Super Monday: Why I Am Really Excited About Great Opportunities

The 9–5 story is fading fast

Happy Monday readers. Fog of Mind is my small, human project to help you find headspace. Not the perfect, incense-and-silence version. The real kind. A few minutes where your brain stops sprinting and you can breathe properly again. It’s Monday. For a lot of people, that word lands like a weight. Commute. Inbox. Meetings. That low-level dread that starts on Sunday afternoon and hangs around like fog on a cold street.

I get it. I’ve lived it and this is how I reframed meditation.

But today I’m upbeat, and I want to tell you why.

A colleague once said to me, “Once you find the thing you love, you’ll never work again.” I don’t think that’s literally true, because even the thing you love still comes with graft, admin, awkward emails, and moments where you wonder if you’ve lost your mind. But the point stands.

When the work has purpose, it feels different.

The old 9–5 story is fading

We were all sold a particular version of “work”.

Monday to Friday. Nine to five. Build a career. Collect the years. Retire. Be grateful.

That model still suits some people. For others, the world has moved on. Work is fluid now. It’s portfolios, pivots, side projects, reinvention. It’s people refusing to live the same week on repeat.

In real terms, I’ve been planning and plotting to launch Fog of Mind for a while, and yesterday I came up with another plan to support my dreams. More on that Snap and Talk, River Thames Walk later.

For now, here’s the part that matters.

I’m getting coaching, and I’m setting a deadline

Part of my strategy for Fog of Mind is to receive professional coaching. That starts tomorrow.

I’m not doing that because I think I’m broken. I’m doing it because I’m building something that matters to me, and I want to do it properly.

And I’m putting a marker in the ground.

My aim is to have my first client by 1 March 2026.

A client might be an individual. It might be an organisation. Somewhere I can talk about mental health, share my own horrendous ordeal without dressing it up, and give people tangible coping mechanisms that actually work in real life.

Not a lecture. Not a leaflet. A proper conversation. It works. That's the feedback I recieved when I last spoke publicly.

I didn’t understand mental health until it floored me

In my early adult life, I didn’t pay much attention to my mental health.

To be honest, I didn’t know how to.

I didn’t have the language for it. I didn’t recognise the signals. I just pushed on. Like a lot of people do. You keep going because you think you have to. You keep going because everyone else seems fine. You keep going because stopping feels like failure.

Until one day you realise you are not fine.

That realisation hit harder when I was diagnosed with general anxiety and moderate to severe depression.

This post isn’t about sympathy. I’ve said that in talks before and I’ll keep saying it, because it matters.

Sympathy can be kind, but it can also trap people in a story where they feel powerless. It can accidentally turn a person into their diagnosis.

Fog of Mind is not built on sympathy. It’s built on understanding.

Because mental health challenges do not care who you are. They are indiscriminate. They turn up in good people, strong people, funny people, high performers, parents, leaders, and quiet grafters who never ask for anything.

And when it happens, what most of us need is not pity. We need perspective, tools, and someone who will actually listen.

Recovery is not a straight line

Over the coming months I’ll write and talk about what I call the Mental Health Triangle. I’ll keep the details for later, but here’s the spoiler.

Recovery is not about being “fixed” by other people. It’s not about a single heroic moment. It’s not even about “staying positive” all the time, which can be exhausting and sometimes insulting.

Recovery is often about basics.

Sleep. Movement. Food. Boundaries. Community. Purpose. Conversation. Small wins stacked up until you start to trust yourself again.

Most importantly, it’s about finding moments of headspace, even if they are brief.

Fog of Mind’s mission is simple: help you find headspace, even if it’s only for a few minutes.

I’m not great at meditation, so I reframed it

I struggle with traditional meditation. The “sit still and empty your mind” approach can feel like trying to hold back a tide with your hands.

So I reframed it.

My passions give me headspace.

Walking.
Writing.
Photography.

When I’m out walking, my breathing settles without me forcing it. When I’m writing, my thoughts stop circling and start forming something useful. When I’m taking photos, I have to look properly, and that alone calms the noise.

Those things are therapeutic for me because they create a relaxed mind, not through perfection, but through focus.

Years ago, writing made me anxious, especially when I hit publish. The fear of judgement is real. The fear of being seen is real.

Now it’s different.

Those early years of writing stretched me, and I’m glad they did.

The stretch zone is where you grow.

Fog of Mind puts me in another stretch zone, and that’s the point. I’m building this while still learning, while still managing my own mind, while still being honest about the hard days. My glass half full mentality is strong.

But my desire to help others is the single thing that keeps me going.

Yes, I want to work for myself.

But more than that, I want to help shift the way we talk about mental health, because despite helplines and leaflets and well-meaning posters, I can tell you from experience that talking has the biggest impact.

Not talking into the void.
Not being told to “cheer up”.
Not being handed generic advice that doesn’t fit your life.

Talking like a human being, with someone who listens, and someone who understands that sometimes a person just needs help clearing the fog long enough to see what’s next.

That’s what I’m trying to achieve.

And that’s why I’m excited about Monday, so stay tuned!

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