Phil Selway on St. Martin's Challenge

Phil Selway talks to Lewis Owens and his co-host on the St Martin's Challenge podcast about Samaritans, which he has supported for almost 30 years. It started when he was a fresher at university in Liverpool, with a bookmark in his fresher's pack from Nightline, the student version of the service. The bookmark listed the traits Nightline looked for in volunteers, the ability to listen and to come into a conversation without bringing one's own judgements, and something in it struck a chord. He was a listening volunteer there and then in his home town of Oxford for about 20 years, and later an ambassador.

Much of the talk is about How to Listen, the Samaritans' approach set down in a book edited by Katie Colombus, and the listening wheel taught in training: open questions, reflecting back, short words of encouragement, saying that a situation sounds difficult. At his all-boys school, he says, the ideal held up was to be super strong and self-contained, and the Nightline bookmark showed him “there is another way of being”.

It has taken him until his 50s to say he needs a life outside work. At times he has sought professional help, which felt like a leap of faith and turned out to be affirming. Samaritans has been a lifeline as well, a world far removed from being in a band. On a call, he says, a complete stranger lets the volunteer into the most intimate parts of their life, and that is a privilege.