I was cleaning the bathroom just now (literally 3 minutes ago) and realised I hadn't written my weekly blog - I think this is the first week that I've completely forgotten. Even during Christmas and New Year I was figuring out how I'd fit it in with festivities...I'm afraid it's not going to have many jokes in it either as the reason I forgot about my blog is that I've been distracted by the sad news of a work colleague who was killed in a crash as he was cycling to work last week. It was such a shock, it's rocked me a bit and I can't seem to get out of it.
I don't feel in much of a position to reflect on my week and make some witty comment. I suppose when someone fit and healthy suddenly dies it makes you reflect on your life rather than your week! Last night I watched the film 'Biutiful' where a man is given two months to 'get things in order' before his cancer kills him (perhaps not such a wise choice of a film given my week?!). It makes you wonder whether, if you'd had this kind of news, what you would need to put in order. Would you change your life radically, tell people that you loved them, regret things you hadn't done, be a nicer person generally? I don't really know where I'm going with this, especially in terms of Children Unite but, hey, these are my thoughts on the week I've had, so I suppose I ought to just go with the flow. One thought I've had this week is that I'm pleased that Children Unite is not EVERYTHING to me, I know that's not what you're supposed to say when you're setting up something - you're supposed to be committed, driven, ambitious....to be hungry for success!? However, Jonathan and I have always wanted Children Unite to be a part of who we are not everything. In particular we want it to work with our family life and the care of our two daughters.
And some learning I would like to impart from the participatory work I've been involved in - is the importance of HOW you work over WHAT you achieve through this work. In particular , how did you treat people along the way, was it with respect? I would contest that in participatory work, if you don't treat people with respect along the way, whatever you achieve is pretty meaningless. And if you get given a life sentence of two months such as this man in Biutiful you can't really change how you've treated people - you could make amends to people you had treated badly I suppose but it would seem disingenuous or motivated by guilt. So what can I learn from this? I guess, how I live is important to me, so Children Unite needs to reflect this fact. This does actually connect to some of the work I was doing this week - writing Children Unite's child protection policy (I know, I know it should have been done months ago). Child protection is important to me and so I didn't just want to use someone else's policy and replace their name with Children Unite's so I spent a couple of days figuring out what should be in it and developing a draft which will be discussed by our Trustees etc. I have to confess to doing the 'find and replace' thing with some other policies I've been drafting though!! I guess we're all a little bit selective about when we want the 'how' to be important?!
I don't feel in much of a position to reflect on my week and make some witty comment. I suppose when someone fit and healthy suddenly dies it makes you reflect on your life rather than your week! Last night I watched the film 'Biutiful' where a man is given two months to 'get things in order' before his cancer kills him (perhaps not such a wise choice of a film given my week?!). It makes you wonder whether, if you'd had this kind of news, what you would need to put in order. Would you change your life radically, tell people that you loved them, regret things you hadn't done, be a nicer person generally? I don't really know where I'm going with this, especially in terms of Children Unite but, hey, these are my thoughts on the week I've had, so I suppose I ought to just go with the flow. One thought I've had this week is that I'm pleased that Children Unite is not EVERYTHING to me, I know that's not what you're supposed to say when you're setting up something - you're supposed to be committed, driven, ambitious....to be hungry for success!? However, Jonathan and I have always wanted Children Unite to be a part of who we are not everything. In particular we want it to work with our family life and the care of our two daughters.
And some learning I would like to impart from the participatory work I've been involved in - is the importance of HOW you work over WHAT you achieve through this work. In particular , how did you treat people along the way, was it with respect? I would contest that in participatory work, if you don't treat people with respect along the way, whatever you achieve is pretty meaningless. And if you get given a life sentence of two months such as this man in Biutiful you can't really change how you've treated people - you could make amends to people you had treated badly I suppose but it would seem disingenuous or motivated by guilt. So what can I learn from this? I guess, how I live is important to me, so Children Unite needs to reflect this fact. This does actually connect to some of the work I was doing this week - writing Children Unite's child protection policy (I know, I know it should have been done months ago). Child protection is important to me and so I didn't just want to use someone else's policy and replace their name with Children Unite's so I spent a couple of days figuring out what should be in it and developing a draft which will be discussed by our Trustees etc. I have to confess to doing the 'find and replace' thing with some other policies I've been drafting though!! I guess we're all a little bit selective about when we want the 'how' to be important?!
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