The Run Within 15: Real strength is being willing to talk

Last week I talked about what real strength actually looks like. This week I want to take that conversation somewhere more personal, because the timing of what I am about to share feels like more than a coincidence.

In October I will be speaking at the St Patrick’s College, Ballarat MENtal Breakfast. I want to tell you about it because this one means a great deal to me personally.

The MENtal Breakfast is now in its tenth year. It is the major fundraiser for the Chris Yeung Fund, which raises awareness of men’s mental health and steps in for families in the St Patrick’s College community where a father’s mental illness has meant he can’t work. In practical terms that means covering school fees so the kids don’t lose their place at school on top of everything else going on at home. Since it began, the event has raised more than $155,000, providing relief to more than 20 students, keeping them connected to their school and their community at one of the hardest times a family can face.

The theme this year is Pull Up a Chair. An invitation to start a conversation about men’s mental health. And I cannot think of a more important invitation to accept.

I don’t take this one lightly. Standing in a room built specifically to support fathers and families through something this hard is not just another keynote to me. I am going to give it everything I have.

Here is why this event means so much to me.

Growing up I experienced firsthand what it looks like when the challenges at home go unspoken. When your dad is carrying more than he should have to carry alone, and doesn’t feel he has the words, or the permission, to talk about it. I saw what that silence cost, and I felt the weight of it too.

That experience shaped me in ways I am still uncovering. It is one of the reasons I turned to running from a young age. Getting outside and moving my body gave me a way to process what I was carrying when I didn’t have the words for it yet. It gave me purpose, structure and space mentally when everything around me felt uncertain. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was already experiencing the run within.

What I know now is this. The barrier between a person and the help they need is almost never a lack of love or support around them. It is the story they have been told about what strength is supposed to look like. That real men don’t talk about things they’re struggling with. That asking for help is weakness. That keeping the mask on is the brave thing to do.

It’s not. It never is.

Men are taught early that the mask is easier to wear than to take off, that achievement and results are the currency of respect, and that if you just keep pushing, you never have to stop and process how you’re actually going. So a lot of men build their identity entirely out of what they do, rather than who they are, and they let that identity carry more weight than it was ever built for. The moment results dip or life throws something unexpected at them, there is nothing left underneath to hold them up.

Protecting who you are outside of your work and your achievements is not indulgent. It is essential. It is what lets you show up fully for the people who love you, instead of just the version of you the world sees on a podium or a payslip.

I am not a dad yet, but I plan to be one day, and I plan to be the best one I can be. That means I will always speak up. I will always ask for help when I need it, and I will never stop training. Of course the amount of training I’ll be able to fit in will inevitably shift once I have a child, that is just reality. But the practice won’t stop, because it can’t. It sounds cliche, and we hear it all the time, but it is true. You have to put your own oxygen mask on first. Looking after yourself is not selfish. It is what lets you actually show up, fully, for the people who need you at home.

November is Movember, the global movement dedicated to men’s mental health, suicide prevention, and physical health. It is one of the most important conversations we have as a society each year. But I think we need to be having the conversation more often. Not just in November. Not just at fundraising events, but in our workplaces, our sporting clubs, our families and our friendships. People should feel comfortable to have these conversations every single day if that’s what is needed.

Men’s mental health is not a niche issue. It is a leadership issue. A culture issue. A community issue. And it starts with people willing to pull up a chair and say “I am not okay”, and truly know, that is alright.

That’s what I talk about in my keynote, The Run Within. Because the run within isn’t just about being disciplined and pushing through discomfort in the times where that is required, it is also about doing the inner work which involves taking ownership of your wellbeing. Choosing Voice Two when Voice One is telling you to stay silent, stay tough and keep it together.

Real strength is being willing to talk. To ask for help. To seek professional support. To take ownership of getting better, even when that feels like the hardest thing in the world.

I am genuinely honoured to be speaking at the St Patrick’s College, Ballarat MENtal Breakfast in October, because events like this are proof that the conversation is changing. That communities are choosing to pull up a chair rather than look the other way. And that the next generation of young men coming through at St Patrick’s College will inherit a different story about what strength actually means. That is worth showing up for. Every single time. I hope more schools follow their lead.

If the message in this newsletter resonated with you today, please share it with someone who needs to hear it. Because sometimes the most powerful thing you can do for someone you care about is simply remind them they don’t have to carry it alone.

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