Paddy Cordell (aka ‘Wee Paddy’) has been on a mission to change the world since 2009. And is determined to help people to avoid their darkest moments.
You see Paddy comes from a standpoint of great insight, he tried to take his own life twice at the age of 18.
Paddy from the age of 14 had panic attacks, sometimes this was as many as ten every single day and the night time ones were progressively worse.
He figured out that drinking alcohol helped him sleep and to avoid the all-consuming dark thoughts throughout the night.
He left school at an early age and managed to make enough money to be able to drink every day.
His state of mind got worse and matters came to a head in 2005.
Paddy comes from and was in the beautiful County Down in Northern Ireland with the harbour, the sea and the imposing mountains. But he found this suffocating, it felt like the end of the world for him and he felt the world was closing in on him.
Paddy explained:
“Then I had a number of my friends take their own lives through suicide, so the world just seemed to close in really fast on me. felt like there was no other way out so, I was sitting in the pub one night and I went myself then and tried to take my own life.”
Fortunately, Paddy was found by police and taken to hospital, but he felt that he wasn’t getting the support he needed, so he again tried to take his own life two months later.
And again, he was found and, a phone call offering support directed him to get help through therapy. And he quit alcohol and this allowed him to think more clearly and better understand his mental health.
Paddy said of how he felt at this time:
“It was a struggle, I’m not going to say it was easy, it was a struggle even just for the first three months to stay alive. It was just fighting every day to keep the suicidal thoughts out of my head all the time.
As time progressed over the next two years, he started to progress and socialising just a little bit more.
After two years of therapy, he took a year out to try and deal with the world as it is and not how he thought it should be. Really coming to terms with accepting that everything isn’t perfect and never will be.
“That’s the whole misconception, we’re trying to create this world around us that’s perfect and it’s just not there – we have to learn to deal with the hard times that come and accept them.”
Paddy then went on to train in Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST) and studied positive psychology.
He uses this knowledge and skills in his training, especially for young people in schools.
He said that teaching children early in their lives that they are in charge of how they’re feeling and how to deal with their emotions is crucial in creating a better mental health landscape.
Paddy explains why it is so important to him to influence young people:
“Whenever you’re in school, that seems to be the toughest time for children,” he said. Especially when they sit exams and there’s so much pressure put on them and I think that’s where a lot of problems develop from. If we can get in and we can control and choose positive thoughts and thinking and instil this from a young age then it becomes a habit.”
Paddy wants his story to encourage more people to open up about their emotional and mental wellbeing and to take steps toward a healthier outlook.
He says
“I’m proud of the person that I’ve become out of that, I’ve definitely become a better person from that experience,”
He is determined to reach out to as many people as possible
Summing up, he tells us
“Our strength comes in talking to people, in getting rid of those emotions, or accepting them and feeling them and then we can grow from them.
While studying to be a practitioner he came across the Art of Brilliance team and took the opportunity of sitting in on their school workshops. He attended day one, intending to sit at the back and observe but within 10 minutes he was getting involved!
Everything fell into place. He’s now providing mental health training in Northern Ireland for the Art of Brilliance, and as they say, the rest is history….