'Living & Dying – the search for meaning' with Dr Kathryn Mannix, Baroness Sheila Hollins and Mark Malcomson

From birth to death, our lives are a quest for meaning, filled with moments of satisfaction, regret, and everything in between. Join City Lit Principal Mark Malcomson as he delves into the topic of ‘living and dying’ with palliative care doctor and best-selling author Dr Kathryn Mannix, and Books Beyond Words Chair, Baroness Sheila Hollins.

Eating disorders hidden in plain sight: encouraging a healthy relationship with food and our bodies

Award-winning campaigner Hope Virgo shares her lived experience of living with a food disorder - a harrowing but inspiring story and some practical guidance on how to support your own wellbeing and those around you. 

Panel Discussion: Mental Wealth in Later Life

Join Paul Farmer, CEO of AgeUK, Dr Tara Swart, Neuroscientist and Author, The Source, and Dr Carole Easton, CEO, Centre for Ageing Better, as they discuss some of the risk factors for our mental health as we get older, including health, wealth and finance.

Humour Through Adversity #2

Garth MacAnally shares his continued journey into understanding humour and the role it plays when things take unexpected turns in life.

“The road to recovery isn’t always what we might expect. An introspection of the reframed journey of recovery where a keeping a sense of humour in the face of continued adversity has been essential to my mental health.”

Live at Lunch at the Royal Opera House

Live at Lunch at the Royal Ballet and Opera. Free performances featuring Royal Ballet and Opera and guest artists. This event is free and unticketed, on a first come first served basis.

The Super Helper Syndrome: in conversation with Jess Baker

Are you a compulsive helper? If you are, you may well suffer from ‘Super-Helper Syndrome’. City Lit’s Ian Tucknott sits down with author Jess Baker to discuss the concept of super helpers and how it impacts their lives.

In Conversation with Dr Tara Swart

Join City Lit Principal Mark Malcomson as he sits down with Neuroscientist and Author of The Source Dr. Tara Swart as she discusses life, career and book, and to share pragmatic neuroscience-based messages all about our mental health.

Beyond Words: The Process of Authoring

Beyond Words is a charity co-creating word-free stories for people with learning disabilities. Founder and Chair Baroness Hollins and artist Mike Nicholson talk about creating picture stories with therapeutic value, while City Lit students will show us how to read 'Rose Gets in Shape'.

Creative Workshop: Pictures on a Screen 

In this creative session, inspired by the National Gallery's current exhibition 'Hockney and Piero: A Closer Look' and Hockney’s focus on the power of slow looking and rediscovering the immediate beauty of the world around us, work with Gallery Educators Bethan Durie and Emily Motto to experiment with mark making. Explore brushwork, colour and composition to create your own responses to the Gallery's paintings.

The Super Helper Syndrome Workshop with Jess Baker

Following on from her talk earlier in the day, join psychologist, coach and author of 'The Super-Helper Syndrome' Jess Baker for this intimate and interactive workshop, to explore the challenges of being a super-helper and how to develop more healthy ways of helping.

Cleaning Up The Mess Around Neurodiversity

Join 4X TEDx speaker, former model, consultant and emerging author Shaun Flores for a transformative exploration of neurodiversity that challenges the status quo and invites you to see beyond the surface. In this powerful and thought-provoking talk, Shaun dives deep into the complexities of neurodiversity, unravelling the misconceptions and societal biases that have long stigmatised those who think differently. With his signature catchphrase, “OCD was the worst thing to happen to me, and I am determined to be the worst thing to happen to OCD,” Shaun brings the same relentless passion to addressing the broader neurodiverse community.

 The talk will be followed by a live Q&A, offering you the chance to engage directly and continue the conversation that could change how we think about neurodiversity forever.

In Conversation with Lindsay Nicholson

Having suffered the unimaginable loss of her first husband and child from leukaemia, Lindsay Nicholson rewrites her story to become Britain’s most successful lifestyle magazine editor. But when a would-be suicide runs in front of her car, the pages of her picture-perfect life fall apart once more.

In this Mental Wealth Festival talk, Lindsay sits down with City Lit Principal Mark Malcomson to discuss her extraordinary life, as detailed in her new memoir. This will be followed by a book signing.

Mental Wealth Festival Showcase: Spoken Word & Performances 

Members of the City Lit community come together for an evening of spoken word, music and performance all based around mental health, wellbeing and more.

Reading Friends: Connect through reading

Reading Friends is The Reading Agency’s social reading and befriending programme. Reading Friends chat, share stories and have fun. Come along and listen to extracts from different Quick Reads stories and have a chat. It’s all about connecting with other people – you don’t have to read anything in advance.

Ready Steady Retire!

Come along and find out how your peers are coping with their newfound freedom in retirement - or perhaps you are approaching retirement and are wondering how to create structure and meaning in your new weekly routine? Maybe you will miss the deadlines and frequent communication you had with colleagues.

In this two-hour workshop, we will explore the pros and cons of retirement and find out how to combat isolation through forging new contacts and finding mental stimulus in a variety of ways from volunteering to lifelong learning.

Frazzled Cafe Online

Join us for an online version of the Frazzled Cafe facilitated peer support meetings. Frazzled Cafe meetings are designed to provide confidential and non-judgmental peer support, where people who are feeling overwhelmed by the stresses of life can talk openly, connect and feel heard. If this is your first time attending one we encourage you to have a look at their website which will tell you a bit more about what to expect: https://www.frazzledcafe.org/about.

Thursday 10 October

Saturday 12 October

Taster Sessions