Tag: Mental Health

It’s been exactly 1 year since I published the second part of my stuttering but stunning How to Be Creative series and I’ve finally got round to making part 3. That’s still in production, and will be with you soon, I promise! But in the meantime here’s the first 2 parts neatly packaged for your listening pleasure.

Hear Alex’s soothing and perhaps magical tones as he walks through some woods in the dark. Warning: this episode may contain bats and sheep!

By way of Aesop’s fable, The Ass and the Lion’s Skin, Alex explores the nature of identity, and how we all, especially autistics, wear a mask from time to time to hide our true selves. He discusses the indelible marks that doing so imposes on our future selves, how this leaks out into our art, and why donkeys are awesome.

Alex chats with Owen Moxey about the dauntingly wide world, both fantasy and real-life, of table top gaming, and how rediscovering Warhammer miniature painting helped him navigate the physical and psychological challenges of successive diagnoses of Functional neurological disorder, autism and ADHD.

Alex wonders the Scottish countryside and laments the lack of recognition for illustrators and fantastical artists, despite their significant contributions to art and culture.

Alex christens a new type of episodes called ‘Walking Therapy’, despite the fact that several episodes of the kind have already been published. In this episode he discusses the wide range of styles and approaches to drawing he observed in a workshop for kids, and ponders why this early diversity doesn’t seem to carry through to the commercial art world.

Alex takes a dreamy stroll through the woods and discusses how listening to challenging music like Bach’s Well Tempered Clavier can be beneficial to creativity, why finishing things is not that important, and why your destination is not the point of your journey.

Alex pays tribute to the legend that was Ozzy Osbourne and the lessons that we can learn from his incredible life and work in our journey of creativity and mental wellness.

Alex reads his short book of art and verse, ‘The Fall’, a raw depiction of a recent mental health crisis and its effect on him and those around him. Content warning: this episode contains references to depression, anxiety, panic, autistic meltdowns and shutdown, suicide, and likely some other mental illness related stuff, and in a higher dose than usual. Consider yourself warned.