Dear Whitney,
I am, as of now, on the same trajectory as you were 5 years ago. I can see a lot of "Same" feeling in what you say. I also left a well secured job in a corporate to find out more about myself and how I relate to this world.
The first 6 months have been encouraging with attacks of depression, anxieties and so on, at regular intervals but by effort and by pure accident, I am still afloat. Actually, if I apply a wrong standard of how much I earn, I have almost reached the same level of income of 8 months before.

Two major things I have learnt through this 8 months. You never go hungry because you do not have a secure job. Second, you become more responsible to yourself when you are insecure of not having a job. You start adding value to yourself and the work you are doing, every moment and every day.

Please do keep in touch. I would like to know more about you and your life.

With love and regards
Best of luck in whatever you do

With regards
Ravi Sheshadri, India, Gujarat, Ahmedabad

Interesting how the most frequent questions we get from some people are  "Won't people steal the books?" and "Won't kids just vandalize these things and smash them to pieces?"  Yes, it is sad to say.  But here are the responses from someone who has lived in places where people are killed almost every day for saying the wrong thing or wearing the wrong colors: 
   You can't steal a free book.
   Yes, someone might rip this little thing to pieces for his or her own reasons.  It's probably going to happen somewhere and we shouldn't be surprised.  On the other hand, the more we involve people in doing something that lets them feel as though they are valued and part of something besides, say, aggressive behavior, the less likely vandalism is.  That's why each Library has one or more stewards to look out for it, and why it helps to have kids, young people and adults feel as though they own it, literally and figuratively. 

If something like this belongs to "someone else "or "those people", it's vulnerable.  The more it belongs to everybody, especially "us" or people "like us," the more it is respected.

One other thing.  We encourage folks to think a lot about where to put the Library.  If it's in a vacant lot covered with weeds and trash across the street from a school that nobody likes, good luck.  If it's in a garden next to a historic church or the home of a grandmother that people love, different story.  If people fill it with junk...or really interesting books that are meaningful to the donor and the readers...it makes a difference.  

Go for the light; not the darkness...