Palace for Life celebrates Mental Health Awareness Week
This year the theme is Nature and how connecting with the natural world can support good mental health.
Today marks the launch of Mental Health Awareness Week, the UK’s national week to raise awareness of mental health.
The week, which the Mental Health Foundation hosts, is in its 21st year and runs from 10-16 May.
This year, the theme for the week is ‘Nature’. Across the country, people will be celebrating the mental health benefits of being around nature in their local community in a range of digital and creative ways.
At Palace for Life Foundation, we embed positive mental health strategies in all of the work that we do with south Londoners and this week we will have a specific focus on connecting the young people we work with, with nature.
Palace for Life Mental Wellbeing Coordinator, Tom Prance, has set challenges below for individuals who want to take part in Mental Health Awareness Week to try:
- Spend 30 minutes in nature. Find somewhere you can’t see any buildings/structures/grey and look for something you’ve never seen before. The likelihood is it won’t take that long – can be calming, educational, enlightening or inspiring!
- Share images/videos/or just sound recordings of nature on your doorstep (and how this made you feel) on social media tag us @PalaceforLife and use #ConnectWithNature and #MentalHealthAwarenessWeek
- Get a house plant to take care of, or grow a vegetable from a seed!
See Tom’s full list of challenges you can do this week (and future weeks!) to achieve positive mental wellbeing here.
For more information about this year’s Mental Health Awareness Week visit mentalhealth.org.uk/mhaw or join the conversation on social media using #ConnectWithNature and #MentalHealthAwarenessWeek