Mental Health is a Universal Human Right
Every year at WTS we get behind World Mental Health Day as; you guessed it, we think mental health is so important.
We are passionate about encouraging everyone to look after their mental health. This year, we decided to hand ‘the pen’ (well it was a keyboard…) to our associate Marjolein who is our resident children’s and young people’s OT with a specialist interest in neurodiversity.
“If looking after our mental health was easy, I would be out of a job” says Marjolein. “As a team of Occupational Therapists we often discuss meaning with people. Meaning is what motivates someone, what they think is the most important in life, what ‘makes them tick’.
Finding the answer to this can be a way of unlocking a whole host of other things that suddenly all start to make sense.
Why can can’t move on from this situation or why we prioritise certain things over others. Why we make the choices we make or why we feel whether we can make any choices at all.
As humans we have an intrinsic need to connect to others.
We are relational beings and often our meaning can be found in relation to others or in doing something for others. When we can feel that things are difficult, we can feel discouraged and disconnected from those we are usually close to. Life can feel like an endless series of demands to keep all the plates spinning and keep everyone happy.
However, the only person in our connected and sociable world we are forgetting is ourselves.
So, I would like to invite you to act on one simple idea. This year for World Mental Health Day I want to invite you to connect. Connect to another person.
Someone who can help give you some meaning to the things you are facing right now.
Someone who will make you feel like a human being, like you are seen and like you matter.
Someone who will stop long enough to really listen or someone who will spend time with you and make you laugh.
Give yourself permission to do less ‘doing’ and a little more ‘being’. Spend time with family or friends and just waste time together. Because time spent with people creates the meaning we need and the connection that helps us carry all the other things we do. Mental health is a human right, now it’s time to make it YOUR human right.”
