SPIKEY’S CLINIC FOR PROFESSIONAL DREAMERS
Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership in the field of Youth
2021-1-HR01-KA220-YOU-000030341
From November 2021 to May 2024, the project has seen the participation of 5 organisations active in the fields of youth work: Subjekt d.o.o. (Croatia, lead partner), Cooperativa Sociale Immaginaria A R.L. Onlus (Italy), Fundacja Edukacyjna Nausika (Poland), Larpifiers MAKE (Greece), and Nansen Dijalog Centar (Croatia).
One of the main objectives of the Spikey’s Clinic for Professional Dreamers project has been the creation of tools and methods to promote the physical, mental and emotional wellbeing and prevent the burnout in the key target-group of “professional dreamers” – youth and community workers who, out of personal commitment, educational background and professional expertise, have devoted themselves to practice “community gardening”:
- planting seeds for social cohesion,
- applying innovative and creative tools for bringing the community together,
- facilitating the participatory processes in which the community nurtures those planted seeds
- and willingly taking responsibility to make them grow,
- thus becoming more resilient to current and future challenges.
SPIKEY'S DECK OF REMEDIES
Spikey’s Deck of Remedies is one of the results of the Erasmus + project in the field of youth called Spikey’s Clinic for Professional Dreamers. The project was designed in spring 2021, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, when the topic of mental health and work-related stress became more relevant than ever.
Back then, many of us youth workers felt chronically tired, emotionally drained and with lots of worries on our minds. A big portion of this stress came from work – supporting youngsters in handling the pandemic, trying to implement activities when there were continuous lockdowns, and being worried about ensuring the financial sustainability of our organisations when the funding was scarce.
While everyone talked about staying strong through tough times and preached about resilience, we had a sudden realisation, our big aha moment: We’d spent so much time and energy supporting others during the pandemic that we neglected our own well-being and forgot to take care of ourselves. This realisation hit us like a ton of bricks, and we knew we had to team up and help each other do something about it.
This is how Spikey’s Clinic for Professional Dreamers came to life and its founders were us – professional dreamers from five organisations active in the fields of youth work and community development: Subjekt d.o.o. (Croatia, lead partner), Cooperativa Sociale Immaginaria A R.L. Onlus (Italy), Fundacja Edukacyjna Nausika (Poland), Larpifiers AMKE (Greece), and Nansen Dijalog Centar (Croatia).
In addition to this card deck, we developed a detailed methodology based on the best practices from the partner organisations in well-being, peer coaching and stress management. Moreover, we conducted 25 interviews with youth workers, in which they shared their firsthand experiences dealing with workplace stress and adopting nurturing practices. You can find these resources by browsing through the website www.spikeysclinic.eu.
Finally, along our journey of discovering strategies to address work-related stress and nurture well-being in youth work, our team experienced many transformative moments. These included the tragic loss of one of the project’s founders and the joyful birth of five babies who grew alongside the project.
We dedicate this project to them – to Valerij Jurešić who poured his heart into Spikey’s creation, and to the new lives that emerged alongside its growth. May their stories continue to inspire us to persist in the face of challenges and serve as a gentle reminder to prioritise the nurturing of well-being.
THE PARTNERSHIP
Here are the names of our organizations and the links to our webpages and social media. We are all happy to talk about youth-friendly practices and policies in various countries – just find the contacts in the links:
