Community Outreach, Somerset - Ian Howlett

I met a chap living on the street. He told me how something had happened to him and not long after he'd lost his job, his wife and his home. He spoke of this as if it was yesterday but when I asked him how long ago it was, he said, '10 years'. 

When we experience trauma in our lives it's as if a part of us stops right there and we are unable to progress past it without help. The bigger the trauma (or number of traumas), the more of us is stuck. 

From that point on I have refocussed my own life towards the understanding of psychological trauma and how to help people through it. I have experienced my own release and continue to work on my own mental health, working through past hurts and finding freedom.

I am currently the owner-manager of Heaven Coffee House in Backwell. This keeps me pretty busy but, now that it has passed its first year of existence, it has become a platform to enable some bigger dreams to be realised. 

I am actively involved in developing the community outreach side of the coffee house, developing a programme of events and courses designed to give easy access to the general community but also more specifically to those stuck with trauma in their lives.

Our homes and surroundings are one of the biggest factors in successfully overcoming trauma and so I am developing retreat times at a very special place of peace just outside Bristol.

I continue to be involved leading worship and prayer times as opportunities for easy, direct access to our Father's heart through song and intimate prayer.

I am part of Stewardship funding because, though I believe I am an expert coffee-maker (aka 'tent-maker') running a business is hard, and harder still if your focus is people, and their freedom. Being part-funded by you, through stewardship, enables me to employ the right people to move the business forward plus focus my own energies more on the work of inFreedom.