Category: Blog

Mental Health & Well-being with Martin Furber

I can’t believe how quickly time flies. This month is two years since I started to write my regular column for Sahir House. I enjoy writing, especially for my own community, so I hope you find my articles and tips useful.

This month I thought I’d tell you about how to go about turning negative thoughts into positive ones

Can you really think yourself better if you are struggling with your mental well-being? The short answer, in a lot of cases, is yes. If you can learn to change the way you think, you can play a major part in helping yourself to feel better.

Quite simply, what you tell yourself really matters to your state of mind.

If someone is suffering with low mood or has depression, they may well feel overwhelmed by things and unable to see much in the way of positivity when they look to the future. They may also have a very negative view of themselves, their lives and even the world in general.

All these thoughts and feelings are actually a product of someone’s imagination, they haven’t happened, we are imagining these things. They are, in effect, a negative forecast of the future. These repetitive, negative thinking cycles can become self-perpetuating, they become more and more ingrained into a person’s way of thinking. In effect we are using our imagination in a negative way, but that’s all it is, imagination.

So, it stands to sense that if our negative thoughts and predictions about the future are being created in our imagination and making us feel down; then, if we can create good thoughts instead, we can start to feel better about the future and view it more positively. I am of course simplifying things here in the space I have, but hopefully you get the idea of it. The only one in control of your thoughts is you. You can decide which thoughts you allow to live in your imagination.

So, here’s how you can start to make a change.

Set yourself some quiet time, on your own, maybe grab a cuppa! Get yourself comfortable, and try the following, simple technique.

Just imagine, for a moment how you would feel if the future looked a little better. If you remembered you had something to look forward to. If you were feeling just a little further up the happiness scale from where you are now. I’m not talking about a lottery win, I’m talking a sunny day or a visit to a good friend, something achievable. Think of something in the past that made you feel good, something you could do again. Just try to imagine, for a moment or two, and then take a few moments to ponder over each of the following 5 questions, and really think about each one.

  • What could you be doing differently?
  • How would it make you feel?
  • If you were feeling a bit better, who in your life would be surprised to see this happening?
  • How would it affect them?
  • How would they react differently to you?

If you’ve given a few moments to each of the questions above, allowing yourself to really visualise these things, you will have already started to imagine yourself in a more positive future. When we ask ourselves this type of question, we immediately begin to think about how our future would be without the problem that is bothering us at the moment. We are using our imagination and our own resources to picture ourselves feeling differently in the future. This technique allows us to build a more positive mental image in our minds.

When we begin to create our own positive images of the future, we are utilising the ‘intellectual’ side of our brain. When we do this, we are, in effect, quietening down the negative fight/flight/depression side of our minds at the same time.

The important thing to do, is to make time for this type of personal self-care. It is all too easy, when we are stressed, to just get on with our day, not allowing our mind the time it needs, to have some space to think ahead in a positive way. When we are stressed, we tend to see thing in the worst-case scenario, we can start to play out these negative scenarios many times over. We can’t help it, it is a natural reaction to stress. If you make a conscious effort to use the techniques above, it can really make a difference, so why not give it a try?

My main aim in writing these newsletters, is to help stop the stigma when it comes to having conversations about our mental health and well-being. If there is a particular topic you’d like me to write about then please get in touch. Feel free to send me an email with SAHIR HOUSE in the subject line to solutions@martinfurber.com

If you would like to know more about the private treatments I offer then please check out my website  https://www.martinfurber.com

Or find me on social media

LinkedIn:   https://www.linkedin.com/in/martin-furber/

Facebook: Martin Furber Therapist

SAHIR CEO WINS INSPIRATIONAL LEADER AWARD

On Friday 18 October, The Collaborative Network CIC hosted their inaugural LGBTQ+ FLOWERS Awards at the Titanic Hotel.

It was a fabulous evening that brought all parts of our community together – from employers, community groups, charities, and individual champions – recognising the collective, inclusive positivity that they all bring to Liverpool City Region.

Representatives from Sahir were shortlisted in four different awards:

Community Impact Award – Kath Charters

Diversity Champion Award – Kat Taylor

LGBTQ+ Ally Award – Ange English

Inspirational Leader of the Year Award – Ant Hopkinson

Sadly, Kath, Kat and Ange did not bring their awards home, but we’re incredibly proud of their recongition in being nominated in the first place; as they help so many of service users, and more, day in, day out.

However, the room exploded when our CEO, Ant Hopkinson, was announced as the winner of the Inspiration Leader of the Year award. As his winning nomination was read out, there were cheers of “hear, hear”, which only demonstrated the impact Ant has had on our community, inside and out of his role with Sahir.

Unfortunately, Ant was unable to attend on the evening, so Community Partnerships & Individual Giving Lead, John Hyland, LGBTQ+ Support Worker, Kat Taylor, and Kath Charters accepted the award on his behalf.

We want to thank all of those who continue to support Sahir.

Community comes together to talk health & wellbeing

On Wednesday 16th October, the local LGBTQ+ community came together as part of Sahir’s Queer Town Hall, as an opportunity to discuss issues important to us.

Following previous QTH’s focusing on:

  • Merseyside Police
  • Pride in the Community

We came together to focus on LGBTQ+ health and wellbeing post COVID-19, and heard from a number of speakers, including:

  • Vivian Hope from Liverpool John Moore’s University
  • Claire Stevens from Healthwatch Liverpool, discussing the Trans Health Report
  • Rach Gaskell from Central Liverpool Primary Care Network
  • Kate Sanders from Spirit Level
  • James Woolgar from Liverpool City Council

The event was expertly hosted by The Queen of Heartbreak, with a performance from Saint Vespaluus.

We will be taking the incredible feedback we received on the evening, and writing up a report to share with both the community and those health & care providers who attended the event.

‘Mind Yourself’ – Mental Health & Wellbeing with Martin Furber

What is a Mentally Healthy Relationship?

There’s no doubt about it, having a great relationship with a significant-other, can do wonders for our mental health and sense of general well-being.

However, those flushes of feeling wonderful when we first meet ‘the one’ can cause us to throw logic out of the window. It’s perfectly natural, the emotional part of the mind follows instinct rather than logic, affecting how we act and feel. That’s why, when we are in the early throws of a relationship, we can become a little detached from reality and see the person through rose-tinted glasses. You’re probably familiar with the expression ‘love is blind’!

Once we become invested in a relationship and it naturally progresses, life events will happen, such as changing jobs, moving home, even having or adopting children etc. It is easy for daily life to take its toll and test even the most solid of relationships.

All relationships take effort, understanding and patience to grow and flourish. All relationships can become strained from time to time. I’ve put a few pointers together for you this month, to explain how to have a mentally healthy relationship.

  • Boundaries – setting your own and respecting your partner’s. If we don’t state boundaries, we can’t expect people to know what they are. Similarly, we need to find out what red-lines our partner may have, that we should not cross. The only way to do this, brings me to my second point.
  • Good and open communication is key to a healthy relationship. It helps to clear misunderstandings, solve problems and build trust. When people stop talking to each other about the things which might be bothering them, the issues can just become bigger and more difficult to resolve.
  • Encourage each other to have hobbies, friends and interests outside of the relationship. When we first become involved in a relationship, it can be very easy to neglect all our other friends and family members, devoting every spare moment to our new partner. As time moves on though, and our lives change and progress, encouraging outside interests will enable you both to have fuller lives and help you both to enjoy my next point more.
  • Spend quality time together to help strengthen the bond and build intimacy. It is all too easy to allow daily life to over-burden us and take the fun out of a relationship. Make time for a regular ‘date-night’ if you can, where you just make time for each other, remembering all the reasons you got together in the first place.
  • Treat each other with respect and dignity. Avoid criticism, blame and insults, especially if something outside the relationship is affecting you, don’t blame your partner. It is very common, when any of us are particularly stressed or anxious, to end up letting our feelings of frustration or anger, take over conversations at home.
  • Take care of your own physical, mental and emotional well-being. A healthy individual contributes to a healthy relationship. When we feel good about ourselves, and we are practising good self-care, we are at our best. This can resonate through all our relationships, whether that be at home, work or elsewhere. As humans we do react to each other, we pick up on all kinds of signals at a sub-conscious level. So do make time to look after yourself.

Let’s face it, we can’t expect our lives or our relationships to run smoothly all the time. However, if you have read the points above and feel that your relationship is out of balance, then maybe it is time to have a good heart-to-heart conversation. In today’s fast-moving world, it can be so easy to let our busy lives take over everything, meaning that we can easily begin to neglect the things that are important to us.

Finally, one thing many people find hard to do when things have not gone right in a relationship, is to practice forgiveness. I’m not talking about forgiving your partner, I am talking about forgiving yourself. We all make mistakes in life, it happens. If we’re smart, we learn from our mistakes. In order to do that, we also need to be able to forgive ourselves when we haven’t got it quite right, so go easy on yourself if you’ve messed up.

That’s it for this month. If you would like me to cover any other subjects to do with mental health and well-being please get in touch, I’d love to hear from you.

Please feel free to send me an email with SAHIR HOUSE in the subject line to solutions@martinfurber.com

If you would like to know more about the private treatments I offer then please check out my website  https://www.martinfurber.com

Or find me on social media

LinkedIn:   https://www.linkedin.com/in/martin-furber/

Facebook: Martin Furber Therapist