Leaves On A Stream
Leaves On A Stream is a children’s book I’m writing about a young boy called Daniel who wants to be a fireman when he’s older. He goes on a walk with his parents through the forest but gets separated and lost along the way. Overwhelmed with the fears he faces getting back looks impossible, but Daniel meets Freddie The Fox who shows him that things aren’t as bad as they seem and how to place his thoughts on the Leaves On The Stream.
On a sunny day in April 2022 I got a call from my mum while fixing a tire on my bike, what I thought was a routine call with her checking in was far from it. She was crying and struggling to speak, when she pulled herself together she told me my uncle Daniel had passed away.
My thoughts we’re ‘she must be joking’ and ‘he’s young, something terrible must have happened’; the next part of that phone call is a complete blur and the next thing I remember is being sat on the kitchen floor crying. To this day every time she calls me I’m transported to that moment and my heart sinks.
We learnt that he had mental health issues which eventually lead to his death, something I discarded straight away. He was a loud, funny, boisterous character that lit up the room and made every family event worthwhile. Someone who could make you laugh and entertain you that much that his nickname in the family was ‘Goofy’.
Each Sunday my family would go to my grandparents house for tea to catch up on the week and get chance to spend time with Daniels son Freddie, a superstar of the family quickly out ranking his dad. But it was like stepping into the Goofy Show were he was a stand up comedian and you were in the audience on the front row hoping it wasn’t you he picked out. Whoever he zoned in on (mostly my Grandad) would receive a roasting over the next two hours but it wasn’t a hurtful roasting, it was always up to but never over the line and it was his way of showing you he loved you.
He was the joker of our family and all families have one.
Unlike Daniel his story isn’t unique, too many men suffer from mental health issues and feel they can’t speak about it.
Stuck with thoughts they can’t manage they suffer in pain, only knowing one way of coping. They apply the ‘man up method’ which is flawed. Feeling like they can’t speak to anyone but also that they cant handle what is going on inside can lead to the worst.
Mental health isn’t new to me, It’s something I have had my fair share of battles with but with my engineering brain being fascinated with how things work and wanting to understand it, I started to read about it. It was when I read The Confidence Gap by Russ Harris I discovered many techniques to help me but there was one that really stuck called ‘Leaves On A Stream’.
This technique is simple, you sit, close your eyes and imagine your on the edge of a stream. You then watch the stream and as thoughts come up in your mind you imagine plucking them from your head and placing them on the leaves drifting by on the stream. The purpose is to unhook yourself from your thoughts, put distance between you and them so you can control them and not have them control you.
I thought back to being a child and I couldn’t remember being taught how to manage my thoughts, this was something that consumed me in adult life and I had to learn now. But, why? The answer is obvious; you're a kid. You shouldn’t be concerned with mental health issues and the voice inside your head, your world should consist of playing, new experiences, and dragons flying over the moon with a cowboy riding it shouting yeehaw.
The point is as a kid you don’t have these issues it’s only a short while after these things start to creep in but by that time it may be too late. I want to arm children with techniques to help them manage their thoughts as they grow all the way into adult hood. I hope that in the future the we live in a world where this stigma is gone but if it does still exits that men who live in it have a better fighting chance.
