Make a Difference

How on earth can we be on week 5 of the #time4change #mentalhealthcharter?

So we're up to 76 companies signed, sealed and delivered. Between Pat O'Toole and myself we also have several companies/organisations considering implementing the charter.  I know that Pat has been massively busy behind the scenes supporting the larger companies to think about how they can easily introduce the charter to their organisations. Meanwhile I'm chatting to a couple of theatres, and attempting to support them to introduce #time4change.

It's so hard though - 76 companies is amazing, and so many more than I initially thought would get involved, however you get greedy don't you? I don't know how many organisations we'd need to get involved to get the industry completely covered, but I do know that it's more than we have right now. I'm aware that we need more colleges, so that young professionals entering the business are mentally prepared from the outset. Obviously the holidays have fallen at a very unfortunate time for the charter.

Similarly I'm aware how London centric our 'members' are right now, yet there are vibrant communities right across the UK that could benefit from implementing this simple PDF.

So the tweets and emails continue.

I still believe that it's the stigma of Mental Health that is preventing people either signing up or indeed just sharing the message of the charter.  I'm still receiving emails with snide comments on them, which I've now decided to just share as dinner party stories. We've come so far, there ain't no way that I'm giving up now.

The distressing thing about the campaign is just when you think you'll leave it for a bit,  a story or event reaches you that pushes you through the apathy. Mental Health 'episodes' are happening every day. You might only be noticing the obvious ones....but the point of the charter is to begin to be aware of the little things.

You can help though...please share the #time4change hashtag, if your agent hasn't signed up yet, please ask them, if the theatre that you're working for haven't signed...ask them, if your college hasn't signed...ask them. People will sign if they can see and understand the need.  Right now Mental Health is so camouflaged by people afraid to 'out' themselves we're close to finding ourselves in a catch 22 situation.  All of us....people suffering from known mental health conditions and people with no known conditions (yet) need to be pushing this charter through our industry.

Today, we could all make a difference.
Email Annemarie@theMTA.co.uk make the subject #time4change Let's do it!!
Full details of the charter can be found here: http://althomasmd.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/its-time4change.html