Family, I’m now less than three weeks away from spinal surgery. As that day gets closer, I’m asking you to help me build a stronger foundation for my work and my livelihood. Preparing for surgery also means preparing for the responsibilities that will still be there afterward.
If you’ve been reading The North Star for free and can afford to become a paid member, please join me today. If a one-time gift works better for you, you can support me here through Buy Me a Coffee.
I want to explain what that support means to me.
Your membership helps me plan beyond today.
When someone becomes a paid member, it gives me support I can build around. It helps sustain the hours that go into researching, checking sources, writing, and publishing. And it helps me provide for my family while doing work I believe in.
That matters as I prepare for surgery. I want to approach this next chapter with more support around the work and more room to give my recovery the attention it needs.
There is a relationship behind this publication. I write something, and you take time out of your life to read it. Sometimes you send it to someone you love. Sometimes you challenge me, add something I missed, or tell me why a story mattered to you. I value that relationship, and I’m asking those who are able to help sustain it.
Think about a piece you’ve read here that stayed with you. Maybe it helped you understand something differently. Maybe it gave you information you needed for a difficult conversation. Maybe it made you feel that someone was finally paying attention to something you couldn’t stop thinking about.
If you want more of that work in the world, please help make it possible by becoming a paid member.
We have a goal to work toward together.
We’re beginning this drive from #19 on Substack’s News bestseller leaderboard, with a goal of reaching the Top 15 before my surgery.
Paid memberships support the recurring subscription revenue behind those rankings. I can’t promise exactly when we’ll move up, but I can ask us to put real effort behind this goal, one person at a time.
If you’ve been meaning to join, today is a good day. Choose a monthly, annual, or founding membership here—whatever fits your circumstances.
And if you prefer to help without a recurring commitment, make a one-time gift through Buy Me a Coffee. Those gifts are a separate way to support me directly, and I am grateful for every one.
If you already support me, thank you. Please know that I see you as part of what makes this work possible. You can also help this drive by sending this post to one person and telling them, in your own words, why you read The North Star.
If money is tight, please take care of yourself and your family. You belong here, too. Your reading, sharing, encouragement, and prayers matter to me.
I’ll keep asking over these next few weeks because this support matters to my life. And I want to be straightforward enough that nobody who wants to help has to wonder how.
Become a paid member or make a one-time gift today. Help me go into this surgery knowing that more people are standing behind the work we’re building together.
Love and appreciate each of you.
Your friend and brother,
Shaun