Do blokes think whinging is the same as asking for help?
We need differentiate the two and normalise struggle.
Last week, the death of former NRL star player and coach Paul Green came as a huge shock and made me wonder what the NRL do to help their past players.
So I messaged someone who played there and asked if they give much support and he replied:
“I think they do, but you've also got to be open to support as well. As you know a theres lot of blokes suffering in silence with too much pride.”
I didn't know Paul Green, but I had a lot of respect for him as a player and coach, and my heart goes out to his family and friends.
I don’t know anything about Paul’s situation and I’m not saying this was the case, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned from this tragic situation is that there's still a part of society who is suffering silently and thinks asking for help when their struggling is soft.
But why? Why are so many blokes choosing to suffer in silence? And how many more have to die before things change?
Perhaps people forget that anything worth achieving in life needs to be done as a team, especially in business, sport, and raising a family.
Not even Michael Jordan, Richie McCaw or Sir Donald Bradman could have achieved what they did on their own, and all were surrounded by fantastic teams that included Scottie Pippen, Dan Carter and Keith Miller.
Yes, they were all drivers of crazy high standards, but no doubt lent on their teammates and coaches for ideas or support when times were tough.
Perhaps people think opening up about their struggles is like complaining and having a whinge, or just a sign you haven’t got your shit together?
Maybe it is and I’m just in denial since I’ve opened up about my struggles here.
But I’m confident that couldn’t be further from the truth, and think successful and happy people are those who’ve lent on friends and family for support while working thru their issues.
Bottling up stuff still causes stress, which then can leak out in unhealthy ways of dealing with it, which I think then reduces the chances the person will reach their full potential.
I also think if we can normalise struggle and make blokes feel ok to put their hand up and ask for help, then we can save lives, which is the driving belief behind why I’ve chosen to share my dark times in this blog.
I’ve never prided myself on being “tough”, and perhaps that was my saving grace when I was depressed, and would hate to think a lot of men refuse to ask for help because it conflicts with their identity of being a “hard man”.
I'm all for sucking it up and getting on with things most of the time, but there's a balance to be found between asking for help and stoicism.
A balance we’ve yet to find as a society, and one we’ll only find if we continue to have more open and difficult discussions about suicide and what causes it.
So if you’re struggling, please call someone you trust and ask for help as it’s not the end of the earth if you're doing it tough.
But taking your life is.
RIP Paul.
Need a chat?
But haven’t got anyone to talk to? If so, please call Lifeline on 13 11 14 or join us at Running 4 Resilience (R4R) at 6pm on Wednesdays from the Arc de Resilience at the Kingston Foreshore.
R4R was started to save lives from suicide, and if you or anyone you know is doing it tough, we believe the best thing you can do is to be active with mates and JUST. KEEP. MOVING.
The deeper I get into my sobriety, the more I'm starting to think of my brain as a thoughts processing unit. Almost like a machine. The thoughts are coming and there is nothing I can do to stop that. My role is to maintain the flow through the machine, ensure there are no kinks in the production line. You have to allocate each of the thoughts into a basket. A lot end up in the "irrelevant" basket. Sometimes a tricky one comes a long and you don't know where to send it, so you set it aside in the "too hard basket" to deal with later on. Eventually you get too many of these thoughts and your left with nothing but the thoughts form the too hard basket. That's where you have to create a new basket. A "ring one of your mates/see a psychologist/write a blog?whatever basket" you need to create to process those thoughts. Not processing them because they're too hard is the essence of bottling things up. That's my thoughts on bottling things anyway.
100%.
I like to think about a group of fellas moving dirt. There's a big difference between saying "this sucks" whilst continuing to move the dirt, and saying "this sucks" and kicking stones.
We can voice our struggles and move forward despite them, and in my mind, this helps us be 'tougher'.
I was also thinking since Sammy's post, the idea of talking is key from two angles. We need to make it okay to talk, but people who understand this need to talk to set the example, so that when we ask our mates if they're okay, they have an example to follow.