I've never been one for New Year's resolutions. Whilst admittedly January certainly brought some much-needed relief after the difficulties I experienced last year which I talked about in the previous blog, I've never thought that coming up with concretely different things you want to do in a new year is very productive.
There are two reasons for this. One is that they very rarely stick - if we all look at what we planned to do last new year, I think very few of us would honestly be able to say we stuck with what we intended. The other reason is that I think we can all resolve to be better people, and these decisions need to be made as and when we realise their importance. There's nothing specific that you have to wait until 1st January to do.
So this is not going to be a list of things I intend to achieve in 2026. This is going to be what I intend to focus on this year. This is different, because there isn't going to be anything here that is remotely measurable - nothing I'll be able to look back at in twelve months time and think, 'Well, that went out the window, didn't it?' Instead, this is just a collection of things that I really hope will make this year more satisfactory than last year was.
1. I want to write more
This is almost redundant, because I write all the time. I'm an absolutely chronic social media user - I'm the original person that never grew out of commenting on everything on Facebook. I also use Reddit continuously, very often to discuss literature, television soaps or whatever takes my fancy.
And I won't describe this as time-wasting, although I know a lot of people would. It is something that's kept me going day by day, particularly over the last year. It reminds me that there's a world out there and stuff going on, and to an extent that I'm capable of formulating a coherent thought and writing it down, which is a useful thing to remember.
That said, there are multiple projects involving writing that I don't follow up. I am writing two different books that I hope to be published eventually - one fiction and one non-fiction. I'm writing a Waterloo Road fanfic (don't ask). I have this blog, which I really hope to update more this year than last year (actually, at two posts this year to zero last year, I've already managed that - give the man a medal).
My partner Owen and I used to have all sorts of play scripts and TV scripts that we wrote together, and we don't do that anywhere near enough anymore. The reason we don't do it enough is that it's so demotivating when no one takes us seriously in the industry (more on that in my next resolution). But writing is not just about the end product - it's also about the process, and I am a much happier and more productive and intelligent person when I'm writing regularly on something structured.
2. I want to progress with the Campaign for Fair Play
I don't believe I have ever written about the Campaign for Fair Play on this blog before (I think Owen and I came up with the idea during my radio silence from blogging).
I will most likely write a whole blog on this project at some point, but just to summarise - the Campaign for Fair Play is a campaign group composed of various creatives that we've worked with at various points, and aims to create a fairer and more accessible situation for struggling creatives in the industry. Owen and I are very jaded by how impossible it is to get anywhere if you're trying to break into the arts. In fact, having done both, we can say for certain that you receive less bullying, less gaslighting and fewer people telling you you can't do something when you're standing as an inexperienced socialist independent General Election candidate in a very tight Labour-Tory marginal than you do even attempting to get a career in the arts. This was the thing that kickstarted this idea for us - in 2024, we temporarily shelved all our creative projects in favour of working on Owen's Parliamentary campaign, and surprisingly, everyone else working on the election, irrespective of their politics, was encouraging, kind and supportive. You don't expect politics to be like that. Going back into the arts after that, with the constant snootiness and rudeness and bureaucracy, almost felt like going back into an abusive relationship.
The demands of the Campaign for Fair Play are: 1) Free legal advice for those working in the arts; 2) A revamp of the Arts Council and of funding decisions more generally; 3) An acknowledgement from the Department for Work and Pensions about how it is to primarily do short-term contract work; 4) A clearer career path and protections from being blacklisted; and 5) Protection for arts venues from having to close down. Something that's particularly important about the campaign is that it comprises people from all areas of the arts. Very often I find that people in different professions end up competing against one another (for example, you get criticised for hiring actors if you're not paying them enough, which on one hand is fair enough because it's hard to earn anything decent as an actor, but at the same time it's often impossible to get funding so without doing that only the very rich end up making anything at all). This is something we should be able to unite on, not fight amongst ourselves.
The Campaign for Fair Play is truthfully the political movement that I currently feel most strongly about. I know this might sound odd, because of all the disastrous and horrible things happening in the world that need to be dealt with, creating a fairer arts industry might not seem like it should be the thing that we focus on most. But I also think that if the arts is functioning well, the rest of the world will follow it. Art can do incredible things. Many of the most amazing political movements were inspired by things people had read, watched or witnessed. If art is a reflection of how everyone, and not just the most privileged, sees the world, it will be easier to campaign for whatever we feel passionate about. That's why there's such a lack of recognition or support of the arts from successive Governments, in spite of the fact that it's one of the few industries in which the UK is still a major global player - it's something that threatens the establishment.
At the start of last year, we were making quite a bit of progress with the Campaign for Fair Play. Unfortunately, my mental health has been so bad that we haven't done very much with it for six months or so, but I aim very much to build it up again this year. Watch this space.
3. I want to promote equality amongst marginalised groups
This I hope is a given for everyone, but one of the things I was most concerned by in 2025 was what I perceived as a radical decrease in recognition of certain groups of people. Perhaps my saying it was a decrease is a sign of my own privilege - maybe these groups were recognised so little to begin with that there wasn't very much to decrease, and in reality the only thing that's changed is my own understanding of it.
There are three parts of this that I've been especially concerned about. The first is, unsurprisingly, an increase in casual racism. The reason this is unsurprising is that I think this has been happening steadily for pretty much the entire time I've been politically aware. Where I live in Abergavenny, there is talk of opening a new mosque in town, and there are a lot of people who are very vocally against this idea. Thankfully, I do think anti-racist movements are increasing in traction a lot - there was one instance where I was at a pro-Palestine movement on the same day as an Islamophobic march took to the streets, and we clearly significantly outnumbered them.
The second is an extremely radical increase in transphobia. Since the Supreme Court ruling on For Women Scotland last April, it feels as though the amount of misgendering and suspicion around transgender people has been almost relentless. I must confess to being a bit shocked by how bad it's become, although perhaps I shouldn't have been shocked. I really hope this year to talk to more people about this and improve cis and trans people's relationships with one another. One particularly interesting thing that happened to me last year was that I went with a friend to a trans rights rally in Cardiff. Across the police line was the counter-protest, the anti-trans group - and what really struck me was that in that group, there was not one single non-white face. Whereas on our side of the divide, we were of all religions, ethnicities and backgrounds. The reason this is important is that so often when we talk about acceptance of different cultures, there's this idea that certain groups of people (read: Muslims) aren't respectful of what we call 'British values', which is usually code for LGBTQ+ people. As an LGBTQ+ person, I can actually say that this is not my own personal experience. The overwhelming majority of homophobia I have experienced in my life (not that I've experienced all that much) has come from white people.
The third is the way we see disabled people. Thankfully I do think this one is moving in a positive direction, even if it's not moving anywhere near fast enough. I think people with disabilities and mental health concerns are getting far better at talking about it, there seems to be much less stigma than there used to be around acknowledging that you're vulnerable (hence why in the previous blog I talked about my nervous breakdown last September). In terms of how it manifests itself for me, I really want to sort out all the issues with my partner's charity, The Gathering, which I referred to in the previous blog. There are plans for this - I really hope it comes off.
4. I want to look after myself and get better
I've left this one until last, but I suppose it's the most important thing on the list. Nothing else I want to achieve will or can happen unless I myself am able to function, and I suppose one positive to having had such a bad year last year is that it's made me far more aware of my own vulnerabilities and how susceptible I am to being harmed if too many things aren't going my way.
I can't really say how I can look after myself. It may come from trying to get more money, or making new friends, or taking part in more quizzes, or reading more about politics, or all of these things, or none of them. You often can't know until you get there exactly what you'll need - but it is important to know yourself and be able to recognise it at the time.
One final point on this - I feel very strongly that the worse your day is going, the more essential it is to be kind to others. There are two reasons for this. The first is that being kind to others can make you happy as well - very often when we're low we can immediately dismiss ourselves as not having time for other people, and that actually doesn't help. But more importantly, I think all the worst things in the world, both in our personal lives and on a wider global scale, are committed by people who are rightly, rationally and intelligently, extremely unhappy and feel hard done by. They feel as though they're the victim. And sometimes they are, but if their reaction to that is to create more victims, we're all worse off from that. It's so important to be able to separate ourselves from that and decide that that domino effect of callousness and insensitivity will stop with us.
So there we are. Four things I want to focus on. Will I manage them all? I have no idea. But I'm looking forward to finding out.
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