Useful sources of reference and inspiration congregate here.
Videos
Jim Carey - Depression and Choose Love
Jim Ferrell - Why we cause ourselves problems
TED - Dixon Chibanda - Why I train grandmothers to treat depression
TED - Elyn Saks - A tale of mental illness from the inside
TED - Robert Waldinger - What makes a good life?
TED - Eleanor Longden - The voices in my head?
TED - Simon Sinek - Why good leaders make you feel safe
RSA Animate - The Secret Powers of Time
RSA Animate - Dan Pink - Drive: The surprising truth about what motivates us
Will Smith - There's no reason to have a Plan B because it distracts from Plan A
Man Up
Black Dog
Why we sleep - Matthew Walker
2014 Montane Lakeland 50
Investing in a Resilient Generation
Books
What other books are you reading at the moment?
These are some of the other books I'm reading at the moment that I'll add into their own sections shortly.
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Life Hurts - Dr Lizzie McNaught -
Soulshaping - Jeff Brown -
The Education of Little Tree - Forrest Carter -
Leadership & Self Deception - The Arbinger Institute -
The Story of the Human Body - Daniel Lieberman -
Antifragile - Nassim Nicholas Taleb
Why We Sleep - Matthew Walker
Not surprisingly this has spent so long on the bestsellers lists and been such a success. It was recomended to me and I now reference it in all my training courses and at every opportunity. Everything you need to know about the wonder drug that is sleep. A must read.
Stand Tall Little Girl - Hope Virgo
Such a wonderfully written story of Hope's battle with anorexia and how she came through the worst of it. The first half gives great detail around how Hope deteriorated and (potentially triggering for some) gives information around how she managed to deceive everyone who cared for her for so long. The second half is around her recovery, relapse, and the start of the journey to mental health advocacy that she is doing such great work in.
The Five Love Languages - Gary Chapman
If you don't know yours and that of your loved one then you should. This little book will give you everything you need to know to be able to understand the potentially different languages being spoken in your relationship and how to work around it without speaking more oudly and slowly in a vain attempt to be understood! Recommended to me by a trusted therapist of mine.
Curious - Ian Leslie
I heard Ian speak at a conference several years ago about this book and immediately bought it on Kindle and read it almost instantly. Such a great book about what is curiosity and how it manifests, how it can be developed, and how important it is for our mental health. I've since bought several copies as gifts for people.
Hostage at the Table - George Kohlrieser
What a great book from this US hostage negotiator turned business advisor about how we hold ourselves and others hostage all the time and the tools and techniques we can employ to get ourselves and others out of those traps.
The Happiness Equation - Manfred Kets de Vries
I've read this a couple of times and given copies to many people. This professor at INSEAD buisness school writes beautifully about all the aspects of happiness and helps us to understand we can't have happiness without struggle and sadness.
The Happiness Trap - Russ Harris
This classic text was recomended to me by a clinical psycholgist. It works you through the theory and practical techniques of Acceptance Commitment Theory to help you to accept the things that have happened to you in your life, and to accept them.
The Courage to be Me - Dr Nina Burrowes
This little book self illustrated and written by Dr Burrowes was aso recommended to me by my trauma therapist; it is a wonderful companion to any work you might be doing on yourself and your values, and what these should mean to you.
Trauma is really strange - Steve Haines
This is a small graphic novel format including everything you need to know about living with trauma. This was surprisingly not recommended for me but what was especially interesting was that my therapist was waiting for me to discover it for myself. It took almost 18 months into therapy for me to find it and when I did she was really pleased that I had, that I was ready for it, and it opened up another avenue in our work.
mBraining - Soosalu & Oka
An academic work, a self help book, a manual all combined into one excellent text giving details of our three nurologically connected brains; head (creative), heart (compassion), and gut (courage), and how they work in coherence with each other, or don't and what to notice. A great and accessible book around somatic working.
Quiet - Susan Cain
The seminal work on introvertedness and all its forms, for those who need quiet read this, and if you don't still read it.
Outliers - Malcolm Gladwell
The classic work explaining how people have found success, exceedingly well written and insightful. Many of the examples will have you quoting them to freinds and family for years to come, I have anyway.
Behavioural Science for Business Health and Self - Bob Cummins
Bob is a fascinating man to watch on stage and to listen to. A great and enquiring mind working with applied behavioural science. A wonderful text and manual to help you get the best out of people using the relative simplicity of behavioural science, or at least relatively simple in concept.
Intelligence in the Flesh - Guy Claxton
The first Somatic text I read, very accessible and thorough in its discussion around why our mind needs our body more than it thinks it does. Best read alongside mBraining.
Rabbit and Bear books by Julian Gough and Jim Field
These are simply genius books for children and adults alike. Great somatic coaching books that touch the essence of self awareness as Bear helps Rabbit in many ways.
..absolutely everything by Irvin D. Yalom
Irvin Yalom has written some of the best series of books about psychotherapy you can get hold of. Essential reading on many therapy courses Yalom writes beautifully and shows the human side of being a therapist. (Even Existential Psychotherapy which is a hefty tome!!)
Inside the Leaders Mind - Liz Mellon
This was a text used on one of our leadership courses managed by Duke. It is a wonderful take on what is leadership in the modern world using case studies and interviews with some of the business greats. I think my copy is signed by the author!
Team of Teams - General Stanley McChrystal
How what we learnt in the changing landscape of war can teach us how better to manage teams in large corporates to enable the agility needed to survive in the modern corporate world.
The Hidden Messages in Water - Masaru Emoto
Emoto gives striking evidence of the impact of positive and negative words on the structure of water, given we are made up predominently of water this gives a powerful insight and asks important questions about the impact our words can have on each other.
Find your Why - Simon Sinek
A fabulous manual from Sinek on how to go about finding your purpose and that of your team and those around you. Well worth a read. Not the only way of course, but it's a great start.
The Untethered Soul - Michael A Singer
Wonderful insights, especially regarding our inner voice and our triggers. You wouldn't listen to your drunk housemate at 3am so why do we listen to our inner voice when it's rambling away at us at 3am?
Man’s Search for Meaning - Viktor Frankl
A classic that everyone should read, not just because it reminds us of one of the worst times in recent human history which is slowly being dropped from school lessons, but also because of its fundamental insights into human purpose and meaning. Not an easy read because of the distressing content.
Children Learn what they Live - Dorothy Nolte and Rachel Harris
Whether or not you have children this is an important text around interactions with people and the reaction that children and others have to the behaviours we show.
Pocket Guide to Interpersonal Neurobiology
Not a page turner in any sense and not to be read cover to cover but a fabulous reference text for those heavily interested in pyschology and psychological interventions.
Films & Documentaries
The Work
Dead Poets Society
Collateral Beauty
HyperNormalisation
Rent the Musical
Websites and Apps
Complex PTSD
The foremost and best resourced place Ive found for information on C-PTSD.
WildRites - Vision Quest and Rites of Passage
I completed my Vision Quest with Jon and Alex at WildRites in May 2018, it was the most incredible and life changing experience. Not a first step in your journey but it will come at the right time for you whenever you feel it is right.
Transcendental Meditation
I was taught by Liz Court in March 2016 just as I was going through some really tough times, the tough times continued but were made significantly easier to bear with a regular TM practice. TM is an essential component of the lives of many thousands of people including hundreds of Hollywood A-listers including Clint Eastwood, Hugh Jackman, and Cameron Diaz, and it was in her book that I discovered it and felt it might work for me so I found an amazing teacher and signed up. I still practice regularly (if not always for my two 20 minutes sessions each day - sorry Liz!).
Somatic Trauma Therapy - Babette Rothschild
In the early days of my therapy work I was pointed in the direction of Babette's work on trauma so I downloaded her talks and studied her work. Powerful and helpful in so many ways at that time for me to help understand trauma and dissociation.
Spiral Dynamics (Values Level Thinking / Graves' Values Systems)
Mental Health Apps
Poetry
If - Rudyard Kipling
Socks - Elly Lloyd
if only I had the right socks
Remember - Christina Rossetti
Numbness - Rupi Kaur
i hardened under the last loss. it took something
This Be The Verse - Philip Larkin
Split - Nayyirah Waheed
you can not
Speaking
Breakfast Panel - Surviving or Thriving - Eton Bridge Partners event
In May 2018 I was honoured to be asked to talk on a wonderful panel to a room of HR professionals about mental health and wellbeing in the work envionment. The white paper can be accessed here: