For people who have been following my leadership in action journey, the absence of a reflections post last week may have been notable. To explain this I must take you into the way I structure my weeks in terms of writing. I typically focus on writing for work during the beginning of the week when I have more energy, and take time every Friday afternoon to write personal reflections. It is during these reflection sessions that my scholars network posts typically take shape, before I polish them over the weekend and post early the next week.

However, towards the end of the third week of my leadership in action project, I became ill, and the resulting scramble to return to health, work and productivity laid bare some of the ways in which I was not as prepared as I could have been for this summer. This turned out to be yet another lesson in preparation, as the areas where I had meticulously planned out my summer: my leadership in action project and other volunteer commitments, survived with minimal disruption. In the week following, I managed to complete the first two months of my content bank, and finished the local businesses arm of my fundraising research.

However, what became more difficult was managing my personal life. When planning out my project, I had failed to consider illness or burnout as a variable. The foolishness of this decision really ought to have been something I foresaw, given I was coming off of exam term at the University of Cambridge, and my usual habit of spending the first week of the vacation in hibernation mode, recovering from the previous term. Lacking a contingency plan, I careened into week four, still on top of work but feeling as though I was treading water trying to keep up.

I credit my ability to get back on the ball during the period to, my supervisor at CAP, my Laidlaw co-ordinator at the e-lab, and my wonderful friends, who gave me the breathing room to recover healthily, but left to my own devices I am not entirely sure I would’ve been able to take the necessary steps back to re-enter my LiA in week four with renewed vigour and enthusiasm.

So what is the lesson here? There is definitely a retrospective acknowledgement that I should’ve built my project around my humanity and considering how to adapt my working schedule to my limitations. Simple fixes like eating lunch away from my desk, taking breaks for my eyes, given that I work primarily on my laptop, and taking time following creatively intensive tasks to do something more procedural or mundane. One key change I would make to my structuring of the project, and that I did implement going into my final few weeks was interspersing my corporate research, which was more logical with the creative work that made up the bulk of my project. While I have adored the marketing work, it did place a demand on my writing and creative abilities which are normally my break from productivity.

Additionally, some of the topics I was required to research to best understand how to communicate the mission of CAP were centred around trauma, suicide and childhood hardship. While I did ultimately feel motivated by this research, and reading the impact of the work CAP does solidified my resolve to pursue clinical psychology, switching between the heavy literature surrounding these topics and my communication work which took on a lighter tone was heavy to say the least. This was the very point of my project: translating the difficult concepts so that those who are vulnerable do not have to wade through the weeds of literature on trauma and mental illness. My lack of foresight in considering how entering into these discussions may impact my own mental health contributed to my sense of overwhelm in these weeks. Moving forward working in mental health, this is a lesson I am determined to make stick, not just for myself, but so that I can continue to be the best possible contributor to the field of mental health that I can be.

Any reminder of my own humanity feels rude and unwanted, as I imagine it would for any high-achiever or ambitious individual, but no matter how intrusive this reminder felt, it was completely necessary. To quote one of the most important entries to our artistic cannon in recent memory, the Apple TV comedy Ted Lasso: “the truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off”. The feelings of frustration and impotence I felt after falling ill were an annoying yet necessary reminder to treat myself more gently, so that I can continue to do what I love: helping people using psychology.