About Already

Already is a newsletter of essays for Foundational Black American makers, written by Karsten Chearis. The name comes from the first half of the Chearis foundation, already worthy, and it does what a name should do: it settles the question at the door. You were worthy before you opened the email. The essays start from there.

Karsten writes in first person, with his life as the receipt, and the voice is Fayette County raised, Memphis made. The essays cover building a career and a life without splitting yourself in two: faith that holds under pressure, culture carried into every room, and the craft of making something out of what you were handed. Each issue lands in your inbox, and the point is the life it shapes after you close it.

The reader Already has in mind is already building something, intentionally or not, and never needed permission to begin. Hustle culture sells worth as a score you raise by never stopping. Corporate America grades on assimilation. Already writes from a different ground: acceptance comes first, so the work stops being an audition and becomes an expression of who you already are.

Every issue leaves the way it arrived, with the whole story in four words: already worthy, create boldly.