I'm Alan Olver and this is Clear In Vivid, conversations about connecting and communicating.

You learn things from real people that you don't get in professional training and this

is kind of the wisdom of lived experience experts that I wanted to capture.

I interviewed 130 people at Alan's from all across America.

It's every single one of them said.

The idea that my experience could help another person.

That I'm going to be in a book as a teacher.

My little story has meaning is the most amazing thing to me that you consider me a kind of

expert, Ken.

And unlike you are a kind of expert, you've lived with this phenomenon in your life for

years.

And you've learned something about it.

It's Ken Duckworth, chief medical officer of the National Alliance on Mental Illness.

He's written a terrific book called You Are Not Alone.

It's a guide for those with mental health problems and it's unique in that along with

advice from experts.

It also tells of the lessons to be learned from people and families who are themselves

struggling to live with mental illness.

This is great to be talking with you because you deal effectively with a really important

problem.

Is the figure still correct that one in five people have mental issues?

Yeah, mental health conditions about one in five, but COVID saw a spike in anxiety and

...