Tag Archives: suicide

Counseling and Psychotherapy Theory and Practice, Clinical Interviewing, Personal Reflections, Suicide Assessment and Intervention, Happiness

The MHA Suicide Prevention Summit is Free (up to 20 CEUs) and Coming Soon!

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Why should you know about the Mental Health Academy’s annual Suicide Prevention summit?

It’s big. There are luminaries (e.g., David Jobes, Stacey Freedenthal, and Rory O’Connor). It’s free. And the MHA is an amazing Australian-based organization that gives as good as it gets. On their website, they report:

Supporting local initiatives
Through partnering with leading organizations around the world, we’ve been able to support local initiatives we’re passionate about, including helping prevent child abuse and suicide, expanding mental health services to communities in need, and more.
$1.7M given since 2009

As a part of the annual Suicide Prevention Summit, this coming Sunday, at 10:30am Eastern, August 23, 2026, I’ll be presenting. My talk is titled: “The Bad News Brain: Five Psychological Truths on Why It’s So Damn Hard to Focus on the Positive.”

Did I mention that this whole summit is free? You can get up to 20 CEUs. You can also pay $20 to have access to session recordings until October 18.

Here’s a link to the whole schedule, which begins Wednesday, August 19 at 7pm Eastern, with a presentation by David Jobes. In case you don’t know, Jobes is awesome.
https://d9hv9sikl36u8.cloudfront.net/documents/MHA-USA-SPS-2026-Schedule-V1.pdf

Not only is the live version of this event free, all the presenters also present for free.

Sometimes, when presenting online to large groups, like the Summit, it’s hard to know how the presentation is being received. This is especially true for webinar-style presentations where there’s no interaction other than the “chat feed.” The problem with using the chat feed for feedback is that it’s overwhelming. Trying to split my attention between doing my talk and reading participant comments requires repeated figure-ground shifts that render my brain dysfunctional. Consequently, I only focus on talking, ignore the feed, and wait for the illustrious Pedro Gondim to facilitate Q&R during the final 10 minutes.

Last time I presented at the Summit, a very kind, smart, and talented mental health professional I know happened to be in attendance. She wrote me a very short Dear John email:

See attached!
I have never seen anything close to this in terms of the outpouring of appreciation for you. 

All by itself, her email made my day. But she also attached the chat feed. I opened it and found a gift of 449 amazing comments. I was stunned and humbled.

This blog post is a reminder that you can still sign up for the Summit. MHA will use a portion of the funds they generate from the $20 registrants to give back to local communities. I hope to see you there—even though I won’t really see you.

Just in case you’re curious, here’s a link to the whole 449 chat feed responses (with last names of commenters deleted).

JSF COMMENTS from MHA TALK AnonDownload


 

Happiness, mental health, Personal Reflections, Research, Suicide Assessment and Intervention

More Thoughts on Suicide Prediction and Suicide Screening (from Craig Bryan, Ph.D.)

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Hi All,

Below, I’ve a pasted LinkedIn post from Dr. Craig Bryan, author of “Rethinking Suicide” and a leading suicide researcher. At the bottom of his comments there’s a link to the article of which he speaks.

Enjoy!

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From Craig Bryan, LinkedIn – 6/29/2026

We keep trying to predict who will attempt suicide. A 15-year study suggests we’re asking the wrong question.

Researchers followed 2,060 Brazilian children from age 10 into their mid-twenties—one of the longest prospective suicide studies ever conducted outside a high-income country. They measured genetics, perinatal history, family psychiatric illness, childhood adversity, cognition, and clinical symptoms, then tested all of it together against who later attempted suicide.

The result: even with multiple domains of risk factors combined, prediction accuracy stayed modest (AUC 0.665), barely above the ceiling seen across 50 years of suicide research. More sophisticated machine learning models didn’t do any better than simple logistic regression.

Three factors stood out as consistent, actionable, and population-relevant: childhood threat exposure (especially bullying), caregiver history of suicide attempts, and childhood externalizing disorders. Bullying alone accounted for the largest share of preventable risk in the entire study.

The authors’ conclusion is blunt: distal childhood risk factors will likely never predict individual suicide attempts with precision, because suicide is driven by acute, fast-moving processes that a baseline assessment can’t capture. Trying to screen our way to safety has a ceiling. We hit it decades ago.

The better investment may not be sharper prediction. It may be quieter, structural prevention like anti-bullying programs, supporting parents with histories of suicidal behavior, and early identification of behavioral disorders, the kind of intervention that helps a population, whether or not we ever know which child needed it most.

**************************

Here’s the article link: https://lnkd.in/eRWtBiXK

I’m excited about Dr. Bryan’s post not because of the difficulties with prediction (which we’ve long know), but because of the idea of moving upstream toward structural prevention. I also feel this fits really well with what we’re trying to do with CAPE.

Obviously, I love this quotation: “Trying to screen our way to safety has a ceiling. We hit it decades ago.”

Have a great evening!

JSF

Clinical Interviewing, Suicide Assessment and Intervention

Free Online Workshop and CEU Alert: “Strengths-Based Suicide Assessment and Treatment”

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Thanks to the generosity of the Maryland Department of Health and the University of Maryland School of Medicine, I’ll be offering a free two-hour online training on Thursday, April 30 from 10am-noon (Eastern time). The flyer (attached below) includes details on the workshop content and a QR code for registering.

04.30.26 Strength – Based Suicide Assessment and Treatment Enhancing Collaborative and Resilience-Oriented Practices Training with Dr. JSFDownload

I hope to see you online on April 30.

Boys and Men, Clinical Interviewing, Cool Counseling, Counseling and Psychotherapy Theory and Practice, education, Personal Reflections, Writing

Therapy with Men and Boys

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As a senior in high school, I had a chance to say a few words at the annual football awards banquet. Apparently, my stammering and stuttering through two whole minutes were so inspiring that afterward, an assistant coach took me aside and offered seven words of feedback, “You need to take a speech class.”

His words sunk in. I was a terrible and inarticulate speaker. But did I take his advice? Nope. I was too scared to even try to get better at public speaking.

Fast forward 51 years. Now I speak all the time. In one of my most recent speaking gigs, David Shepard and Erica Liebman had me on their very cool podcast called, “Therapy with Men and Boys.”

On the podcast, we talked about men and boys and therapy and suicide. We talked so much they made my appearance into two episodes. And David, whose work I respect a ton, told me, “Your comfort in front of a mic is really impressive. I can imagine how much your students liked your classes in your teaching days.” 

Thanks David! What a difference 51 years makes.

I share this story because things change with time. . .and I’m hoping (in the sociocultural-political realms) that time will change some things (for the better).

If you’re interested in therapy in general and therapy with men and boys in particular, I’m sharing links to part 1 and 2 of the podcast; they’re about 35 minutes each.

In the first part we talk about suicide in men/boys/males: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-08-40-000-male-suicides-a-year-re-thinking/id1793567491?i=1000752371768

In the second part David does a rather challenging role play with me: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-09-part-ii-on-assessing-for-suicide-with/id1793567491?i=1000758738724

Happy Easter Sunday. I hope you are being as well as you can be in these challenging times.

John

education, Happiness, Personal Reflections, Suicide Assessment and Intervention

Ten Things Everyone Should Know about Suicide, Mental Health, and Happiness

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Hi All,

My apologies for the late notice, but I’m doing a free, online, one-hour talk tomorrow, 3/4/2026 at 2-3pm Mountain time. Sponsored by the Center for Children, Families, and Workforce Development and MAPP-Net, the talk is titled, “Ten things Everyone Should Know about Suicide, Mental Health, and Happiness.” Here’s the link:

https://www.umt.edu/ccfwd/training/childrenmh_series/

Warning: this is not my most uplifting talk. the first half focuses mostly on the “Wicked Problem” of suicide. The good news is that I do end on Happiness!

Whether you attend or not (it’s free!), thanks for being someone who’s working to make the world a better, kinder, and more eudaimonically happy place.

John

Happiness, Multicultural, Personal Reflections, Suicide Assessment and Intervention

Strengths-Based Suicide Prevention on the Blackfeet Reservation

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Today, Tammy Tolleson Knee and completed day 1 of a 2-day course on Strengths-Based Suicide Assessment and Interventions in Schools at the Buffalo Hide Academy of Browning Public Schools on the Blackfeet Reservation. We are beyond happy for this opportunity. It’s the first time for Tammy and I to present together (for two days!). As frosting on the presentation cake, Rita is here with us, watching, listening, heckling, and guiding.

In case you haven’t heard, Browning Public Schools and their staff have already started integrating strengths-based suicide prevention work into their programming. Two of our former University of Montana school counseling graduates, Sienna and Charlie Speicher are at the center of this work. Sienna and Charlie have already taught strengths-based courses through Blackfeet Community College, and they founded the Firekeeper Alliance. Here’s the Firekeeper Alliance Mission Statement:

Our mission is to cultivate resources, attention, and awareness to ultimately transform perspectives regarding suicidal distress in Indian Country and to help reduce suicide rates in our communities. We believe that mainstream and current approaches of suicide assessment and intervention struggle to meet the unique needs of Tribal populations. The Firekeeper Alliance promotes a different set of strengths-based, decolonized ideals around suicidal behavior. We believe that systemic and cultural shifts in the clinical community are necessary to truly make a positive change.

The Firekeeper Alliance also focuses on several areas, including offering strengths-based approaches to counseling, as in the following:

  • Offer individual and group counseling sessions utilizing evidence-based therapies which are effective in addressing suicidality.
  • Promote assessment techniques and interventions that elicit protective factors and a resilient spirit.
  • Administer assessment instruments that screen for strengths, character assets, and benevolent experience to depathologize suicidal distress.
  • Advocate for strengths based assessment and intervention approaches to be used in conjunction with cultural healing mechanisms.

Back to our training. . .here are the ppts that Tammy and I developed. There are SO MANY, but then again, we’re covering two whole days!

SBSA for Browning 2025Download

In closing, I want to give a big shout-out to Browning Public Schools (BPS) for collaborating with us (the Center for the Advancement of Positive Education; aka CAPE) to bring this training to Browning. Not only do we have a dozen or so school counselors in the room, we’ve also got a dozen or so administrative staff, including principals and the BPS superintendent. We had a blast today and are looking forward to more meaningful fun tomorrow!

John SF

Suicide Assessment and Intervention

Integrating Strengths Based Suicide Assessment into Traditional Approaches​

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Good morning.

Yesterday I was in Arkansas with the Arkansas Psychological Association talking about Strengths-based Suicide Assessment. And today I’m in Philly, along with Dr. Umit Arslan (and missing Tammy Tolleson-Knee) talking about it again–at the Association of Counselor Education and Supervision conference.

Unfortunately, Tammy’s efforts to get here were foiled by a particular airline fiasco, but we’re carrying on! We miss you Tammy!

Here’s the ppt:

ACES.2025Download
Personal Reflections, Writing

Hope Theory for Suicide Prevention Month on the Blackfeet Reservation

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All too often on this blog I’m writing about what I’m doing and I’m thinking. I suppose that’s just fine, after all, it’s my blog. But, as many people have said before me and better than I can, “Other people matter” and seeing the light (or the divine) in others is among the most meaningful experiences we can have.

One light I’ve been seeing lately is the strengths-based suicide prevention work that the Firekeeper Alliance (a non-profit org) is doing on the Blackfeet Reservation in Northern Montana. In July, they had a “suicide prevention” heavy metal concert called Fire in the Mountains, complete with amazing metal bands and equally amazing panels, discussions, and speakers. If you’re interested in creative approaches to well-being, you really should check them out.

Here they are on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=9232983300123005

And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DIjQIhtirRj/

This past Thursday, Charlie Speicher, architect of the Firekeeper Alliance and Director of the Buffalo Hide Academy in Browning, shared one of their Suicide Prevention Month activities. The idea is simple: Feature the beauty and strengths of the reservation and its people. The product: A 12-minute video that focuses on what gives the Blackfeet people hope. The video captures the faces, sentiments, and emotions in response to “What gives you hope?” Here’s the link on Youtube:

I hope you’ll watch and share this video.

Here’s the link on the Firekeeper Alliance website: https://firekeeperalliance.org/news/what-gives-you-hope

All too often, people think and share information about the challenges of reservation life. This video shares hope, beauty, and potential.

With your help, I hope this video travels far and wide. Please share. At the very least, it should get all over Montana media. And, just in case anyone has the right connections, I think it’s a great fit for virtually any national media outlet that wants to shift toward a positive narrative in Indian Country.

Thanks for reading . . . and for seeing the light (and fire) in others.