World Mental Health Day

Yesterday was World Mental Health Day and I was invited to attend a performance of a play addressing the issue of mental health called Cancel the Sunshine at Bloomberg’s offices on Finsbury Square, London.

The piece was extremely powerful, hard hitting and very well performed. The discussion with a panel and the audience afterwards was no less powerful and very sensitively chaired by Paul Anderson-Walsh from the Centre for Inclusive Leadership.

One aspect that struck me was the sense of presence in the room – a real sense that everyone in the room who contributed did so from a place of openness, sharing - sometimes some difficult truths, and honesty. 

And it occurred to me that perhaps because we had all shared in the experience of that performance of Cancel The Sunshine that we as a group had the permission to talk about something that normally we wouldn’t have spoken about and not at that level of depth and engagement. 

After the performance and chaired discussion we all went outside into another area for a more informal gathering and I had a discussion with some other members of the audience that continued and developed that same sense of openness sharing and honesty; something I am sure would not have occurred had it not been for the play and discussion.

I think it was in the power of the story and the discussion that followed that gave us all permission to be more present, more honest and as a result gave us more opportunities to connect. What a wonderful example of an intervention to enable positive change in an organisation.