For £5 You Can Watch Me Dream (The Public Therapy Sessions) ©

Everyday at 6 in the evening they begin to stir. At a time when most others leave their desks to go home and rest, they prepare to entertain. They may have already put in a full day of work. Don’t mind that. They were in deep slumber the whole way through.

Earn by day and dream by night.

You will find them in clubs playing music, doing stand up, performing plays, reading poetry, exhibiting photographs or screening short films.They gather their creativity and display it to any audience who will pay for the right to be silent or applaud. All the privileges a five-pound entry fee affords.

Later, on the way home, if all goes well the artist will post a status update on Facebook to describe the moment she shared with the audience. What she’s expressing is an instant of connection. A moment in which others recognise that which she values in herself.

A fragment of time through which she escaped from her daytime persona and saw people finally acknowledge who she is or at least who she thinks she is. I say think because I’m not sure if we can ever really know the extent of our full potential. Maybe some of us can see it clearly but most of us are probably walking through time selling ourselves short.

Why is she doing it? What does she want? 

She wishes the moment will expand and take up her whole life. She’s hoping that one day the recognition will carry through into the morning and that her life will no longer be divided into that which she can tolerate and that which she loves.

She tells me all this of an evening and I hug her and say:
"At least you know what you love, keep dreaming.
And if you really want it to work, add structure.”