Special people

Every evening, before going to bed, Rikki Beadle Blair writes a status update on Facebook, about what he has learned today. Every single day, Rikki's post is insightful and appropriate, and always seems to be relevant to whatever I'm doing or feeling that day. This means that even from the other side of the world, Rikki continues to be an inspiration.

I know him because for many years, I've been getting up on a Sunday morning to dance my ass off at his aerobics classes. Attended by all many of all shapes and sizes, Rikki's classes are renound throughout London, and many a time I've met somebody at a party on the other side of town who is also planning to get up the next morning and come. I also know many people who won't move out of the area because its too far from 'going to Rikki's'.

Whenever I'm feeling a bit lazy or tired, its the best thing to cheer me up and make me feel better about myself. After all, he's quite a bit older than me and his springs never seem to stop - if he can do it, so can I!

Rikki is one of those people in life who uses his talents to give back. In association with the Drill Hall, he wrote and directed a play called FIT which was developed to tackle the growing problem of homophobic bullying in British schools. It was later turned into a film which was distributed to secondary schools around the UK. The Drill Hall have also laid on a series of workshops designed to help teachers dealing with the issues.

He's always up to something new, be it mental, physical or creativity and he's a powerhouse of energy and inspiration. We've urged him to collate his daily updates in a book but he's happy just to share them and its worth checking them out on a daily basis to give you a tiny bit of positivity each morning.

Thank you to whoever took the pic!