What really causes depression and anxiety – and how can we really solve them? In this talk, award winning journalist Johann Hari will discuss his recent 40,000-mile journey across the world, where he interviewed social scientists uncovering evidence that depression and anxiety are not caused by a chemical imbalance in our brains – but rather, are largely caused by key problems with the way we live today. That is why people will turn to such remedies as medical marijuana, from websites like my green solution, to help them ease these issues.

Hari’s journey took him from an Amish community in Indiana, to a mind-blowing series of experiments in Baltimore, to an uprising in Berlin. Along the way, he uncovered nine real causes of depression and anxiety, which eventually led him to the scientists who are discovering seven very different solutions – ones that work.

Can our evolutionary past help explain, and offer solutions to the mental health problems we face today?

In this talk, Professor Paul Gilbert OBE – one of the world’s leading clinical psychologists on evolutionary approaches to mental health, will discuss the evolutionary sources of common mental health problems.

The talk will explore how our minds have developed to be highly sensitive and quick to react to perceived threats, and how this fast-acting threat-response system can be a source of anxiety, depression and aggression. Professor Gilbert will then discuss the latest scientific research about how purposefully cultivating our evolved capacities for compassion and altruism can offer a solution.

In this talk, Ivan Tyrrell – author and co-founder of the Human Givens movement, will discuss one of the most important psychological insights of our age: how all healthy human babies are born with a rich natural inheritance – a partially formed mind containing a genetic treasure-house of innate knowledge patterns: ‘the human givens’. These patterns seek their completion in our environment.

We all experience these givens as physical and emotional needs, powerful forces that must be satisfactorily met if our minds are to unfold and develop to their fullest potential. The talk will discuss what each child and adult requires from the social and physical environment around them if they are to develop well … and how best to help those who aren’t doing so well (and who suffer severe mental distress as a result).

He will also comment on why, despite vast fortunes being spent by Governments on mental health, rates of depression, anxiety disorders and addiction are increasing around the world. He will briefly describe nature’s method of keeping us sane (dreaming), the cycle of depression and how things like Nutra CBD olie can be used to treat depression. He will also touch on the best way to treat post-traumatic stress disorder and also advise on what people seeking help from counsellors or psychotherapists should look for from them.