Excerpts from the book: "The Art of the Mentally Healthy Conversation" by Jonathan Phelan

"I invite you to come on a conversational journey with me. Give me a good listening to and help me find support rather than stigma for my mental wellbeing.  

If you can do it for me (and you can) then you can do it for yourself, and you can do it for others. You can be among the growing number of people willing to build a culture of mutual support for wellbeing.

Learn the Art of the Mentally Healthy Conversation and you’ll be able to change your life, by changing your minds.”

© 2019 The Evenhood Organisation Limited

First published in 2019.

Copyright © 2019 by The Evenhood Organisation Limited (Evenhood). Authorship by Jonathan Phelan with all rights of Copyright assigned to Evenhood. The Author retains moral rights.

Published by The Evenhood Organisation Limited (Evenhood).

Evenhood is a not-for-profit social enterprise whose aim it is to improve mental health outcomes in organisations, including workplaces, schools and universities by the educational provision of Training, Coaching, Speeches, Books and Online Materials. All proceeds from the sale of this work will be applied to support these aims.

PREFACE

Here’s a Tardigrade. A creature so minuscule that we would expect it to be vulnerable, weak and utterly lacking in resilience. 

Yet it has been dubbed the most resilient creature on earth. 

Despite its microscopic size, the Tardigrade is able to survive the heat of the desert as well as freezing temperatures. It can cope with extreme pressures in the depths of the ocean. It even has the ability to survive the vacuum of space and exposure to radiation. 

The Tardigrade is an illustrative contradiction to challenge what we think of as being resilient. 

Apparent vulnerability can, in fact, achieve great resilience in the right circumstances. 

That’s true for mental wellbeing too. It is possible to achieve great resilience despite mental wellbeing challenges. 

You are about to discover how to give support or gain support to achieve mental resilience. We are about to go on a journey together to solve what seems like an intractable and widespread problem - how to achieve mental resilience and the ability to perform and be effective, despite our human fragility. Particularly the fragility of the mind.

Innumerable studies show that people choose to avoid talking about their mental health because they perceive that they are more likely to receive stigma, rather than support. Further studies show that when people do choose to attempt a conversation about their mental health, poor outcomes tend to follow these conversations.

It’s not the studies and statistics though; it’s the human stories that concern me. Stories of talented, motivated, capable people who end up carrying a private, painful burden. 

Workers, students, pupils, friends, colleagues and family members.

People who endure a public humiliation, distress and stigma. People who would surely mention to a colleague, boss, friend, tutor or teacher that they had a physical injury or illness but who go to quite some effort to hide their mental health challenges. More-to-the-point, people whose mental health challenges would be more manageable if they could have a conversation at an early stage. 

These challenges would be less likely to progress, if only they could have a conversation that worked. They would be less likely to need medical interventions, if only they could have an early conversation and receive support, rather than stigma.

These human stories aren’t just about those with the mental wellness challenges. Much of my career has been spent in management and leadership roles and this gave me an insight into the other side of the mental health conversation.

It takes two to have a conversation and those on the other side of the conversation have corresponding fears. What on earth are you expected to do as a leader, manager, tutor or teacher when someone comes up to you and talks about self-harm, depression, bipolar disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, post traumatic stress and so on? 

This is scary stuff. The sense of responsibility is an enormous burden. The lack of specialist knowledge is a handicap. Surely, unless you happen to be a psychologist, therapist or medically trained in some other way, your chances of helping are slim to non-existent. In an instant you shift from being a competent leader, manager, tutor or teacher; to instead being completely out of your competent depth. You are no longer the person with the answers, insights and opinions; and this doesn’t sit well with the perception of your role.

My encounter with the limitations of my mental resilience came after the death of our son. I hesitated for years over talking about my mental health and how it had suffered following the death of our baby son. So I didn’t talk about it; at home, at work, to friends, family or anyone. But it got to the point where I realised that my condition wouldn’t improve unless I started to talk about it.

So in the end I did talk about it. And what people expect me to say at this point is that I really wish that I’d talked about it sooner because things got so much better. But I’m not going to say that, because it isn’t the case and that isn’t the point of this book.

The courage it took to talk about my mental health is the first notably bizarre feature. You don’t need courage to tell anyone that you have the ‘flu, a broken leg, arthritis or even cancer. Yet people sense that they need to be courageous to talk about their mental health.

From the moment I first opened up about my mental wellbeing my journey was bumpy. I experienced both stigma and the lack of support. In fact, things got significantly worse and my mental health deteriorated rather than improved because of the way some people behaved - so much so that I needed additional treatment and medication that I hadn’t needed before. That was an amazing consequence of me opening up about my mental health.

Among the first words uttered in response to my taking what seemed like a brave and tentative step towards getting support were these:

"I’m surprised you can climb into a suit in the morning."

Perhaps this was intended sympathetically. I don’t really know. Perhaps it was an acknowledgement of the enormity of the impact that my experience of death had had on me and my mental health. 

Perhaps. 

It came across as revealing a view that I was not ill, but incapable. Someone who had become weak and vulnerable - even to the point of not being able to dress for work in the morning, rather than someone who was good at their job, albeit with some mental wellness challenges. 

So my point isn’t that we should talk about our mental wellbeing sooner. My point is that we should talk about it differently. That’s the point of this book. We should talk about it in a way that is more likely to lead to support, rather than stigma.

After the outcomes I faced when I made an attempt to start this conversation it became my mission to find the Holy Grail to this particular problem. The solution lay in discovering how to turn a conversation about mental health from one that resulted in stigma, to one that instead resulted in support. 

Over time, I combined my experience as a people manager, a leader, a Coach and as someone who had mental health challenges of his own. This combination of experience led to my discovery of how we can all have Mentally Healthy Conversations.

I used this approach myself to improve my own situation. And it worked. 

So I started to Coach others, applying what I had learned to help them create a positive shift in their own lives. And it worked. 

So I started to give speeches to help spread the message. And it worked. 

So then I started to train leaders, managers, university tutors, teachers and others in The Art of the Mentally Healthy Conversation. And it worked. 

And now I’m writing it all down. So that it can work. For you.

You’re reading this because you want to know how to have a Mentally Healthy Conversation. You are going to learn how to have a Mentally Healthy Conversation so that you can find support rather than stigma, or so that you can offer support to someone else. While this feels like an intractable problem, one with a difficult-to-find solution, I want to reassure you up front that the solution is, in fact, very easy to put into practice. The hard bit is discovering how to have a Mentally Healthy Conversation. But once you know how to do it, having a Mentally Healthy Conversation is something that it is actually relatively easy to do.

What this book doesn’t do is offer therapy. I am not medically trained. I don’t suggest that I can cure or solve someone’s mental health challenges. That’s for the medically trained and it’s for medication. And that’s not me. I am very clear that what I offer here is the “Art” of having a Mentally Healthy Conversation. This is not my attempt at Science, and shouldn’t be read as such. I am not one of those pseudo-scientists who believe that they can diagnose and cure by alternative means.

This book is not about science. It’s about how to find practical support to help you manage your mental health in the workplace, at university or in school so that you can perform and be effective. And it’s about how you can be a supportive boss, tutor, teacher, colleague or friend.

So let me invite you to come on a conversational journey with me. Have a conversation with me, work with me and help me find support rather than stigma. If you can do it for me (and you can) then you can do it for yourself, and you can do it for others.

This practical, experiential approach will ensure that by the time you finish having this conversation with me, you will be able to have the same sort of conversation with others - either about you, for your benefit; or about them, for their benefit.

First, we’ll have a conversation about my mental health taking the approach that is normally taken to these conversations. By taking that route we’ll discover why it is that the outcome is so often stigma and a lack of support. Then we’ll learn how to have a Mentally Healthy Conversation. 

Chapter One - The Fisher King

Before we get to the reality of my situation, let’s lay the groundwork by talking about a film called The Fisher King. This film sets out wonderfully how we can provide support to someone with a mental health challenge.

The film has two main characters. The first is Parry, played by the great comic actor Robin Williams.

. . .

Parry is a mad vagrant in this film. He sleeps rough in the basement of a building, and probably out on the streets. He wears rags and we see him throughout the film having strange visions of a red knight on horseback, who is breathing fire. Parry is the sort of character that you, and I frankly, wouldn’t want anything to do with, because he comes across as a complete nutter.

The other character is Jack, who is played by Jeff Bridges. Jack is completely different to Parry. He’s a full-of-himself, know-it-all, Radio DJ who thinks he has all the answers. Jack is the sort of person who bounces through life like Tigger - without an apparent care in the world. He’s in the world for himself and he’s going to get as much out of it as possible. Jack lives at the top of the tree because he’s the alpha male. He’s the boss.

The film starts with Jack taking calls from the public on his radio programme. This is one of those problem call-in shows, where members of the public call in to discuss their problems on air.

The film starts with an incredible dialogue. At first it comes across as a bit of throwaway, warm-up dialogue. Merely a vehicle to introduce Jack’s character. But it is much more than that. You realise later that this dialogue represents the sort of stigma-inducing behaviour that the film was made to shine a light on.

In this dialogue, Jack and a lady caller talk about a problem she has with her husband. She explains to Jack that her husband drives her “crazy” because he “never lets me finish my sentence”. And then we see Jack mockingly interrupting every sentence she utters before telling her that someone ought to hit her over the head.

Being perfectly honest; when you don’t know what the rest of the film is about; this dialogue is funny. That is why the dialogue is clever. We don’t see what is coming, so we initially side with Jack’s comic mockery.

Jack speaks to his callers. He doesn’t listen to them. He’s not actually interested in fixing his callers’ problems. All he wants to do is to speak to them, with this kind of mocking, comic insensitivity; because in reality he just wants to use his callers as a vehicle to entertain his other listeners.

And we, the audience, might laugh at this amusing, seemingly innocuous opening scene. But, having sucked us in to being one of Jack’s entertained fans, we then move up a level of seriousness to the next caller, who is a guy called Edwin. 

. . .

Our expectation as an audience is that this film is going to be a great comic adventure with our mad Parry and the fallen alpha male Jack going on a wild goose chase in search of a Holy Grail that probably doesn’t even exist. 

But it’s not that at all. 

While it is a great comedy, it’s also deadly serious. Because as the film unfolds it turns out that Parry’s search for his Holy Grail is actually his search to get the support that he needs for his mental health problems.

I’ll come back to the film later. Because in our search for how to have a Mentally Healthy Conversation, it turns out that the solution lies with our mad Parry and a Fool. But we’ll leave The Fisher King for now, save for one final point, which is this.

I don’t want you approach this book as a reader. The reason why I introduced with this film is because I’d like to invite you to help me find my Holy Grail in just the same way that Parry invited Jack to join him in his search for his Holy Grail.

I’d like you to be my Jack. I’d like you to come on a conversational journey with me and help me find my Holy Grail - which is to get the support I need for my mental health condition. I’d like you to work through this book as if you are my boss, or my university tutor, a friend, a teacher, a colleague or fellow student. Take whichever of those roles is most appropriate to you. If you choose to do this, then please have a conversation with me through this book and learn how to provide me with support, rather than stigma.

Once you’ve worked through this experiential and practical role, I assure you that you’ll not just learn the theory of how to have a Mentally Healthy Conversation. You’ll be able to do it. You’ll be able to talk about your own mental health with others; and you’ll be able to provide support to others who talk about their mental health with you.Chapter Two

Mentally UNhealthy Conversations - Label And Story

Let’s start this conversation. This is the UNhealthy version of the conversation. You’ve chosen to be my boss, university tutor, teacher, colleague or friend. 

So, let me tell you about my mental health challenges. I’ll start with the Label for my condition. 

I have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. And, when that’s really bad, I suffer from Depression too. 

But they’re just Labels. You’re not going to be able to support me if I just give you a couple of Labels, are you? 

If you’re going to help me, I will need to tell you about the Story behind this Label. 

My Story starts with an umbilical cord. 

When you think about it - which I often do - the umbilical cord is an amazing piece of biology. Like some sort of flexible straw it provides essential nutrients from mother to baby. Each year in the UK up to a million babies are delivered. A few years ago one of them; just one in those million babies, had a faulty umbilical cord because it was on the thin side.

It was actually big enough to allow the baby to grow to a perfectly good size. At four pounds he was practically ready to be delivered. In fact, had he arrived a few weeks early, he would have been fine. But he didn’t arrive early; and the cord was just thin enough that when a small clot travelled through it, it got blocked, a bit like a pea getting stuck in a straw.

That one in a million baby is Theo. And he’s the first child that my wife and I were expecting. 

. . .

Chapter Four - Mentally UNhealthy Conversations - Impact

I now need to tell you a bit more about me. Because so far I’ve only told you about my Label and my Story. To complete the picture I need to tell you about the Impact of this on me.

And the Impact is this.

. . .

Chapter Six - Your Perspective

So let’s now start to delve into this in more detail and have a look at this from your perspective. The perspective of those listening.

First of all I gave you a Label didn’t I? But, to be fair, I could have hit you with any number of Labels. When you first sit down with someone who wants to talk about their mental health, you most likely have absolutely no idea what it is that they’re going to tell you.

So I could have told you that I am autistic, have chronic anxiety, that I’d had a bereavement, that I’m suffering from chronic stress, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, depression, obsessive compulsive disorder, dyslexia, dyspraxia, post traumatic stress disorder, bipolar disorder or loads of other conditions.

. . .

So, if you’re going to be able to support me, you’d need to know a little bit about each one of these conditions. You’d need to ask questions to understand severity. You’d need to understand, perhaps even just at a basic level, what the Impact of each condition could be on someone, at each level of severity.

Perhaps you’re getting a glimpse that this is a whole spaghetti of conditions and no-one, except perhaps the medically trained, could hope to unravel or understand that lot.

. . .

Chapter Seven - The Human Brains

I’ve already said that I’m no scientist. I’m not medically trained - I’m not a counsellor or therapist; nor a psychiatrist or psychologist. I am not going to pretend to know what is actually going on in the brain here. I make no attempt to be one of those pseudo-scientists claiming knowledge of an alternative approach. The conversational approach I propose we take to talking about mental wellbeing is not about providing an alternative to therapy or medication. It is not a cure or treatment.

This is about giving and receiving practical support. It is about finding or providing the support needed to manage mental wellbeing. 

This is why I very deliberately call this The “Art” of the Mentally Healthy Conversation. And with that qualification in play, I’m now going to give you an idea of my personal perspective about what is going on here.

. . .

Chapter Ten - Stigma

First, of course, there’s the often-mentioned stigma.

The negative language surrounding mental health is really quite extraordinary. There aren’t many words for people who are considered to be normal. Look it up. You really wont find much alternative language for “normal”. Although frankly it’s a moot point, because even if there was a whole dictionary of alternative language for “normal" you don’t actually get people going round and applying these sort of labels to people: “you’re normal”, “you’re ordinary”, “you’re typical”. But if they did, that’s about it. There aren’t many words for normal.

But then take a look at the opposite of this. I didn’t appreciate this point until I encountered mental health challenges of my own, but it turns out that there are lots of words for the opposite of normal. And they are used freely and frequently.

It doesn’t stop there. There’s more. Some of these phrases are, frankly, amusing because I discovered that I was also “one tile short of a full roof”. “The cheese had slid off my cracker.” I was “one sandwich short of a picnic”. My “lift wasn’t going to the top floor”. And, my personal favourite, I was “two fries short of a happy meal”.

. . .

CASE STUDY

Nadia - Depression, anxiety and post traumatic stress as well as dyslexia

Nadia has depression, anxiety and post traumatic stress. 

. . .

Chapter Eleven - Lack of Support

So that’s Stigma. One of the harshest and most often talked-about outcomes experienced by people who open up about their mental health. 

Next there’s the lack of support. 

Through Evenhood I’ve Coached people who have not been sent for a medical assessment, even though they’ve asked for one. I’ve seen people who have been accused of “gaming the system” simply because they’ve asked for an adjustment to help them manage their mental wellness challenge.

. . .

CASE STUDY

Jane (depression and anxiety)

As well as enduring the challenges of living with depression and anxiety, Jane worked in what she felt was a toxic environment. The toxic environment wreaked havoc on her mental health.

. . .

Chapter Twelve - Outcomes For Organisations

These poor outcomes for individuals lead to wider poor outcomes for our organisations too.

Across our organisations it is widely accepted as the case that one in four people will have a mental wellness challenge at some point each year. And one in three people will have a mental wellness challenge at some point in life. 

More working days are lost to mental health than anything else. When you ask what people think the biggest cause of workplace absence is, they will often say that it is probably musculoskeletal problems - bad backs, arthritis and other bodily aches and pains. And it is right that this is a major and significant cause of both physical pain and workplace absence.

But it’s not at all the biggest reason for workplace absence. Mental health takes that unhappy prize. 

. . .

Chapter Thirteen - The Fisher King

So this is a problem that needs a solution. As we have seen, it has poor outcomes for individuals in the form of stigma and lack of support. It also has poor outcomes for organisations; both economically and for their reputations. This has all the hallmarks of a big, difficult to solve, intractable problem.

. . .

In our journey towards a search for a solution to this problem let’s start by returning to our fictional Parry and Jack. Let’s go back to Robin Williams, and The Fisher King.

. . .

Chapter Fourteen - Mentally Healthy Conversations

So, what do we learn from this story for people who want to have a Mentally Healthy Conversation?

. . .

If you’re going to be my Jack and help me find my Holy Grail, I need you to start by doing one thing. I need to you to forget about my Label, Story & Impact. Everything I’ve told you about me so far is only here so that you can see how not to talk about your mental health, and why. 

Label, Story and Impact are actually pretty irrelevant, even a distraction, to getting support from a boss, tutor, teacher, friend or colleague. It may be totally relevant to getting support from a therapist, from a GP, a psychiatrist, psychologist or counsellor. But it’s not what you need to know in order to give me support as my boss, tutor, teacher, colleague or friend.

So. Let’s start again. Let’s start that conversation one more time and learn how we can get this right.

Chapter Fifteen - Active Listening

The first thing that we learn comes from Jack. Because Jack gets it completely wrong, doesn’t he? 

Amusingly, sometimes the greatest teachers in life are the ones that get it completely wrong. 

. . . 

So Jack gets it completely wrong with his money, advice and motivational coaching. 

When you reflect on these things - money, advice and coaching - you realise that these are the sort of tools that the bosses use aren’t they? Parry didn’t need any of these things did he? He needed to be Listened to with humanity, compassion and understanding.

Tell-mode doesn’t really work at the best of times. It certainly doesn’t work with mental wellbeing. But don’t just write Jack off as being an extreme example. Someone that none of us could ever be like in the real world.

. . .

Listening seems like the one thing to not do when it comes to helping someone. It appears to be too passive. It doesn’t appear to “give” anything. Yet this is precisely the thing that we should be doing when it comes to mental wellbeing.

. . .

Chapter Sixteen - Being Non-Judgemental

Our next lesson comes from The Fool and the one beautiful question that our wise mentor asked: “What ails you, my friend?”

“My friend", he says. To the King!

He has the audacity to call the King his friend. 

It is through this that we, the audience, discover that after all those years searching for support, the King needed help from someone who didn’t judge him. Someone with a clear mind and no expectations of what it takes to interact with a King. 

So . . . who better than a Fool. 

. . .

Chapter Seventeen - Explore The Triggers

So, once we can do this; once we can Listen, with a Non-Judgemental mind, what is it that we should be Listening to if it is not Label, Story and Impact?

The answer to this, in my view, comes from our wise mentor, The Fool, and that one beautiful question he asked the King - “What ails you, my friend?”

So he asks “What ails you?” He doesn’t ask about Label, Story and Impact. Label is just a title. Story is the emotional stuff that happened in the past. The past may make us who we are; but this takes a lot of professional working out. That’s outside the remit of those who are the boss, university tutor, teacher, friends or colleagues. Impact is the medically complex and negative consequences from that past. Again, this is the territory of professionals and not for us, as we have already seen.

The Fool knows that he can’t do anything about the past. He can’t do anything about the consequences of the past and how they impact the present. Again, this might be territory for the scientists, the medical profession or therapists. But us mere mortals - we can’t change genetics, we can’t change our past experiences, we can’t fix what is broken, physically or mentally.

Asking and exploring “what ails you?” shifts the conversation massively. Asking “what ails you?” zooms in on the one thing we can influence. We can change what is happening in the present.

In that one question the boss, tutor, teacher, friend and colleague move from incompetence to competence. 

. . .

Once you understand what ails me, you can then ask: “what makes for a good day?” “What keeps you well?” “What are your Resilient Resources?”

So. Let’s try that for me. In whatever role you have chosen to play to help me find my Holy Grail, let me explain my three Resilient Resources to you.

. . .

Chapter Twenty Four - Resilience - What Is It?

At the start of this book you read about the Tardigrade - a seemingly vulnerable, minuscule creature but which is, in fact, able to survive extremes of temperature, the vacuum of space, the depths of the sea and other challenges. The Tardigrade is a great example of physical resilience.

We now need to work on getting a better understanding of mental Resilience; because our next job is going to be to help you identify your Resilient Resources.

Let’s start by having a think about what Resilience actually is.

. . .

Let’s start with the elephant versus, say, a small bird.

The general consensus is of course in favour of the elephant when it comes Resilience. The same goes for a thick-trunked oak tree compared to a poppy, or a whale compared to a goldfish. But take the debate a little further and explore what happens to an elephant versus a bird in a drought, an oak tree versus a poppy in a storm or a whale versus a goldfish facing a harpoon and then definitions of Resilience become less clear.

. . .

I’d like to offer a route through all of this lack of clarity.

Let’s approach the subject of Resilience from a different direction. It’s such a nebulous concept that we need to apply a more meaningful and measurable word to it.

. . .

Chapter Twenty Five - Discovering Your Resilient Resources

Tool #1 - Raising Awareness of Triggers and Resilient Resources

The single most common question I am asked when I talk or train on the subject of The Art of the Mentally Healthy Conversation is this: “how do I discover my Resilient Resources?” People hear me talk about Mentally UNhealthy Conversations and they hear me talk about The Art of the Mentally Healthy Conversation and they see that it works. They get excited and energised by it.

Then there’s a pause when people realise that for this to work for them, they have to identify their own Resilient Resources. It’s all very well and good for me to tell people how to have a Mentally Healthy Conversation. But this isn’t going to work for those who listen to my Story unless through some major coincidence they have the same Triggers and Resilient Resources as me. They need to find their own Resilient Resources for this to work for them. You need to find your own Resilient Resources for this to work for you.

So the big question that comes then is this: “How do I find my Resilient Resources?”

I love this question - because it is usually asked with such enthusiasm and desire. Like the audience has completely “got” my point. All they need to know now is how to discover their own Resilient Resources so that they can have the conversation for themselves with their bosses, teachers, tutors, friends or colleagues.

There is work to do here to discover your Resilient Resources. 

. . .

For now, let’s take a look at how you can find your Resilient Resources. Here’s the first of three Tools that I will be introducing you to. It’s a tool to help Raise Awareness of Triggers and Resilient Resources. It has four steps that you’ll see labelled.

The Tool is available to download from the evenhood.org website. By way of license you may photocopy and use the Tool as much as you like as long as the page is photocopied and distributed in its entirety.

The exercise we are now going to embark upon is something that you can do for yourself or you can do it conversationally with someone else to offer them support. If you’re a manager, leader, tutor or teacher you can use this approach to help an employee, student or pupil to find their Resilient Resources.

. . .

Chapter Twenty Six -Exploring Your Brains’ Influence On Your Triggers And Resilient Resources

Some people want to understand why it is that they respond in a particular way to certain situations. Some would also like to work on modifying their response to those situations. For others, this isn’t important - they just want to know what situations are bad for them so they can avoid them as much as possible and what situations are good for them so that they can remain in them as much as possible.

I don’t have a view on this. As a Coach, if a client wants to come up with a good, well thought-through list of Triggers and Resilient Resources so that they can have a Mentally Healthy Conversation with a boss, tutor or teacher, then that’s perfect; especially if it leads to them getting the support they need to avoid their Triggers and get more of their Resilient Resources.

If they are curious about their list and want to explore it further, either to just understand themselves better or to start to make modifications; that’s great too.

Steps Two and Three are about how to dig a little deeper by taking a look at how your brains are responding in each situation.

. . .

Chapter Twenty Eight - How To Have A Wellbeing Conversation

Tool #2 - Wellbeing Conversations

One particular challenge in taking a self-monitoring approach is that it can be difficult to dispassionately explore the conflicts between your own Instincts, Experiences, Logical thinking and Values.

So what we’re going to do now is explore how you can have a good Wellbeing Conversation with someone else. This chapter is something you could invite someone else to read so that they can support you. Or you can read it so that you can offer support to others.

. . .

Below I’m going to introduce you to a Tool to support people who want to have a Wellbeing Conversation. The Tool is available to download from the evenhood.org website. By way of license you may photocopy and use the Tool as much as you like as long as the page is photocopied and distributed in its entirety.Chapter Twenty Nine

Anchoring Yourself In Your Resilient Resources

Once you have been on this journey and discovered your Resilient Resources the next stage is to anchor yourself in those Resilient Resources. 

This means that you need to keep them with you. All of the time.

. . .

Resilient Resources are like a food. They are not optional, or occasional. They are a daily food that need to be in place to ensure that you remain able to manage your Wellbeing.

. . .

Chapter Thirty - Creating A Culture Of Mutual Support For Wellbeing

What I’d REALLY love to see, across all organisations, social groups, families and so on is for people to offer each other Mutual Support for Wellbeing by regularly having Mentally Healthy Conversations.

Let me explain first what I mean by a “Culture of Mutual Support for Wellbeing”.

. . .

My desire now is to help organisations build a Culture of Mutual Support for Wellbeing - where staff, students and pupils can support each other by having Mentally Healthy Conversations.

That is why everything in this book is an Art and not a Science. What I mean is that it is something that you can all do, with practice and desire.

Having a Mentally Healthy Conversation isn’t a science. With humanity, compassion and understanding; anyone can do it. With practice and desire; anyone can do it.

Where you have something that ANYONE can do, you have something that EVERYONE can do. And once everyone can do something, it has the ability to become part of a culture.

. . .

PART FOUR

Frequently Asked Questions

In the next section I’ve set out the opinions I have offered in reply to questions I’ve been asked following a speech or during Training sessions. These issues also commonly come up in coaching sessions.

It’s important to emphasise that my replies are just my personal opinions. They are not factual. They are not researched. They are not necessarily the “right” answers. 

They are the right answers for me and I offer them so that you can think about what the right answers for you are.

Chapter Thirty Two - Frequently Asked Question #1

Social Media

“Does Social Media contribute to good or poor mental wellbeing?”

. . .

Chapter Thirty Three - Frequently Asked Question #2

Challenging Environments - Workplace, University And School

“Why is the workplace / university / school such a challenging environment?”

. . .

Chapter Thirty Four - Frequently Asked Question #3

Who To Talk To

“Who’s the best sort of person to speak to about my mental wellbeing?”

. . .

Chapter Thirty Five - Frequently Asked Question #4

Parents

“What can I do for my son / daughter?”

. . .

Chapter Thirty Six - Frequently Asked Question #5

Spotting The Signs

“How do I spot the signs of poor mental health in my team-members / students / pupils?”

. . .

Chapter Thirty Seven - Frequently Asked Question #6

Finding The Time

“How do I find the time to support my staff / students / pupils with their mental wellbeing?”

. . .

Chapter Thirty Eight - Frequently Asked Question #7

Creating The Environment

“How do we create the right environment and culture to encourage our staff / students / pupils to talk about mental wellbeing?”

I have four tips to help you create a Culture of Mutual Support for Wellbeing.

. . .

Chapter Thirty Nine -Frequently Asked Question #8

Suicide And Self Harm

“What should I do if I think someone is at risk of suicide or self-harm?”

. . .

Chapter Forty - Closing Remarks

I do hope that this book has helped you in whatever role you have and in whatever part of your journey in life you are at.

I also hope that you have found something to focus on that is positive and useful for you; and that is positive and useful for the people that you come across in your life.

I am constantly learning myself, so if you have any thoughts or suggestions, a story to share or a challenge to conquer, feel free to get in touch with me through the Evenhood website or by email to jonathan@evenhood.org.

I wish you all the very best.

Jonathan