How To Fail With Elizabeth Day - S10, Ep2 How to Fail: Matt Haig

Episode Date: February 10, 2021

Today, I invite you to listen to one of my most-requested guests. I've lost count of the number of messages I've received begging me to get Matt Haig on the podcast, and now here he is: the man, the myth, the legend himself!Matt is a bestselling author of both fiction and non-fiction and a mental health advocate whose admirers include everyone from Dolly Parton to the Duchess of Sussex. After surviving serious, life-threatening depression in his 20s, Matt used his experiences to form the basis of his 2015 memoir, Reasons to Stay Alive, which was a number one Sunday Times bestseller and stayed in the UK top 10 for 46 weeks. His latest novel, The Midnight Library, tells the story of Nora Seed, who, after attempting to take her own life, finds herself in a library of books which contain alternative versions of Nora’s future. It's a charming meditation on what it means to live a fulfilled life, and on the often blurry line between failure and success.Matt joins me to talk about his failure to get the right work / life balance, his failure to check his own privilege and how he wishes he'd been open about his mental health earlier [TW: contains discussion of depression and suicide]. We also talk about having thin skin in an age of social media, how to handle criticism and the dangers of being given 'expert' status when you've never sought it for yourself.*Matt's latest novel, The Midnight Library, is out now.*Failosophy: A Handbook For When Things Go Wrong contains 7 Failure Principles developed from two-and-bit years worth of accumulated podcast wisdom and is out now.*How To Fail With Elizabeth Day is hosted by Elizabeth Day, produced by Naomi Mantin and Chris Sharp. We love hearing from you! To contact us, email [e-mail]*Social Media:Elizabeth Day @elizabdayHow To Fail @howtofailpod Matt Haig @mattzhaig      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Make your nights unforgettable with American Express. Unmissable show coming up? Good news. We've got access to pre-sale tickets so you don't miss it. Meeting with friends before the show? We can book your reservation. And when you get to the main event, skip to the good bit using the card member entrance.

Let's go seize the night. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamex. Benefits vary by card, other conditions apply. This episode of How to Fail is sponsored by Vichy Laboratories, whose product, Mineral 89 Hyaluronic Acid Hydrating Serum, has been described very accurately as a glass of water for your skin. I don't know about you, but I have been reading for years about the benefits of hyaluronic acid on your skin, and this is the product to use. Don't just take my word for it. It has been approved by the British Skin Foundation. Not only

that, but it's hypoallergenic and dermatologist tested. It is an intensely hydrating skincare solution, clinically proven to hydrate, plump, and boost skin's radiance for healthy, glowing skin. There are over 1,500 five-star consumer reviews, and it's also award-winning. It's Glamour Magazine's 2020 Best Hydrating Serum, which shows just how much other people love it. Anyway, we all need a bit more hydration during lockdown, don't we? So if you would like a Vichy Laboratories Mineral 89 Hyaluronic Acid Hydrating Serum, go to lookfantastic.com and use the code HEALTHYSKIN20, all one word, HEALTHYSKIN20, for 20% off Mineral 89 products. This offer is available until the 31st of March. Thank you very much to Vichy Laboratories.

Hello and welcome to How to Fail with Elizabeth Day, the podcast that celebrates the things that haven't gone right. This is a podcast about learning from our mistakes and understanding that why we fail ultimately makes us stronger, because learning how to fail in life actually means learning how to succeed better. I'm your host, author and journalist Elizabeth Day, and every week I'll be asking a new interviewee what they've learned from failure. My guest today could not be better qualified for this podcast. He is someone who has taken the darkest moments in his life and distilled them into points of profound human connection. A best-selling author who claims his depression made him into a writer and an unofficial global

agony uncle who counts the Duchess of Sussex and Dolly Parton among his innumerable fans. The latter recently admitted that she had a copy of his latest charming novel, The Midnight Library, next to the Bible on her bedside table. He is, of course, Matt Haig. Haig grew up in Nottinghamshire, the son of a teacher and an architect. He had, he says, a horrible time at school and has confessed to shoplifting in an attempt to fit in. By his mid-twenties, Haig was living in Ibiza when he became ill with a depression so severe that he found himself on the edge of a cliff considering whether to jump and take his own life. With the help of his partner Andrea, his family, and an exploration of the things that made him feel better, such as time spent in nature, he painstakingly made his way back to himself.

These experiences formed the basis of Haig's 2015 memoir, Reasons to Stay Alive, which was a number one Sunday Times bestseller and stayed in the UK top 10 for 46 weeks. In total, Haig has now written two non-fiction books, seven novels and 11 children's books. He has something of a golden touch. His novel, How to Stop Time, is being adapted into a movie starring Benedict Cumberbatch and a film of his children's book, A Boy Called Christmas, will be out later this year with Dame Maggie Smith at the helm. It's an impressively prolific work rate, especially when you consider his substantial social media following and the fact that he and his wife homeschool their two children. So how does he keep at it? Very often the books I'm writing are things I feel that I need to read, he says, rather than things I feel I've

got totally fixed and sorted in my own life. Matt Haig, welcome to How to Fail. It is such a joy and honour. Thank you for having me, Elizabeth. The honour is entirely mine. I'm so glad that you found the time because your work rate is unbelievable. And I know that we're going to get onto that later. And I have so many questions to ask you. But I wonder if I could just ask you off the back of that quote, whether for you writing feels like therapy, it's somewhat of a cliche, I think sometimes ask authors that, but because of your particular work, I'm very interested in what your answer would be. Well, yeah, absolutely. I mean, in terms of what therapy is work, I'm very interested in what your answer would be.

Well, yeah, absolutely. I mean, in terms of what therapy is anyway, I mean, therapy is essentially made of words, whether you're talking or writing it down. And when I was super ill in my 20s, and at my lowest point, living back at my parents' house, my girlfriend, Andrea, was with me too, I could hardly speak. I I mean it was almost a physical thing where I felt like I couldn't speak or verbalize anything my tongue would be super heavy I would have that sort of heaviness of depression around me and I just found it very hard to articulate what I was feeling in any verbal way and Andrea at that point had said you know write things down so I started writing things down not with any career ambition of turning this into anything but I just used to sort of write

down what I was feeling and it was very melodramatic stuff because depression often gives you very melodramatic feelings and thoughts it was like the lyrics to the sort of worst heavy metal song or something you know I'd always be on fire or this and it was very epically hyperbolic and very much that intense feeling I'd find it hard to sort of look back and read the sort of stuff I was writing but the moment I externalized it and put it down and wrote it and turned it into words and language it's not like a magic wand of course but it actually makes you feel less like an alien it makes you feel less like an alien. It makes you feel less like you are the only person who's ever been through this. Because that's, I mean, it sounds

ridiculous now, but 20 years ago, when I first became ill and had, I know it's not a medical term, but I still think of it as a breakdown. I felt melodramatically like no one had ever felt like this because I wasn't very articulate with the language of mental health I hadn't known anyone any friend who'd spoken openly about depression or anxiety when I was growing up my mum had gone through post-natal depression but she hadn't really spoken much about that so this was a totally new thing and it was an intense thing it was more intense than anything I'd been through and I've been through illnesses and hospital operations and various injuries and scrapes as you do through your life and griefs and stuff and this felt like a totally new and far more intense like it belonged

to another planet and so language was a sort of way back to earth I suppose it was a way back to actually make everything real again. Because the moment you turn something into language, you're turning it into a shared thing. You're borrowing words and ideas that have been around forever. So I think there's this kind of therapy in that. And I mentioned in the introduction that you've said in the past that depression made you into a writer. So am I right in thinking that as horrendous as that experience must have been, you wouldn't undo that moment? Well, I definitely wouldn't undo any moment. I mean, I would reserve the right to have that sort of red button by your side. You know, if I fell into that state again,

I would not want to relive that moment. And I wouldn't want to go through that moment. And at the time time I would have definitely wanted to press any button that could have got me out of that moment but now yeah I mean so much good has come out of that experience I'm not talking about career stuff I'm talking about my frame of mind through recovery because if you take me before I was ill before I was aware of anything going on or wrong with my brain I was was a person, I suppose a very cliché, typical young man who needed everything to be top volume, everything to be the most intense experiences,

the most violent Tarantino movies, the spiciest food. I was bored by neutrality. I was bored by just life itself. You know, it had to be sensation overload in all things. And then what recovery gave me was just an extreme desire for all the things that I'd once been bored by. It gave me a gratitude for normal stresses, for normal boredoms, for normal, you know, I just wanted to stare out of the window and not feel anything. And in a way, that experience made me oversensitive. And we use words like thin-skinned as a negative. And it is a negative. Often, it's got a very negative side. But I became

this thin-skinned person who could also feel good things more intensely than I ever had before. So I didn't need to raise the volume. I didn't need to go to a beefer. I didn't need to escape life. In my old me, from a child onwards, I was always obsessed by this quote by Madonna. I didn't need to go to Ibiza. I didn't need to escape life. In my old me, from a child onwards, I was always obsessed by this quote by Madonna. I can remember reading it in something like Smash Hits or Look In magazine. Apparently, this is probably urban legend, but on her first trip to New York, she'd got into a taxi and said, take me to the centre of everything. And I was obsessed with that quote. I wanted to escape into sort of, but I was obsessed with this idea of losing yourself

in nightclubs at six in the morning, drinking all night, taking drugs, blah, blah, blah. And I then became the opposite person who didn't want that at all. I just wanted to sort of hear my own breath and my own thoughts and just be. I love your cultural references. Smash Hits, one of the greatest magazines of all time. Madonna, love it. Let's talk about being thin-skinned because

you say some really interesting things about this that I massively relate to as a fellow thin-skinned person. And I think it's interesting that both you and I have through the course of choosing to express ourselves through writing and me podcasting we bring ourselves into a public arena where people have opinions of us and I find that incredibly hard to deal with and I must only get an absolute like millimeter fraction of what you experience because you have a huge social media following what you do is life-saving literally for many people and other people don't like it how do you deal with that mad tell me teach me your ways this is such a week to ask me i've had this has been one of my worst periods of that because i don't know why I mean possibly because I've recently been on a podcast with Meghan Markle and I've been a bit more out there my book's doing well

and stuff never heard of her yeah and I've had it and I know I absolutely know what I write is not for everybody and one of the reasons people possibly don't like me is I resort to quoting ancient philosophers to sort of justify my arguments but anyway Plato said that you should debate ideas and not people and I think the trouble is sometimes I've become more of an idea of something in people's mind I've become like this sort of I don't really see it in my own work because I feel like although I write about mental health a lot on social media I think if you look at my books, I've only actually written about two or three books that are directly about mental health or my own experiences of

mental health. So I spend a lot of my time writing about Father Christmas or writing fiction or aliens, vampires, all sorts of things. And so I feel like I'm quite a varied writer. But I think some people think I'm this sort of like talking fridge magnet of optimism. And I feel there's a sort of like snobbery about it because I can remember going back to the bedroom when I was in New York on Trent and I was having a breakdown. I couldn't actually read books. You know, people would suggest great books, wonderful things like The Noonday Demon by Andrew Solomon or things like that, which are great and brilliant. And they're groundbreaking in terms of understanding mental health and understanding things. But when your brain is fried to pieces, and you're just wanting something, some sort of glimmer of light that gives you a hope,

the thing your brain can take at that moment is a condensed thought, some sort of aphorism, at that moment is a condensed thought, some sort of aphorism, something that actually can hack into your brain and change your perspective. I didn't have many books available to me then because it was 1999, 2000. There wasn't really internet shopping as such. New York on Trent didn't have a bookshop and I was agoraphobic anyway. So the books available to me were books that were in my mum and dad's house and in my bedroom. And I did have this old concise Collins dictionary of quotations. And I would skim through that book of quotations. And I loved a quotation because I could focus on a quotation. And quotations become quotations for a reason because they pack a lot of power in a short amount of words. And obviously, in this age of Facebook wars and Instagram,

people have become super snobby about this and suspicious of this. And I understand the suspicions because people think, oh, well, that's a bit too easy. And that wouldn't work for me. But I sometimes think, are you actually engaging with it? Or are you sort of automatically dismissing it out of hand? Because you just think, no, that's not not for me I'm not that sort of person I'm this sort of person and I question that and I feel like I'm in the sort of firing line for a lot of that I've almost become shorthand like I'm the new hallmark or something I don't know oh man I think we live in such a cynical world and actually you're very open-hearted and it's almost like the disconnect between those two things is some people just

can't compute it but I wonder if do you feel I mean this is a podcast all about failure and it's shadow twin success and I know you've done some really insightful writing about this not least in the midlife library where there's a whole section called The Successful Life. But do you think people are annoyed by success in others? Well, it's a well-known British trait, isn't it? That we like to build people up and then see the tall poppies and we want to sort of keep them down to size and keep everyone down to size. And there's a definite element of that in British media. And we see it all the time. I wrote this Meghan Markle,

we saw it with Princess Diana. We see it on a micro scale all the time going on just on Twitter and social media. Then obviously when people are doing it, they're not being honest about it or even self-aware about it. They always got their legitimate reasons for doing it. But it does, you know, from the alien's eye perspective,

it seems like everyone's trying to level people down. And there is that trait, but there's also the opposite of that trait. And I feel like if you're writing books, or writing social media posts, and you're being authentic to you, and you're doing it for the right reasons for you, there's a point at which they can't really touch that. You become kind of immune to that sort of criticism. And I relate it, because I almost relate everything back to depression and mental health, but I kind of relate it a bit to what depression does. Because I actually reached a point, I can remember during recovery, when I was in Marks and Spencer's food hall in Leeds, remember during recovery when I was in Marks and Spencer's food hall in Leeds we were living in Leeds at the time and there came a point I had been feeling awful all week and I felt particularly bad in supermarkets or anywhere that where there was no natural light and I'd feel very claustrophobic

and terrible and I'd gone weeks and weeks and weeks of feeling quite suicidal like or not suicidal necessarily in terms of an impulse but in terms of thinking there's no way out of this. I felt like at that point it'd gone on so long. I passed the suicidal phase, but I just thought this is going to be it forever. But I realized that I'd actually sort of touched something which couldn't be broken. I'd got to like the bottom of me. And if I'd been more religiously minded, I'd have thought of it as a soul or something. But I almost felt it almost like a physical thing inside me that couldn't be broken down anymore. And I've written about this since and I've turned it into an aphorism about rock bottom. And the great thing about rock bottom is the rock part, because then

you can build the foundation from that rock because it's solid. And you sometimes do actually need to break something down to actually see the core of something. And I feel like that with criticism in a way, you can chip away and chip away. But if what you're offering actually means something to people because it means something to you and you're not being cynical you're not selling snake oil you're actually talking about your own experience and talking about things that still help you then they can't actually take that because that's you and that's you being authentic so I've got that approach now to criticism where it's fine they're absolutely entitled to their opinion and as I'm entitled to my opinion about their opinion but it doesn't really affect me it doesn't really damage me long term I'll take the hit but then I'll sort of keep going

what I'm doing I won't change what I'm doing because certain people don't like it if that makes sense. I think that's such good advice and you put it so so well and you and I have both been slagged off by the same magazine that no one reads okay yes yeah well they come from everybody don't they yeah and I'm not for a minute comparing myself to you but I noticed that yes I still find criticism hurtful but I'm getting better at being more quick at dealing with it so something will really sting for 24 hours and then I'll be okay again and I think that that's just a really important thing for people to hear you say and I think it's okay to feel it I think one of the worst things is when we deny that it doesn't hurt at all because then you sort of live with that longer because

you haven't acknowledged it so I take the hit I sometimes say something about it online which isn't always good but I'm trying to stay off Twitter now which I think helped deal with this particular thing but yeah I try and feel it and get cross about it then analyze it then move on and while I move on I don't change at all there's no point in life changing your behaviour to win over people who you will never win over. Why gravitate towards the negative to try and actually sort that out? Why not build up the positive?

Why not go to where the warmth is and actually sort of work on that? And I've been too much in the past because I was quite an insecure writer. When I was first published, I was published by Jonathan Cape, very prestigious, highbrow, Booker Prize territory publishers. And I was very insecure being published by them, because I felt like I had to be a certain type of literary author, which wasn't totally natural for me, because a lot of my influences are much more commercial. And I felt I was always pretending to be an author I'd sit down at laptop and be a capital A author and I think how do I write like this and it took me a long time to discover my voice as a writer and when I found

that voice and if people are criticizing me now for my actual natural voice then I will think well that's absolutely fine but there's nothing pretentious about what I'm doing now as far you know I mean everything's pretentious in terms of we're all acting to some degree, but I mean, it's as real as I can get. So I'm going to keep doing that, I suppose. Well, let's talk about your work, because that brings us on to your failures. And you very generously gave me four. I could have given you 27. Oh, you're so kind. I'm actually going to start with the second one, which is not getting the right work-life balance. I'm so glad you put this one because I look at your output

and my jaw hits the floor. I'm in awe. And not only that, there's also, I don't know if it's you or another Matt Haig who writes books on branding. Is that you?

That was me years ago, 20 years ago. Yes know I should have written like four more books than I listed in the introduction yes it's honestly one of the things that absolutely and this is another failure actually failure to change your name when you start your actual publishing career when I was younger when I was still ill when I was still living in Leeds my girlfriend who became my wife Andrea because she had to sort of earn the money because I was younger, when I was still ill, when I was still living in Leeds, my girlfriend who became my wife, Andrea, because she had to sort of earn the money because I was kind of useless. She set up this sort of like freelance PR consultancy thing, which tied to what she'd been doing in Abifa. And it was sort of youth marketing or whatever it was.

And my part in that was I do these sort of newsletters for her PR company. So I was doing these PR. I've never, ever spoken about this in my life, actually, this is strange. But I did these internet PR tips, because like this is going back to 2000, where to be an internet expert, you just have to say you're an internet expert. So I was doing these PR marketing tips for her. And then a business publisher called Kogan Page, they were subscribed to it. And then they asked me to do a book and that book did quite well for them. And then I did something like eight books within two years for almost zero money. But it taught me the discipline of writing a lot of words on deadline.

Some of those were the longest books I've written. I mean, they're all absolutely terrible. And they are definitely dated. And I would advise no one to look at them. But they taught me a lot, I think, about productivity and sort of writing as a job and all that stuff, which I lacked, because I'm not really a disciplined person in lots of ways. That was part of my recovery, actually. Work became part of my recovery, which I suppose is why I struggle with work-life balance, because I'm sometimes scared of having the right balance because I'm scared sometimes of dropping the ball of work. I totally understand. You associate work with your identity and recovery. Identity and recovery yes I'm thinking aloud now

you've turned it into a therapy session but yes I do actually feel like work was one of the things, the forward momentum that work gives you was one of the things that took me out of the present moment of despair. You know, we talk a lot about how everyone should be in the present. And I've even talked about that. But there's a time when you don't want to be in the present. And that's when you're in the midst of terrible depression. And so you actually want to be thinking of a future. And when was writing these books we were thinking about this book being published and this and it just gave you a sense of the future and work still gives me that I'm never working for the present moment I'm always working to finish a book and then for that book to be published and then da da da da so yes I think this is the problem I struggle with switching off work and writing because writing still to this day feels a kind of therapy in itself and also a therapy in that I'm picturing a future where you

know depression was the opposite I want to ask you more about that but it's so interesting hearing you speak because I've had a minor revelation myself, which is that last year, 2020, was one of my most productive years from a work perspective. And I think I now realise that was me coping with mental health. Like that was my way of distracting myself and keeping this identity that was very important to me alive.

And that's a very helpful thing that you just said there. So thank you. I wonder if it's- Well, do you think you were more productive because of the pandemic as well? I mean, I felt like I was more productive. I mean, in a weird way, I think I worked harder and was more creative and more active last year than almost any other year. And I think it can't be unrelated to the fact that what was going on I totally agree with you and I don't mean productive like I didn't bake any banana bread I didn't learn how to speak Italian I literally just worked like work expanded to fill a lot of time and I was so lucky that I

got to do that because as writers it seems like you were very busy you were doing doing this you were doing books you were doing telly. It's insane. It's just a massive distraction thing I've realised now. But I wonder if it's very difficult for you in particular because you are a writer, which means you work from home and you homeschool your kids, not even just during a pandemic, you homeschool them all the time. And so is it difficult because there are no physical boundaries between your workspace and your home space? Yes. Firstly, on that practical thing about homeschooling, because people get different ideas for homeschooling. We live in Brighton and Brighton being the sort of alternative hub of every alternative lifestyle choice. You can imagine there is a lot of default homeschoolers

in Brighton. And so homeschooling in Brighton is a very different experience because you're not often in the home in normal times the kids are out of groups every single day super social but not always in the house but I take your point but in our house there's a lot of noise and a lot of life going on and I do some of the homeschool teaching when they're at home and I do Fridays when they're totally at home with the kids and there's a lot going on. Weirdly I'm actually more productive or I get more done and my word count gets higher when there's a lot of things taking up my time. Often I'm at my most floundery which I know isn't a real word when I love it though I love that word when I've got nothing to do when there's nothing going on and I'm just got a blank word document in front of me and I'm trying to come up with an idea and I've got all the time in the world, but I've got nothing. I've got nothing. So in a weird way, I need that tension, that push-pull of life work to actually get things done. That was another revelation that I've just realised about myself as well.

I've just tossed myself as well I've just totted it up and Matt Haig you have written 28 books but you're factoring in your face you're factoring in those horrible things I used to write aren't you I am I mean you've written 20 without the branding books but still that is you know I always say I've written 17 have I written 20 yes I probably have actually if you count yeah I think it's a lot when you can't remember the number isn't it of anything it is and has not getting the right work-life balance has it negatively impacted your personal relationships at all because you talk so often about Andrea in such a lovely way and she does come across as like a real hero in so many ways

through your work so it strikes me that maybe it doesn't negatively impact your personal relationships but what's your take on that? The Andrea of Reasons to Stay Alive that was sort of like us when we were in our very financially struggling days and mentally struggling in my case and recovery days and yeah I mean there is absolutely no denying I wouldn't say I wouldn't be here without her, because I like to believe I would be here without her. And that life gives you reasons that you find around you if you look hard enough. But yeah, Andrea was so great for all that period. I mean, we were young. Andrea was young when I became ill. She was 24. I was was 24 but we'd been together since we were 19 so at that age 24 being

in a relationship for five years that's a very long-term relationship at 24 you feel like it's a 50-year marriage at that age so it was someone that I could be myself with and don't get me wrong I mean I didn't put it all in reasons to stay alive but I hint at it in reasons to stay alive we had some flaming rows and understandably because I had gone from one type of boyfriend, who the niggles and disputes we had before I came out were because I'd be the terrible boyfriend out at two in the morning who wanted to stay out till four in the morning. She'd want to go home and get some sleep. And then I went from that boyfriend to a boyfriend who couldn't even go to the corner shop on their own. So I went from one sort of nightmare extreme and then a pendulum to the exact opposite person who couldn't leave a house.

So that was horrendous. And I've still got massive guilt about that time and how hard, you know, we basically both lost our 20s. But I lost my 20s because I was ill. But Andrea lost her 20s because she was looking after someone who was me so I've got a lot of guilt about that and I've still got that on paper we're quite incompatible people if we tried to meet via match.com

we would have never been matched or whatever because in terms of personality and everything even some of our tastes very different but it somehow seems to work you know we do have sparks occasionally and frictions and all of that stuff as anyone would who's been in a 25-year relationship very different but it somehow seems to work you know we do have sparks occasionally and frictions and all of that stuff as anyone would who's been in a 25-year relationship and gone through all sorts of intense things but I feel like we understand each other more than anyone

else on earth and we're sort of on each other's side and I think that's essentially what you need in life to be understood and to have someone on your team and someone you don't have to wear the mask with. So much of life is a sort of presentation. And even sometimes with certain family members, you put on a little bit, it takes a little bit of energy out of you. And so it's nice to have someone where you can just be yourself with. And I think that was one of the things that was so vital and life-saving for me during recovery I didn't have to waste any sort of nervous energy on pretending I wasn't feeling a certain way and what does she think of your work rate it depends which work she has not been a fan of my social media activity. If I'd had a day wasting my day on Twitter, she's not a fan of that. But she understands that with the books, I'm not super stressed when I'm writing books. Even if

I'm on deadline, I'm actually quite calm. Writing sort of calms me down. And I try and sort of break away from it. It's not so much when I'm at the computer actually working. What she gets annoyed by is when I'm with her, but I'm not with her because my head's somewhere else. And so she could literally say three questions in a row and I will not have heard one of those questions. And that was always the case at school. Teachers used to get cross with me for that. And I'm bad at listening if I've got too much going on in my brain yes so that will be a frustration so if I'm trying to get a new idea in a book or something I'll just sometimes sit there with my mouth open like a zombie and not quite be in the same room your second failure is a really interesting one which is not being open or honest about mental

health earlier. Because there was a gap, wasn't there, between what happened in Ibiza and you writing Reasons to Stay Alive. Is that what you mean? Yeah. I mean, Reasons to Stay Alive, I don't know where it fits in the book count. Something close to like book number 10 was Reasons to Stay Alive. Lots of people think Reasons to Stay Alive was my first book. Reasons to Stay Alive, even when you don't count those horrendous business books,

which I've never mentioned in any podcast or interview ever before. Thank you. I'm sorry. Totally fine. And so I'd written a lot before then. And I genuinely possibly wouldn't have written Reasons to Stay Alive if I hadn't been asked to write it. It was the only book I've ever been asked by anyone to specifically write. There's a person who I think you possibly know called Cathy Rensenbrink, who wrote... Yes, love Cathy.

And she's quite well known in publishing and she's a writer herself now. She wasn't my publisher, but she was a friend. And I'd written a tiny blog for BookTrust. I used to write lots of blogs for BookTrust. I was their writer-in-residence for six months, the great the great charity book trust and I'd run out of things to write about and I was commissioned to write these weekly blogs and once I just put it out there I just sort of broke my ice I sort of mentioned the fact that I had depression and then that blog had far more traction and interest and support than anything else I'd written. And

when Kathy contacted me to go for a coffee, and she just said I should write it. And she had this idea of who should publish it and this, that and the other. And it stemmed from there. But even then, I didn't know how to talk about it. Because I hadn't actually spoken about depression until I wrote about it in that blog to anyone beyond my parents and Andrea who had to those people had to know because I was going through a breakdown with it I mean I lost a lot of friends during the years I was ill but not telling anyone I was ill because my hometown friends when I was living at home they'd say oh do you want to go out into Nottingham on Saturday night or to do this? And I would just make some rubbish excuse

or not get back to them or I wouldn't pick up the phone. And so people drift away and I literally shielded myself from it. And also I was sort of scared of friends because I was in a state of panic disorder, so scared of everything. I just wanted to be in my little cocoon away from the world. I was probably more that way because I had Andrea, because I had my parents, because I had that privileged setup where I could just sort of cut myself off. But yes, it wasn't good because it was basically, I had a lot

of self stigma. I had a lot of shame about the word depression, about being depressed, about having panic attacks, about having some symptoms of OCD, all these things. I felt like, I don't know, as a young man, I'd wanted to be someone who felt like I was in control and mind over matter. I had all these sort of ideas of what I should be. I mean, man up wasn't really a thing then. But that sort of idea that you should just sort of put up and shut up and just sort of be tough. And I knew in my heart, I was never really that person. But the mental illness experience, I really struggled. And actually overcoming the stigma was almost in my case, to a degree overcoming the illness itself, because

so much of the stigma made my symptoms worse because it stopped me getting help when I needed it. I didn't want to be a person on pills, even though I should have been on pills. I didn't want to be a person in therapy, all of those things. It was stopping me get better. And I was scared of the depression. So I didn't want to be depressed because I was depressed. I didn't want to be depressed because I was anxious. I didn't want to be anxious. And so actually coming to terms with depression was a big part of me getting over depression. I had to get to a point where I was okay with having depression, which sounds like a paradox because depression is not okay. And it was life-threatening in my case and lots of people's

cases. But I had to get to a point where I accepted it as an experience I was going through rather than a definition of who I was. And now that you have been open about it, and it's had such an extraordinary resonance with so many people around the world, it puts you in this position, I think Jamila Jamil described you as the king of empathy. It puts you in this position where I know a lot of people come to you who you don't know, who will message you on social media or email you, who are often going through really traumatic life events. How do you cope with that? I found that really hard for a long time because obviously I was a writer who'd paid my dues writing 10 books struggling writer never been close to a bestseller list never won anything you know I was just your average

struggling writer who like most writers are you dream of having your breakthrough book then Reasons to Stay Alive became my breakthrough book and that was great for a little while and then it became number one in paperback and at that point and it was winter the book came out as a sort of new year thing and it was winter and that January I was seeing it in waterstones windows and everything and that was all exciting but my inbox was quickly filling up and my social media messages from people who often were in terrible situations and wanting help with things and there's kind of messages that you can't ignore, even though they're from strangers. You know, sometimes they were from

people whose life was in almost immediate danger. You know, they would be typing in, literally, not because they knew of my book, but they'd be typing into a Google search box, reasons to stay alive, and my book would pop up. And then they'd contact me. And it was far too much, because I was in an anxiety patch myself. So I went through a period in 2015, 2016, whenever it was, where I wished I hadn't written it. It sounds sort of self-indulgent, but even though it was helping people, I was mentally so fragile at that point. I felt like a fraud myself because I thought, well, they're getting advice from this book that's helping them. Apparently they're saying it's helping them. And why is it not helping me? Because I'm in this sort

of state myself. I'm back having panic attacks. I'm back sort of, I could feel the old agoraphobia creeping in. So I was having to consciously force myself out of the house, force myself to walk the dog, feeling like it was an achievement to walk the dog and things like that. Reasons to Stay Alive, although people now who criticize it say, oh, he wrote it to capitalize on mental health and make money out of mental health.

It's like Reasons to Stay Alive was always seen by myself, not just by me, but by my publishers as well as this kind of side project. You know, it got smaller advance. It was a small book to write it was a short book I didn't actually spend that long thinking or overthinking reasons to stay alive I wrote it as if no one was watching I fired it off and then all the time I was writing reasons to stay alive I was trying to think what my next novel would be I wanted to write a children's book and it was probably out of all the books I've written it's one I've thought

about while I was writing the least in some ways and And I'm not saying that makes it a worse book, it might in some ways make it a better book, but I wrote it totally not self-consciously. But then the publication of it made me so self-conscious of it. I can remember there was a Guardian interview, it was the first sort of profile on it, and about the first question in the interview. And it was one of those where the questions were in bold type so everyone could see the questions the first question was on page 73 your father told you to pull yourself together what do you think about people who say that and then my mum was on the phone saying Matt dad's really upset about what's written and my mum and dad had read the book before it was published, gone through it, they were fine,

there was nothing too uncomfortable. And then the one possible bit which is awkward about my dad telling me to pull me up together, it's picked out in the media. And then I just thought, oh my God, I never want to write anything about my life again. This is terrible, all of that. And I needed some help with professionals

like from Mind and Time to Change in terms of where to direct people to, what to say, what not to say, because I was just getting back in a human to human way, actually trying to give individuals reasons to stay alive, emails, and it was just like, it was far too much. But now I've absorbed it. I'm very glad I wrote that book. I definitely don't think it's my best book by any means. But it's possibly if I had to pick one book of mine to exist, I would probably still go for that one just because it has definitely been of practical use to people. But it was a very intense process of, but gear change anyway, from being struggling writer to successful-ish writer was weird anyway. And it's the kind of weird that you don't get sympathy for because everyone wants to be...

Yeah, but anyway, sorry, I'm off. Super intense. No, a very, very good description of what that must have been like. I also think that there's a tendency, and maybe it goes beyond this country, but particularly in this country, that once you write a book about something

or once you launch a podcast about something and it becomes successful you're then perceived as someone who's putting yourself forward as an expert on that particular subject and actually that's not the case at all like I'm not an expert on failure I just happen to ask lots of people questions about it i only came on here because i thought you had a phd in fail philosophy or whatever you are a failure fraud elizabeth day this is terrible i know exactly you've nailed it both both amusing and slightly hurtful when people are like well what would she know about failure because here's this successful podcast and whatever. First of all, no one knows what goes on in someone else's life. Secondly, it's like saying to an orthopedic surgeon, well, you don't have any broken bones. So what would you know about

orthopedic surgery? But thirdly, it's like missing the point. And I feel there's probably a touch of that with you as well. Like you never set yourself forward as an expert on mental health. with you as well like you never set yourself forward as an expert on on mental health absolutely I've always been clear certainly in the books I am very clear that I'm definitely not a doctor I'm not a neuroscientist I'm not a psychologist I am a person a writer if I consider myself anything I consider myself professionally as a writer who went through an experience partly recovered from that experience definitely didn't get to a state of 100% wellness. I didn't sit under a tree for 40 days and reach a state of enlightenment. I haven't reached nirvana. Yeah, I'm not on the mountaintop. I'm not snobby about other people's

self-help books, but I don't really feel like I've written a self-help book in the sort of what people mean by a self-help book. Because I don't give bullet point solutions of what you must do or what time you should get out of bed or you should do this I'm speaking even when it sounds like I'm speaking universally that's the voice of me now to the voice of me then you see with reasons to stay alive I had a very clear reader in mind I think it always helps well certainly for me I don't know about you but if you're anything, it helps to have a reader in mind, even if that reader is you, to have an individual in mind. And I was very clearly writing Reasons to Stay Alive for someone, and that someone was the younger version of me, who I felt very different to when I was writing Reasons to Stay

Alive. And I was just trying to find words from the future to that person and I knew if I did that authentically enough it would possibly speak to other people in similar situations or other people who wanted to understand that situation so yes it is trying to offer people hope but it's not trying to offer people any kind of false hope it's trying to offer people just a belief that things can change and things can be uncertain but what I've noticed now is people now think that from reasons to stay alive onwards my message basically is the way you get over depression is you become a super successful writer or you get film deals or this that and never and it's like none of that a would have helped me at the time.

And B, that is not what I'm writing about. When I recovered, I was still tens of thousands of pounds in debt, still had all my student loans to pay off, still renting a flat in Leeds. That's how I recovered. I'm not saying, you know, I was still very privileged in lots of ways. But this idea that it was just because I became this successful person or had a big check or something and that's what got over my depression I never have written that and I don't believe that and I understand that people can select a few tweets here and there and say that's what I'm saying but that's definitely not what I'm saying and it's certainly not what I said in Reason Stale I've any of the books about depression you You mentioned privilege there and your third failure is your failure to check your privilege for too long and hands up I think so many of us

feel the same way but tell me your particular experience of that. Well I think it is because I've got lots of fatal flaws but one of them is defensiveness so I have a very knee jerk kind of a gut reaction sometimes when I feel people automatically and this certainly used to be the case think that you've had it easy when you haven't as you could probably tell from that last answer I get frustrated when people belittle your own journey in some way. So I felt, and in those nine books before Reasons to Stay Alive, and all the rejection letters and stuff, I knew, as everyone does, everyone knows their own story. Everyone knows their own battle. So within that story, you're not always placing yourself as a statistic in the social context. You're a person going through your life, knowing what you've been through, knowing the kind of school you went to, knowing the kind of friends you had, knowing that

you were bullied at school, knowing that you had your breakdown, you had your problems with alcohol, knowing that you're agoraphobic. You know all that, and other people don't know all that. So they're seeing a different picture of you. So I think my problem with privilege was really a problem of feeling misunderstood and then getting defensive about it. And then, therefore, because I was so aware of my own situation, I wasn't having enough empathy at that point to understand that actually, when you're presenting yourself to the world, other things come into play.

And if you're truly trying to be a kind person and you're trying to think of other people, you've got to realise that, A, everybody has their struggles. And the question of privilege isn't a question of taking away your hardships. It's not saying that you didn't go to a tough school. It's not saying that you had it easy or you got there through networking or you went to Eton. It's not saying any of that. It's just saying that privilege exists. There are certain people in society who have other barriers, who have other things that they have to overcome. And so I struggled with that. And I think part of the reason I struggled with

that was the nature of Twitter itself and the nature of that social media debate, which, Twitter itself and the nature of that social media debate which as we all know is kind of nuance free it's combative and it's not exactly the place where healing happens or understanding happens and so yeah if you go back I wouldn't advise anyone to do this but if you go back a few years to my timeline I was getting into all kinds of arguments. And I just cringe so hard at the way I sort of occasionally presented myself. And it's a learning curve. And I wouldn't say I'm 100% there. You know, I have weekdays where I'm feeling, you know, I felt a bit like that this week, it's probably coming across in this podcast. But when you've been a bit attacked, or hounded, you start licking your wounds, and you look a little bit like you're

presenting yourself as a victim just because that's how you're feeling in that moment it doesn't necessarily mean that if you take a step back you know how privileged you are and you know how but you're not necessarily feeling that every time of day I think as my approach to writing has always been to sort of like wear my heart on the sleeve there's a good side of that but the bad side of that is when you're not being your most pleasant or empathetic self that is also out there too so I think that's part of it I had such an interesting therapy session recently when my therapist was talking about accepting your whole self and all of the facets, all of the unpleasantness, all of the kind of dark sides where you cannot be the king of empathy every single day because you wouldn't be human

and you'd be really bloody annoying as well. So I think that that's a really good point. And I suppose I wanted to ask you about the two things that are connected. You've spoken really eloquently in the past about there being no hierarchy of suffering, the fact that wealth and privilege doesn't insulate you from mental health issues. But I wonder if you think that in your own experience, it cushioned you, that there was a level of privilege that cushioned that experience in any

way or not? Yeah, well, definitely. I mean, in all kinds of ways, I was essentially lucky. I mean, there's a luck that a lot of people have, but I was lucky that I had somewhere to go. I was lucky that when I was ill, my parents could take me in, I could live without having to earn at that point in time. That was an extreme piece of luck. I can't honestly say I was that lucky in terms of the medical care I had access to because given my situation at the time, I was in such a state of agoraphobia and so scared of speaking, I didn't actually go for any of that care. I went to the doctor, I got prescribed diazepam and the doctor wasn't

particularly understanding, which is fair enough. It was the year 2000. There weren't many GPs who were that understanding, certainly not in New York and Trent. And I had a bad experience because I was prescribed the wrong pills. And that put me off getting help. So in a way, the barriers for my recovery weren't social. They weren't to do with a lack of privilege. They were to do with my own head and agoraphobia. So there is a frustration when people say, oh, well, you were privileged,

so you had access to all the best care when you didn't actually get that care. That's a frustration. But I was definitely privileged to have people, to have a support network, to have people and a place I could live. Admittedly, we had to leave it out my parents' house and then Andrea sort of had to start working and we were in debt and all that stuff. But yes, it still was a better experience than a lot of people get. get. I mean, the statistics, they're well publicised now, but they weren't at the time. For instance, if you're a young black man who had experience of any kind of mental health problem, the chances of that problem being misdiagnosed are so much higher. You're so much more likely to be misdiagnosed with something like schizophrenia if you're a black man than if

you're a white man of that similar age at that time and so I didn't have any of that when I was diagnosed I was diagnosed with I think pretty much accurately of what I was going through and all of that stuff and I probably wasn't seen as a danger to society through that experience in the way other people might be and all of that so there's all kinds of privileges but I think privilege also works on a deeper level like I don't know there's probably a deeper privilege of like being conditioned from a young age as a man as a certain group in society to feel like I'm important or my life is important or that I have to live for all sorts of things so there's yeah I don't know it's privilege I'm still trying to sort

of work it out and work my place. But obviously, I am privileged in a billion ways now. I still find it hard to sort of analyse exactly how privilege worked in my own recovery. I think because what is frustrating, I suppose, is that for me, it felt so like I was on another planet. The earthly things, the material thing, I wanted to be in the world of stress. I wanted to be in the world of difficulty because I wanted real difficulty because my head was exploding. So when I had a relapse years later, when we were living in York, our house became flooded and the whole value was written off the house and everything. And we had to move out of our house. And everyone was super sympathetic, suddenly, because it was

a real problem. I was super relieved that the house had become flooded, because suddenly, I had been lifted out of the depression that I was in, because I had something external to worry about. So I think the reason I fell through the gaps of understanding privilege properly is because I'd always felt so like my problems were internal and intrinsic to my own wiring. And I used to crave external problems, which obviously is a bad look for a privileged white person to be doing. And that's why I got so defensive and so bronchic. And I also I wasn't that well versed in what the problems were in terms of the mental health world about lack of privilege.

And there's a lot more data on it now. And it is very clear that there's all kinds, you know, if you look at suicide figures relating to class, relating to age, any kind of demographic you look at, there are massive discrepancies, nation to nation, ethnic group to ethnic group, by gender, it's very cultural. Mental health is a very cultural thing. So when a culture is, and society is, unequal, those inequalities are going to be evident in the facts and data. I also think that there's an issue, and this is not an original thought, that mental health as a whole is such a vast umbrella

term. And it encompasses people who might feel a bit low and go for a jog and feel better, them all the way through to someone with bipolar, someone who's been sectioned, someone. And so it's very hard sometimes for people who talk about mental health to make specific reference to every single one of these elements. And so it all kind of gets lumped into one. And there's this idea that if we just read a book about, you know, taking up knitting, that everything's going to be okay. And you're not saying that, are you? No, I'm not saying that. I'm not saying that. But I'm also saying that there's a kind of mental health snobbery out there, where if something helps someone, but it doesn't help you, then that person is really scornful about that thing that helps them. And going back to the point of

privilege, I think sometimes there's a privilege in looking down on things that are actually life-saving for other people. I used to be super snobby about, for instance, yoga. I used to think, you have not gone through a panic attack. If you think me calming my breathing down is going to help me in any way have this life-altering experience, which is a panic attack, if you think that's related. And it didn't work like magic, but I genuinely think that me actually learning to control my breathing was having some sort of neurochemical effect on me. And I think there's this British trait that unless something's literally prescribed by a doctor, that is literally the only authority we're taking on this matter. And actually, there are some things with mental health,

we are still so much in the dark ages, which is why there is no one antidepressant, there's no one talk therapy, there's no one treatment, which blanketly works for everybody. So mental health is so in the dark ages, and it's so subjective, you kind of have to be, to a degree, your own laboratory. And to make it an effective laboratory, you sometimes have to be open-minded. I mean, when I was ill, I was trying to be as open-minded as possible. I'm not a fan of homeopathy by any means, but my mum thought that I should go to the homeopath. So I went to the homeopath, and the homeopathy itself did not do a thing. But speaking to the homeopath did do something because this homeopath was someone who'd gone through depression.

And I was seeing a person who'd gone through suicide or depression who was there in front of me better. So it didn't matter what was in her tinctures. Nothing she would offer me would actually make me better in the physical sense. But having seen her in that room, that was a help because there she was, she'd gone through the death of her husband, she'd gone through suicidal depression, and there she was smiling and happy and enjoying her work. So what I'm trying to say, I suppose, is it's so easy to be sort of snobby. And you can see during this pandemic, it's so important,

obviously, to have science behind things and to actually know what is right and what is pseudoscience. I'm not saying we should head towards pseudoscience, but I'm saying in terms of things that give people comfort, that is a subjective thing. People could think, oh, you've only got to read the most academic works about mental illness and depression to understand mental illness. But there could be another person who stayed alive because they listened to Hold On by Wilson Phillips. And, you know, their life's not any less valuable than the person who is reading Andrew Solomon or whatever. I don't know. I don't really know how to explain it. I think there is a kind of mental health snobbery, actually. And we can get sort of inspiration from anywhere. I mean, some of the things that have helped me stay alive

aren't things that are written down or understood. It could be just like the way a shadow moves or the sun sort of coming out or just staring at the stars. But if you start talking about staring at the stars as a mental health therapy, people would be, oh, that's just utter nonsense, the idea that if you've been bedbound for six weeks with depression, that you could go out and look at stars. And yet, in my own experience, I definitely have not had the most extreme end of some mental health conditions, I know. But in the most extreme end of my mental health conditions, I've often had

the most sort of whimsical, or poetic, or sort of Instagram cliche thoughts when I've been at my most depressed. There's a point related to this. It isn't specifically about mental health, but there's a guy, a famous guy, I think George Clooney played him in a movie, a sailor, Steve Callaghan, who got lost at sea. And he was lost at sea for 74 days on this dinghy.

And he was a philosophy student. And he was lost at sea for 74 days on this dinghy. And he was a philosophy student. And he was down to his last supplies. He was convinced he was going to die. He was famished from hunger. And he was in the worst state ever. He knew he was going to die. He couldn't sleep. He was in physical pain. He couldn't see anything on the horizon, literally. Yet he said in his book, which is called Adrift, which is quite an inspiring book, he said in his book, which is called Adrift, which is quite an inspiring book, he said that in those moments of desperation, he had never seen the world so beautiful. He said he felt like the stars were singing to him. He felt like the waves and the ocean had a kind of music. And he suddenly understood how beautiful the world is now for

someone who wasn't in that situation but in a lesser situation than that they would think well that sounds like the most patronizing thing ever if I'm lost at sea what I've got to do is appreciate the beauty of the waves and the stuff that's not going to actually help my boat meet the shore so I sometimes think there's a case of missing the point. Yes, sometimes it's easy to be snobby because your experience has been worse. But I sometimes think people who haven't been at the point of suicide are being snobby about it because they don't actually understand that sometimes in those moments, something like a sunset can break through. It doesn't cure your depression, doesn't alleviate your depression,

but it might offer a glimpse that the world is a beautiful place that you want to stay in at that point in future time. Oh, Matt Haig, what a beautiful, beautiful point to bring this to a close. We didn't get onto your fourth folio,

which is not learning how to drive, by the way, but I feel like- I've been so rambly. I mean, even for a podcast, I feel like I've been so rambly I mean even for a podcast I feel like I've been super rambly today but that has been so good I feel like I've gone through something I'm reaching closure on something well I feel like you've given me pockets of revelation throughout this you haven't been rambly at all you've been a really wonderful guest just tell me quickly before we go do you and Meghan Markle just chat now do you just text

each other all the time no I would love to say yes to that and I'd be so loose-lipped if that was the case but unfortunately it's not there was a chance I had to chat to her when I was on holiday and she'd phone because she was phoning people who'd been in her edition of Vogue and I missed the phone call from Megan Markle so no we're just sort of podcast appearance friends. That's so interesting. You've never actually met each other? No. How amazing to have such a symbol of the influence that your work has, that you've never met this person who is so influential in her own sphere, who comes from such a different life and what a beautiful moment of connection really is what I'm saying. Yeah I mean I think that's the beauty of the modern world isn't it

I talk a lot of bad stuff about the internet and 21st century modern stuff but I feel like the fact that we can connect with people and influence people and change people's minds in different parts of the globe that That's a beautiful thing. And that's certainly a thing I would have been thankful for 20 or so years ago. Matt Haig, there are so many people who are thankful for what you do. Thank you for coming on How to Fail, for your 28 books, and for generally being just a source of inspiration for so many of us. Thank you.

Thank you very much this episode of how to fail is sponsored by vichy laboratories whose product mineral 89 hyaluronic acid hydrating serum has been described very accurately as a glass of water for your skin. I don't know about you, but I have been reading for years about the benefits of hyaluronic acid on your skin, and this is the product to use. Don't just take my word for it. It has been approved by the British Skin Foundation. Not only that, but it's hypoallergenic and dermatologist tested. It is an intensely hydrating skincare solution, clinically proven to hydrate, plump and boost skin's radiance for healthy glowing skin. There are over 1,500 five-star consumer reviews and it's also award-winning. It's Glamour Magazine's

2020 best hydrating serum, which shows just how much other people love it. Anyway, we all need a bit more hydration during lockdown, don't we? So if you would like a Vichy Laboratories Mineral 89 Hyaluronic Acid Hydrating Serum, go to lookfantastic.com and use the code HEALTHYSKIN20, all one word, HEALTHYSKIN20, for 20% off Mineral 89 products, this offer is available until the 31st of March. Thank you very much to Vichy Laboratories. If you enjoyed this episode of How to Fail with Elizabeth Day, I would so appreciate it if you could rate, review and subscribe. Apparently, it helps other people know that we exist.