A Personal Letter From Chelsea

To my beloved TFD community,

If you follow my personal Instagram, you might have seen that I have been experiencing a period of depression of late. It’s one of those time where I catch myself crying constantly, over seemingly nothing, and then feel embarrassed and silly for having cried in the first place (IYKYK). It took me a long time to understand what was really wrong, but I finally feel like I get it.

As you might know (or maybe you don’t, because I haven’t been promoting it much), my new novel The High Dive is coming out May 27. I’m extremely proud of it, and feel as strongly now as I ever have that women should do this more: pursue their creative dreams, contain multitudes, stop waiting around for permission to do and be everything they want. But I have also deeply regretted bringing it into the world when I have because, put simply, self-promotion (or really focusing on anything “unimportant”) has felt awful.

Like we talk about all the time on the channel, we are in a time of extreme political and economic uncertainty in this country. Every day, we receive dozens if not hundreds of messages and comments from women losing their jobs, fearing a recession, incredibly angry that their tax dollars are going to simultaneously roll back civil rights, alienate allies, and fund war crimes. And in an environment like this, encouraging people to buy my romantic beach read feels gross.

You may also know (or not) that my husband is one of the many, many immigrants impacted by the first Trump administration. He was forced to leave the country for two years, during which time we were privileged enough to hire lawyers and could visit each other sometimes through visa-free tourist travel. We were one of the lucky ones. But so many immigrants today — even permanent residents like him, targeted for exercising peaceful protest and free speech — are not so lucky.

So I have decided that rather than sit around and feel guilty and depressed for doing something frivolous, I would like to turn my book launch into a chance to raise funds to ensure many more families like ours are able to access the help they need should they be targeted like we were. And since I shared my initial plan — donating $1 of every copy sold this summer to immigrant legal funds, inviting guest speakers from political and community orgs to speak at my tour stops — my little personal community has stepped up in a major way, offering to buy copies of the book for someone who would love a summer read but doesn’t have it in their budget for any reason. In just 24 hours, we’ve already had over 300 gifted books volunteered, and I will be donating 100% of my profits from these gifted copies, as it would not be right to enrich myself from such generosity.

To celebrate my book’s publication, I am running this book gifting fundraiser, and I will also have my first supported nonprofit joining my NYC launch party on May 27th and a YouTube Live fundraiser on May 28th, and I’ll be sharing more about both in the coming days.

For now, if you would like to receive a free gifted copy in the mail, simply fill out this short form, no questions asked. Also, if you would like to gift one, drop your info here. Do not be shy about requesting one, so many people are volunteering to spread joy AND raise money! [Please note that this offer is only available for participants in the US and Canada, anywhere else we'll gift you an eBook!]

I can’t say that I suddenly feel great — being married to a green card holder and a small business owner in this chaotic economy is probably not going to feel easy for a long time — but I have felt infinitely better in the past two days than I have in a long time. We are still allowed to do things that bring us joy, to follow our passions, to celebrate our wins. But the answer to our sadness is not to retreat, it’s to turn it outwards: to build community, to help others, and to invite others in on our moments of celebration. Now let’s raise some money!

❤️ Chelsea