Pressing Pause

'In other news, all signed up to my next gig. Been a while since I've been able to face up to anything other than filler work - hope I'm ready'.

Earlier this year, I took the first deliberately long break of my career. The break was longer and more needed than I ever could have realised. It's taken all these months of rest, and a couple of months of being back at work to finally begin to understand, admit - and crucially, open up about what I feel and felt.

Just before my break, I remember turning down a decent sounding job, and feeling guilty for doing so. I was making myself unavailable for work at a time where there were just are not enough experienced assistants to go round, and I was stalling my career. I was convinced that I'd miss out on that one job which would lead to me stepping up, and paranoid that other assistants would get trained up and jump ahead of me.

Outwardly, I presented a happy, positive spin on the break. I said I was looking forward to a rest, looking after myself,  and that I couldn't wait to throw myself into my hobbies. What I presented was, on one level, completely true - what I was doing was a positive, necessary step, but what I presented couldn't be further from what I actually felt.

What I felt was absolute, total defeat.

I was incapable of dealing with the basic demands of working in television and making my own opportunities. In my mind, not only was I too inadequate to achieve my own goals, I was feeling things I wasn't allowed to feel,  and that made me a bad person. Bitterness, jealously, irritability, anger and resentment all bubbled inside me. I tried to just not feel them at all, but in the end, I couldn't stop myself expressing them. They were bursting at the seams and spilling out onto the mask I'd spent years building. Taking a break should have meant admitting their existence and why I felt like that, but instead I hid behind the nice things, and tried to avoid facing what my mind was really doing.

That came tumbling down when I thought I was ready to go back to work. I met with a post supervisor who told me excitedly about 'how great it is that there's so many opportunities for assistants to step up', whilst interviewing me exclusively as an assistant. That fed deeply into every insecurity going. I spent hours thinking about all those assistants stepping up around me. How awful I must be to not have stepped up with all those opportunities floating about - to not even have noticed them. That was my first glimpse back into the world of my work for weeks and it broke me in the space of a ten minute chat. Clearly, I wasn't ready to return.

I am back at work now, but I still have to be careful. Despite the fact that somewhere inside me I know there are things in my life to be proud of, so much of me still feels defeated. I'm still grieving the missed opportunities and skills I don't have, and the person I'm not. I still beat myself up for what I haven't achieved and look longingly at those who have bigger or faster successes.

Cheery reading eh? I know my blog posts, when I do write them, are rarely a barrel of laughs these days. I had even told myself that I wasn't to write one until I had something positive or funny to say. I don't want to present myself as 'weak' or 'miserable' - I want, so desperately, to be the calm, happy Naomi who rocks up with a perfectly baked cake and handles every struggle and setback with nothing but a smile and a to-do list. But as I see more and more friends and loved ones push themselves to their absolute limit, I'm realising that this stuff needs to be talked about.

So please - if you're feeling like you're on the cusp of being, or are burnt out, learn from my experience. Pushing yourself to the limit is so tough but I know, I really do know and understand that admitting there is a limit and taking action is ten times more painful. You'll always give yourself a reason why now isn't the right time. There's something that absolutely must be done at the moment so you'll stop next week, which turns into next month which turns into next year. We all go through times where we have to give more to get more, and when life deals us a tough hand - but at some point, you have to find a way to look after yourself. Some things a long, slow recovery can gradually restore - but some you won't get back. There are beautiful parts of you that you are sacrificing, and you have to ask yourself - is it worth it? Because it's not just 'an hour of my life I'll never get back'. It's a part of you.

I remember distinctly the fear of going back to work, because it's the same fear I have now. It's the one fear that's managed to out-root the still deeply embedded one of not being good enough - and it's that I cannot feel like that again. I cannot give what I gave before, without at least some small sense of it paying off.  I'm still carrying a lot of pain from last time, so I simply can't go back to that heightened level of alertness, activity and anxiety, where every hour I don't give, any request I say no, or even 'not today' to, I could be loosing an opportunity. Where everything matters and hurts so much. Where work becomes more important than sleeping, eating proper meals and seeing people I care about.

So many people told me to look after myself better when I was starting out - friends, colleagues, family, and I blindly soldiered on, working all hours, believing it was the only way to prove myself, trying to find a way to be the 'best'. Now I'm the one telling friends, second assistants, trainees and family to look after themselves - and the resistance I so often get mirrors that which I gave. Clearly there is a cultural issue - certainly in my industry, but I imagine in so many other careers and even hobbies, that embeds these damaging ideas deep into our psyche.

So I'm making positive changes. I'm learning. The career break won't come any faster for destroying myself in the cutting room hour after hour, so I'm trying to make the journey a little smoother in the meantime. Things are better and I'm in a far better place than I was in January. The process I kicked off by taking a break may have revealed more wounds than I knew I had, it may have felt so overwhelmingly like surrender, but it pulled me away from breaking point and is dragging me towards something better.

There's no contrived happy ending here, because I can't in all honesty, describe myself as 'happy' yet - I'm still, deep down, quite confused and conflicted, I still want to be more than I am. However, I am beginning to reflect more about what makes me tick, and stop ticking.

So, that's the messy, honest truth of it all. I flew what to me was the white flag. I did what every inch of my mind and body was telling me not do, but that which they desperately needed me to do. This was not an easy post to write, it took several drafts and I wrote much of it through tears, but I press 'share' because I think more of us need to hear this - not only is it ok to stop, it's brave, it's honest, and it's vital.

Midnight Musings

As I sit in bed wondering if my throat will ever feel normal again, trying to relearn the simple art of falling asleep, my mind finds itself lingering on a word that seems to have appeared in conversations a lot recently. It's a theme that's run at the heart of a lot of my digital musings, but not one I've ever really addressed directly before.

Confidence.

However you interpret it - in social terms or just beleiving in yourself, I guarantee you I've battled with it more than once in my lifetime, to varying degrees. It jumps around so much that some people would laugh at the very idea of me being shy or lacking in any sort of confidence, and others probably wonder how it is I manage to leave the house in the mornings.

Right now - life is generally good and I should have no particular reason to feel shy or without self assurance. So here's the point where I sit back and ask myself why my self, social and whatever other confidence there is to have, is going through such a low patch.

One answer could be that I'm still not over the tough year I had a while back. It's possible that I haven't given myself enough time to bounce back from working myself silly whilst feeling like I was going nowhere. I've written before about how I place too much of my self worth in my work.

The other could be that there's so much going on now that I really care about. Coming to the end of a job that has revived my desire to work in TV, as well as really wanting to put on a good performance in the play I'm currently rehearsing for, probably means I'm putting too much pressure on myself and allowing my brain to overload. The more I care, the tougher I find it to get things right.

However, the most likely answer is a lot less satisfying, and far more difficult to address. Yes, the above are probably both factors. I could blame it on some sort of childhood experience if I really wanted to. None of that negates the fact that sometimes it simply comes and goes. Anyone who's battled with shyness could list the social situations where they've just clammed up and their mind's gone blank for no particular reason. Anyone who's experienced insecurity could name you plenty of incidences where all of a sudden, it feels like they're incapable of anything, no matter what they've achieved or are achieving. Anyone who's even just creative could write you a really angst-y and probably very dull poem about the times they've lost their instinct, their mind's dried up despite working on a really exciting project. Sometimes your mind just fails you.

My quiet, sometimes shy personality means it's not rare for me to be greeted by surprise when people hear about my work and my hobbies, but confidence and desire are not mutually exclusive, you can aim for the stars and see just how far away they are. Struggling to believe you're capable of something doesn't mean you want it any less than someone who feels they can do anything. It might sound backwards, but my shyness and lack of self belief are often the drivers for me to work so hard and throw myself out of my comfort zone.

You see, I can't just wait for my confidence to come back. It doesn't work like that. Confidence is gained and regained by proving to yourself that you can do something. Sometimes that proof comes through a really painful process - being bad at something you were once good at, allowing other people to see your weaknesses, coming face to face with everything about yourself you'd rather forget. Sometimes that painful process might even have painful results. The rewards, however, when you finally make progress, are unspeakably brilliant.

I often beat myself up about the way I am, but there are silver linings. You get really used to putting up a fight. Every time you decide to have that conversation, give something new a go or walk into that room full of unfamiliar faces - you're choosing to face up to an insecurity. You don't always win - and that really hurts. You get incredibly frustrated with yourself but you keep going. You risk feeling that way all over again because one day you won't be scared of who you are in front of that person. You'll know from experience you can do that job, play that part. Be yourself again.

And you know what, if you mapped my confidence on a graph (what else would you do, when your dad's a demographer), it would probably still show an overall upward trajectory. Not a steep one, and not one without significant, prolonged dips, but upwards nonetheless.

I may never have the levels of self assurance and belief that others do. I may always find myself freezing, looking at the floor and going bright red in certain social situations - but experience has shown me that there's one thing I can always trust myself to do, however tough it gets.

Never stop trying.

And now I will try, once more, to fall asleep.

'Here comes the sting the pain again

Just open up and let it in

That's where the healing can begin

And when you stay away from dreams,

Your world is never what it seems,

The end is falling into reach' 

2017 - An Obligatory Year In Review

After the extremes of 2016, it's tempting to think of 2017 as a bit of an uphill struggle that culminated in distinctly average results. However, to think like that would be to enact a terrible habit of mine - obsessing over what I did and didn't do or achieve, without looking up and seeing the blessings that surround me.

There's no getting away from the fact it's been a tough working year. When your job encompass so much of your life, it hits hard when it doesn't go to plan. The excitement of travelling for work and assembly editing in 2016 was always going to be difficult to live up to in 2017, and when some opportunities did come, it was when my day to day working responsibilities were at their most intense, and my personal life at its busiest or most emotionally difficult. It felt like I didn't show myself at my best.

However, I ended the year on what has so far been a lovely job, certainly the best gig I've worked on in quite some time, and I can relax and enjoy the Christmas break, knowing I will be continuing my role into the new year. I also got to reap a reward of 2016 - seeing my first assembly editor credit broadcast, and received some positively sparkling silver linings on the tough gigs of 2017 - I worked with some amazing people, who I'm probably all the closer to for the mad workload. Moreover, being pushed to your absolute limit makes you admit personally and professionally that you do indeed have a limit - and teaches you that people in and out of work are more understanding about that than you'd think.

I performed in two shows this year, but I have to give special mention to The Anniversary, my first play with Incognito Theatre. I was trusted with a part which pushed me a long way outside my comfort zone and eventually boosted my confidence to levels I'm not sure I've ever experienced before. After feeling exhausted, creatively unfulfilled, and a little broken following a particularly tough job, this experience helped put me back together. The support and patience from the cast, crew and director was incredible, and for the first time since I can remember, I think my biggest achievement of the year lay outside of my work(/education - if you go back far enough!). From the first rehearsal to the final curtain, it was an experience I'll always cherish.

2017 was also the year my grandma was diagnosed with dementia. Naturally that's devastating news, and has been particularly difficult for my mum, who has had to deal with both the emotional and practical pains that come with it. It has also shown me the absolute best of my family (who I obviously knew were brilliant anyway). From the amazing strength, resilience and compassion my mum has shown in the most trying of times, to watching my amazing dad and sister calmly and patiently helping grandma up the front step into our house on Christmas day, I have been reminded time and time again that my family are beautiful and that I couldn't have hoped for a better one. (No, I'm not crying...you are).

The diagnosis spurred Helen and I to do a 10k run in aid of Alzheimer's Research UK. Taking on the challenge with my sister definetly made it a highlight of the year - even if she was faster than me!

I find it all too easy to look back and beat myself up for what I didn't achieve or do 'well enough' at, but that's a terribly selfish and ungrateful way to look at the year. For all my frustration about the London housing market, and still sharing a rented flat, never was I in want of a roof over my head. For all the quick sandwiches I've wolfed down whilst walking out of work late at night, never have I had to wonder where my next meal was going to come from. For all the times I was frustrated with how my career was going, I always had work in 2017 when I needed or wanted it. For all the times I've felt down, stressed, angry, broken or just exhausted, I have always had a family member or a friend to vent to.  As a girl who hangs too much of her self worth and happiness on achieving and generally wanting to be better at stuff than she is - yes, it was a frustrating and exhausting year. But my life is extremely, unfairly blessed and I should never forget the riches God gives me by His grace, year on year, despite me straying further and further.

2017 also brought more cake baking, another panto, being the editor for a short film (which I really hope I'll get to tell you more about in 2018), another puppet video, a much awaited return to the Edinburgh festival, a fun photoshoot with friends, more theatre trips, more Shakespeare, a tweet unexpectly appearing in Broadcast Magazine, and even a little trip to York. It was also the year the Conservatives lost their majority, and our Leave-loving-tory MP lost his seat to a man with an awesome name, so it really can't have been that bad.

As for 2018? Well I think it should start with gratitude for all I've been given in 2017.

Taking it Slow (ish)

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.

I'm an anxious person. Anxious about if I was nice enough to that shop assistant, whether I worded that e-mail correctly, whether I left something on the tube. Even whether I bought the right flaming bag of rice (although if it's on fire, I've definitely gone wrong somewhere). You get the idea. I'm also anxious about the bigger picture. I'm anxious to achieve all the time and I've changed from a patient little girl to an impatient grown woman - when it comes to the bigger picture at least.

A little impatience can be good. It can kick you on the backside when you're not pulling your weight, either with your own goals or being a positive, responsible presence in the world you live. Too much however, is counterproductive. Worse than that, it's terrible for your mental health and general well-being. Overwhelming yourself with ideas about where your career should be, how much you should weigh, and all the new skills you've suddenly decided you should have, actually just causes you to stop all together. It undermines your focus and you don't know what to do with yourself so you just end up sitting worrying about what an awful person you are and how far away you are from your goals, without making any actual progress in anything. Which for someone like me is paramount to failure - and there the loop-the-loop begins (and I hate roller coasters. Literal, metaphorical and use as a metaphor). You just stop and sink.

And that's exactly what I did to myself last year.

I told myself that I wasn't good enough because I wasn't first assisting right from the start of the year, because I wasn't running far or fast enough, my (millennial cliche alert) body wasn't good enough and I hadn't suddenly, out of nowhere become this amazing writer or actor. Quite frankly that led to times where I hated myself and the life I led (I don't use the term 'hate' lightly, especially in the currently unpleasant political climate), and was completely incapable of seeing how outrageously blessed my life is.

Similarly, 2017 hasn't been the best of starts for me. There's been a few reasons, but it's mostly because I've let my impatience get the better of myself - why hasn't my life suddenly become the Utopian vision I want it to be? Some genuine questions I've asked myself within the space of a few weeks include: why am I not getting to do any cutting on this job? Why haven't I learnt to drive yet? Why am I not writing, learning to sing, creating short films, acting? Why can't I run very far? All of which were immediately followed by: what's wrong with me?

Well, the answer to the final question is that I always think about the hundreds of things I want to do or think I should be doing with my life, and allow myself to get so overwhelmed that I end up just doing nothing with the limited free time I have. It's the same with work - I berate myself for not getting further or for not working on this production or in that job role, and that just leaves me feeling like I want to go home and forget it all - and also leaves me very vulnerable to letting the basics of my job slip. Again - counterproductive and damaging.

There are of course times to really push yourself (or literally run that extra mile). I did some insane hours on one of my jobs last year where I practically pushed myself to breaking point, but there was a specific reason to do it and the hard work paid off. I'm utterly proud of what I achieved both professionally and personally, and I'd put myself through it again. My mistake was in not allowing myself to recover and to almost immediately start berating myself that I wasn't moving at the same pace from then onward.

Looking at my attitude last year and at the start of this one, I know I will always want to do and be better. I always want to achieve and be productive, and in an industry that is always running at full-pelt, where you're surrounded by successful people making a name for themselves, there will always be a pressure to go further. I need to learn, however that sometimes progress just means taking it slow for a little bit - moving forward means easing your pace, rather than trying to sprint and ending up collapsing.

On that note, let's go back to one of my personal interrogation subjects for a moment. In 2016 I completely fell off the running wagon - mostly because I thought I'd failed if I didn't run at least three times a week and either go faster or further on each run. It, naturally, wasn't sustainable and I ended up finding I wasn't getting out there any more.

This year I've started up again. I only go once a week. The first time I went was a week into January and I just about jogged 4k before wanting to collapse. Five runs in and I've just doubled that. When I go out now, I tell myself that it doesn't matter how fast I go - if I can just do what I did last week, then I'm doing great - and sometimes I find that positive feeling of reaching an achievable goal gives me that final bit of energy to go just that bit further. Suddenly I find that I actually enjoy running again - it's time away from a screen, and an excuse to listen to music without using your brain for much else, and in amongst all that, I've made some progress I'm really proud of. Taking my goals and my literal steps at a steady pace has meant that running has been both my most enjoyable, and my most successful challenge of the year so far. (As a natural exercise-phobe, I can't believe I just wrote that).

Likewise, this year, I need to learn when to jog and when to sprint in my wider being. This isn't me telling myself to be complacent - I want to keep going, to maintain certain standards and I want to do big things with my life - I've learnt not to shy away from that fact about myself, but you can only do that one step at a time. One foot in front of the other.

I will always doubt myself.  To an extent I know that I will never believe I'm doing enough or am good enough, but that's ok if you can accept that as part of your personality and learn to use it as a motivator and not a stick to beat yourself with (and grasp that there is a difference between the two).

Now, do excuse me whilst I help my previous self to recover from all those running metaphors.

A Letter to 2016

Well, 2016.

Your time is nearly out, and it's tempting to say good riddance. To Brexit, to Trump, to experiencing the less pleasant sides of working in TV, to trying to leg it up a down escalator with my confidence and self belief; but in amongst the international bleakness there was much to celebrate - you brought many of my friends into marriage, gave me unforgettable memories with my best friend at Eurovision, and took me over 4,000 miles away to work in Guadeloupe.

I don't really know what to make of you. Even the most special moments and proudest achievements were a difficult and often emotionally painful struggle to reach, and in the last few months I feel like you've tried to unravel a lot of them. Friends are harder to hold onto, and the energy for the achievements I crave is harder to come by. But if there's anything your predecessors have taught me it's that the tough times  - when we're most exposed to the unfairness and struggles of the world around us - that build us up and make us the people we really want to be. It's human to dwell on the negatives, but I can't ever forget that I have an amazing family, great friends and that I have been blessed with opportunities and privileges that so many people would love. I got to visit two new countries, step up the assisting career ladder and meet some amazing people - and that's what I will remember you for.

For every person that didn't think I could do something, someone else took a huge risk on me. For every time the one putting me down was me, someone else told me otherwise. You taught me, through the best people in my life, how to love, care and laugh.

I think in the end, you were lost, scared and misunderstood, just like most of us. I hope we can learn your toughest of lessons and come together to help 2017 blossom through the ashes.

Faith and... not much really

I've come to accept that this blog is the antithesis of my social media accounts. Like many others, I'm often guilty of only talking about the best bits of my life on Twitter and Facebook, and just resorting to talking about small oddities or different things all together when times aren't so great. Here I seem to have done the opposite - I've gone a bit quiet when things are going well, and posted plenty when they're not.

In one way, that's inevitable - when things are going well, it's difficult enough finding time to wash my hair, forget write long blog posts. I also think that it's ok (so long as this doesn't become 'Naomi's blog of self pity'). There's plenty out there about the highlights of working in this profession. It's only natural to want to post the exciting things - your name in the credits, wrap parties, adverts for the show.  It's also a pretty sensible approach - it goes for all lines of work that it's wise to stay positive, at least publicly, about your job. I just suppose that in a blog about my personal experiences, I feel like I have to try and say the less commonly said, and be completely honest about both the good times and the not so good.

So, to play catch up - I'm pretty sure this blog doesn't have a readership much beyond my social media circles, but for anyone who doesn't know me in person - quite a lot has happened since the last time I wrote a blog about my career. So here are the very brief highlights

• I left my full time job at the post production company
• After doing so, I worked as a second assistant editor on three dramas. I came in for the end of one and saw another pretty much the whole way through.
• I finished on my third job a few weeks before Christmas, leaving me with my first proper taste of unemployment.

In summary - despite lots of ups and downs, I finally found the thing I really, really like doing and am pretty competent at, but now I can't seem to claw my way back in. I feel like ever since one job in particular, things have gone downhill. 

That might be a little strong - this time of year is known as a difficult one to get work in as it just isn't when companies are crewing up. I'll also be the first to acknowledge how incredibly fortunate I've been up to this point. I've had some amazing opportunities and learning experiences - I am of course still grateful for that. The thing is, that between then and now, I've done a day's cover for one show, and two weeks of night shifts for another. That is very little time to spend doing what I would call my 'primary' job, and I think it's possible to both be grateful for the work you've had, and really struggle when it's not in your life. 

Because that's the thing - these gigs can be all-consuming things. You put in a vast quantity and range of hours. I've literally worked, at some stage, every hour of the twenty four that a day has to offer. I think sixteen hours is my record for time spent at work (it may be more if you start to count dealing with emails and phone calls at home), and I have to admit, I thrive off being busy and needed - so when that's pulled away it's really difficult to face up to the vast nothingness that greets you.

Of course I'm doing things to counter this. I'm trying to keep my CV circulating, my post production skills up to date and pick up bits of work here and there, but nothing is the same as being fully employed doing the job you've fought to do. It's not the same sense of achievement, the same feeling of being a part of something, or the same sense of worth. 

I'm not very good at being unemployed. I don't like having big stretches of nothingness that I need to work out how to fill. I have done and will probably continue to take on unpaid or low paid work, but it's dangerous waters. It's one thing to have your own 'passion project', it's another to spend time working on something, especially where the opportunities for learning or creative ownership are not there, and then having very little show for weeks of your life (financially or otherwise). Getting the right project can be very rewarding - but the wrong one can be soul destroying. It's something that you can deal with when you know you have an income to subsidise it, but otherwise it's very demeaning. Staying motivated becomes incredibly difficult when you can't get someone to pay you to do your job.

To be brutally honest -months of either nothing, rejections or drawn out 'maybe's have led me to being very low at points. I like to work and I find life pretty tough without it. This is an element of my line of work that I'd prepared myself for financially but not emotionally. I just assumed that when work was not a-plenty, it'd be easy to spend the time writing, cutting things for free and doing all the things I don't normally have time to do. It never occurred to me how overwhelming and emotionally trying the vast expanses of nothingness would be. I'm not standing in competition to anyone - I know people have been through worse and for longer.

I think I've drawn myself into a very long winded way of saying that it's ok to admit when things aren't great. I suppose it's only right to try and balance out the superficial positivity that most of us emanate online, with the reality- sometimes life's good, sometimes it's not. Sometimes we're interesting, funny and clever, and sometimes even that is taken away from us. When you're not so proud of yourself (I blame no-one but me for the situation I'm in), when you're not the one who's getting the limelight and success, I don't think it's healthy to pretend otherwise. As someone who's ambitious, and more competitive than I would like to admit, I would quite like to act as if this time isn't happening, but the reality is different and I shouldn't create a narrative that says otherwise. All that happens then is that we collectively create this 'happy bubble' online that makes us in turn all feel even worse during the bad times. Life is a mixture of good and bad, and none of us are perfect (least of all me).

My response has to be the only one available that can have a positive outcome - keep fighting, searching, e-mailing, and yes, doing those free projects where I need to. Learn stuff, write stuff, do whatever I can to stay sane and get back on the ladder. Find ways to motivate myself to do the things I won't have time for when I'm back in full-time work. I once listened to a sermon about how our 'time in the wilderness' is the time God uses to teach us, show us the aspects of ourselves we need to change, and to train us for what's ahead - in summary, he uses that time to 'grow' us. In that respect, lent is a really appropriate time to publish this, I'll just have to pray that my wilderness isn't for another forty days and that it doesn't end in crucifixion...

Just Vote Already

I could be wrong, but it seems there might be a general election happening soon. Alright, yes, of course I know. I've not stopped going on about it since the last one.
Now, I have some very strong political views, but I'm going to do my very best to keep them out of this, and simply explain why as Christians, we should not only vote, but be very, very careful about how we decide to who to vote for.

This is going to seem like stating the obvious and then putting it up on a massive billboard, but the government are very important. They make decisions that affect our health systems, welfare, housing, the economy...in fact, there's no point in making a list. It's their job to, you know, run the country. You may feel that the decisions listed above are too easily swayed by vested interests, or that the system doesn't allow real change, but a lack of voting is not going to do any more to change that than writing a letter to congratulate everyone on what a good job they're doing.

People think that by not voting, they're standing up against the system. What they're actually doing is ensuring that it goes on exactly as it was and that the same people can run it, unchallenged, exactly how they, and not the public, want to. The percentages you ultimately hear after the votes have been counted only reflect the people who show up. For example - in this election, Labour and the Conservatives are very, very close in the polls at the moment, swapping between 33-34% each. If this were to happen in the election, it wouldn't mean about a third of the country supported each of our main parties. It means a third of the people who got off their backsides and into a polling station supported each of those parties. The people who didn't show up aren't reflected at all.

If as Christians we are supposed to make a difference, stand up for what we believe in, for our neighbours, and those in need, then we are shooting ourselves in the foot, promptly followed by one of our two faces if we don't vote. Why? Because we've missed our chance- one that only comes about once every four or five years, to be heard. To not only be the voices of ourselves, the church, our faith, but those whom we were instructed by God to stand up for. If you're not happy with any of the main parties - vote for a minority one. Or at the very least spoil your ballet paper, at least the number of spoilt ballet papers is read out (although this should be an absolute last resort as it still won't count).

If the voice of the church isn't heard in the polls, the simple fact is, the politicians won't care. Young people are often the target of cuts because much fewer of them vote. The older population very rarely feel the cuts in the same way because they turn up and have their say. If as Christians we avoid the polling station, it's the same as staying silent about all the things our current government have done, whether we agree or not. We're basically saying 'you can do what you want, because I won't stop you if I don't like it, and I won't support you if I do like it.'

Take the Lib Dem tuition fee pledge last year. The student vote was a huge factor in the rise of their party. Yes - they went back on that promise, but that caused outrage, people took to the streets during and after the parliamentary vote. This time round? Tuition fees are back on the agenda. The parties that feel they still have a chance with students are promising to cut or scrap the fees. Whether things change this time around depends very much on whether this generation of students take to the polling stations in similar or larger numbers. As Christians, let's not wait for a party leader to put us on the agenda - let's review all the policies and the politicians, then vote the way we think is right. That way we're making the first move, not waiting around for someone to take up our cause.

Then there's the next issue - not only do we have the responsibility to vote, we should do so responsibly. What policies would Jesus agree with? Which politicians would He anoint? We should be wary about anyone who out of the blue (or yellow, or purple or red...you get the picture), declares their Christian faith and values. Almost all of them seem to at this point. Especially if a hustings is held at a church. On that note, go to a hustings. As they're local and often held away from the spotlight, they can be very insightful.

Whilst thinking very carefully about the party we're voting for, who's in that party, and the specific MP we're voting for, we should approach the media coverage with extreme caution. Seriously, it should come with a warning, like cigarettes do, it's that dangerous. Are you honestly going to vote for someone because they're the most 'media friendly'?

In Matthew's gospel, Jesus says 'Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves'. Although Jesus is talking about Christian teachings, I think the phrase 'ravenous wolves' is a great way to sum up the Great British press. The fact is, that almost every paper in this country has a political agenda, and it is to their advantage to push it as strongly as possible. Many of them are very closely linked to our country's politicians themselves, others choose to take advantage of the huge amount of power they hold over them. Scaremongering, hyperbole, and eye-catching, yet ultimately irrelevant facts (and pictures) all sell papers. As such, they're all tactics used on a daily basis by the majority of our press.
Now, not every journalist is evil, and not every news report is wrong, but when reading a headline - especially a political one, you should always ask yourself these questions:

• What party does this paper support?
• Who runs this newspaper, and how does this headline benefit them?
• What is this newspaper's track record?
• What facts in this article can be verified?
• What is the other perspective on this?
• Why are they breaking this story today?

In the past few years we've had hacking scandals, hypocrisy from some of our papers regarding tax affairs, countless accusations of downright lies, unnecessary personal attacks (Gorden Brown's children have nothing to do with his ability to run a country, neither does Ed Miliband's ability to eat a bacon sandwich, or how David Cameron chooses to eat a hot dog), a whole enquiry into the behaviour of our press and a battle with consistent sexism in the majority of our papers. The list could go on. My point is - let's not necessarily take them at their word, huh?

We then have television news, which, because operating under much stricter rules than our press, is better but not perfect. Various broadcasters have been accused of bias towards the left or right at some stage, but very importantly, television headlines are often derived from newspaper headlines - so again, listen out for the name of that newspaper, and refer yourself back to the questions above. ITV may very well spend half an hour creating a very fair debate on who eats their food more elegantly, but it's the  press who put that piece on nonsense on the agenda. A good example is the Telegraph's recent publication of a letter from a hundred business leaders in support of the Conservatives. Whatever your political views, you have to admit, it's very impressive that they managed to get all our major broadcasters talking about a headline that bottles down to 'rich people support the Conservatives'.

Every party has at some stage indulged in political point scoring, finger pointing and spin. Sadly it's become how you survive in this political landscape - owning up to unpopular policies or ideas before an election, even if you really believe in them, means you'll be sunk by the media and your opponents. Complicated policies, or policies that reflect the complexities of a situation don't fare much better, because the reasoning behind it can't be reduced to a headline or shouted into a crowd of rowdy MPs in parliament. So we have to do our own research. Look into the track records of those who want to run our country. Work out who's values and priorities are genuinely in line with yours. Then get out there and have your say.

7th May. Write it on your forehead if you have to.