so I wonder if everybody here realizes
that they have the ability to save
someone’s life I don’t mean by doing
something spectacular light CPR or
applying a bandage or a torn okay but
something far more fundamental something
you will do every day never probably
give any thought to what so ever and
that’s just communication but beyond
that listening and that’s what I want to
talk about today maybe we can start a
whole new campaign today that you can
take away with you go just listen so
within recent times there have been a
whole load of campaigns that have
focused on supporting people with mental
health problems bringing stigma tackling
stigma bringing all this out into the
sort of open time to talk was being a
great one and that rattles on every year
there’s been a another day recently
that’s focused on that the young royals
here looking rather resplendent in their
royal headbands on heads together which
again is helping tackle those stigma who
are so hopefully bringing it to another
demographic and making it more awareness
about mental health problems so having
grown up in a fairly dysfunctional
family I think they’re be fair to say
that this sort of scales of mental
health run quite deep and I’d we all
find ways of coping and making our way
through that sort of journey I guess
mine was forming some fairly destructive
relationships and often drinking far too
much and developing what I’d like to
perceive as a sort of rhinoceros like
exterior which I thought kept me fairly
safe meant that I didn’t feel anything
always affected by anybody but also men
that I didn’t get any close to anybody
at all which is not great in the way of
forming good relationships I think it
when we think about sort of mental
health and it’s and the environments
that you grow up in we could easily get
into the debate as to whether its
environmental genetics and I think both
have a major factor and really I
probably a hold of a total waiting to be
done so if anybody out there is wanting
to pick that up and run with it please
do so from this amazingly cute little
boy here
as a cup through to the slightly wizened
old chap standing in front of you and
without making light of it I can see why
I was depressed in my early 20s in the
1970s with that haircut and the and the
and the color of the curtains behind but
hey we all have bad hair do’s in the 70s
but I guess my turn a journey through
recovery and and coping with mental
health problems particularly depression
obsessive behavior was in my late
twenties entering into a whole raft of
talking therapies taking some fairly
high doses of antidepressants and
antipsychotics which enabled me to cope
hold down jobs but left me fairly numb
and a little bit blunted I suppose but
would also occur to me at that time as
well that there was another way out and
at the time that seemed like a fairly
good solution and that was suicide
thankfully I didn’t take that route but
I’ve talked to many people that have
considered it and have seriously
considered it and people often say
always suicides a bit of a coward’s way
out and I don’t believe that because I
think it takes a heck of a lot of
courage but what stops people it made
people say oh well you know religion my
partner my pets there’s always lots of
good reasons why you wouldn’t but I
think if you’re pretty serious about it
and you’ve you’ve gotta focus you know
that is a way out and you will do it and
it doesn’t necessarily become so much of
a case of if but when I think also it’s
worth thinking about that when for the
gladly i do gladly think about myself as
a sufferer but survivor now but the
mental health affects those around us as
well and certainly those who are closest
to us and i was and still am very
fortunate to being supported by an
amazing wife who who kept me going kept
me in therapy and keeping support and
cajoling and hardly with me and probably
sitting down and crying with me and
pushing me but more than that supporting
and listening to me and i think like so
many men i just didn’t talk about these
sort of things i wanted to be brave and
when we think about mental health in
sort of wider context we often focus on
the sort of the wider the community the
world figures that are often bandied
around one hundred and six billion per
year across the UK economy one here
looking 18 billion pounds work days and
then we sort of have the sort of wider
concept of people with prejudice and
fears about people who are out in the
community with mental health problems
what danger they might be and then this
wonderful image that the media just
loves to use continually the head in the
hands as though as though that’s what
mental have supposed to be like I don’t
think it is but it it seems to be very
popular what we probably all know now or
certainly are becoming far more aware of
and with some other great campaigns as
well is that suicide is the single
biggest killer of men under the age 45
which I find quite frightening and now
past that 45 will buy a long stretch but
the in UK in 2015 and those are the most
recent figures I could get hold of there
were six thousand 188 suicides and of
those seventy-six percent were men which
is just over two hours a day but I can
only find that slide but that’s 12 a day
too many and if we just think even the
numbers in this room if we look to that
by days minutes per year there’s that
would soon wipe out a good chunk of the
audience so it’s it’s something that I
really think we’ve got to put a lot more
working a lot more energy and a lot more
devotion to duty to try and change that
and I think we can all do it so for the
past 20 years as my introduction said
I’ve been involved with a local
organization and I’ll talk to you a
little bit more up a minute but I’ve
also run a counselling and psychotherapy
practice and over that period of time
I’ve seen a lot of people and not sure
how many I’ve never counted them all
what I do know is that surprisingly we
know that men don’t talk about their
feelings very generally but over two
thirds of my clients have been men which
I’m quite surprised by I know whether
that’s because they think are collude
with em or or perhaps not challenge them
or maybe they just didn’t ask
me and that’s easy for them but general
I have to disprove those miss that I
will in fact challenge them but
hopefully listen to them and give them
the space to tell their story and
hopefully move them back into a better
place as a as a society what we seem to
continue to do is to raise boys
particularly with this sort of
unrealistic expectation about what they
might achieve what they would do what
sort of place they will eventually
inherit in his earth but and always sort
of like telling him to be strong all the
time to be brave to be courageous and I
we probably all seen it and sadly I
daresay some of us have done it in I was
walking through a shopping center the
other dance or a parent down on their
hands and knees talking to their little
boy trying to console him he was sobbing
his eyes out and telling him to be brave
be strong be this brave little soldier
don’t cry and the only message we’re
giving there is it’s not okay to display
emotions the only way that that
unfortunately men often display emotion
is is through violence and that’s not a
particularly productive process and then
when as boys grow into young men the the
whole sort of macaronis competitiveness
develops further and further where
typically i think if we see a group of
men together sorry men in the audience
and I guess I form part of this as well
is that there’s often in a sort of
stereotypical one-upmanship behavior
about being that much I know faster
stronger how far I rode my bicycle at
the weekend how fast I did it and the
size of the engine in my new car even
how many meetings I’ve got tomorrow I’ve
heard all these things it’s quite
amazing that we really can focus on that
and then when you then run that
competitiveness into a relationship you
tend to come up crash and because
there’s not a lot of room for that in a
relationship and sadly if the outcome of
that ends up being separation or divorce
that can be pretty disastrous and it can
be disastrous for anybody but for a male
who is particularly emotionally
repressed
his partner was the only person that he
would open up those feelings to and
display that emotion take that away and
sadly again suicide can be an outcome
and a couple of years ago our recent
time certainly I I joined a male choir
which some may think is not a
particularly masculine thing to do which
is surprising really because most men go
to foot matches and they seem quite
happily the terraces but yes I I joined
a male choir which was a for me was an
amazing thing to do because I never
realized quite how good singing was for
your mental health and there’s now lots
of brilliant research out there to tell
you about that and but you can be part
of that group you can be an individual
you can be a soloist you can be quietly
in the background and there’s not that
general competitiveness that we often
see within this social setting this male
group I mean there is a little bit of
banter it’s fair to say between the
baritones and the basis but then the
baritones are somewhat better I’ll leave
it to you to decide what I sing so a
dimension for the last 20 years I’ve
been involved with this what I believe
is amazing organization oakleaf
enterprise which is based in Guildford
and we do I think some pretty great work
we currently work with about 250 adults
every week and we are about sixty
percent of men so that it’s a reasonable
split and we offer all sorts of
activities yoga tai chi Pilates
mindfulness currently riding the wave
mindful coloring and other such things
and be counseling of course forms a very
big part but what we also do is we
provide people space and the opportunity
to perhaps feel confident develop that
confidence and and–but build that with
them but enable them to be heard to be
listened to and that and that again is
just such an important factor and
something that I I guess I hadn’t really
appreciated it if I started to think
about this talk was that over the time
that Oh cliff has really been running
which is pretty much the length of time
that I’ve been there
never had one person that has committed
suicide why they’ve been attending
Oakley and I know that we’ve worked with
thousands of people and that’s something
that I’m incredibly proud of and
credibly proud of all the staff and
volunteers that support us to enable
that not to happen in this case and I
think when we when we think about
suicide there’s this sort of myth that
if you talk to somebody who is suicidal
you’re more likely to get them to do it
and I think that is just a myth and it
needs to be squashed straightaway and
I’m fortunately I think it’s been
perpetuated by people that perhaps are
are scared to engage with somebody
emotionally to listen to that their
deepest fears but then they have to
listen to their own fears but to be able
just to listen to somebody and I think
we can all do that and he’s incumbent on
all of us not just to learn basic first
aid which is a great tool to be able to
have but to be able to truly listen and
to be able to to get alongside somebody
and accept them for who they are but we
need to create that environment to do
that and I think we can all do it it’s
entirely possible it’s not it’s not that
difficult I know for some people
listening to somebody else is more of a
challenge and I’ll leave you to look at
one another in the audience but and we I
guess we all know that person when we
say oie Ivan I really hurt my army up
there oh I hurt my arm so much worse
than yours or are I’ve got a headache I
had a headache worse than yours the
other day we know those people were even
they can learn it’s possible we can all
do it so one of the that sort of this
whole idea of speaking out and being
able to listen and change perception one
of the things that struck me recently
from this fine magazine that gets
dropped through my door every month and
the psychologist from the British
Psychological Society there has been a
recent spate of letters from clinical
psychologists which is really quite
surprising because they’re talking about
their own mental health problems and
that that’s really never happened before
p that this whether I include myself in
that professional I think I probably due
to speak out and talk about this is just
unheard of
and it’s quite radical and there was
unfortunately there was a letter that
they’re also struck me the other day I
just like to read you a tiny excerpt
there and it said that whilst i’m sure
that publishing coming out narratives
takes great moral courage i find it
difficult to believe that anyone
benefits except the narrator and
possibly have a professional suffering
from the condition my life is a little
bit surprised when i read that and i
think it’s fair to say that I entirely
disagree with that sentiment and think
that that that’s not really what we
should be focusing on if people are
willing to talk out then we willing to
speak out then we need to provide them
with that environment that they can do
and to say that we’re ready to listen
and I’d really like you all to perhaps
go away from here and to join me in this
quest because we can all save lives and
I think you can do that as well by by
listening to people and the one other
little quote that jumped out of me when
I was thought thinking about this was
from the philosopher jiddu krishnamurti
and he said that the ability to observe
without evaluating is the highest form
of intelligence so you can all be
incredibly intelligent you just need to
listen without judgement and I think
that’s something that we could all do so
hopefully you will help me thank you very much