Forbes have published an article entitled 5 New Year’s Resolutions For People With Disabilities. I’ve got to be honest, I saw that title and thought that it a bit stupid, how would disabled people all make the same 5 resolutions.
However, upon reading the article — it did inspire me to set some resolutions and goals of my own and I wanted to write these down (as a way of committing myself to doing them).
#1: Explore disability issues and culture.
Covid-19 has changed my relationship with my disability and disability issues. Although I find myself stupidly busy at work, I would like to take more time to explore disability issues and culture. To educate myself.
Goal: Write a blog post a month on something that will teach you about disability issues, history or culture.
#2: Create a Community.
Disability usually doesn’t come with a built-in community. I don’t often come across other disabled people or have the opportunity to talk with them (and when I do come across other disabled people they will usually have other types of disabilities).
This year one of my goals is to start building a community of other disabled lawyers and encouraging them to have conversations. Covid-19 has made me more open and this has inspired me to also try and support others as well.
Goal: At the end of last year I started having more coffee mornings and conversations. My goal is to continue to do this in 2021 by joining as many coffee mornings as possible.
#3: Speak up.
Pre-pandemic, although I participated in the Legally Disabled research, I was generally happy to just sit and watch the world go by when it came to disabilities in the workplace. However, I have personally found that I needed more support during lockdown and had to figure out most things for myself. I am happy to be open about my disability, not everyone is and therefore I have felt that I need to speak up more. Not just about my own needs, but about the needs of others as well. The Legally Disabled Report(s) provide a great conversation starter for talking more about disability in the workplace.
Goal: Use the Legally Disabled Report(s) and Easy Wins to have more conversations with my firm about disability. There may be less than 2% of us within the firm, but 2020 has shown me that it is important to speak up.
#4: Raise awareness.
A combination of all of the above is to also promote disability awareness (both inside and outside the office). So it is important to keep the conversation going — so my final goal is to continue to write on a regular basis about my own personal experiences and thoughts and to continue to share resources that I find.
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