You'll Never Walk Alone: Poems for life's ups and downs

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Poetry can be like a salve to the soul if you find just the right one to read in the right set of circumstances. This inspirational and soothing collection, organised according to the season, not only provides great comfort but acts as a friend, too, when there are times to celebrate. As the title suggests, you'll never walk alone when you have this trusty companion by your bedside. -- My Weekly The pursuit of happiness is about connecting more deeply with yourself, not attempting to be like anybody else. This book will show you how to bring poetry into your everyday emotional reality, where it can be a new tool for wellbeing. And one that means you’ll never walk alone. My Review of You’ll Never Walk Alone

On to the book itself; this is a book of poems that have been put together by Rachel Kelly, who is a Sunday Times bestselling author. Rachel Kelly is a writer and a mental health campaigner and ‘an advocate for the therapeutic power of poetry’. She has published several other books and is an ambassador for several mental health and wellbeing related charities. She introduces the book and includes some detail around how poetry has helped her psychological wellbeing and has a healing power. In sharing the poems and arranging them by season she hopes to help other’s wellbeing and also to highlight that it’s perfectly acceptable to have a variety of different feelings, including both highs and lows, both of which are equally valid. Why is loving ourselves so hard? And how can we change this? Here, Walcott takes us by the hand and leads us not just to imagine but to believe in a new relationship with ourselves. We can relax right from the start of the poem, in the astonishing certainty that, in the future, we will greet ourselves with elation. It is only a matter of time.

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Kelly's brilliant introduction and explanations of each choice make this an indispensable companion. -- Bel Mooney Right now it’s ‘Wild Geese’ by Mary Oliver. I change what I find the most compelling poem in the book according to my mood. But Oliver really speaks to me right now. Here’s the poem, and below I’ve written about why I love it so much and why I turn to it in times of trouble. Take the first, more universal approach to feeling better. Here the aim is for all of us to do a better job at supporting ourselves and feeling more connected to one another. To create a more sympathetic environment for anyone who is struggling, especially in the workplace, and to increase the amount of social prescribing. Probably fish. I know it’s expensive, and it’s best to choose sustainably sourced fish, but fish contain omega 3s or ‘healthy fats’, which are crucial to support good brain health. Many of us don’t eat nearly enough fish… which means we are deficient in omega 3s, but also in Vitamins A, D & K and essential minerals such as iron, zinc, and iodine.

Instead, we can embrace unconditional love, just as Walcott embraces us. The frantic search for the approval of others is over. The poem ends with that same certainty. The simple instruction to ‘sit’. But the poet’s invitation is more than simply to eat; it is to feast. Here is a poem for the Autumn of our minds: a time to gather in and gorge on Walcott’s message of self-love and acceptance, ready for any psychological challenge. A second approach to reaching those who really need help is to provide much more targeted medical NHS relief for specific communities who are vulnerable, such as minorities and the aforementioned middle-aged men. Sir Michael Marmot’s recent research has focussed on how much harder Covid has been for the wellbeing of the economically disadvantaged. Solutions are much harder to deliver to these groups, all of whom suffer disproportionately from poor mental health. You’ll Never Walk Alone: Poems for life’s ups and downs is a collection of the kind of inspirational texts – mainly poems – that can accompany us, whatever we are feeling, from sorrow to delight. The poems are organised according to the season in which they ‘belong’: we all have seasons of our minds, be they wintery and dark, or more spring-like and hopeful. Rachel loves poetry. Poems help us to feel deeply and to connect. ’ I think of it like a handshake with the poet’, said Rachel . Her new book ‘ You’ll Never Walk Alone: Poems for Life’s Ups and Downs ’ is about how verse – both reading and writing it – could become an unexpected part of your mental health toolbox and help you manage and allow all types of feelings to come to the surface. Poetry can help you to honour those emotions and to possibly explore them further.

The second poem I want to share is for anyone who finds it hard to love themselves. Love after Love From probiotics to poetry: how Rachel Kelly keeps depression at bay". www.newstatesman.com. New Statesman.

Some of the poems are from well known poets such as Keats, Wordsworth and Cummings, well known names such as Abraham Lincoln and Emily Brontë and others are from less well known ones (although my knowledge of famous poets stopped accumulating upon leaving education!) Their biographies are in a section towards the end of the book. Obviously, if you hate poetry this book probably isn’t going to be right for you, but if you either already like poetry or are even slightly undecided about it, then this is a gentle introduction to poems grouped together to link to specific moods, so you already know which section to go to if reading them for wellbeing reasons. It isn’t a book I’d have thought to have bought for myself but is one I’d recommend as a gift for someone, maybe for Mother’s Day as that is coming up or as an alternative Easter present. As I mentioned at the start of my review, I found the actual book aesthetically pleasing, so it would likely go down well to unwrap from pinky purple wrapping paper as an eye catching gift. A lovely collection of inspirational poetry, designed to help you through every occasion, on good days and bad... insightful. -- HELLOSometimes I feel like a motherless child Sometimes I feel like a motherless child Sometimes I feel like a motherless child Long way from my home.

This book will show you how to bring poetry into your everyday emotional reality, where it can be a new tool for wellbeing. And one that means you’ll never walk alone. We had the chance to talk with acclaimed author, mental health advocate, and SANE Ambassador Rachel Kelly, during her latest visit to our offices where she delved into the pressing issue of the NHS mental health crisis and shared invaluable insights on her personal journey, the transformative power of poetry, and her latest book, “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” a beacon of hope for those facing mental health challenges. The government needs to stress the importance of diet to the nation’s mental health and recommend we all eat more oily fish: My mother’s belief that fish is good for the brain turns out to have been absolutely right. As an advocate for the healing powers of poetry, her new book You’ll Never Walk Alone is an attempt to convey her enthusiasm and passion for the written word. It is a collection of “poems for life’s ups and downs” that will show you how to bring poetry into your everyday emotional reality, where it can be a new tool for wellbeing. Her hope is that poems can become part of everyone’s emotional life too, even if you don’t think poetry is ‘your thing’. There is also a section towards the end of the book titled ‘Enhancing Your Enjoyment of Poetry’ where Rachel Kelly provides ideas around reading, memorising and writing poetry and then ‘selecting individual inspiring lines of poetry’. The reading poetry section states, ‘Start with the belief that poems can be a source of wisdom and beauty, open to anybody. Look at them as simply a way individuals have found to better convey moods and feelings that, can sometimes be so hard to pin down or find the right words for.’ She also goes on to mention that due to the way some poems are worded, they can be like reading a song. Again, this is something I really feel with poetry. Songs and music have the ability to make me emotional and I find that the poems I enjoy the most are those I can almost read and imagine them being sung. The short section around writing poetry encourages the reader to try poetry as a way to express feelings and emotions.

Writing about my depression and my recovery allowed me, to paraphrase the Bible, to feel ‘oneself to be in a desert, and make of it a well’. Something positive came out of it, which perhaps spoke to others. And for me the creative process itself is also valuable – writing for me, and fiddling with sentences, and how to express myself, feels fruitful and purposeful. You have overcome great challenges in your life and use those to help and inspire others which is wonderful. How do you manage your mental health with such a busy life? No. At the height of my depressive episodes, I only thought about myself. I was utterly preoccupied with how unwell I felt – I was in screaming agony, in a fetal curl in bed, holding onto my husband or mother or a nurse or whoever was nearby… it felt as if I was falling into a bottomless pit of darkness and if I didn’t hold on, I would die. Another analogy – it felt as if I was on a plane which was going to crash… as if an emergency landing had been announced and I was hanging on for dear life. The feelings were terrifying and continuous. My heart raced; I felt nauseous; and my thoughts were darker and darker and darker … it felt as if taking my own life would be a relief. It all sounds dramatic, and it was… so no, at that point I didn’t think of others at all. Only when I began to get better did I want to share my experience and the reality of severe mental illness, how it could happen to anyone, and why charities like SANE are lifesavers to those who were desperate like me.