My guest today is James Routledge. James is a mental health advocate and author of the book ‘Mental Health at Work’. After burning out when his first business failed at the age of 24, he founded Sanctus who are on a mission to help companies invest in the mental health of their employees.

In this episode, James talks openly about his personal experiences. We also cover some of the myths of mental health: how to manage boundaries, how to question some of the conventional narratives on mental health and more.

I asked James what the motivation was to be very open about his own mental health:

Well, I didn't for so long. I definitely didn't grow up being open about how I felt or articulating my emotions.

I suppose for me now I've experienced the power and the transformational change of taking the time to become aware of how I'm feeling, articulate it and share it with others…

…and I've seen the benefit of that. It's changed the course of my life and taken my life in directions that I would never have expected. I would never have expected to have written a book on mental health! That was never on my radar.

James explained why some people find it so hard to share their emotions with others:

The reason we don't open up is because we don't feel safe or we don't feel comfortable. Often that is through the fear of judgment or fear of dismissal. And when I say dismissal, I don't just mean being dismissed from your job. That's one way. I mean just dismissal. You know, you are saying something that’s really important for you to someone and it just goes completely over their head.

I really enjoyed this important conversation about mental health at work and would like to say a special thanks to Penguin Business for connecting me with James.