Our work today
is the same as it was yesterday
& it will be the same tomorrow:

To care for community, creating safe spaces to gather,
for deep listening, medicinal attention, musical holding,
creative catharsis, processing, & self-expression,
reminding one another we are not alone
& lightening the burdens that often come
with the dark, hard parts of being alive.

In 2018, after a San Quentin volunteer's moving experience at one of You're Going to Die's Grief & Gratitude Open Mics, YG2D's Founder and Executive Director Ned Buskirk was invited to come into San Quentin for the first time ever and "give a talk" to the Brothers Keepers, a suicide prevention peer support group...

"I remember the day they asked, several things immediately occurred to me: First, I was an immediate YES. Instantly followed by the humbling realization that I couldn't possibly have anything to say that would be worth this incarcerated community's time, having mostly no understanding for what it means to be alive in prison. And then, finally, with absolute clarity, I knew exactly what I needed to do... I needed to listen."

- Ned Buskirk

The first event YG2D ever held in San Quentin was its organization's flagship event, the kind of event that started it all - an open mic, a creative invitation for poetry, song, and storytelling around grief and loss, death and dying, the hardest part of being mortal - but this time we offered it to our community living inside the prison walls.

In the wake of this incredibly moving, deeply impactful, and devastatingly enlightening experience facilitating a listening, learning, and integration space in San Quentin, Buskirk would go on to share the story at one our open mics for the general public in San Francisco. In attendance that night was Jordan Edelheit, hailing from Ohio with years of experience working with incarcerated community; after listening to Ned share his story, she asked if he'd be willing to meet and talk about nonprofit prison program possibilities...

And YG2D's ALIVE INSIDE prison program was born.

By 2020 we had a year’s worth of approved bimonthly events happening in San Quentin.

As of 2024, in collaboration with San Quentin Mental Health, ALIVE INSIDE now facilitates the weekly suicide prevention group that Ned was first invited to speak to in 2018. We are regularly invited to produce memorial/vigil/grief events in San Quentin, expanding our programming every year since 2018. We've facilitated events during Mental Wellness/Suicide Prevention Week in 2018, 2019, 2022, 2023, and 2024. And we are currently completing programming for the entirety of 2024, hosting monthly grief and gratitude open mics and workshops every month this year.

For 2025, we've just submitted proposals for another year's worth of programming, again with our monthly grief and gratitude open mics and workshops, but with the addition of a monthly concert series, offering the musical medicine of our heartfelt and expert musician community, including the chance for musicians inside to collaborate with our visiting musicians at these events.

Outside of San Quentin, led by program director Jordan Edelheit, we have visited the Ohio prison system several times, offering our events in multiple prisons throughout the Ohio area and [in collaboration with the Innocence Network and The Ohio Innocence Project] we also work with our exonerated community, supporting those who have been wrongly incarcerated, along with the organizations and legal teams that free them.

And miraculously, this week, because of the impact of our prison programming presence in CDCR's San Quentin, we've been invited on a tour of multiple CDCR facilities throughout California, starting with our Grief & Gratitude Open Mic in San Quentin Tuesday night, November 12th, flying down the next morning to offer events for incarcerated community and staff in San Diego's CDCR facility all day Wednesday, November 13th and Thursday, November 14th, and finally flying up to San Luis Obispo's CDCR facility to offer our events for incarcerated community and staff all day Friday, November 15th.

It should be known, the CDCR is NOT able to fund our work. While we are doing more work than ever to garner grants and foundation support, WE NEED YOUR CONTRIBUTIONS to help fund this tour and our prison program's ongoing expansion! PLEASE CONTRIBUTE TODAY! And introduce us to your favorite foundation or philanthropist who could also believe in what we're up to with ALIVE INSIDE!

If you have any questions, want to know more, or would like to set up a call to discuss how you might be able to more substantially support our prison program, please reach out to Ned Buskirk at ned@yg2d.com or Jordan Edelheit at jordan@yg2d.com.

Here are articles in San Quentin News about our offerings in 2023...

‘ALIVE INSIDE’ EVENTS GIVE SAN QUENTIN RESIDENTS OPPORTUNITY FOR MEANINGFUL EXPRESSION: https://sanquentinnews.com/alive-inside-events-give-san-quentin-residents-opportunity-for-meaningful-expression/

THIRD ANNUAL MENTAL WELLNESS WEEK PROMOTES SUICIDE PREVENTION: https://sanquentinnews.com/third-annual-mental-wellness-week-promotes-suicide-prevention/

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If you’d rather not use Givebutter or can’t, here are some others ways to contribute to this fundraiser. You can send payment to...

Venmo: https://account.venmo.com/u/YG2D_nonprofit @YG2D_nonprofit
&
PayPal:

https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/chelseacoleman1184 via chelsea@yg2d.com

Or you can mail a check Payable to "YG2D" to:

YG2D
PO Box 720040

SF, CA 94172

And if you need us to accept another form of payment, just email chelsea@yg2d.com!

NOTE: If you contribute with any of these other options, we’ll happily account for your contribution by adding it for you to our total raised here on Givebutter. Just let us know if you’d rather remain anonymous!

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ALIVE INSIDE [a YG2D Prison Program] Fundraiser

ALIVE INSIDE is bringing communities impacted by the prison system creatively into the conversation of grief, loss, & our shared mortality, inspiring a more connected & meaningful experience of being alive.

Team Members