in preparing for the bursaried visit thanks to a go and see bursary from a n, i find myself again being reflective of the journey to this point.
in thinking about what to write down, i find myself considering writing a post about things that didn;t qite work out. i note that i don;t often find posts about things not working out, in fact i seem to experience posts where everything is amazing and wonderful and just occassionally i’d like to read about how a plan went skewy.
our plan that went skewy was for a year long endeavour in a park near where we live. we planned for a celebration of it’s ecology, history and to make new activities to allow it to be seen in a different context.
in attempting that we had a funder interested, the local authority who own the park interested and several local groups who would benefit targetted as partners. the plan skewed at the point where we tried to get the groups to commit to showing interest via something in writing to evidence to the funder that their money would benefit a broad base of local citizens. the plan also skewed when it became apparent that we were struggling to commit oursleves to a programme of activities. across the group the question of activity or money became one that caused us many a difficult conversation.
months after the heartache and unhappiness caused by the breakdown of that idea, we have a few elements of that original plan still on the drawing board. our go and see visit is to the grizedale sculpture trail in cumbria. the visit there will help to inform our plans to make an art walk in the park near where we live next april.
in reflecting again about how the go and see bursary has helped us i note that it’s helped the group to continue to make new plans despite several external unforseen circumstances evolving that we needed to work through. the bursary has continuously been a source of a keep going spirit. it was the difference between giving up and continuing. i can’t begin to explain the benefit that being in receipt of the bursary has given us. it’s way more valuable than the amount of money actually held in the bursary.
in sport there’s a focus on the winner. the individual or team who do all the necessary actions to comply with the rules of the sport to become the best at that particular moment … wether it be world darts or motogp … there’s evidence of how getting through troubled times help to make them a winner. one of my favourite quotes is by a darts player on the occasion of their second world darts title …. his comment was that first he had to learn how to loose.
i have written about this before.
in cultural activity there are not the same rules as in sport.
however one thing that is very important is that for any activity there are followers / backers of the idea for their backing will make the difference when the troubled times happen and they might just happen as one never really knows how an idea will evolve over time.
the other guiding condition is how simple is the idea? and in it’s simplicity, does it unfold to show many layers ?
speaking from a personal practice level i seem to be continously learning to loose. being part of this group activity funded by a go and see bursary from a n is helping me to continue and believe that my voice can further form to further be heard.
for any group out there thinking about making a project, i urge you to consider a go and see bursary as part of your plans, it might just be the difference between a successful project and another idea that stalls because of a lack of external backing.
