Real Mental Health

I wrote the piece below as part of a wider programme of talks and mindfulness sessions I'm delivering for a third sector client. On writing it I felt this was worth sharing with a wider public because it gets to the heart of something I feel we have got profoundly wrong in our society, and may perhaps stimulate some of you not only to reflect on your own true degree of wellbeing, but also what we must do to change things to that our society can become a place where true,m positive, and deep mental wellbeing is the norm.

Before Covid I was doing live mindfulness events up and down the country, occasionally in other countries, to all sorts of people. These groups would include people with dementia, corporate leaders, murderers and sex offenders in prison, doctors, nurses, carers, people who were suffering depression, and every other sort of individual you can imagine.

Regardless of the situation the people I taught were in, the most common snippet of conversation after I guided them in a mindfulness meditation went as follows:

“So, what did you feel when we were doing the meditation?”

“Relaxed. Peaceful.”

“And how often do you usually experience feeling peaceful.”

“Never.”

Or

“Hardly ever.”

I think this is a tragedy of huge proportions, little noticed, rarely commented on in our media. Not to feel at peace ought to be a worrying signal. Yet today it is so prevalent that it is actually feeling at peace that is the exception. We are way out of kilter, far from true mental health.

True mental health is to be at peace with oneself, situations, community, society, and the wider world as a whole, regardless of circumstances. We have a long way to go.