The late, great Robin Williams usually had the right words for just about any situation. I wrote down some years ago what he said about mental health:
“Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind. Always.”
In my black and white world, that’s not always as easy as it sounds, but I try. A few weeks ago at our food bank, a caller with infinitely worse mental health problems than me became very angry as I tried to help him. I’ve always volunteered my services to deal with him when he comes in, but this time my presence served not to pacify him, but to further disturb him. He said some pretty unpleasant things to me, but Williams’ words came back to me and I just sucked it up. And later, when I had time to think about it, I knew I had reacted in the right way. I don’t usually back down when I think, when I believe I’m certain, I’m in the right, but there comes a time, right?
I have no idea whether the Williams quote is accurate or not. Everyone is fighting a battle? I’ll never know because I know plenty of people who find life so easy to navigate. But do they? Who is to say that the most confident man and woman in the room doesn’t have their own demons? The outward swagger could easily be a bluff. Who knows what goes on behind closed doors. I must do better.
On World Mental Health Day, an event so far ignored by Rishi Sunak who is far too busy posing for photos with the England football team but, wonderfully, remembered by Prince William and Kate Middleton who are out and about doing stuff to support it, it’s more important than ever to be kind, even those to whom you might prefer to be nasty.
While scrolling through X, formerly known as Twitter, I found some very helpful advice from Simon’s Cat. Here it is:
In fact, the advice is a rather good design for life for those of us several sandwiches short of a picnic. At various times, I try, not always successfully, to carry out what the cat says. Today – and this is a very moot point – I decided to do something I’m good at; writing. And lots of it.
The moot point is that writing is one of the things I love to do, something I need to do. Whether I am any good at it is in the eye of the beholder and I promise that this is not me angling, somewhat pathetically, for compliments. I know that technically my work is more than slightly flawed, writing as I do by sense of feel rather than knowing, as I really should, the laws of grammar, but I’d like to think someone somewhere gets something – anything – out of a blog. If I was really, really good, you would probably be reading my work in a publication paying me vast sums of cash, but as it is you get me for free or, if you are feeling particularly benevolent, for a cup of coffee.
I knew what today was and determined that today I would write and write and write, as well as prepare my thoughts for that difficult second book and to that end this has been a successful World Mental Health Day.
Some of Simon’s advice just isn’t cutting it. though. I’ve been relatively inactive because my mood is lower than it has been for a few days and the old adage that exercise is good for mental health falls down when you aren’t well enough to take any. I don’t need help today, but I am talking about things in the most general sense and I hope that meets with Simon’s wise cat’ approval.
World Mental Health Day is here today and gone tomorrow. It always is. For many people it’s a reminder that mental health is important but for others, like senior politicians who run the country and have run mental health services to near extinction, it’s a day to ignore and forget and hope no one notices. Given how the media works in our country, it’s very easy to miss days like today.
Finally, sometimes someone comes up with something so clever you sit and shake your head at the power, yet the sheer simplicity, of it. Today, that someone is Norwich City Football Club who have produced a video called Check in on those around you. It drew me in, took me in one direction and then ended up with me in another because it reaffirms the words of Robin Williams. Watch it and you will see what I mean and if you agree with me, then share the actual hell out of it.
