Why my FOUR brains play havoc with my mental health.

Although I frequently give speeches, training and coaching on mental health I repeatedly make it clear that I’m no scientist. I’m not medically trained — I’m not a counsellor or therapist; nor a psychiatrist or psychologist. I don’t pretend to know what is actually going on in the brain.

My work is all about helping people have more effective conversations about their mental wellbeing and resilience; so that they stand the best chance of getting support (rather than stigma). This 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 refer to my work as being about 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.

To underline my non-scientific approach; let’s do that with a plate of cakes.

When I train people in The Art of the Mentally Healthy Conversation I’ll pop a box of cakes at the front of the room. They look all delicious and inviting. With things usually kicking off in the morning, most people have rushed to work, university or school having had an inadequate breakfast and are in need of a bit of caffeine and sugar. So this is a particularly inviting move.

It’s also a touch cruel, because the purpose of the cakes is not to feed and sustain. It’s to illustrate a point about how I characterise our brains…

Related posts:

This week I was back to class and I am now blessed with a mountain of readings I have to do at the time of writing. This week was good in continuing prototyping with the glasses. Chris and I made the…

At the intersection of finance and technology lies a phenomenon that has been reshaping the world of money. The rise of the internet has brought about a high degree of disruption to almost all…

There is no end to the gossips, doing the round, much beyond the school grounds. The mind-boggling questions whether Google changed something or was it merely an algorithm update leads to infinite…