# The Art of Asking: How I learned to stop worrying and let people help

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/books/art-asking-i-learned-stop-worrying-let-people-help/
- Published: 2016-10-19T10:10:48+01:00
- Author: Howard Lake

**We’re adding The Art of Asking to the UK Fundraising bookshop on the day that 
[Amanda Palmer](https://twitter.com/amandapalmer) presents the opening plenary of
the 2016 International Fundraising Congress.**

_When we really see each other, we want to help each other’ – Amanda Palmer_

Imagine standing on a box in the middle of a busy city, dressed as a white-faced
bride, and silently using your eyes to ask people for money. Or touring Europe in
a punk cabaret band, and finding a place to sleep each night by reaching out to 
strangers on Twitter.

For Amanda Palmer, actions like these have gone beyond satisfying her basic needs
for food and shelter – they’ve taught her how to turn strangers into friends, build
communities, and discover her own giving impulses. And because she had learned how
to ask, she was able to go to the world to ask for the money to make a new album
and tour with it, and to raise over a million dollars in a month.

![Amanda Palmer speaking at the 2015 International Fundraising Congress in 2016.
Photo: Howard Lake](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2021/06/amanda-palmer-ifc-
201610.jpg)

Amanda Palmer speaking at the 2016 International Fundraising Congress in 2016.

In the _New York TImes _bestseller _The Art of Asking_, Palmer expands upon her 
popular TED talk to reveal how ordinary people, those of us without thousands of
Twitter followers and adoring fans, can use these same principles in our own lives.

Here is her TED talk:

## About Amanda Palmer

Amanda Palmer is a world-renowned singer, songwriter, activist, director, and blogger
who first came to prominence as one half of the internationally acclaimed punk cabaret
duo The Dresden Dolls.

She is a fellow at the Berkman Institute for Internet & Society at Harvard University
and has shown her underwear on Australian television. She currently avoids living
in places including Boston, New York, and Melbourne with her husband, author Neil
Gaiman, who is easily embarrassed.

Palmer’s TED Talk, ‘The Art of Asking,’ which she presented at a 2013 TED conference,
has been viewed at least 8 million times around the world. You can visit her website
and blog at [www.AmandaPalmer.net](http://www.AmandaPalmer.net).

 * **[16 fundraising insights from Amanda Palmer](https://fundraising.co.uk/2016/10/19/16-fundraising-insights-amanda-palmer/)(
   19 October 2016)**