Below are some prompts and exercises to help you explore funding.
Review
What do you actually need money for? Break the number down as specifically as you can. What would you be paying for?
What would having that money make possible? What could you do, make, access, or change that you can't right now?
How much do you actually need to take your next meaningful step? Not the amount you'd need to build the entire dream, just the amount that gets the ball rolling.
What are you currently spending money on that isn't moving you forward? Are there places where you could redirect money you already have?
If money wasn't available, what would you do instead? What could you make, borrow, trade, pre-sell, learn, or find another way to access?
Practice
Funding Map : create three different buckets and label them personal, public and private.
Under personal, list everything you could realistically fund yourself: savings, income, selling something, taking on extra work, pre-orders, etc.
Under Public, look at government grants, subsidies, scholarships, cultural funding, startup programs, competitions, or other public money you might qualify for.
Under Private, consider investors, sponsorships, customers, crowdfunding, partnerships, loans, or people who might be willing to back what you're doing.
Fill each bucket with as many possibilities as you can. Then circle one realistic option from each bucket and investigate what it would take to access it.
Shopping List: imagine you have the money to make your thing happen tomorrow. What exactly would you buy? Make the shopping list. Put a price beside everything, then start putting them into categories: need it, want it, or can find another way.
Staircase: draw a staircase with your ultimate goal at the top. Work backwards, breaking the journey into increasingly smaller financial milestones. Put a rough cost beside each step. What would it take to reach the next step? Which steps can you fund yourself, and which require outside money?