#MentalHealthAwarenessWeek Workshop

Last week as I'm sure you must have been aware was Mental Health Awareness Week. There were a number of events taking place at work for this, one on Friday was a creative writing workshop to explore writing as an aid to well-being. UK Poetry Slam Champion, Toby Campion was invited in to run the workshop, and we engaged in a couple of writing challenges.

The first exercise was a free writing period. You just write, and keep writing even if all you are writing is complete gibberish or "I'm writing, writing, writing that I'm writing", just so long as you do keep writing.

Another exercise involved writing for 4 minutes 30 seconds at a time across five different titles, that were issued at the end of each time period. You switched, and wrote. It's amazing exactly where the mind goes when you do this.

At the end we were invited, if willing, to share one of the pieces that we had written, about a third of us did. There was no pressure to do so, but since I did I thought I would also share that 4 minute 30 second piece here - putting it out there - something to reflect on. Make of it what you will.





What On Earth Have We Done?
DJ. Kettlety (17/5/2019)

What on Earth have we done? Created a monster, that's what. It's out of control. It's taken over everything. It's on the rampage, we've got to find a way to stop it now before it devours everything.

It's too late, I know that. The beast is already loose out there, consuming everything in its path, gorging its hunger on our misery and sorrow. We did this. We did not take stock of our actions. We all stopped listening to the warnings that were there in front of us. All of us are guilty. Our own arrogance let this thing out.

It's too late. We can't kill the beast now, it's bigger than us. It's taken over. It's won. We are but fodder for its appetite now. It's all over.