Who Looks After the People Who Look After Everyone Else?
My birthday falls on World Mental Health Day. This has always felt fitting, as my path has involved working with mental health in one way or another throughout my career.
Having developed a career in the not-for-profit sector, I still receive updates from one of the UK’s largest recruitment organisations. Last week, I received one that really made me stop and think. It outlined concerning statistics about the wellbeing of people working in the voluntary sector.
84% of people surveyed reported work-related difficulties, with concerns ranging from sleep problems to impacts on physical health. 11% either didn’t know whether support was available to them or didn’t think it existed at all. Almost 75% hadn’t accessed any kind of wellbeing or mental health support in the previous year. These are the very people I used to recruit, train, support and supervise. These are people like me. They are people like you.
People who join this sector don’t necessarily do it for status or money. They do it because they’re driven to help. And every day, I have conversations with decent human beings who choose to work in health, care, social services, education, public and emergency services. What they have in common, whether they realise it or have the opportunity to connect with one another or not, is a desire to make a difference. To do something useful for others and within their communities.
Surely something isn’t right if these very people feel unable to ask for the help they need to manage their own wellbeing?
What happens when the people who spend their lives looking after others lose sight of how to look after themselves? And why does this matter to me?
My journey into complementary and holistic therapies has been long and varied. It’s grounded in my own passion for the power which I recognise creativity and nature hold in restoring our wellbeing.
In every job I’ve ever had, there have been useful boundaries, but also natural limits to what I could offer within that role. Those limits have continued to encourage me to learn new therapeutic models, work on myself and expand the range of perspectives I can offer people navigating life’s challenges.
I’ve also had to take mental health breaks from positions and projects I’ve loved. I’ve used those times to work on my own healing and to discover what helps me reconnect with myself. Over the years, I’ve developed a toolkit of approaches that I’m passionate about sharing with others.
I’ve learned that supporting our wellbeing doesn’t have to mean having all the answers, embarking on a huge journey of self-improvement or making sweeping changes to our lives. Sometimes, it starts with having the quiet space to pause. To notice what’s happening within us. To explore something creatively. To look at a familiar situation from a different perspective and discover that we have more choices than we thought.
And sometimes, we simply need someone to listen.
Making space for ourselves
I don’t believe our opportunity to nurture our wellbeing should be diminished by our material circumstances. That’s one of the real limitations of private therapies. The people who need support don’t always have the money to access it, and those who spend their days caring for others may have very little time or energy left for themselves.
It’s frustrating, because surely we all need to talk? Surely we all need time and space not only to focus on our wellbeing, but to prioritise it too?
In my day-to-day work, I offer support to many people, often for free. I do this with love. When it’s necessary to charge a fee, I aim to be as reasonable as I can, and I draw on my creativity to find ways of making what I do accessible.
I’m genuinely concerned to hear that the sector I spent so many years working within might not be doing enough to support its people. And perhaps this is part of why the work I do now matters to me even more. I believe we all deserve opportunities to reconnect with ourselves, to be heard, to explore our creativity and to find ways of supporting our own wellbeing. It’s one of the reasons I write.
Why I wrote “Energy Alchemy: Being Well and Truly You”
My latest book, Energy Alchemy: Being Well and Truly You, grew out of years of working with people, exploring different therapeutic approaches and discovering how much can happen when we begin to see ourselves and our experiences differently. I wanted to bring together some of the things I’ve learnt and make them accessible to people who might not otherwise have the opportunity to explore them.
This isn’t a book about learning to be an energy healer. It’s about learning how to tap into your own creative essence, reconnect with yourself and explore different ways of approaching life. Because I don’t believe we should have to wait until we’re at breaking point to begin looking after ourselves. And I also don’t believe we need to become someone else to make meaningful changes. Sometimes, what we really need is simply a little space to understand ourselves better, to recognise the patterns we’re caught in, to explore what matters to us and find a different way forward.
Energy Alchemy: Being Well and Truly You contains 37 exercises designed to help you do just that. They’re an invitation to reflect on your wellbeing, explore your own creativity and consider small, manageable changes that can make a difference to how you experience your life.
You don’t need to be an artist, have any previous experience of energy work or know exactly what you’re looking for. You can work through the exercises at your own pace, taking what feels useful and leaving what doesn’t.
I’ve drawn on many years of experience in making complex information more manageable. The book uses simple language, an accessible font and bite-sized sections, with free accompanying audios to support you along the way.
My intention is to offer something you can return to when you need a little breathing space, a fresh perspective or a reminder of your own ability to participate in shaping your life’s experience.
It’s not about fixing yourself, because you aren’t broken. It’s about giving yourself permission to explore who you are, what you need and what might be possible.
A little birthday gift
So, as a little birthday gift, I’m giving away a copy of Energy Alchemy: Being Well and Truly You. If you’re struggling right now, feeling overwhelmed or simply ready for a lift, I’d love for you to have the opportunity to explore it.
Perhaps you know someone who spends so much time looking after everyone else that they rarely make space for themselves. Perhaps you are that person.
If you’d like to be in with a chance of receiving a copy, share this post and tag me so I know. I’ll choose someone later this month, once the message has had a chance to circulate. I believe that making space for our own wellbeing shouldn’t be a luxury.
We all deserve the opportunity to reconnect with ourselves, discover new possibilities and feel more involved in creating the lives we want to live. Don’t we?
With all my love.
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