Suppose There’s a way To find meaning Even as the world ends Suppose We let the sun warm Our tired faces Even as our carefully constructed world Falls apart around us Look up The sky is clear No longer scarred by our comings and goings Suppose We can find a new way of living Despite [...]
We all know that one of the common and nasty side effects of struggling with a mental illness is the tendency to believe ourselves to be unworthy. Unworthy of love, unworthy of opportunities, unworthy of happiness. And a common side effect of those feelings of unworthiness is the tendency to make ourselves smaller. To attempt, [...]
In the last post, Rachel talked about her experience of panic disorder and accepting the reality of living with it. In this post, I explore some strategies that can support you to manage panic attacks. Panic attacks are terrifying things. When you first experience them it is impossible to know what is happening and it [...]
It often feels like mental illness robs us of so much. On the bad days, finding any sort of joy in life can seem completely impossible - futile, in fact. But this is why it's important to find and acknowledge the joy in good days - even the tiniest joys - so that we can [...]
This post is an updated version of a post I wrote a while ago about Emotional Honesty. It's something I think is incredibly important for any positive conversation, action or reflection on mental health. In the past, when the symptoms of anxiety, depression or panic disorder would start to rear their ugly heads, I would [...]
“Yes, the night has dark bits, but it has stars too, And you’ll feel when they shine, That they shine just for you, You will step outside and see from the park, That the light is brighter when it’s next to the dark. You will have so many great times ahead, And soft happy dreams [...]
This week was Mental Health Awareness Week and all week I've been wanting and meaning to write something to share with you, my lovely readers. But I've had a funny mental health week and have just not quite been in the right frame of mind. I've felt edgy, restless and anxious, as if something is [...]
I have started writing this post several times and don't quite know how to say what I want to say. I have heard and seen too many stories of people struggling with their mental health and not being able to find a way out; too many stories of people for whom the only escape they [...]
Today is International Happiness Day. I have been thinking a lot about happiness recently; I think I am generally a happy sort of person. I have a wonderful life and there are many things in my everyday that make me very happy indeed. I also sometimes feel profoundly unhappy, for no discernible reason, and subsequently [...]
Yesterday, I walked in the spring sunshine with snow swirling round me on a wintry wind. I watched my spaniel companion try to catch snowflakes in her mouth and leap amongst the tussocks with sheer joy and abandon. I had taken my kindle with me because I was so engrossed in my current read (A [...]
Thrive In Chaos 