Posts by Michael Vickers

Leadership is not defined by your title or the size of your office. Leadership is defined by the difference you make, by your capacity to build leaders around you, and by results.

Ready to find your voice, deepen your presence, and amplify your impact? You’re going to enjoy my conversation with best selling author, speaker, and coach, David Irvine.

Each year taking the time to rethink your business and your life will help you focus on what’s important, eliminate the distractions limiting your performance and create a framework from which you can grow beyond yourself. To help us understand what we should be rethinking is bestselling author, award winning speaker and popular coach, Jim Cathcart.

Personal catastrophes are like earthquakes. They leave us too shaken to know what to do next. Afraid that every step we take might spark another upheaval. But we can learn to resist our human instinct to hide from challenges. If you want to learn how you can break through and thrive after a life altering setback, you’re going to enjoy my conversation with international bestselling author, Vince Poscente.

The Becoming Preferred Podcast is all about helping you authentically differentiate yourself and stand out in a congested marketplace. Whether you are a business professional, an entrepreneur, a business owner, or just want to enhance your understanding, our goal is to expose you to subject matter experts that are active practitioners in their field and share insights that if applied can positively impact your life.

We have just finished our first season and we want to thank our guests for generously sharing their insights, and we thank you for listening and supporting the podcast.

Our goal with each episode is to deliver insights, strategies and tactics that will give you an edge and help you authentically differentiate yourself in a competitive marketplace.

This week millions of people are processing the news of another loved and admired celebrity who died by suicide.

No doubt, the world has lost too many people we love to mental health challenges. It can be difficult to understand or make sense of the news that somebody we looked up to, admired or touched our lives died from suicide.

When we read some of the online comments, we realize that we still have along way to understanding mental health and its impact on all of us.

Comments like…

“How could they do that to their family?”

“What a selfish thing to do”

“There are so many resources available for people”

“Terrible timing, so close to the holidays”

I admit that I used to have those thoughts, until I started educating myself about mental health and its impact. When someone dies from a terminal disease, we don’t say, “What a selfish thing to do” or “I can’t believe they died so close to the holidays.” When my father passed after suffering from liver cancer, I didn’t say, “What a shame, how could he do this to his family”

It might be helpful for us to think of dying from suicide, the same ways we think about dying from a terminal disease. Mental health experts teach us that just as disease can deteriorate one’s physical body, mental illness can impair the processes of the mind.

When someone has a disease that deteriorates the body, we can see it. When someone is fighting mental health challenges, they often feel shame and we are unable to see the pain they are experiencing. We need to remember that just because we can’t see it, doesn’t mean the pain they are experiencing isn’t real or overwhelming.

As Frank King mentions in this podcast interview, It is important to understand that those suffering from mental illness are wanting to end their pain and that is different than wanting to end their life. That’s why death by suicide isn’t selfish. It’s what happens when someone loses their battle with mental illness.

My guest in this encore episode teaches us to change the way we think and talk about suicide. Join me now for this encore conversation with Frank King.