Acting Sane

This week I spoke to Freddi Beard about his mental health journey, his masculinity, his experiences with therapy, and his work with Voice Box - an organisation he founded with three friends. Voice Box works with young people, often young men on redefining masculinity through drama based exercises and conversation. They also provide sex & consent workshops in schools.Freddi himself went to boarding school for many years, which he explains had a profound impact on his mental health and identity as a man.He openly discusses his journey and stands on the problems of toxic masculinity and how we define and understand what it means to be a man in our society.For more information, and to get in touch with Voice Box visit https://www.voiceboxcic.com/ 

For this week’s episode I had a conversation with my friend Mary Gring, who lives and works as an artist and educator in Chicago. Mary has always been very open about her mental health and how she incorporates her story into her work and creative life.Officially diagnosed with OCD, depression and anxiety, Mary speaks about her experiences with the healthcare system (especially after she was in a bad car accident), medication, how she feels about being diagnosed and how she lives her day to day life. She goes into detail about her art work, especially her piece “Happy Birthday To You” and “Disintegration/The Cure”, which were both video installations.For more information and resources visit www.actingsanepodcast.com

Listen to a few snippets of my conversation with Chicago based artist and educator Mary Gring, who openly speaks about her mental health, life during the pandemic, and how she uses her art practice to process, heal, and create the work she'd like to see.