Introducing Project ‘100 Angels’

As I closed the SMBN in February this year, I felt comfort in the fact that there are so many organisations working towards supporting our community, I also felt reassured that changes were underway, with enhanced flexible working rights and the renters rights act progressing well. Whilst the barriers to work, homes and finance remain, they are in a snowball now rolling down a hill.

I have been passionate about barriers to finance, and I am aware that change is happening, but it is slow change, and there are hundreds if not thousands of families who need help TODAY. These people are not asking for a handout, they are asking for a hand up; they are skilled, and they know that they can make work work via enterprise, to overcome the barriers or challenges that they face. With adverse backgrounds, these people are rejected by most banks and lending institutions, but Purple Shoots are different.

As I tried to embrace my new found free time, and enjoyed the wonder is Netflix, this became very tiring very quickly, as I flicked from one movie to the next, I became increasingly frustrated that I was not helping anybody, and that this was not a good use of my time, and with the new head space, I could see very clearly what I needed to do.

Charities need money, but what is fantastic about Purple Shoots is that money can be used over and over again. Just as they say you can give a man a fish and he will have a meal, or teach a man to fish and he will eat for life, purple shoots help those who want to fish. If they just gave them a fish they could not regurgitate that fish to be used to help another in the future could they?! but, by helping them be self-reliant financially, that money is paid back, and can help others as it helped them. The interest freeing up the loan amount to be used in full again.

I have written about the poverty premium for many years now, and that with that journey of adversity and damaged credit score came the offer of finance from lenders who preyed on people like me, charging APRs that only perpetuated my hardship and left me extremely vulnerable with declining mental health. As I faced barriers to work the light at the end of the tunnel was too distant to see, and enterprise was the only way to make work work. My work ethic did not decline, but my social status did, and the journey was excruciating.

As others preyed on me or turned me away, Purple Shoots offered humane micro finance, for a humane APR (a very sensible business model for them to be able to sustain the charity and ensure donations or investments reached beneficiaries and had a positive economic impact).

As a borrower of Purple Shoots, I feel the duty of guardianship that comes with that. As hundreds of individuals and families, desperately trying to be economically active through enterprise queue for this support, Purple Shoots needs society to support them as they have supported others, and so project 100 angels begins. A simple quest to find 100 Angels. 100 Angels to donate £1000, for ten months, just ten months. As a micro business or SME this could make a small dent on monthly outgoings, or as an individual this could half disposable income for a short while, but those who had tough beginnings in life, they will value the life long legacy that will come by making a small short-term sacrifice, for the greater good.

If you understand the full circle, you will understand that every decision we make impacts us further down the line, everything is connected, and somebody who needs your help now, could well be your saviour, or a saviour of somebody you love in the future. When we remove the need to survive, we can use our energy for good, and that is the natural beauty of being human.Please take a look at Project ‘100 Angels’.

Please support or signpost to somebody who could support this project. We all need each other, and right now, we need YOU.