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In this episode, we explore how a small change of just two words can save a life…

One of the themes that’s been highlighted by the current pandemic is that mental-health can no longer be ignored. The usual life-events - marriage, children, leaving home, unexpected illness or injury, strife at home or at work, finding a job, losing a job, all those kinds of things - well, they’re all challenging enough in their own ways. All of those challenges impact on mental-health - which in turn can have huge knock-on effects on physical-health, emotional-health, social-health and more.

That’s hard enough for us as individuals. But when an entire industry shuts down, or the entire country needs to go into lockdown to deal with a deadly disease - well, by definition that’s going to be challenging for just about everyone, all at the same time. And issues like mental-health can’t be so easily swept under the carpet any more. In short, we need to change how we look at mental-health - and really look at it, and at what we can do about it, rather than pretend that it doesn’t exist.

It’s always been there: that’s the point.

It’s always been ignored, as much as possible: that’s also the point. Too big; too scary; can’t face it. So won’t face it.

Which generally means that, just as with any other unacknowledged and untreated illness, it just gets worse. Until it, uh, can’t get any worse, in a rather final way.

Not A Good Idea…

So what can we do about it?

Short-answer: start small.

Small changes. To create space for bigger changes.

Small changes: sometimes just two words, like this, that can literally save a life.

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As with physical-health, mental-health can take on an almost infinite array of forms. Some forms, though, are a lot more common than others - and for mental-health, perhaps the most common everyday example is depression.

There are a huge range of causes for depression. For some people, such as those with bipolar disorder, it’s what would classically be called a ‘lifelong condition’, primarily driven by physiology and the like. But it can also be driven by internal factors, such as self-doubt and other challenges in learning new skills and competencies; by external factors, such as clashes with colleagues, context and more; or a combination of both internal and external, such as aloneness and isolation.

There are a lot of other drivers, of course: type of work is another example. Some contexts such as comedy are notorious for depression; supposedly ‘smart’ people seem particularly susceptible; and wherever creativity and innovation are required, intense self-doubt is all-but-inevitable as an industry-wide occupational hazard.

But the reality is that just about anyone can fall into depression - which in turn can affect just about everyone around them.

The real problem here is that unless that depression is properly addressed, it can quickly become self-confirming, self-sustaining. It gets into a loop, blocking out all view of anything other than itself, blocking out all hope, all joy, leaving only a crushing sense of loss and sadness: hiraeth, fado, ‘the blues’.

The ‘downer’.

Whatever the reason, though, it’s all too easy to get depressed.

And then depressed about being depressed.

And depressed about being depressed about being depressed.

And that’s when there’s a real risk of spiralling down into the darkness…

And down in the darkness, there’s one phrase that can arise, a phrase that can quickly become lethal, not just to hope, but to life itself:

— “I don’t want to live any more”.

That’s not a phrase that we can ignore. Not ever.

Yet there’s one simple, powerful action that anyone can use in this situation, for others, or for ourselves. It’s an action that subtly breaks the downward-spiral, and moves it immediately into a much more positive direction.

All we need to do is, first, acknowledge and respect the hurt and pain behind that phrase. And then make one small change, to add two words into that phrase:

— “I don’t want to live like this any more”.

‘Like this’. That’s the truth here. That’s the point.

“I don’t want to live any more” - that’s definitely a dangerous phrase. Letting that phrase get into a loop is most definitely Not A Good Idea…

But “I don’t want to live like this any more” - well, letting that phrase get into a loop probably is a Good Idea. It acknowledges the need for change; the possibility of change; the hopefulness of change. And with each small change, each time round the loop, it creates the space for more change, and then more, and more, reaching towards the larger changes that make so much worthwhile difference in so many people’s lives.

So when things go downward towards the dark, start small.

Just small changes, at first.

Like this.