Читать книгу Move Your Mind - Nick Bracks - Страница 16

Around this time, I had been approached by modelling agencies and was regularly appearing in the media, social circuit and getting booked for modelling jobs. I think this gave people the idea that I was someone I was not. While I had made some self-improvement, the reality was that I was still scared and insecure and had no self-love. I was afraid of being myself and was desperately hoping for more attention, fame or admiration to justify my existence. It wasn't until my late 20s that I finally experienced a relationship. I had so desperately wanted it for so long but had never allowed it to happen. I always told myself no-one was good enough, but the reality was that I didn't feel like I was good enough.

Then one day, I was invited to appear on the reality show Dancing with the Stars. Immediately, my competitive side kicked in and I said yes, also thinking that I could raise awareness and money for a charity I believed in (I wanted to help in mental health).

But I woke up the next morning in a cold sweat thinking, ‘What the f*ck have I just said yes to!?’ I couldn't even dance when I was out with a group of friends, let alone in front of a live audience on live television broadcast around the country to more than three million people. I panicked and tried to pull out, before reminding myself of my experience with public speaking, and how it changed my life. I thought if I could get through that, then maybe this was possible too, and that I may learn something about myself along the way.

To this day, I was more nervous than I have ever been in my life on the first episode of that show. I was probably one of the worst dancers in the history of the show, but I survived it, and ended up staying in until week seven of 10. I was also able to speak out about my own mental health publicly for the first time. More importantly, it was this that led me to being invited to speak in schools and share my story. Had I not overcome my fear of public speaking I wouldn't have been able to do the show and I would have missed the opportunity that changed my life.

In those first school talks, I quickly saw the impact of simply speaking openly and authentically. Kids would come up and tell me it led to them getting help for the first time. It sparked something in me, and in the years since I have spoken more than 1000 times both in Australia and overseas, at schools, universities, companies, in the media, even doing two TEDx talks. It led to working with behaviour-change companies, charities, individuals and eventually starting my own seminar company and producing video and audio programs around mental wellbeing. My goal is simple: to make global change in mental health by whatever means are available to me.