Free Hugs Tour Preparations!!

Since my last post I have had most of my big school projects due.  From now until the end of the quarter, and the start of Free Hugs Tour 2013 I only have 2 video editing projects and 3 final exams.  I also have to get everything prepared for Free Hugs Tour 2013.

A couple days ago I purchased a backpacking backpack (Pictures yet to come) which I will test pack hopefully later today.  I also will upload the itinerary onto www.couchsurfing.com in order to be able to coordinate places to stay while I am on my tour.  I also have to figure out places to free hug in each of the cities I will be in and find people to hug with and enjoy my Free Hugging experiences.  Let me know if you want to free hug with me!

I also now have some merchandise available on my website (www.freehugstour.com/merchandise.html), so go and check that out.

I'll keep you updated and upload pictures of my packing endeavors soon!!

Hugs,
David Melia (Professional Free Hugger)

Free Hugs Tour 2013 Tour Itinerary!!

It is with much excitement and hugs that I present to you my Free Hugs Tour 2013 Itinerary!
Here is a couple posters with the information:

Posters made by Adam Graham of Zigurous Studios who also designed a program where you can design your own Free Hugs design and enter the Free Hugs T-shirt Design Contest until May 18th!! Be sure to enter through the Free Hugs Design link!

For those who can't read the dates on the posters, here they are again:

Chicago 6/12-6/13

Milwaukee 6/14-6/16

St. Paul/ Minneapolis 6/18- 6/22

Seattle 6/24- 6/26

Portland (Leakycon) 6/27- 7/1

San Francisco 7/2- 7/4

Los Angeles 7/6- 7/10

San Diego 7/11- 7/13

Albuquerque 7/15- 7/17

Denver 7/19- 7/21

Wichita 7/22- 7/25

Kansas City 7/26- 7/29

St. Louis 7/31- 8/2

Nashville 8/3- 8/6

Atlanta 8/8- 8/11

Durham/Charlotte  8/12-8/13

Washington DC 8/15- 8/18

Philadelphia 8/19- 8/21

New York 8/22- 8/25

Boston 8/26- 8/29

Pittsburgh 8/31-9/1

Louisville 9/2- 9/3

Indianapolis 9/4- 9/7

Chicago 9/8

Let me know if you know anyone at these locations that would be interested in hosting me for a couple of nights as well as free hugging with me a couple of the days! Let me know what you think of the itinerary and the posters!

Until next time *Hugs*,

David Melia (Professional Free Hugger)

Agapefest Awesomeness!

Right before my last post my computers harddrive totally crashed which was a real bummer.  Most of the data on it was saved in other places but there are a few things that I lost that I wish I would have had backed up beforehand.  Anyway, it took about a week to get fixed at the Apple store.  It set back some of my tour organizing projects.  Now that I have my computer back, and I am saving and backing up all of my files constantly, updates and new fun updates should start to become a more common occurrence.  Within the next few days I will hopefully have an itinerary uploaded with dates that I will be in each city!

This past weekend I attended Agapefest in Greenville, Illinois for the first time.  It was an interesting experience to say the least.  Agapefest took place at the Bond County Fairgrounds (a grassy field) which, at the end of the fest became a field of mud due to the rain and the tread of thousands of fest participants.  That being said, I did have a fantastically awesome time meeting people, giving away hugs, telling them about my Free Hugs Tour 2013 project and my book.  Some of the bands I met and actually had that chance to engage in dialogue a little bit include: Ravenhill, The Madison Letter, Family Force 5, Kutless, Hawk Nelson, and Attaboy. I was able to give them a little information about hugs and my book and I had the privilege to hear them live and get some of their music so that I can listen to the music on Free Hugs Tour 2013 and will provide some of my soundtrack for that (I am going to have a soundtrack like they do in the movies and stuff because I am cool like that? Maybe I don't know about cool but It will be a thing.)

A couple of other cool people I met include the people in this picture:

  

Overall I met a lot of really cool and awesome people, and hopefully will continue to keep in touch with them in the future!  I will definitely be going to Agapefest 2014.  

Stay tuned for the release of the dates I will be in each city for Free Hugs Tour 2013! 

Hugs,

David Melia (Professional Free Hugger)

Book Updates/ Seattle Trip

My book has now officially been published and for sale a little bit over a month now.  I have sold about 70 physical copies of the 300 copies that I bought to sell so far.  I am making progress.  I have about 7 weeks until I go on tour on June 14th.  It's coming up pretty soon, and I have a lot of stuff to work on in order to make sure that I am ready for it!!  This includes marketing my book and trying to get people interested in the book and the tour and lots and lots of marketing.

This past weekend I went to Seattle to see the Youtube star and Singer/Songwriter Tiffany Alvord in concert.  The concert was amazingly great and I had a blast listening and chilling out with her for a couple hours due to the fact that I bought backstage passes to the show.  I gave her a copy of the book because she is mentioned a few times in it and we got to talk a bit about like hugs and how awesome and amazing hugs are.  That night I received 30 hugs and Tiffany received about 300 hugs.  Afterwards we had a discussion about the amount of hugs we each receive and who gives away more hugs, you know, a little friendly competition.  I also mentioned that my goal for Free Hugs Tour 2013 was to give away 100,000 hugs in 90 days.

The next day, April 20, 2013, I tried to give away some free hugs around Seattle but I really wasn't feeling the hugging mood (the confidence and dedication to stick to giving away hugs without being able to take rejections personally).  When this happens, as described in my book, free hugging doesn't have as many of the benefits so it is better to stop giving away hugs because that is when it is more likely to have negative effects.  I was then thinking about the goal to get 100,000 hugs, and with that goal, there is a lot more emphasis on the process of getting and receiving the hugs and less emphasis on the meaning behind the hug as well as the message behind the Free Hugs Lifestyle. The meaning and experiences of each hug are lost in a way.  Another problem that I thought about with trying to compete with giving away a certain number of hugs is the tendency to try and push people that don't want to get hugs into getting hugs and potentially providing a bad experience for them rather than a positive one.  That is not to say that having a hugging goal number, but just making sure that I remember the more important parts of the hugging experience than just focusing on giving hugs in order to reach that hugging number goal.

Just some food for thought that I was thinking about recently.  Let me know what yall think about that.  Have a fantastic day.

Hugs,

David Melia (Professional Free Hugger)

Free Hugs: It’s More Than A Campaign—It’s A Lifestyle is officially Published!!

I have been pretty busy since my last post.  This is probably because of my decision to take 5 classes this past quarter while attempting to get a book published, which is now published!! :) So the past couple of weeks I have had a lot of writing, and thoughts and craziness going on in my head wrapping my brain around 3 different philosophy classes.  That means to say there was a lot of philosophical content that was covered and expanding my brain and stuff.  It was super amazingly challenging but I am really glad that I took them all and I am now working on some other philosophical inquiry quests for some fun stuff (all relating to Free Hugs of course). 

Speaking of Free Hugs, I now have an officially published book!!! What does this mean for you buying the book?  Let’s be honest, that’s the reason why you are reading this post right?  You want to buy my book!! Here is the deal:

The book is available right now on Amazon, the book cover has not been updated on Amazon yet but it should be there soon, it is not yet available through Barnesandnoble.com but here is a link to where you can find the book online www.outskirtspress.com/freehugs

I am ordering 300 copies to sell to people that I will come into contact with very soon so if you are going to see me in the next couple of weeks, when I get the copies (probably 2-3 weeks from now) then you can buy a copy from me in person and I will also be able to sign it if you wish. 

I hope you are as excited about this amazing development as I am.  Here is to the future!! Let me know your thoughts. :) Be sure to order your copy of the book as well!!

Hugs,

David Melia (Professional Free Hugger)

Justice Conference

I decided to attend the Justice Conference about 3 months ago with the intention of trying to understand what Justice really is, and try to understand the meaning of justice, and what a just person looks like. (I had just read Plato’s Republic at the time).   I didn’t really know what to expect so I was a little bit nervous as the dates for the Conference came closer.  I wasn’t sure that I really wanted to attend, whether it would be worth it, I had a lot of stuff to do the week leading up to the conference and I also had a lot of work to be done over the weekend.  I flew in on Friday and got into the hotel at about 3:00 the main conference registration didn’t start until 4 so I had some time to get mentally prepared for the conference.  I took some of that time to plan out doing some of my school work throughout the conference and looking at the schedule to see what it looked like, took a shower and then registered for the conference. 

I went over and the first night was good, there were some interesting speakers, but my mind was elsewhere and I was a little bit out of it because I was tired.  The first day ended at 9:15 when I went back to my room, did some organizing and some work and was in bed asleep by 10:30.  I woke up and got to the conference again at 9:30 in order to hear the end of the first speaker and from this point I started to get excited and enjoy the conference a lot more.  During the lunch break I met a few people at a pizza place right by the convention center from Louisiana.  We had some good conversation that started to engage me in the conference and bring up my spirits.  After they left, I invited someone to sit with me named Maddi.  I am very glad that I did because Maddi is an amazing individual from Seattle, Washington who became a conference buddy (that means we hung out together for most of the rest of the conference).  It was a real blessing for me to meet her and share my experience of the Justice conference with her and share in her experience of the conference as well.  I hope that this is just the beginning of a long friendship. 

A few other highlights of the conference include saying hey to a good family friend Noel Castellanos (a speaker at the Justice Conference), hearing all the rest of the amazing speakers (my favorites were Shane Claiborne, Dr. John Perkins, Dr. Nicholas Wolterstorff, Lisa Sharon Harper, and Claire Diaz-Ortiz), getting Lisa Sharon Harper to sign a copy of her book for me, giving and receiving 97 Free Hugs, meeting a whole bunch of awesome people and hopefully finding cool opportunities to learn and create a more just and peaceful world in addition to giving away free hugs. 

I still have a lot of materials that I received at the conference to go through and process but I am really glad that I decided to stick it out and go even though at first I wasn’t amazingly excited about it.  Thank You Justice 2013 for a great time!!

Birthday Bliss

My birthday was a few days ago on Wednesday February 20.  I just wanted to take a moment to write about how amazing and awesome my 20th birthday turned out to be.  I started out the day by getting up at 7am to get ready for my Math Class at 830.  After class I found a lucky penny (heads up) on the ground, from that point on, I knew that it was going to be a fantastically great day.  I went back to my dorm and then approved production of my Free Hugs book.  I am now in the Production phase of getting my book published!!! How crazy is that? That was super exciting.  From there I went to my micro econ class which was rather ordinary then I studied and took my philosophy exam on Plato which i feel really good about.  I then was able to hang out with a group of close friends (Mallorym Gianna, Kelly, Rachel, Katie, Ashely, and Sandi)  After that My mom dropped off some mini chocolate dalek cakes that she made for me for my birthday!! It was fantastic!! I ended the night hanging out with my friends from my dorm (Maia, Maggie, Emily, Marissa, and Alex.)  Thanks to everyone for a fantastic birthday.  It couldn't have happened without you!! :)

Ice Skating!!

Yesterday I went ice skating with some of my family and some friends.  I decided to wear my amazingly awesome Free Hugging outfit.  I gave away 30 hugs and was able to talk to some people about my book!!

I first met a group of 4 friends Kirsten, Jessica, and Michaela celebrating their friend Katya's birthday.  It was cool to meet them and talk about my book.  I then met some people from Chicago Cru as well as some people from Africa!! :) 
As I was talking about my book with people while skating, I realized that I have not really done much with updating my blog in over a month.  A lot has happened with my book and there are some cool awesome things still to come.  I have submitted all of my photos and my manuscript to the publisher to work on.  The next steps are to get a professional copy edit and then 7-10 weeks after that my book will be in production.  That will hopefully if all goes well mean that the book will be out and ready to be sold at least a month before I start my tour on June 14th!!
I would also like to inform you all that you can track my daily hugging progress on my twitter @duckydavehugs with the #davesdailycount!! Be sure to check that out and follow me on twitter.  I will try and keep you all updated as new developments become available!!
Lots of hugs,
David Melia (Professional Free Hugger)

I MET OTHER FREE HUGGERS!!

Yesterday I was able to receive and give out 1000 hugs!!!!!!! It was totally crazy!!  This is my total hug count for the day, not my free hug count, there is a difference between the two which I am still really trying to understand fully myself but the gist is a free hug comes mostly from strangers and doesn't count friend hugs too much whereas the daily hug count is the number of times hugged in one day so friend hugs qualify for that count.  I am trying to explore this more and it will probably be written about in a future book... But speaking of books, I have a book that is coming out and I need your help in order to make sure it gets published!!! You can learn more about that here: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/duckductdave/free-hugs-its-more-than-a-campaign-its-a-lifesyle?ref=live 
Yesterday morning after bible study in America's Center I encountered another person who was planning to give away free hugs at the conference!! It was amazing and exciting and fantastic and fantabulastic, there are no words to describe my joy at having the opportunity to hug with Jacqueline yesterday.  So I Free Hugged with Jacqueline yesterday in the morning before the morning session and then after the morning session I went and bought some supplies to be able to make a couple more free hugs signs for other huggers that would want to free hug with me.  There was also a group from North Carolina that hugged with me for a good amount of time in the afternoon and evening and Jacqueline joined for a little bit of time before heading over to the evening session in the dome.  All in all yesterday was one of the most inspiring and crazy amazing and awesome days in my whole life with receiving 1000 hugs... 1000 hugs!!!! That's a lot of hugs..  and meeting others who were excited about giving away free hugs and joined me in my mission to hug strangers and brighten their days one hug at a time.  I am very blessed that I met them and I hope that this is just the start of something bigger, the creation of a more intimate and caring worldwide community brought together though the simple action of a hug from a person to a stranger. 
I wish you all lots of hugs!!!
Hugs,
David

Urbana Update!

So I am really excited to say that yesterday I received 312 hugs at the Urbana Missions Conference!! I have also been able to take part in some of the Launch Lab where I got some advice about my Free Hugs Tour project that I am working on.  I have a lot of stuff to work on getting my team together for my free hugs tour and working out all of the details of how my team and I are going to go about getting all of the necessary preparation for the tour and coming up with a plan of how the tour might actually look and other opportunities to work with others to make Free Hugs Tour 2013 the greatest experience that it could be.  As I walk around Urbana Free Hugging I am meeting a lot of really cool and interesting people that I am blessed to come into contact with.  It's really exciting and amazingly fun.  So far at the conference I have gotten 378 hugs and my goal for Urbana is to get 1000 hugs.  If you are at the Urbana conference I hope to be able to hug you soon.  :)
Hugs!
David