Tag: writing

Stages of Suicide: How to Help Your Mind BOOK is now published.

STAGES OF SUICIDE: HOW TO HELP YOUR MIND

is now available to buy

 

CLICK HERE TO BUY

 

This guide is a short explanation of the six stages of suicide with practical activities to help you prepare and assist your mind in the event it becomes irrational and unsafe.

Roy Baumeister, a social psychologist described these stages that people experience prior to carrying out suicidal acts.

Included is a mind-monitoring tool to assist you in identifying if your mind is displaying signs of reacting within the various six stages. This tool provides actions you can do to support your mind. A link to a printable PDF of the tool is included.
At the end of this guide, you can find a list of help crisis hotlines for various countries.

My original article is independently described as a:

Very good report, written in a humanistic way. The observed stages of suicide are of serious scientific interest, i.e. can help in preventive terms.

 

The more you understand how your thoughts and emotions respond in irrational ways the more you can transform your actions beyond the influence of an unhelpful mind to that of a supportive mind and live freely and fully.

If you are a therapist, this is a useful resource for your clients. It also is filled with illuminating content for those people curious about the irrationality of our minds and how to prevent that from interfering with our quality of life.


Stages of Suicide is an excellent insight into the though patterns of those dealing with suicide. Each stage very well describes the kind of thoughts, behaviours and emotions one feels as their condition continues, which I found extremely accurate and relatable. As for someone who has experienced these stages second hand, this is an incredible tool that can help non-suicidal people understand what it is like to be suicidal which I believe is one of the most important things for dealing with suicide on the larger scale.

After each stage there is a ‘prepare your mind’ section which works as a helping hand/’what to do about this’ counterpart of the stage. I found this to be really useful in not only making the content a lot less daunting and overwhelming to take in, but the reader is reminded that regardless of what stage you find yourself or someone close to you in there is always a solution to help you get out of it, which is exactly how this book approaches the terror of suicidal ideation.

Moreover, the mind monitoring tool at the end seems incredibly useful to help the user understand their own thoughts and emotions as they go through stages as well as help to generate some rational thinking patterns.

Overall this is an extremely insightful and practical helping hand for those dealing with suicide. Definitely recommend this to anyone who are either going through it or know someone who is, this book can help!

 – Rhys Jones


Feel free to contact me below.


WILD: LIFE DEATH ECOUNTERS WITH WILD ANIMALS

Genre – Adventure Memoir.

 

CLICK HERE TO BUY.

 

An exert from this series of true adventure stories can be read free click below

CLICK HERE FOR ONE CHAPTER FREE

 


Reviews From Australia

cristobel
Wild Ride

Reviewed in Australia 🇦🇺 on 18 October 2021

“It’s not often I find myself holding my breath as I read a book, however in the opening story of Wild: Life death encounters with wild animals, I was doing exactly that.

The shark encounter at Murramarang Beach raised those old fears which were embedded into everyone who watched the 1975 classic, Jaws. I watched that film as a child and was terrified for some time of the overcast days at the beach, when you couldn’t see what was under the surface. Even though I know Dr Myfawney Webb, and am familiar with many of her stories of an adventurous life, I was still riveted to the pages of my kindle as I followed her narrative of the shark encounter.

Myfawney has a knack for bringing you into her experiences, through the truth of the tales within this book and the authenticity of her voice.

It’s a real talent to be able to convey emotions such as desperation, fear, sadness and terror while staying true and real to her story.

Dr Webb has achieved this, and it was a real joy to see her stories brought to life with such passion.

I can highly recommend this book to any lovers of adventure, wildlife, Australian experiences and those who like to read a book perched on the edge of their seat.”

Helen Menzies
5.0 out of 5 stars Journeys with Myf

Reviewed in Australia 🇦🇺 on 17 October 2021

“It seems to happen in my life that I set out for an adventure and it’s dramatically rearranged by the gods into one of those deep priceless experiences.”
So says Dr Myf Webb in Life Death Encounters, and it’s no exaggeration. The book is a stirring tale of derring-do, told in an authentic down-to-earth no-fuss Australian voice.
“I … reflected on how I had somehow survived three direct active threats on my life by three very different types of animal, a Great White Shark, an Eastern Brown Snake and now a wild buffalo bull.”
To that list of adventures the spellbound reader can add spiders, wild horses, wild donkeys, beached whales, the hunt for secretive possums as part of her doctorate work, and being thrown from her horse when it was attacked by a bull-Arab hunting dog intent on murder.
Phew.
Most of these stories were written by Mfy Webb during her year-long treatment for cancer. In a lifetime of challenges this was yet another to overcome. The details of that adventure are yet to be published, but readers of Life Death Encounters will know to anticipate another inspiring journey of curiosity and courage.”

menace aforethought
5.0 out of 5 stars Wild by Nature

Reviewed in Australia 🇦🇺 on 3 October 2021

“It’s wonderful to see these works collected into a book. These are stories not just of the wild, but of the inner being, how we tread our path through the world, how we learn about ourselves and how to become a fully engaged person through challenges that we sometimes seek and which are sometimes thrown at us by life.
The stories not only surprise with the breadth of Myf’s experience from her work as a mammal specialist, travelling and living in remote Australia, but also in her love of animals and the wilderness in general. She takes on an immersing ride surfing, fascinated by a shark attack until the reality of the risk finally hits home. ‘This is the first time in my life I have completely and absolutely maxed out on exerting my body physically.’ We are there with her, feeling that intense moment, the stress of trying to get back to shore when there are no waves to help and splashing could be the worst possible idea! Fortunately, this is followed by ‘White and pure EUPHORIA’, and she is safe on the shore. But danger was never far behind her in the bush while she studied mammals, or even when she was young, and being confronted with angry brown snakes as well as death adders, yet that didn’t seem to faze her. Although she has learnt to respect the angry brown snake a little more over time. I remember going out with her and her reptile specialist husband, Johnno, on one of his field trips to collect death adders near Darwin. My partner John and I were in the back of the ute as he drove along a road between rice fields where he would jump out from time to time and bag one, only to toss it in the back with us! One thing I learned from our early time living in the upstairs flat from them in Glebe, where they were breeding Funnel web spiders to feed his study animals – death adders – life was never dull around Myf! A photo of her in the book, smiling while a python winds itself around her neck is a classic!
Whale rescues and her surprise at the bond she formed with one, her hundreds of efforts trying to trap wild Rock-ringtail possums in Kakadu, and I know she had to wear beekeepers kit at least at times to protect her from swarms of killer mosquitos, lost in the Kimberly among ‘dodgy mineshafts’ with a ‘team of blokes’, ‘waking up in the morning, la de la de la, walking down the sandy creek bed,’ and being confronted by a wild buffalo, one of the most dangerous animals you can encounter in the bush, the scientist in her even taking in that he pawed the ground with his left foot, so perhaps one part of the 7% of ‘left-handed’ creatures! How she escaped this situation is classic. She came off less well when her horse she was riding was attacked by a dog, ending in a 15-kilometre trek with a broken arm and a one-handed drive to hospital!
“But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.
“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
This quote from Alice in Wonderland seems particularly apt when I think of how Myf has crashed her way through life to contribute enormously to our understanding of the natural world, and perhaps this is how people have to be to do this work. So, it is not surprising that she has fought cancer with the same chutzpah, and now has given the world a wonderful collection of stories from her adventures to inspire new generations to get out there and go for it!”

NEW BOOK LAUNCH, WILD : Life Death Encounters with Wild Animals

My new book WILD Life Death Encounters with Wild Animals, true stories, is soon to be launched as both a Kindle E-Book and Paperback version. Launch Date is Monday 4th October 2021

This book is a compilation of my blog post series of encounters with wild animals.

I’d just like to thank all of you who have been reading my posts over the years. You have helped inspire me to write more and make sure my writing ‘fire stays alight.

The book description is;

“The compelling, dramatic series of white-knuckle encounters with a medley of wild animals keeps you turning the pages, feverish to know how Myfanwy manages to escape alive. A risk taker, she likes living life on the edge and in this adventure-packed memoir, you’ll discover how in the remote forests, deserts, and oceans of Australia, she sidestepped death not once but multiple times. If you fear snakes, spiders, sharks or dogs, this book is for you.

These stories span her childhood to adult encounters. They include incidents while traveling with her family to remote locations in Australia, to close calls with wild animals during biological fieldwork in Kakadu National Park in the Northern Territory. Other incidents happened while surfing and riding her beloved horse.

Myfanwy’s curiosity and depth of understanding the behaviour of animals, is reflected in the way she describes these contacts with wild animals. Her stories interweave a love of animals and nature, with adrenalin and adventure.”

Some of the comments from my series, posted here include;

  • Maria said of Cujo- the Attack “I could picture it as if I was there”.
  • John said of El Toro – “Very clever and brave – El bloody Toro made me laugh aloud. What amazing bush experiences of wildness you have had – so exceedingly rare – I am jealous. I also learnt that you need agility to catch Rock Possums, so that’s one career lost to me.”
  • Ben – “Great stories about spideys, I love them myself!”
  • Bronwyn said of Eaten Alive- “Fantastic story!”
  • Angela said of Eaten Alive – “Oh wow a compelling story! Interesting behaviours demonstrated in the part of both fish and human!”

If you’d like to write a Review for this book send me an email at myfanwy@myfanwywebb.com and I’ll send you a free electronic copy.

(To be eligible to contribute to Amazon reviews, you need to have purchased $50 worth of books from Amazon in the past year).

Please share this link if you know someone who would enjoy these stories.

 

Pink – 1 min read

The best piece of advice I was given I would have to say was to not follow the crowd, don’t be a sheep, be your own person, that concept. The other dimension is not to waste energy competing with others.

I learnt this in first grade. I was 5. Linda unknowingly gave it to me. Our task for the lesson was colouring in. My patience never stretched as far as colouring in perfectly up against those thick black lines. Never. No matter how hard I tried. Hopeless I was. But, I couldn’t see the point really. Linda however was perfectly skilled at this. Linda had blonde hair, was my friend, I liked her and was super popular. The teacher asked consecutively around the room what our favourite colours were, starting with Linda. She said pink. Alison my other friend said pink. Glen probably said pink. They all said pink. I loved pink but I said brown. That felt good.

Since that moment I have never worried about going against the grain. It has me in trouble but it’s usually worth it.

**     *****   **