Michaela Thomas, clinical psychologist at CBT Innovation, explains why the business should win the home business category of the Guardian Small Business Showcase competition.
I provide psychological therapy for anxiety, depression, trauma and stress from my home (and from a therapy room). I use technology such as Skype, texts and emails as a way to directly help people who are suffering.
I also write a blog from home as a way to indirectly help even more people by spreading the message that the stigma around mental health needs to cease. With Skype, I can treat people in hard to reach areas of the world, where they might not have access to psychological therapy, and at hours of the day suiting people in full-time work. I am also writing a book from home, on how to help couples develop compassion for each other. With more time and resources to devote to this in the future, I would also develop my own app on practising compassion, in a similar way to Headspace.
I chose my company name, CBT Innovation, because I want to innovate how psychological therapies are used to help people. It is time to break free.
All entries which meet the competition criteria are published and our judging panel select a shortlist of the top three for each category. Winners are announced at an awards ceremony in summer 2016.
