livestream: Meeting Mental Breakdown Mindfully by Isabel Clarke

Thursday 3rd February

livestream - 7pm - free entry

Register your interest by getting your free ticket for this author talk, instructions to join will be emailed shortly afterwards. For your security and ours, you cannot attend this talk without registering in advance first.

After a popular event on the shop floor we are delighted to invite you to join Isabel Clarke via ZOOM to hear about her new book 'Meeting Mental Breakdown Mindfully' exploring the Comprehend, Cope and Connect method. An opportunity for those who could not attend in person (or those who attended and would like to learn more!) to connect virtually.

This book cuts to the heart of the distress that is mental breakdown and makes sense of it in ways that are both simple and profound. Received ideas about what it is to be a single ‘self’ are overturned in order to understand how easy it is for the delicate balance of ‘feeling alright’ to be upset. Medical orthodoxy is set aside to reach a simpler, more compassionate and holistic approach to both sense making and helping. The book covers how the approach is used in the NHS, where it has been embraced as both effective and practical, within services as diverse as the acute hospital and primary care. The book is aimed at those supporting sufferers, whether in a professional or personal capacity, and is relevant to those going through the experience themselves.

Isabel Clarke is a consultant clinical psychologist with 30 years’ experience as a therapist in the NHS for people with complex problems. Her innovative approach to mental health that side-steps diagnosis is applied widely in Acute Services to enable mental health hospitals to operate in a more psychologically informed and holistic way, and is adapted for IAPT (Increasing Access to Psychological Therapies) and cross-cultural application. She has a particular interest in the psychology of spirituality, and psychosis and spirituality.

This book is clearly and engagingly written, and summarises complex information in an accessible way. I particularly like the way you have made connections with wider issues of social justice, racism, colonialism, climate change and our whole political economy - which are also the aspects the Power Threat Meaning Framework (PTMF) aims to re-introduce. Spiritual perspectives are presented in a way that will be acceptable and useful to people of all faiths/beliefs and none - an aspect that needs incorporating into our lens on distress. - Dr. Lucy Johnstone. Consultant clinical psychologist and lead author with Prof Mary Boyle of the Power Threat Meaning Framework.

"This is an excellent book for coaches and counsellors, or anyone who work in related fields such as student support, chaplaincy and Human Resources to understand mental distress is a part of human life and know how to support those who are experiencing difficulties. For those who read the previous book about Comprehend, Cope and Connect (CCC), they would find this book a great companion. In this book, Isabel Clarke has taken the CCC approach beyond the health service context to a wider audience. The basic ingredients of CCC are described in clear and simple language, making the approach more accessible." - Professor Ho Law.  Honorary Professor of Research & Psychology

Please register via Eventbrite if you wish to attend so we can manage numbers on the shop floor. We are operating with Covid caution here at October Books, so please respect your fellow attendees by maintaining some distance and wearing a face covering during this event unless you are exempt. We want to ensure all people feel safe and welcome at our events.

Register via Eventbrite for instructions to join ZOOM event. This and all October Books online events have closed captions available.

This is a free entry event, but if you'd like to sling October Books a donation, please do.

If you’d like to purchase a copy of ‘Meeting Mental Breakdown Mindfully’ for delivery to your door, click here. You can reserve a copy to collect on the day by emailing us at info@octoberbooks.org