BAD DAY RULE

by .

It’s World Mental Health Day.

A moment to talk about one of the most important self-care items going: What goes on in your head.

A moment to talk to an audience that is the most likely to be affected by it and not say anything (you, my friend).

Men are pretty shit at this. Mostly, it’s men that read this blog. So let’s have a chat about it.

It’s ok not to be ok sounds cliche, but it’s true. Mental health, no matter how many ‘wellness days’ brutal office cultures offer up, is not respected to the level it should be… still. That’s why I think it’s so powerful superstars of elite level sport are crafting a way forward for normal people. Simone Biles tapping out of some of the Olympics? If she’s ok to say ‘no thanks,’ after all the shit she’s been through, then guess what… Pedro who makes tweets for a living can tap out if things are going badly.

I did a podcast last week with someone that works in a high-stress environment (football) and they shared this little gem with me:

‘We have a rule that I have made very clear to my people. If you are having a bad day, you tell me upfront. You don’t have to talk about the details. Or you can talk about the details. But if you’re having a bad day, I want to know, because we all have them.’

I loved that. So simple. So easy to implement in any job. Beautifully disarming in a way. You don’t have to get into the details, you don’t have to pull out a chaise longue, but if everyone around you knows the deal, it can really take the steam out of some heavy things going on in your head. How many people going through some severe shit would just like to say, ‘I’m having a bad day’, and haven’t, with sad consequences? I sat next to someone at new London job, the nicest chap you’d ever meet, incredibly sharp and easy going. He helped me navigate this new monster organisation I worked in. He set the tone for the culture of the office. He was beloved. One day, he just didn’t show for work. He’d never show again. Just like that, gone. I never thought to ask him how he really was, but I wonder if he’d been able to say he was having a bad day, whether things would have been different?

I actually don’t think I can remember ever having the courage to say something like that, but you know what, that’s going to be a new rule I bring to all my teams going forward. It’s a small thing, but it’s actionable, and if only one person reading this does it, then it’s a win.

Part of me wonders if some of the newfound empathy we’re seeing in football might be partly related to the tough year we’ve all had sitting in a box shut off from the world. Everyone wrestled with demons this year. We all needed something a little deeper than a Zoom happy hour. I wonder if the softening towards athletes is here to stay? They aren’t robots. They’re at work like you and me. Maybe the game is just better if we’re a bit nicer offline and online.

… as for the online bit. This is another area we can all be a little bit better and I will 100% hold my hands up here and say I need to take it easier and realise that it’s just football. Maybe we could all be kinder to people on the internet? It’s just a football opinion. It’s just a game. If you wouldn’t say it to someone in a bar, maybe you shouldn’t say it on the internet… because you never know what is going on with someone behind the keyboard. I’d say the internet is a dreadful place generally, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised how kind everyone is to me, Johnny and Matt on the Youtube videos. It’s very sweet. Same with the podcast stuff. The world is a better place when there’s a bit of kindness out there, life is a little easier, and one less thing to worry about is good for everyone.

Someone who has dealt with mental health issues is Tyson Fury. What an incredible story. I think he gave an entire paycheck to a mental health charity earlier in his career. He’s a symbol of someone dealing with his challenges head-on and coming out the other end a hero. So massive congrats to him.

Would it be wrong to cite Bukayo Saka as well? He missed a decisive penalty in a European Cup Final, he came back into club football, now he’s back scoring goals, looking extremely well. What a player. You absolutely love to see it.

Anyway, bit of a weird one from me today. It’s hard to write things like this, mental health cuts brutally close to the bone for me, so this is uncomfortable, but if it makes one person feel even 1% better about themselves, then it’s a win.

Be good to each other, check in with those you love, and set up a ‘bad day’ rule in your work team.

See you in the comments. NEW podcast below. BIG LOVE xx

131 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Left Testicle

It seems there is a disproportionate amount of people on here who suffer with their mental health. Common denominator? Le-Grove?

Left Testicle

That’s where I’ve been going wrong Sid. I have been taking it anally! 😬

Sid

Annually?

DivineSherlock

So so thankful that I stumbled on to this great blog of Arsenal related stuff. Sometimes a really brilliant reminder of how sports unite people . This community in comment section is top class. An article like this helps a lot Pedro , thank you to you as well . Just brilliant.

Graham62

Goobergooner Spot on. What is our ID? After nearly two years, what is it exactly? I’ve criticised Auba on here but when you’ve got an asset like him in the team why don’t you play to his strengths? Arteta is so rigid in his methods. You’re 100% right, it’s all the attacking players. It amazes me that Arteta doesn’t see or act on the obvious, something Wenger became very good at. You have to question things and not have you head stuck in the clouds all the time. We have a more than potent attacking force but we never see… Read more »

Graham62

your head

WiltshireGooner

Appreciate I’m late to the party for world mental health day but is it possible to do a you gov poll on mental health? Identifying possible causes of mental health within arsenal fans. While I appreciate it’s a very small specific segment of the community it might be enlightening? Personally I suffered with Being molestered in childhood. Fortunately out of the worst of the mental health and depression issues now but only just looking for councilling. On average it take 24 years for male survivors of male child sexual abuse to come forward. And even after raising it 10+ years… Read more »

Nelson

“We could yet see a midfield of Xhaka, Wilshere and Oxlade Chamberlain.”
_________________________________________________________________

I wouldn’t mind signing Ox. He was used by the Pool as a midfielder who can shoot from outside the box. But we already have Martinelli and Pepe who need game time.

Kris

Good post, Pedro. As someone who has severe, treatment-resistant depression combined with 2 types of 24/7 chronic pain, I can appreciate what you wrote. I also hope that most of you support euthanasia and assisted suicide for people like me who have no better option left after 15 years of hell. Strange how so many still oppose that or they want to only have it for people who will die anyway in a few months (I’m 45). Some people just have a broken brain due to a combo of factors: genetics + extreme stress usually. Anyway, I hope you all… Read more »

englandsbest

Graham62 Sure I’m out here. And sure I’ll explain. You are not looking, or maybe you prefer not to see. At times Arsenal’s speed is truly astonishing,. That is what repetitive training achieves – speed of thought and action. But it’s a kind of dance rhythm – slow, slow, quick. The slow stuff is mesmeric, the fast is lethal. It’s true to say the team is not scoring because Auba is not scoring. You may get away with a one-man bandwagon if Messi or Ronaldo or Lewandowski is the driver – but not with present-day Auba. His best is behind… Read more »

Sid

Hugs and kisses work better than euthanasia

kjelli

Should we relief man und. of Fred in jan . instead of going for Bissuma ?

Tom

Englandsbest, now perhaps you can explain how Wenger giving the 28 year old Ozil the 350kpw 3 year extension was a crime of the century whilst Arteta giving the 31 year old Auba the same a simple blip.

englandsbest

Tom At the time I thought it was a mistake, and I gave my reasons: – the ridiculously high wages, Auba’s age, putting him in the comfort zone, etc….so it’s hard to explain. So I’ll make an excuse instead, Arteta was a rookie, learning on the job. However, putting myself in Arteta’s position, I can follow his reasoning. Auba had pretty much kept the team ticking, won him FA Cup, losing him at that early stage would have seemed cataclysmic. And he had enough dross to get rid of on his hands without losing Auba. But what matters is now.… Read more »

Dissenter

Benjamin Mendy: Man City defender refused bail for third time

Not looking good for him.
The prosecution must have all their ducks in a row.

China1

Kris it saddens me greatly that you’d feel that way Life is so beautiful despite the shit that comes with it Kris the Big Bang happened 13.7 billion years ago. Whether or not people believed there is a god or whatever could’ve happened before that, take a moment to consider in order for you to exist, it required all the physics, chemistry and biology of 13.7 billion years to culminate in who you are. You exist on an absolutely minuscule oasis of what is an incredibly inhospitable universe. The very fact you exist a phenomenally remarkable series of circumstances So… Read more »

China1

No Ox for me thanks. He disappointed the first time round and he’s a crock!

englandsbest

Is it San Marino next? Will Ramsdale get a run-out? And Bukayo get a rest?

englandsbest

I’m wondering how players regard the prospect of three weeks in Qatar. With joy? Or with despair?

Still find it hard to believe that this bad joke WC will ever actually happen.

China1

To any one else having a hard time with depression or even just having one of those ‘proper wank’ days, I wrote this poem a couple of years back The Best is Yet to Come I have seen despair so deep – my heart reduced to ash Laid to waste, a crumpled heap, no strength within to thrash Pale in spirit, grey in soul, a tourist of great depths Burnt and stung so many times, a hoarseness scars my breath But it ends in me tonight – for I will find a path A guiding light within me to make… Read more »

China1

Englandsbest I’m still not sure what the arrangement will be with Qatar. Like can people get smashed and flip tables like they do at football tournaments elsewhere?

if there’s no alcohol or whatever it’s gonna be a very odd vibe lol

James wood.

China 1
Nice.
“There’s alway’s more to come.”
Alway’s look forward.

englandsbest

China1

No problem getting a drink, in my experience. Spent one of the best afternoons of my life getting pissed with friends in a taxi driving around Lahore.

Drinking alcohol is as natural to us humans (almost, anyway) as eating. I’m told the first farmers grew their grain more as a drink than a food. And without agriculture there would be no towns, no cities, no civilization. Yeah, I guess we can blame everything on booze – and Arteta, of course.

Nice pome, by the way

James wood.

McGINN Constantly getting MOM for
Villa and Scotland priced to buy.

raptora

China, that’s deep man and well written. I hope that everyone who feels depressed, finds the will to fight back for better days. The easier thing is to stay in your own shell and feel nothing. When friends or family ask you to go somewhere with them, don’t say no. What can you lose? If you don’t have fun and you don’t enjoy it, you’ll be back to your comfort space in no time. But the small chance that you might just find a new passion or a way to go through the rough days… don’t miss it. Give yourself… Read more »

Graham62

englandsbest Our slow is incredibly slow. Do I give Arteta the benefit of the doubt here? Do I give him the leeway and freedom to create a dynamic rhythmical style of play or do I question if I see slow, ponderous, one dimensional football? Coaching is based on muscle memory and repetition, as you highlighted, but it should also emphasis the significance of playing to a pattern of play that is progressive and threatening to the opposition. I haven’t seen any of this to date with Arteta. Two years……….THAT’S TWO YEARS! to get things right, is an awful long time… Read more »

Dissenter

It’s great to see the humanity of the blog on full display
Maybe now, we will all accept that criticisms of anything Arsenal is never intended to be personal. It’s just passionate gooners venting about everything Arsenal.
Safe to say, everyone will have a moment of transient or persistent depressed, at some point in their lifetime. Even if it turns out to not be clinical depression. The last two years with the covid pandemic has been devastating.

Graham62

Dissenter I agree and I would be the first to admit I have not been too enamoured with Pedro’s Arteta love ins these past few months. We all have differing views and opinions on things but, at the end of the day, focusing positively on something that clearly needs to be questioned is, I feel, relevant, as long as that is the evidence is there for all to see. Imo, it definitely is.. Today’s society is different to 30-40 years back. If you question and criticise you’re seen as being the aggressor and rude but if you’re ignoring the flip… Read more »

China1

Fuk u dissenter

Jus kiddin

China1

Cheers Rap

I actually self published a poetry compilation on the kindle store a couple of years back (since taken down as I want to edit it more and add to it)

I come on here all careless and bristolian like but when push comes to shove I’m a FOOKIN WORDSMITH

raptora

China,
So you’ve got no excuse for not participating more actively in the blog’s artsy fartsy circle. One day when Almunia and co are back with the good stuff, you better be ready and bring in your A game.