July 2018
With the basics sorted...I thought it was time to try and publicise more. Crikey. This was much, much, much harder than I thought. Finding the ‘right’ wording, image, pictures, font, style was really difficult. I thought this would be an easy’ish’ thing as I am creative and like colour etc. Nope....this did not help me at all!
I got caught up in my perfectionist ways and needed all the help and support of friends and various therapists I met networking along the way. I did get a poster finally finished after many, many many drafts! It was now time to put the flyer everywhere I could. I got a 1000 printed. Yes that is quite a lot. Yes I still have loads. If you want some let me know! I have seen the poster still up and about though in local areas which is great (and still surprises me...seeing your name and contact details up on a wall is an odd feeling!). I keep some on me and give them out whenever I can!
Getting the word out about #NOLABELS is still the main aim. Made harder as the organsiation prides itself on being flexible. There are no limitations on who it supports. The whole point is that there are ‘NO LABELS’. This has made it harder to ‘target’ an audience. I am learning that in business this is important. Although I am still at this stage just concentrating on establishing myself and the organisation. If it feels right to specialise in the future then I will but not right now.
So the focus of the last couple of months has been to get used to talking about #NOLABELS. You would think this would be the easy part. After all I created it, I am passionate about it. Yet I have found that this was an excellent opportunity for my historic self critical thoughts and self doubt to latch on and have a field day! It surprised me how strongly I suddenly felt vulnerable when talking about my hopes for the venture. How exposed and inexperienced I suddenly felt.
I openly talk about mental wellbeing all the time and my own mental health struggles. Usually I can manage it quite well (with in reason). The start of this venture however really pushed me out of my comfort zone and challenged my existing coping skills. I really had to test out asking for support and needing other people’s skills and advice. This gave me a great experience to learn and counteract negative thinking around being a burden and a failure. And so I grow and develop as the organsiation does. This is a fabulous journey and open to all sorts of opportunities. I am grateful to be able to share it with you all.
Nikky