I started my blog as a means to develop my seemingly rapid and disconnected thoughts into a communicable, organized form. I also find writing is a useful exercise for building emotional resilience in sharing these thoughts with the public. I find it frightening to be so exposed, yet also exciting to see what kind of response I get from people. Plus, it’s revealing to look backward to reflect on what topics I’ve written about over time as my story unfolds.
Finding common ground between our movements: psychiatric survivors and the broader disability community
This essay was included in the November 22, 2019 newsletter for MindFreedom International, a non-profit organization that fights for human rights in mental health. I was recently invited by my new friend Tom Olin to attend an event in Washington, DC titled ‘Humanity of Connection: A Celebration of Leadership and Empowerment within the Disability Community’. …
My Cool Project Bucket List
Recently, I ran a workshop for a group of teens where we went through a brainstorming process for generating project ideas. I thought it’d be fun to share a list of my own dream projects, all of which I hope to complete before I die. I guess that makes this my “project bucket list”. As…
State of the Startup: July 2018
Note to reader: this was written in July of 2018 and was supposed to be published in July of 2019… I never published it due to my discomfort with certain parts of the article, so I’m posting it now on June 3, 2021. State of the Startup: July 2018 This is the third installment…
Introducing: Voices for Choices
Two summers ago, I watched as a good friend of mine in North Carolina was involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital. Though he posed zero risk to himself or others, he was handcuffed, forcibly drugged, and locked in a psychiatric hospital for weeks against his will. I had experienced four involuntary commitments in my life,…
Psychiatrists React: Live at the 2019 Annual Meeting of the APA #protestAPA2019
I traveled to S.F. for the Annual Meeting and brought the videos submitted to the ProtestAPA.com website. This is the outcome:
My interview with the Alliance for Self-Directed Education
Thanks to Alex Khost at the Alliance for Self-Directed Education for interviewing me for their online magazine, Tipping Points! In the interview, I speak a lot about the crossover between issues in our education system and mental health system as they related to human rights and self-direction. Hope you enjoy! Transcript Available at ASDE’s website: …
Reflecting on 5 Years of Stand-Up Comedy
This was originally written on April 20, 2018. I set a fuse on it to publish exactly one year later to avoid the discomfort of publishing my personal thoughts and feelings in real-time. March 29, 2018 is the five year anniversary of the first time I performed stand-up at Winston’s Open Mic in Ocean Beach,…
Announcing the 2019 Virtual Protest of the American Psychiatric Association
For more information or to get involved, visit ProtestAPA.com. TRANSCRIPT: My name is Jim Flannery and today, I invite psychiatric survivors, ex-patients, and peers around the world to participate in this year’s Virtual Protest of the American Psychiatric Association’s Annual Meeting. You can participate by creating a 3 minute video sharing your personal story of…
I discovered that 7Cups.com is “hacking” their own website to trick depressed people into using their service.
To share my recent discovery about 7cups.com, I have to first reveal two personal things I’m often ashamed of and shy about broadcasting: sometimes I get quite melancholy and part of my income comes from freelance digital marketing. While the comic in me wants to suggest that #1 is a consequence of #2, they are…
State of the Startup: July 2017
Just like in my 2016 State of the Startup post, I put a time fuse on this post. This article was written one year ago. Simply put, it’s really hard to publish about these kind of personal things “in the moment” but I want to share them because I think it may benefit others. So…
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