke up the same way. It would be months before I pulled myself out of that hole of self-doubt and defeatism.

When I talk to an ecosystem builder today, I can usually tell whether they've been through their own version of that reckoning. The moment when you have to ask yourself honestly whether this invisible labor is worth it, even when no one will ever see or acknowledge it.

Every practitioner I interviewed for It Takes a Valley had an answer to that question, and most of them had earned it the hard way. In a way, they were that heron.

2021 Anika would have been floored to know that five years later, after hundreds of conversations, fifty of her peers had shared their stories in a book that she had authored. 2021 Anika is one of the reasons I wrote it.

Our field has a solid knowledge base that conveys the technical knowledge. What's missing is the human layer: our heroic accomplishments and rock-bottom disappointments, our small wins and great losses, the burnout no one talks about, and the stubbornness that keeps us doing it anyway.

It Takes a Valley covers both, and it gives readers something to actually do with what they learn.

It Takes a Valley launches tomorrow!

You can preview the campaign before it goes live tomorrow morning at 8:

The first 75 backers get the paperback, an invitation to the virtual book launch, and their name in the acknowledgments — for $50 instead of $60. That offer closes once those 75 spots are gone.

Look out for a celebratory campaign reminder tomorrow, I'll keep it short and sweet!

We have a subtitle!

Thank you everyone who voted in the last issue and to those who reached out to me personally!

"How to build thriving entrepreneurial ecosystems that transform our communities"

Bookish and Shen-Anika-ns are taking the week off. The manuscript and the campaign have consumed everything. They'll be back.

I'll be back in two weeks!

In camaraderie,

Anika

P.S. Missed my last newsletter? Check out the previous issues of Impact Curator.