I woke up on the sofa this morning feeling apprehensive about going back to work after a week off, but I forced myself to get up, brush my teeth and get dressed because the very kind counsellor (Carole) at the clinic agreed to see me again for 9am. I hauled myself out the hosue quickly, picked up a coffee at the Coffee Lounge and then headed for the Trafalgar Clinic.
Unsurprisingly, Carole noticed the huge difference between me being in floods of tears last week and me speaking much more calmly and lucid than this week. She had written a letter to my GP saying I was having mood swings and thoughts of death. Both true. She was very worried as I had surmised correctly, but we spent some time talking about work, stress, how things got that way before tapping into... Relationships. She said I can actually treat you for relationships and I can keep seeing you for that. And so I have managed to get some free therapy on the NHS. She recommended a book on mindfulness for me, which is just great – I hope it will help.
I caught a bus thay went the long way round to North Greenwich and got to my office. Good to put in an appearance so that people could see I wasn't off indefinitely. I dropped in to see Helena and we bitched about the validation process. I cancelled a meeting, bitched more with my colleague Sylvie about how naive 'the cabal' (as she calls them) were being about the programmes. Suzanne range me – she's furious with the whole situation. And me? I did start to feel ever so slightly bullied and singled out by the situation. They are a bunch of very nasty people and sadly I've been caught in the moddle of it. I started to feel sorry for myself, typed out an email to Simon Robertshaw and decided not to send it.
David rang me and told me that I should just let it wash over me – that if they do the work then I should let them. And after he said that, I kind of stopped caring. I had already broken my back and my mental health by typing out a 90 page document – perhaps they could have a go, if they wanted to.
I had a meeting with Barking Enterprise Centre to talk about my social enterprise. Karen West-Whylie was really nice and very helpful – she said she was willing to help in any way possible. They offered me some space at the Young Entrepreneur's centre. She also gave me some advice on charging charities in a means-tested way then paying the young people who work for the agency. This seems like a really sensible business model and it also is becoming something much bigger. She showed me a tender for £100k and asked if I had considered applying. £100K?!
She said it seems like a lot when you're first starting but it's not. She then urged me to register my company as soon as possible to get the ball rolling.
On my way home from barking, i tried to think of various names like 'Creationary' or 'Vision8', but they had all been taken. So, instead of reinventing the wheel, I decided to try for my first choice – The Atelier Project. A recently dissolved company had the same name, but I'm hoping now the don't exist that I can steal it. So I just went for it – I registered a company in my own name!
I'm hoping I can use variations like Atelier Project LDN and Atelier Project NYC. It's flexible enough to accommodate the training for young people while also allowing my personal projects to come underneath it. I'm actually quite excited. If the name gets confirmed, I will buy the web spaces and away we go!
Thiago has been in touch with me regarding meeting up, as has Tracy Stringfellow from Royal Greenwich Heritage Trust. I plan to tell them both about my exciting company venture.
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