Danny Brown

podcaster - author - creator

Guest Posts

Is ‘Mental’ Health a Misnomer? Why We Need to Destigmatize Depression

This is a guest post by Robert Clarke, and is a personal recollection and call-to-action on how we need to change the conversation around depression.

Two young men.

The first young man is 19, a constant joker who enjoys nothing else than making people laugh and bringing joy to those around him. He is big into robotics and the challenge of solving problems. He also helps his close friends solve their problems by being their go-to guy when they need a shoulder to cry on, or simply someone to listen.

The second young man is also 19. He has a lot of social anxieties and gets depressed. He often lies in bed for days, shutting out TVs, phones, and even food. He?ll make excuses to not go out with friends. His mind is burdened with such an unbreakable cycle of negative thinking that the best part of his day is falling asleep, and the worst part is waking up.

The first young man?s name is Lucas.

Last week Lucas took his own life.

He was the son of a close friend to Danny Brown. Danny says,

There?s got to be something missing. For someone to seem so happy all the time and always willing to help others, but not themselves. It just doesn’t add up.

I won?t pretend to have any easy answers, but I can offer some insight on the topic of depression.

That?s because the second young man I describe above is me, nearly half my lifetime ago.

The Dangerous Compartmentalization of Depression

Since that age I’ve gotten better. A lot better.

After years of keeping things bottled up, I finally was able to reach out for help, and got it.

The question is, why did it take me so long? Why is it so hard for people to reach out for help?

I think it starts by the way we frame the discussion of mental illness. Specifically, what we mean when we say mental illness.

We compartmentalize mental issues as being exclusive from physical issues. This mind/body dualism school of thought dates back to Enlightenment thinkers such as Rene Descartes.

And I think it’s bullshit.

Our mental state, or consciousness, is a biological phenomenon just like any other part of our body.

Notable modern philosopher John Searle, who would agree with me on this point, says:

It is true that [our brain] has special features, most notably the feature of subjectivity, but that does not prevent consciousness from being a higher-level feature of the brain in the same way that digestion is a higher-level feature of the stomach, or liquidity a higher-level feature of the system of molecules that constitute our blood.

The problem with framing depression as a mental issue is that it?s reduced to something that?s ?all in your head?, that it?s completely different than having a physical issue.

What we imply when we say something is ?all in your head? means it doesn?t really exist, so you should be able to just work it out for yourself.

But saying that depression is something that?s ?all in your head so just work it out?, is like saying cancer is ?all in your body, so just exercise and it will go away?.

Depression can be physical.

Robert Clarke on the stigmatization of depression (2)

The Physical Illness of Depression

Did you know that that the hippocampus is smaller in some people with a history of depression than those with none? Or that neurotransmitter or chemical imbalances in the brain is a source of depression? Other causes can include abuse, death or loss, major events, and genetics.

Do any of these things sound like they?re ?just in your head??

No, they are real. They are physical or have materialized in our physical world.

My point is, people with depression often won?t reach out for help because they believe their issues are in their head, and not something that could possibly be a natural phenomenon in human beings.

They think they are solely responsible for their problems, and are solely responsible for solving them.

I personally always felt like my feelings of depression were like some sort of character flaw, and the reason I couldn’t just break the cycle of negative, depressive thoughts was because I simply wasn’t smart enough, good enough, or normal enough.

Consequently, my poor attitude about myself just reinforced my negative thoughts, and my negative thoughts reinforced my poor attitude about myself.

And around and around we go.

So I believe that to help more people with depression we need to not only destigmatize mental illness, we need to treat it with the same care, compassion, and understanding that we would physical illness.

We need to change the conversation.

CAMH

Ask yourself, why is it that we get annual physicals, but it has nothing to do with how healthy we are feeling?

Why is it that when we get injured, we can go to physiotherapy and train or rehab the injured part of our body until it gets better, but we don?t think we can do the same with our brains?

Why is it that we have cancer ribbons, campaigns, runs, and mega-fundraising campaigns, but people battling or who have battled depression or mental illness don?t benefit from an equal support system?

Cancer doesn?t discriminate, but neither does depression. It just happens, and can happen to anyone. No-one should feel guilty about getting cancer, and no-one should feel guilty about feeling depressed.

Some facts on mental illness in Canada:

  • In any given year, one in five Canadians experiences a mental health or addiction problem.
  • Nearly 4,000 Canadians die by suicide each year ? an average of 11 suicides a day.
  • While mental illnesses constitute more than 15% of the cost to treat disease in?Canada, these illnesses receive less than 6% of health care dollars.
  • Just 50% of Canadians would tell friends or co-workers that they have a family?member with a mental illness, compared to 72% who would discuss a diagnosis of cancer and 68% who would talk about a family member having diabetes.
  • The economic cost of mental illness in Canada is estimated at $51 billion per year. This includes health care costs, lost productivity, and reductions in health-related quality of life.

(Source: CAMH)

So what can we do?

Learning?to Accept That It’s Normal to Not Feel Normal

Besides changing the way we look at depression, and talk about mental illness, I think another major part of the solution is early education.

Just like we have gym class to encourage fitness and home economics to teach kids how to manage a household, we need to teach them to recognize and understand the signs of depression and mental illness even before they?re old enough to get them.

In other words, set expectations and equip kids with the right tools.

http://youtu.be/EUb063stmfU?list=PLGaXn-0H6JmvhCPvdIcr_g2QNepfeyQxa

Teach kids that some of them might not feel ?normal?, and that this is perfectly normal. Let them know what the signs of depression might look like, feel like, and what they can do and who they can talk to. Above all, they should understand that it?s fairly common and not something to be ashamed of or run from.

It?s part of being a human being.

And it can?t be easy growing up these days. Before the internet and mobile phones, kids could at least go home at the end of the day to safety and security. Now, with Facebook, texts, Instagram, Twitter, etc., there?s seemingly nowhere to find that comfort zone.

I think it?s the responsibility of parents, educators, and even the makers of social media sites and devices to work together and find solutions for kids to safely use and participate in an online world.

With more awareness and funding for mental illness, there?s increasing hope that more can be done to uncover the specific causes of depression.

And to learn more about the causes of depression, we should also learn more about the causes of happiness,?because?they?re two sides of the same coin.

In the meantime, you can also help.

Lobby your MPP, MP, and school board to get proper mental health education in schools.

Perhaps even more importantly, help change the conversation about mental illness. It?s not something to run from, hide from, to be ashamed of.?It?s something worth talking about.

When you experience a pain in your side for a prolonged period, you visit the doctor. You don?t even think about it, it?s automatic. Depression should be the same – when you don?t feel right, you should seek help without even thinking about it.

And if you or someone you know may be suffering, say something. Tell someone.

And if you want to talk about me about my experiences, your experiences, or anything at all, please send me an email: robert.at.op-ed.ca

Let?s make sure people like Lucas don?t have to suffer in silence any longer.

He?d like that a lot.

He?s still helping people.

  • If you would like to help change the conversation on depression, and support young people suffering from it, the family of young Lucas have chosen to support Kids Help Phone, an organization offering anonymous and professional help. You can make a donation in memory of Lucas here.

Robert ClarkeAbout Robert Clarke:?I’m a listener, engager, and purveyor of social media (when done right). Constantly curious about all things digital, marketing, and more. Partner at Op Ed Marketing in Oakville, Ontario.?Proud daddy to three beautiful girls and a basset hound to boot. A wonderful wife, a wonderful life. Read more at Op-Ed Marketing Blog, or connect on Twitter and/or LinkedIn.

The Future of Content Part 3: with Richard Becker

As content continues to become an ever-important staple for businesses of all shapes and sizes, I thought it?d be interesting to share some thoughts on what the future of content might look like.

However, instead of?sharing just my own thoughts, I wanted to bring you what the future of content looks like for some of the folks I look up to and respect in this space.

This mini-series will bring you some of the web?s most critical thinkers when it comes to content ? hopefully you?ll enjoy reading as much as I did, and these thoughts will spark ideas of your own on what the future of this thing we call content looks like.

Today?s thoughts come from Richard Becker, president of Copywrite, Ink.

The Future of Content Marketing Isn’t in Marketing Content

When most marketing professionals think about content, they think in terms that have grown all too familiar. They want to produce consumable content that is considered valuable, shareable, and drives measurable action.

It doesn?t matter what form the content takes as long as it meets those three criteria. Social media, articles, electronic newsletters, case studies, white papers, videos, webcasts, photos, and other content are all part of the marketing mix.

Sure, most marketers prefer some tactics over others, which is largely based upon budgets, production capabilities, content trends, and self-actualized outcomes.

When you boil it all down, however, content marketing is largely the same with an emphasis on brand attention over substance ??short, punchy bits of data that marketers hope (emphasis on hope) will propel the public to do something, anything.

Richard Becker on the Future of Content

Like it or not, that is the model. It isn?t a very attractive model, but that is the model that has grown out of what some people branded a social media revolution.

They were partly right too. It changed marketing, just not necessarily for the better.

As the social media revolution continued, marketers created new barriers in that the only way most organizations think they can be heard is to increase production budgets and increase the volume of content as if spray and pray is a real strategy.

It all coincides with how marketing is perceived right now. But not for long.

Marketing is Ripe for Another Technological Shakeup

We are currently standing at the edge of the next technological leap forward and most marketers are largely unaware and unprepared for it. But once the right piece of hardware is introduced, the term ?medium? will be given up for multimedia with an increasingly immersive participant experience.

What is the right piece of hardware? The writing is on the wall, but not everyone sees it.

The next generation device will be whatever technology provides a portable processor strong enough to allow a participant access to all of their applications and data (desktop or mobile) and then project any number of them onto relevant screens or display panels with the wave of a hand or voice command.

We?re this close to it.

The next generation smart watch will likely provide enough processing power to enable access to desktop-tablet-mobile applications and content and then direct this data to the most appropriate interactive display device ? whether it is function-specific tech like a motorcycle helmet, handheld like a tablet, desktop screen and keyboard, table- or wall-mounted flat screen, or full room virtual reality display.

So whatever desktop you sit down in front of will become your desktop. Whatever presentation is in the room will become your presentation screen.

Whatever table- or wall-mounted flat screen is within proximity can become your gaming access pass or set up a tabletop game with a touch screen interface. No wires needed.

The functionality will be dynamic enough that people will be able to simultaneously interact with content in different ways on more than one screen, enable shared interactive features on demand, and enjoy an increasing array of creatively interactive touch displays. Interactive paper and notebooks are not too far off in the future.

A portable processor would likely bring them to market sooner.

What Will Content Marketing Look Like in Such a World?

While some of the specifics are only as limited as your imagination, there are some core concepts that have some universal benefits in such a world. As an introduction to an exploratory of what is possible, here are four key components to the future of content and content marketing.

Multimedia

While some people bank on content marketing becoming more visual, they are neglecting that not all people consume information the same way. As educators know, people can be visual (see), auditory (told), kinesthetic (touch), or language (read/write) learners.

This suggests that the content of the future needs to be more malleable, catering to each learning style, or more multimodal, catering to all styles at once.

To accommodate, marketers may have to be more effective in creating multimedia presentations that reach people in whatever way they are most comfortable, including content that might augment big screen presentations with small screen definitions, graphics, or exercises.

Richard Becker on the Future of Content

Nonlinear

As a natural extension to multimodal content, information will become increasing nonlinear. Linear communication can be effective in many instances, but? isn?t always the most efficient means of communication as it relies on sequential data.

Nonlinear data opens up a scalable communication experience whereby every piece of data can be attached to additional bits of increasingly in-depth data.

For example, a reference to a battle during World War II might lead to a non-sequential array of data about that battle or about the politics of the war or about the individual combatants. In short, the participant drives the direction of the data, helping fill in details they might not have.

Personal

A nonlinear communication array doesn?t necessarily have to be tied to pre-existing data. It can just as easily provide participants with a seamless choice of communication options, thereby allowing them to move from data sources to messaging platforms to one-on-one calls to town hall video conferences.

Imagine, for example, the effectiveness of Twitter if participants could move from typing to talking to video chat or from one-on-one to one-to-some or one-to-all communication simply by directing the application to a suitable display.

In short, people can pick what style of communication makes the most sense without changing applications or devices much like social media managers do today but without the need for a middle man application.

Interactive

By giving people the power to choose what they learn, how they learn, and by what degree of intimacy they communicate, technology really could change everything about content.

It would provide people with the ability to learn about a product or service, focus on details that are important to them, provide outside opinions, and contact live customer service representatives on demand.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7AYfq9uIY8

When all of these factors are brought together with varying degrees of interactivity among people as well as people and their proximity within an environment, anything is possible. ?This can be?via visors or glasses or googles (without the added bulk of technology on your face) to activating full-room virtual reality simulations.

Technology is Still the Best Bet for Form to Fit Function

In biology, it is commonly accepted that form fits function. This means that things take on designs and shapes based upon their function. It?s why nature works.

The Internet is designed in reverse. Sites are given a form and participants are required to adapt to it. In essence, form dictates function.

The next technological leap, with a nonlinear, multimodal, interactive form that accommodates personal choice is the first step in realigning the space as it was meant to be experienced, with form fitting function on the screen and in our day-to-day environments.

But you don?t have to wait. Function-first content can be now.

Richard BeckerAbout Richard Becker: Richard R. Becker (Rich) is an American writer, journalist, communication strategist, educator, and entrepreneur.?He is best known as an accredited business communicator and president of Copywrite, Ink., a strategic communication and writing services firm with experience on more than 1,000 accounts, including BlogCatalog, City of Henderson, Fidelity Investments, McDonald?s, National Emergency Number Association (NENA), U.S. Air Force, and Volkswagen.?

In addition to this position, he currently serves as a city council-appointed commissioner on the Las Vegas Parks And Recreation Advisory Commission, social media director for AIGA Las Vegas and the Vegas Valley Book Festival, and is a co-founder of BloggersUnite.org. He has also assisted more than 60 nonprofit and professional organizations as a consultant and/or board member. This includes nine years of service as a governor-appointed state commissioner for Nevada Volunteers (AmeriCorps) and a decade as an examiner for the IABC International Accreditation Board.?

Read more from Richard on his blog, or connect with him on Twitter, Google+ or LinkedIn.

image: Emerson

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3 Types of Editorial Calendar to Manage Your Business Blog

This is a guest post by Sarah Arrow, and is part of her 30 Day Blogging Challenge.

30 day blogging challenge

If you’re going to grow your blog, and publish content that your audience will love on a regular basis then you’ll need an editorial calendar.

In this post I’m going to share with your three types of editorial calendars, and how to populate them so that they free up your time and work for you.

When planning future blog posts ask yourself these questions about reaching your audience:

  • Where does your audience currently get their information?
  • What sources are trusted and what sources are considered unreliable?
  • What sources have the highest traffic flow for your demographic?

Editorial Calendar Planning – Things to take into consideration:

  • Monthly conversation theme.
  • Weekly conversation theme.
  • Blog post title.
  • Target audiences (primary, secondary & tertiary)
  • Author (more than one person can contribute to your business blog)
  • Editor – who’s going to oversee the content and chase the blog posts?
  • Buyer?s cycle (awareness, consideration, preference, purchase, loyalty)
  • Draft due date – Content has to go out in a timely fashion and when it’s relevant.
  • Primary keywords?(5-10) for your blog posts and headlines
  • Supporting image(s)
  • Other supporting media (image, video, podcast)
  • Embed in other resource kits or publications
  • Syndication
  • Possible whitepaper ?/ free report (repurpose)
  • Client testimonial / graphics

At the end of this article, you’ll be able to download a free editorial calendar template to help you with your planning.

Your editorial calendar isn’t carved in stone, it can and should be adapted to your needs and your business. When doing your first editorial calendar it’s easy to get overwhelmed.

You don’t have to include everything listed above, at once. You can add in parts as you become more adept at planning your blog posts.

Let’s investigate the editorial calendar tools:

A day to a page diary.

There’s nothing that beats a good old-fashioned diary when it comes to creating your editorial calendar.

When you buy a diary it comes with all the important dates in it already. Christmas, Easter and all the religious holidays are marked. You then mark in all the dates that are important to your ideal readers.

If your ideal reader is based in the US and is a mom, you’ll know that the school holidays start in June and the kids go back to school in August.

If your ideal reader is a mum in the UK, then the school holidays start at the end of July, and the kids go back in September, unless its Scotland in which case the kids go back to school at the end of August.

The next step is to locate all of the conferences and national seminars your prospect is likely to attend and mark them in the diary.

Then add in the things that impact on your life including birthdays, anniversaries and important business dates. Remember to add in staff training days, staff birthdays and anything else you celebrate in your workplace.

Your diary is now about half full. But you’re not done yet. Go and get a copy of Blog Energizer.

This will give you all the crazy holidays out there like; national jam week, international?soccer day as well as things like international women’s day and black history month. In your diary copy over any of the events that your ideal reader will love.

Then check out the blogging prompts here and add them into your diary. If you add in one a week, you’ll find your editorial calendar is pretty full up with things surrounding your prospect, her interests and where she’ll be.

You now just have to add in the titles to your editorial calendar spreadsheet, and you’ve pretty much got all your content ideas planned out for a year in advance.

Not only that, you’ll have a good idea what your prospect wants to read, and when. Nothing beats the diary when it comes to planning :).

WordPress Editorial Calendar plugins.

The?Edit Flow??plugin shows in your WordPress dashboard areas and will help you manage communications between you and your contributors.

If you’ve got a business blog with regular members of your team contributing, the Edit Flow plugin will save you a lot of time and hassle. If it’s just you, and you’re writing your own business content then the Edit Flow Plugin isn’t as important.

Edit flow

Features of the Edit Flow calendar include:

  • Calendar – A convenient month-by-month look at your content in your WordPress dashboard area.
  • Custom Statuses – Define the key stages to your workflow.
  • Editorial Comments – Threaded commenting in the admin for private discussion between writers and editors.
  • Editorial Metadata – Keep track of the important details.
  • Notifications – Receive timely updates on the content you’re following.
  • Story Budget – View your upcoming content budget. Handy if you purchase content.
  • User Groups – Keep your users organized by department or function.

The WordPress Editorial Calendar is a great tool for sites with just one main contributor, and you can use it with a contributors too, if you prefer. The best part about this plugin is that you can drag and drop your blog post titles all around your calendar.

Wordpress calendar

Writing about something and a disaster happens? Too sensitive to publish the post? Drag it three months into the future and write something else instead.

Features of the WordPress Editorial Plugin include:

  • See all of your posts and when they’ll be posted.
  • Drag and drop to change your post dates.
  • Manage your drafts with our new drafts drawer.
  • Quick edit post titles, contents, and times.
  • Publish posts or manage drafts.
  • Easily see the status of your posts.
  • Manage posts from multiple authors.

Got an assistant? Give her your day to a page diary and ask her to add in all the dates as drafts on the corresponding date in the Editorial Calendar plugin. You then have a visual in your dashboard. You can then drag, drop, delete and publish accordingly.

The only downside is when you see you have 300 drafts in your calendar and not enough time to write up the content *sigh*.

Co-Schedule

Co-Schedule is the new kid on the block when it comes to editorial calendars, and it’s been getting rave reviews from bloggers everywhere.

Its biggest advantage over a diary and the Editorial Calendar plugin is the ability to automate posts to social media. This eliminates some of the time suck of promoting your content.

Coschedule

  • Drag And Drop Editorial Calendar
  • Lightweight WordPress Plugin
  • Automated Social Publishing
  • Simple Team Communication
  • All-In-One Publishing Solution
  • No More WordPress Hacking
  • Small monthly fee

The third most common type of editorial calendar is an Excel Spreadsheet. It’s not exclusive to WordPress and many spreadsheets can be imported into Google Docs and shared with other people.

This means at any point people can access the calendar and see what they’re meant to be doing and when. This is also handy when you use a content management system other than WordPress for your blogging activity.

The spreadsheet isn’t limited to just content planning, it can also be expanded into who is promoting what and where. You can also keep track of your call to actions in the spread sheet and monitor what’s the most effective and why.

Like the WordPress plugins, you can add the diary to the spreadsheet to give you an overview of what’s going on in your prospect’s world.

Spreadsheets make it easier to present data in the form of charts, and make it easy for you to see in a single glance what’s working and what’s not. The only downside to a spreadsheet editorial calendar is that it takes over your life and you start to think in cells and merges.

Here’s a copy of one of my spreadsheets.

Blog Editorial Calendar Template_overview

It’s empty, you’ll have to add in your own content. Right click and save as to your desktop.

An editorial calendar in whichever format you choose is a powerful tool, and will enable you to blog consistently for any amount of time.

Sarah ArrowAbout the author: Sarah Arrow is one of the UK’s leading bloggers. She loves all things blog. You can find her on her own blog at sarkemedia.com or organising blogging challenges (of which this post is a part of). Her first one was back in 2007, and she instantly loved how her writing muscle developed when she worked it hard.

If you’ve already subscribed to Sarah’s 30 day business blogging challenge then you’ll have an editorial planning checklist attached to your email.?Not subscribed? Join?here.

image: Cindy Gedenspire

The Future of Content Part 2: with Lisa Gerber

As content continues to become an ever-important staple for businesses of all shapes and sizes, I thought it?d be interesting to share some thoughts on what the future of content might look like.

However, instead of?sharing just my own thoughts, I wanted to bring you what the future of content looks like for some of the folks I look up to and respect in this space.

This mini-series will bring you some of the web?s most critical thinkers when it comes to content ? hopefully you?ll enjoy reading as much as I did, and these thoughts will spark ideas of your own on what the future of this thing we call content looks like.

Today?s thoughts come from?Lisa Gerber, founder of Big Leap Creative Integrated Communications.

Content and the Lack of Originality

I don’t know I can predict what will happen in the future when it comes to content but I’d love to share my hopes. I can share what will differentiate those who succeed from those who fail.

There will always be brands who are late to the game, and try to take the shortcut to get to the finish line by copying and/or stealing ideas.

This will never change.

Lisa Gerber on the Future of Content

Matt Cutts, head of Google’s web spam team, said,

Ultimately… we can’t have nice things in the SEO space: a trend starts out as authentic, then more and more people pile on until only the barest trace of legitimate behaviour remains.

He was referencing SEO tactics but it applies to anything that happens in marketing. Look at what happened after Oreo made the famous tweet in the dark. The following year, every brand was poised at the Superbowl waiting for their big moment in the Twitter spotlight.

We are out of original ideas.

Content and?Creating from the Heart

What I hope for the future is brands who forge their own paths, and do marketing on their own terms.

They take smart risks by standing for something and using that perspective to drive their content plan. They don’t worry about the people they piss off, but nurture those who they inspire.

Because when they take take that stance, they come from a place where they are creating from the heart; and it shows. In quality and substance.

Lisa Gerber on the Future of Content

As technology improves, our consumers expect a more personalized experience. Search engines are lagging when it comes to this because we’re still getting results based on who is best at SEO, not what is best for me, as a searcher.

So we’ll start to see better curated content sites – much like public radio programs that work hard to bring out indie musicians; we’ll see curators cherry picking better, deeper, content that doesn’t have the following and backlinks that allow them to compete with those early adopters who have too much track record to be able to compete with.

Content and the Fundamentals

The bottom line is, as always, the fundamentals remain the same. We need to continue to create helpful and relevant content.

Lisa Gerber on the Future of Content (1)

The difference is we’ll have to rely on other channels outside of search engines to get in front of audiences by building relationships with influencers and networks.

Which isn’t much different from present day.

Lisa GerberAbout Lisa Gerber: Lisa Gerber is the founder of Big Leap Creative Inc., an integrated marketing and communications company in Sandpoint, Idaho. Lisa is on the perpetual search to balance happiness with ambition. Read more from Lisa on the Big Leap Creative blog, or connect with her on Twitter @LisaGerber.

image: Emerson

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