The Music & Mental Health roundtable discussing my podast with Jon Bryant was very insightful and stimulating. As usual, my friends at Nettwerk Music took the conversation to very interesting places including: an exploration of how meditative mind states generate openness and curosity to what shows up - a 'waiting-upon' rather than a predictive mode; the metaphor of the mind as a 'mobile' as a means to understand how the conscious and unconscious mind integrates experience; the maturing artist becoming less self-focused, more aware, more balancd and the healthy integration that creativity can bring; and how there is a type of 'resonance' as we tap into a more collective consciousness, feeling a part of something that transcends yet includes us. All in all, a thought-provoking discussion!

This Q & A explores issues arising from 'Mastering Difficult Conversations Part 2 (Managing Self). Topics discussed included:stepping outside one's reaction and pausing and seeing how this breaks habitual patterns in self and others; how, in dealing with personality-disordered people it is less about changing them, and more about protecting self and others around them; when we are not getting win-wins the importance of equanimity and how to get our ego out of the way and not be upset by the other person's non-willingness to change.

When we find ourselves in a difficult conversation, or when we are anticipating one, before we can manage other people skilfully the first task is usually to manage our own emotions and reactions. The best approach is to be proactive. Such ‘Approach Coping’ enables us to manage our own thoughts, behaviours and emotions and to take care of our own needs. It then allows us to better manage the needs of the other person and the conversation generally. This second Managing Difficult Conversations podcast provides strategies for self-awareness and for in-the-moment self-management.

This was a thoughtful and illuminating Podcast in which we discussed Music, Creativity and Mental Health. Themes in this conversation included: Jon's latest album "Therapy Notes" and explore the therapeutic role of music in processing emotions and life experiences; how music can help transform difficult experiences into something bearable and beautiful; the relationship between creativity, mental states, and environmental conditions; how meditation helps Jon access creative mind states; creativity as an integrating process that allows individuals to trust their own process more; the concept of love and its spiritual dimension, especially as it involves surrender; how the music industry rewards narcissistic behavior and has become a social media popularity contest, while offering little financial security; how Jon credits a more structured lifestyle focused on regular exercise, healthy eating, and balance, for his career longevity while managing multiple creative pursuits including music, acting, and visual art. It was a wonderfully diverse conversation and I hope you love it too.

This Q & A explores issues arising from 'Mastering Difficult Conversations Part 1 (What's Going On?)'. Topics discussed included: how nurturing trust over time makes subsequent difficult conversations much easier; the distinction between naive and mature trust; the distinction between reacting and responding, and how we can use analysis of conversational dynamics to shift to responding; the importance of preparing for difficult conversations; and the development of confidence in one's ability to navigate difficult conversations well.

The first of this 3-part series on mastering difficult conversations begins by describing 'what's going on' when a conversation is difficult. We see that the threat system in our brain is activated when there is low trust and this inhibits our capacity to think collaboratively and creatively. By contrast, we generally want there to be high trust so we can experiment and create together. So the first task is to assess the dynamics: to see what states in ourselves and in the other person need shifting to create more trust. The following podcasts explore how to do that.

This roundtable discussed the podcast with Alyssa Coco and Matt Merritt and focussed on the following themes: how 'comparison is the thief of joy' and the necessity of transforming the cycle of comparison to a cycle of inspiration; how studying others' successes builds one's own success; how mindfulness can help in identifying one's negatiev reactions thereby allowing a more positive perspective; how typical these challenges are for the Indie artitst; how brave and honest Alyssa and Matt were ini this discussion; how early success and signing with a label is just the ffirst of many mountains to climb, and how unprecendented and problematic the contemporary access to artists is via social media.

This Roundtable discusses the "Thee or Me?" podcast - subtitled ‘Altruism & Compassion’. Issues discussed include: how all people are contradictory and may have within themself a 'community of selves'; how polarisation is fed by social media, how we are all prone to it and are offered incentives to be extreme; the problem of scale and the innumeracy of empathy; the salience of the negative in social media; the problem of the lack of direct accountability in social media; how the antidote to polarisation is compassion and altruism; and why it is 'reciprocal' altruism and not just altruism.