Using your voice to make a difference- it's a battle

Firstly, thank you so much to everyone who has been reading Matt's last blog he is overwhelmed and very grateful for all your positive comments. My next blog is a follow up from Matt's blog really on understanding and how we can make a change or difference by simply just using our voice about issues we might be passionate about to help others. As someone who has struggled with confidence and self belief I thought also it would be good to give some tips or advice to those who want to make a difference but maybe need that little bit of a confidence boost. Like many people who can find social situations sometimes quite high in anxiety there always is the "what if" question and the constant worry of messing up or making a fool of yourself, when it can be for complete strangers that can be even more nervewracking. Using your voice doesn't have to mean verbally using your voice to speak out. A lot of the awareness work I have done has been started by blogs or social media on twitter where I know people have "got it." The feeling when finally someone gets it especially if you've maybe experienced some negativity can be such a lovely feeling. I also have a lot of parents who read my blogs who might be having difficulty getting their child help and support for a hidden condition such as dyspraxia and dyslexia. I know my mum constantly had to battle to get me the right help and support I needed, and it's not till you're older I think do you really truley appreciate the battles parents have to go through to get you to be where you want to be in life. But I hope my story and blogs can provide a little bit of hope and light at the end of what can be a very dark windy tunnel for many people.


Since moving to London I have been closer to a lot of the charities I support and last week I was lucky enough to visit Dyspraxia Headquarters where I met their lovely team again and spend the day there. You can tell how much they are genuinely passionate about what they do and appreciate every little thing someone does for them as most of them have personal experiences related to the charity. I arrived with a huge hole in my leggins ( how that happened I have no idea, later on I also found a huge bruise under the leggins again how that happened not got a clue) We discussed plans for the future I'm so excited and petrified at the same time to be doing a speech at their Birmingham workshop in March. I also met up with Fixers to hopefully get the ball rolling on a campaign with them to raise awareness and on friday I'm going to their Feel Good Fix in Manchester where young people will get the opportunity to talk about mental health. Eventually I would love to have the confidence to have my own campaign. Some of you may feel like you're in the same boat as me when I'm passionate about an issue I get very deeply involved in it (a positive dypraxic/dyslexic attribute?) My brain is buzzing with ideas on what I can do next and what can have an impact. I'm also very determined and will never stop fighting even if I stand alone and not everyone agrees with the issues I am trying to promote. The hard thing is always the confidence, self belief and anxiety related issues. Although recently I've been trying my best to try and overcome these issues here are are some of the tips I have been using recently I hope they might help some of you.

• Breathe sometimes one of the hardest of things but using breathing techniques can really help
• do some self care and make sure you look after yourself as much as the people you're trying to help, run yourself a bath get a glass of wine, read a book whatever makes you relax.
• Talk to others who are passionate about the same causes
• Have someone who you can bounce ideas off
• write down any strategies in simple form which might help
• repeat to yourself silenty "I can do it"
• Be inspired by someone or something which can motivate you to overcome a goal or achive something (no clues who I would say)
• Join an online community @anxietyunited are such a lovely group of people would really recommend a follow, there are also lots of online forums I manage the dyspraxia foundation adult facebook group
• If someone says you can't do something make yourself a lot more determined to do it you CAN do it. Prooving people wrong when they say you wont be able to do something is such a good feeling
• set realistic goals in small steps
• motivate other people and see the positives in others
• be kind you never know where being kind might lead you
• build up contacts and be grateful to them when you do make them
• keep fighting there is light at the end of the tunnel and people out there who will understand you, keep going you can do it I promise

Until next time.... thanks for reading, keep smiling :)