23/03/2026
I was not going to share this.
But it wouldn't leave me alone until I did.
๐๐'๐ ๐๐น๐น ๐ฌ๐ผ๐๐ฟ ๐๐ฎ๐๐น๐
Crikey. That's hit home.
I'm standing in a stairwell at Entrepreneurs Circle HQ. There's a graphic on the wall. Apparently it has more pictures taken of it than anything else in the whole building.
It's really a colourful graphic, like someone has splashed red, blue, yellow and purple paint on a wall. And in all that colour there is in white capital letters "IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT." To the side, in sensible grey letters, are the words "Where you end up in your business is 100% up to you."
So I did what nearly everybody else does and took a picture on my phone.
I became aware of a weight pressing down on my shoulders and a weight pressing down on my chest. I drank my coffee, went into the room for the afternoon session, and there was something bothering me.
Something was off.
I hadn't read the whole thing. Just four words.
It's all your fault.
Not the business bit. Just the accusation. Pointing straight at me.
Patrick. It is all your fault. Everything. Everything's gone wrong. It's all yours.
I sat in that afternoon session and nothing was going in. I started thinking. Eyes up to the left.
So now I go back about 14 years to a sunny day in Stone, late spring.
An office.
A counsellor.
I knew I wasn't well. Everything was falling apart and I was helpless. I sat in that office and everything came out. How wrong it had all gone. How persecuted I felt.
The counsellor listened. Then said โ all I am hearing is it is all somebody else's fault. That's not the case, is it?
I thought โ if it's not everybody else's fault, then it must all be mine. Why would I make myself feel this way? I wouldn't do that. It must be them.
I didn't accept it. Not straight away. My first reaction was suspicion.
I know what this is. It's them not wanting this to be classified as work related stress. They will try anything to shift the blame.
Bastards.
But what's worse, they are pretending to help me. Pretending to care.
But I knew I didn't feel right.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you.
Maybe I'll play along and see what happens.
Before I left, they suggested I start a journal.
Stone is a market town in Staffordshire. Pleasant High Street. Pedestrianised. I walked down it that afternoon, reeling.
WH Smith's. Stationery aisle. Notebooks.
All the fancy ones. Floral. Art deco. The kind of thing bought by people who want to be seen writing. If I'm honest, a stack of revision cards would have done me.
Then I saw it. Blue plastic cover. Ring bound. Diagonal ridges you could run your thumb across. Small enough to fit in a pocket. Small enough not to attract suspicion. Nobody needed to know there was a bloke writing a journal because he'd been told to. Looked like nothing special. Functional. Discreet. Looked tough enough for a bloke.
I picked it up. Ran my fingers over the ridges. Bit my lip.
Bought a pen. Made my way to a coffee shop on the High Street. Sat down.
I should say โ I have dyslexia. Writing has never come easily. All my life I edited myself before the words reached the page. Never used a word I couldn't spell. Which made everything slower and more frustrating. Every thought passed through so many layers just so that the writing would make sense.
That day in the coffee shop โ for the first time โ I didn't.
I opened the first page of the blue notebook and thought โ what do I write then?
Then it just came.
I feel stupid writing this.
I stopped. Looked at it. Long enough for the coffee to get cold.
Then I wrote how angry I was. Everything poured out. The meeting. The injustice. The weight of it. Pages of it. Dyslexia and all.
I still thought it was stupid. Couldn't see how it was going to help.
The next few weeks were just numbness. I was in my body but it wasn't me. Just needed to feel something. Started smoking again to get the rush. Felt worse after having a fag. But at least I felt something.
My brain was running at 110 miles an hour. A constant loop. How guilty I was. How it was all my fault. I was weak. I had brought all this on myself. The counsellor was right.
Walking to the toilet took everything I had. I'd get there and need to lie down from the exertion.
They didn't give me a new idea. They just confirmed the one that was already going on in my brain.
The doctor signed me off. A week at first. Then longer. She asked โ was it just a bad day or is this a long term thing? I said I didn't know.
There was a six month waiting list on the NHS. I don't go private on principle. But I couldn't wait six months to talk to somebody. So I used my savings.
Ten days later I was talking to someone. I was on tablets too.
This new counsellor was different. She suggested I use the notebook. I told her I had one but hadn't really used it. She said โ just write down one thing that happened during the day and how you felt about it. That's it. No analysis. No solving. No fixing. Just that.
I didn't do it straight away. Of course I didn't.
But the week after she said it again. One thing. How you felt. Stop there.
This time I did.
I still felt stupid doing it. But that was the start.
Slowly the tablets lifted the fog. And once the fog lifted the patterns were already there in the notebook waiting for me. I'd been recording them without knowing it.
I was in the yellow room in our house. Lying on the settee like I had been every day for weeks. Just nothing. Looking out through the window.
I had been there for weeks. But on this day.
And suddenly I could see the space between the tree and the house. Next door's tree.
Not focus. Separation. Three dimensions. Depth of field. The world had been flat and then it wasn't.
Crikey. I can see in 3D.
Autumn came. Things became more three dimensional. Less flat. Not right yet but better.
The school arranged a back to work meeting. A phased return after Christmas. Me, my union rep, the head teacher, HR from the county council.
I set off to drive there one morning. Down our road. Turn right. Steep slope. Slipped it into third.
Looked across at the junior school on my right.
And I thought โ I can't do this again. I won't go to the doctors. I won't get tablets. I won't ask for help. I will just repeat. The same pattern. And I don't think I'll survive it.
I still drove to the meeting.
Met my union rep outside. Nice man. Friendly.
My first words were โ I quit.
He said okay. Let's talk this through. We sat in the anteroom and I told him I couldn't go back. Didn't say why. Just โ I can't go back. I need to leave.
He went in. Had a word. I followed.
The head teacher said she was surprised. Asked if I was sure.
I said yes. But I wasn't. I'm not Superman. The doubts were already arriving before I'd finished the sentence. What about money. What will you do. Part of me was trying to talk myself back in.
But there was something about that moment going past the school. That thought in third gear. I knew if I let go of it I'd lose it. And if I lost it I knew what came next.
So I held onto it.
Last day of Christmas term. Back in to say goodbye. Strange day. These were people I'd worked alongside for years. I acted friendly. Said the right things. Felt nothing.
We had a little assembly in the staffroom for those of us leaving. I stood up. Thanked everyone for the leaving present. Said something about so long and thanks for all the fish.
Someone asked โ so what are you going to do then Patrick?
I said โ I don't know. But I'm going to get somebody to pay me to walk up mountains.
Nobody laughed.
That was the plan. In its entirety.
No next day sorted. No strategy. No business model.
Just a man who had learned โ slowly, painfully, through a blue notebook and a tree coming back into colour โ that he had a choice. That he was response-able.
Not fault. Could choose. Was response-able.
I don't blame the counsellor in Stone. They were doing the best they could. The worst was yet to come. And nobody had any idea. Including me.
Standing in that stairwell the same four words landed the same way. The weight on the shoulders. The weight on the chest. But this time it only took a few minutes to get to response-able. Not months. Not a yellow room and a blue notebook and a tree coming back into colour. Just a few minutes. Because I'd already done that route. I knew the terrain.
The graphic isn't wrong. It just assumes you're already there. That you're already response-able. That you have the capacity to choose your response.
For some people in that stairwell it's liberation.
For others it lands differently.
I know. I've been both of those people.
Just like the counsellor in Stone. The timing can be wrong.
I hope my timing is right when you read these words.
๐๐ฏ๐ฅ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ๐ณ๐ฆ ๐ช๐ต ๐ด๐ต๐ฐ๐ฐ๐ฅ. ๐๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐ด๐ต๐ฐ๐ณ๐บ. ๐๐บ ๐ด๐ต๐ฐ๐ณ๐บ. ๐๐ฆ๐ข๐ฅ๐บ ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ฑ๐ถ๐ฃ๐ญ๐ช๐ด๐ฉ. ๐๐ถ๐ต ๐ ๐ฅ๐ช๐ฅ๐ฏ'๐ต ๐ฑ๐ณ๐ฆ๐ด๐ด ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐ฃ๐ถ๐ต๐ต๐ฐ๐ฏ ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ถ๐ฑ๐ญ๐ฐ๐ข๐ฅ ๐ช๐ต. ๐๐ต ๐ธ๐ข๐ด ๐ช๐ฏ ๐ฎ๐บ ๐ญ๐ข๐ฑ๐ต๐ฐ๐ฑ ๐ณ๐ฆ๐ข๐ฅ๐บ ๐ต๐ฐ ๐จ๐ฐ, ๐ถ๐ฏ๐ต๐ช๐ญ ๐ต๐ฐ๐ฅ๐ข๐บ. ๐ ๐ฐ๐ถ ๐ด๐ฆ๐ฆ ๐ ๐ด๐ต๐ฐ๐ฑ๐ฑ๐ฆ๐ฅ ๐ธ๐ณ๐ช๐ต๐ช๐ฏ๐จ ๐ง๐ฐ๐ณ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ๐ด๐ฆ ๐ญ๐ข๐ด๐ต ๐ง๐ฆ๐ธ ๐ธ๐ฆ๐ฆ๐ฌ๐ด, ๐ช๐ต ๐ธ๐ข๐ด ๐ญ๐ช๐ฌ๐ฆ ๐ฎ๐บ ๐ฃ๐ณ๐ข๐ช๐ฏ ๐ธ๐ฐ๐ถ๐ญ๐ฅ๐ฏ'๐ต ๐ญ๐ฆ๐ต ๐ฎ๐ฆ ๐ฑ๐ถ๐ฃ๐ญ๐ช๐ด๐ฉ ๐ข๐ฏ๐บ๐ต๐ฉ๐ช๐ฏ๐จ ๐ฆ๐ญ๐ด๐ฆ ๐ถ๐ฏ๐ต๐ช๐ญ ๐ ๐จ๐ฐ๐ต ๐ต๐ฉ๐ช๐ด ๐ฐ๐ถ๐ต. ๐๐ฐ ๐ ๐ฉ๐ข๐ท๐ฆ ๐จ๐ช๐ท๐ฆ๐ฏ ๐ช๐ฏ ๐ฃ๐ฆ๐ค๐ข๐ถ๐ด๐ฆ ๐ ๐ฏ๐ฆ๐ฆ๐ฅ ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ธ๐ณ๐ช๐ต๐ฆ. ๐๐ต๐ด ๐ญ๐ช๐ฌ๐ฆ ๐ฎ๐บ ๐ญ๐ช๐ต๐ต๐ญ๐ฆ ๐ฃ๐ญ๐ถ๐ฆ ๐ฏ๐ฐ๐ต๐ฆ๐ฃ๐ฐ๐ฐ๐ฌ ๐ฃ๐ข๐ค๐ฌ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ๐ฏ.
So here goes.
PRESS.
