The Happiness Formula!

One of the key foundations for the Lifemaps model is Positive Psychology, and the Happiness Formula. This is a scientific formula that shows how a large portion of our positive mental health is built through our actions, skills and attitudes, and fostered through our relationships with others.

The formula is Happiness (H) = S + C + V.

S = Your genetic Set Point. Different people have different emotional set points; some may be more naturally pessimistic whereas others will have a more positive natural outlook. Significant life events, whether good or bad, will alter this drastically, but we will generally return to this emotional set point after time, and this accounts for about 50% of our happiness.

C = The Circumstances in your life. Some of our circumstances can change, like getting losing a job, moving house, getting married, bereavement etc. And of course there are circumstances beyond our control, like age, sex etc. These circumstances may feel like they have a massive impact, but in reality they only add 10% towards our happiness.

Many people think that if your circumstances aren't good, then you can't be happy. "If I had more money, or a better car, or a bigger house, then I'll be happy." This is untrue - these are rewards, and rewards don't sustain happiness in the long term. The best way to build sustainable happiness is through our everyday actions, behaviours and attitudes, which leads us to...

V = the Voluntary Actions that we take on a regular basis. This is entirely within our control - some people choose to do nothing, or choose behaviours that are bad for them. But we can also choose to build healthy behaviours by engaging in positive activities, looking at life with a better attitude, and taking actions to build our mental health. These voluntary actions contribute 40% to our happiness, making this the largest portion of our happiness that we can control.

Like physical fitness, we can't just read a book about mental health and expect our wellbeing to be boosted; we must develop skills, thoughts and actions to help our mental health and wellbeing flourish.

So there you have it! Your happiness is much more within your control than you realise, it is up to you to take action to build the positive behaviours and actions that will make the difference. Here is an excellent article on the science of happiness, and we hope this inspires you to take some voluntary actions to help improve your happiness level!

S is for Social Connections!

Social connections are absolutely vital to our mental wellbeing. 

Connecting with others is the arguably greatest way to build our mental health. Spending time with others and enjoying the time together satisfies our need to feel that we are valued, listened to, cherished, empowered and worthwhile.

Having a wide range of social connections in different settings is critical. Making new connections is easier when we are younger, but the older we get the harder it is to make new friends, so we need to either make an effort to keep in touch with our current connections, or go out of our way to try and make some new connections by trying new activities.

If we have no sense of belonging to other people, we can begin to feel isolated and lonely, which is very damaging to our mental health, and we may struggle to feel like we have a purpose in life.

We feel so much better when we are in social networks that offer us support, trust, cooperation and enjoyment. We have a sense of belonging and community with those around us, and this builds our positive emotions. 

Communication and connection are different.

When you talk to someone on Facebook or by text, do you feel like you are truly connecting with them? I know I don't. Social connection involves contact and feelings. The physical elements of social connections are subtle, yet powerful. 

Hearing a voice and using your own voice, laughter, physical contact, smell, and the sense of activity, belonging and excitement. These are all left out of digital communication such as text, email or Facebook.

Living in the digital world and relying too heavily on our phones and computers for communication can fool us into thinking that we are connecting well with others, when in reality we are not.

This isn't to say that we shouldn't use social media and digital communications of course, as they are incredibly useful tools, but we need to make sure that we are maintaining and taking care of our real life connections, not just our digital ones.

Exercises and activities to try:

Reach out - We don't often go visit people just to chat these days, because it's easier to just pick up the phone instead. Make an effort to visit a relative or friend and have a long conversation with them over tea or coffee. 

This simple gesture is great for strengthening connections, as it shows that you really care about them. This is an especially important thing to do with elderly relatives as they are often very susceptible to loneliness, so showing them that you care can mean the world to them. 

Don't get left out - This is a hilarious game, but requires a lot of space. The more players, the more fun it is! One person is in charge of the group, and is also the DJ for the game. When the DJ plays the music, everyone must walk round the circle, but when they stop the music, they will shout a number, and the group must gather into teams of that number. 

For example, in a group of 12, when the music stops, the DJ could shout 5, and 2 groups of 5 would assemble with 2 people left out. The people who don't make it into a group in time are put out, and the next round begins, repeating until only 2 people are left at the end. Then you would shout 12, and everyone would come up for a giant group hug!

The purpose of this is to show how good it feels to be part of a group, to feel that sense of belonging. but that exclusion is sometimes a negative consequence when there are clearly defined groups. This is why it is important to do the final group hug with everyone to communicate that we should be accepting of everyone.

P is for Purpose!

Having a clear sense of purpose adds to our feeling of wellbeing and fulfillment.

Feeling purposeless can weigh very heavily on our mental health and sense of worth, but when we feel that we have something to give to others, we are more engaged with the world outside ourselves and find it a little easier to navigate our way through life, as we have a direction to follow.

Our feeling of purpose is most clear when we have goals that improve the lives of others, rather than ourselves. When our purpose is about self promotion, we might have a clear personal goal of fame and fortune, but this goal doesn't feed our desires. Instead, the more we get, the more we want, and we never feel satisfied.

Purpose doesn't mean going out and trying to save the world (unless you want to!) 

Purpose doesn't have to mean something spiritual or philosophical, it can just mean doing something that isn't self serving, and that can help someone other than ourselves. 

Being an active citizen in your community, being supportive to your friends and family, being good at your job, starting a business, creating art or music, helping those less fortunate; these are all purposes. If we feel that we have something to contribute to the wider world, even in just a small way, it will make us feel good. 

Exercises and activities to try:

Signature strengths: Our purpose is driven by our signature strengths; the things that we excel at. If we are good at creating music, we can record and release the music online for others to enjoy. If we are a good listener, we can offer to listen to someone who is going through personal problems, 

Have a go at this questionnaire to find your strengths  and have a think about how you can use them to find your purpose!  https://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/questionnaires/survey-character-strengths

Life triangle: This is an exercise to help you find your purpose by establishing life goals in a simple way. You will need 15 post it notes and a wall. Take the first 5 notes and write down 1 strength or asset that you currently have on each. Then stick them all in a row on the wall. This is the bottom line of your triangle. 

Next, write down 4 goals that you would like to achieve in 6 months time. Use your strengths and assets to help you think of these goals. Stick these in a row above your first 5 notes. Then for the next row, think of 3 goals you would like to achieve in a year's time. then 2 goals on the next 2 for 2 to 3 years time, and finally the last 1, which is 1 goal for the next 5 years. 

This is a really simple but effective way to help us think a little clearer about the future and our purpose, and how to build on the strengths that we currently have rather than focusing on the weaknesses. 

A is for Accomplishments!

Accomplishment, recognition, and achievement are all ways of boosting self esteem. 

We feel good when we accomplish a goal that we have set for ourselves. Research shows that our mental health improves with accomplishments - as we feel pride, we have a sense of purpose in the world, and we have uncovered or nurtured a personal strength.

The size of the accomplishment is irrelevant; the important part is what it means to us. Accomplishments are relative; they must be relevant to us personally to be able to build our self esteem. We need to take our abilities into account when measuring our accomplishments - measuring everyone in the same way is harmful to some people's mental health, as they feel inadequate compared to others.

Think of it like physical fitness - someone who runs 5 miles every day would think nothing of running for 20 minutes. But for someone who has not exercised in several months, this would be a huge accomplishment!

Similarly, something like getting up and going out the door in the morning may seem like nothing to people with good mental health, but for someone with a mental illness like depression or anxiety, this is a massive accomplishment because that illness is working against them.

Changing our perspective on what accomplishment means is key to recognising the progress that we are making for ourselves.

Accomplishment in life is not about winning or losing, or passing or failing - it is about learning and growing. Every single experience that we have, regardless of the final outcome, teaches us something and helps us to grow as a person.

Many goals that we set for ourselves (or that other people set for us) are toxic to our mental health, because quite often these goals are only concerned with the end result.

This isn't to say that big accomplishments and good end results aren't great, because they definitely are, but there are so many small accomplishments and improvements that happen along the way that build our abilities, skills and strengths, so limiting the measure of our success to the end result undermines the journey that we make during an experience.

When we recognise those smaller accomplishments along the way, and how much those accomplishments help us to grow, this makes things feel more worthwhile and actually help us to succeed more as we strive to keep that chain of small accomplishments going, and this paves the way to bigger accomplishments.

Exercises and activities to try:

Track your accomplishments: Start to list your accomplishments for yourself  - you can do this in a diary, on your calendar or in a notebook. Each day, write down something that you accomplished. It can be anything that feels like you achieved something, whether it is small or big; waking up on time, handing in an assignment, running a marathon!.

Anything that you feel good about from your day, write it down! This helps you to see that you are accomplishing small things every day, and shows you that you are growing as a person. Being able to write down several accomplishments in a day feels great, and this encourages you to keep going and strive to accomplish more!

A gift for the week: This is a great activity to try with your family or friends.  Gather everyone together in a circle and give everyone an envelope to write their name on. Then give everyone 7 pieces of paper. Everyone passes the envelopes around the circle, and for each envelope you get, you put in a positive message for the person who owns the envelope about something they have accomplished, or that they should be proud of.

The ideal number of people for this activity is 8, but it can work with fewer people, you just have to put more than 1 message in each envelope. The aim is for each person to get their own envelope back with 7 positive messages in it, and they can go away and read one note per day. This can highlight accomplishments that we didn't notice ourselves, and also bring us a renewed sense of pride from the accomplishments that are written down!

M is for Mindfulness!

How often do we actually take the time to notice that things are going well, or to appreciate the good things in our lives?

Not as often as we should! Our lives are so fast paced that we don't give our minds enough time to properly experience and acknowledge the positive things that are going on in our lives.

The human brain has a "negativity bias" - a tendency to focus on negative experiences, and minimise the positives. So if we are moving so fast that we don't notice any positives in life, then we will only ever see the negatives!

This gives us a distorted perspective on life, and this can have a bad effect on our mental health. By slowing down and noticing the positive moments and events in our lives, we develop a more balanced and realistic viewpoint of life.

Mindfulness is about tuning into what is happening around us in a conscious way; by 'savouring the moment'.

Savouring the moment can intensify our enjoyment of experiences, and help reinforce the positive aspects of that experience. 

It is about noticing the small, simple things in our daily life that make life good - watching a favourite show, eating food, smelling nice flowers, having fun with your friends.This means slowing our mind down so that we can pay full attention to the good things in life.

Mindfulness is also about finding the balance between the past, present and future.

Always looking to the past, or dreaming of the future can mean that we forget about the here and now, and that leaves us feeling stuck in one place. 

Finding that balance means changing our perspective on things, so that we can reflect on the past positively while having realistic hopes for the future, but remaining fully in the present and building a path to follow for ourselves.

Exercises and activities to try:

Savour the moment - Try being mindful during an activity in your day. A perfect time to try this is while eating your dinner, but you can do it during any activity. There are 5 key steps to fully savouring something:

1. Slow down
2. Pay attention to what you are doing
3. Use all your senses
4. Stretch out the experience
5. Reflect on your enjoyment

If you try this while eating your dinner, you find that you actually pay attention to your food, how it tastes, feels, and smells, how much you enjoy the meal, and you feel more satisfied afterwards because you ate more slowly and savoured every bite. This brings a positive experience to something that we usually don't think twice about!

Guided mindfulness - Have a look on YouTube for a 5 minute guided mindfulness video - these are great as an introduction to the world of mindfulness. The focus is on relaxing, breathing deeply and feeling present, and even after 5 minutes you will find yourself feeling more relaxed and mindful!. Give it a go and see how you feel! Here's a link to one to try: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEzbdLn2bJc

Lifemaps session feedback - Young Farmers Clubs of Ulster

Last Thursday we had an excellent training session with some members of the Young Farmers Clubs of Ulster. We got some great feedback from the participants, so here's what they had to say!

What do you now know about mental health and well being?

• It’s all about your attitude and how you look at things. It’s very important
• Everyone has mental health. Some have better health than others
• That ‘mental health’ is not a closed name – there are many different aspects to mental health
• It’s about the big picture - it isn't just something negative, it’s positive too
• I know how to look after my mental health better and how to be positive. There’s a lot more to mental health than people know, and it needs to be taught
• Mental health is just as much about the positive things in life as the negative
• How important it is to recognise the part that we play in supporting each other in protecting our mental health
• Everyone has mental health, whether it’s good or bad
• There’s more to mental health than associated illness

Do you feel you are more motivated about life, learning and work?

• You learn more when working / while you do your dream job
• I feel it was good to break the cycle of everyday life and think about things. It’s good to laugh with others
• Yes, I feel this has helped me greatly allowing me to look at life better and that tomorrow will be a good day regardless what happens
• Yes, I feel I’m a more positive person now and as a student nurse I feel I can pass this on to my patients
• Yes, it’s important to be mindful and confident and motivated
• Yes, I enjoyed the activities and interaction

What practical things can you do to improve your mental health and well-being?

• Be focused and be inspired for the future
• Playing games and getting a laugh out of them
• Think about 3 positive things before bed
• Be happy and don’t stress about things too much
• Stay connected and try more social activities
• Do positive things like helping others
• Just wake up in the morning thinking “it’s to be a good day” and enjoy every minute of life. Life is too short
• Take time out to think about positive things that have happened to me 
• Always think positive and look for the good things in life. Don’t dwell on the bad
• Do activities to make everyone happy
• Exercise, sports, meeting folk, volunteering, trying new things
• Talk more, be confident with mindset, help and encourage others
• Be active – walking, music, friends etc

How can you support others to improve their mental health and well-being?

• Help people to be confident about what they’re doing
• Listen and give compliments. Care about others
• Be there. Be supportive. Listen. Help others laugh
• Just talk to them, spend time with them when needed and smile
• I can offer to listen when someone is having a problem and also give them advice on where to get help
• Be positive. Be friendly and supportive. Listen 
• Be positive, be a good role model, make time for them, listen to what they say, be mindful
• Help them, listen, talk to them, get out and about and meet new people

Any other comments about LIFEMAPS:

• Enjoyed it and learned something different
• Great night, great atmosphere
• Brilliant speakers
• Very good youth workers
• Very enjoyable and a lot of fun
• Great concept

We're really pleased with this feedback! If you are interested in attending any of the Lifemaps events, please like our Facebook for updates of what's happening near you or send an email to amypollock@youthaction.com!

E is for Emotions!

Everyone experiences both positive and negative emotions - that is a fact of life.

When we feel negative emotions like anxiety, anger or fear, we try to find ways to cope with them, and we often bottle them up as a coping mechanism. This is harmful to our mental health because it usually causes those emotions to fester and become worse.

It is important to realise that dealing with those emotions directly is the best way to overcome them. Rather than burying them, we should address them head on and try to find the root of that emotion so we can deal with it. This helps us to build vital coping skills and helps us to be more open about when we feel negatively about something.

The more positive emotions we feel, the better we are able to function.

Research shows that the more positive emotions we have, the more we can think creatively, overcome barriers, and recover more easily from shocks and hard times. 

Positive emotions aren't just about feeling happy all the time. We have the capacity to feel a massive range of positive emotions, like joy, interest, serenity, hope, gratitude, kindness, surprise, confidence, enthusiasm, satisfaction, pride, inspiration, awe and love.

These positive emotions do more than make us feel better, they actually help to boost our ability to work and study, and improves our physical health and relationships!

To build our mental wellbeing, we need more positive emotions that negative ones. 

Research has shown that for every one negative feeling we have, we need 3 positive ones to balance it out and make us feel positively. For example, if one person insults you, and one other person compliments you, you are more likely to remember the insult. But if 3 people were to compliment you, that would balance out that one insult and help you feel positive again.

We can build our range of positive emotions, not by forcing positivity or pretending to be happy, but by being open to new people, experiences, challenges, ideas and thoughts, and by being open to reviewing old ideas and experiences to change how we feel about them.

Exercises and activities to try:

Identify your emotions - Take a page and draw a line down the middle. On one side, make a list of all the positive emotions that you feel have experienced recently, and on the other side make a list of the negative emotions. Circle each one of the negative emotions, and then circle groups of 3 of the positive ones, and draw a line from each one negative to a group of 3 positives.

This activity can be useful to help us understand the feelings that we feel on a regular basis, and to help us establish if our positive and negative emotions are balancing out. If we find that they are balanced then that's great, but if not then we may need to look at ways to either deal with our negative emotions to reduce them, or to find some activities to help build new positive emotions.

Positivity treasure chest - Grab a box and go treasure hunting in your house. Look for things that bring you positive emotions, and that remind you of positive experiences in your life.

This could include photos or souvenirs from great times, awards that remind you of accomplishments, cards or notes from special people in your life, something you made or drew, your favourite inspiration quotes or song lyrics, childhood mementos, a gift that you treasure, and photos of someone you look up to.

Having all of these things that bring us a wide range of positive emotions in one place can be a great way to help us feel better when we have a bad day, or when we experience hard times. Keep this box in your room somewhere, under your bed or in your wardrobe, and revisit it regularly to give yourself a boost of positivity. And don't forget to add to it regularly!

F is for Flow!

Today's post is all about flow activities. But what do we mean by the term 'Flow'?

'Flow' happens when we are so absorbed in an activity that we lose ourselves and our sense of time. You are 'in the zone'; fully immersed in a feeling of focus, energy, enjoyment and involvement in the activity at hand.

Flow links closely to Intrinsic Motivation, which we talked about here. They are linked because without intrinsic motivation, it becomes almost impossible to achieve flow. They are both specific to you as an individual, so knowing your interests is a great help when looking for activities to help you find flow and intrinsic motivation.

I personally find writing, gaming and cycling to be great flow activities because they are engaging to me, but that doesn't mean that everyone will find those activities engaging or enjoyable. Knowing what you enjoy and what brings you satisfaction will help you find your flow.

Flow activities are perfect for when we feel negatively about things, if we are having a bad day or something bad has happened, because it gives us a sense of escape from those negative emotions. 

This is because you are fully focused on the task at hand, which helps to slow the tide of negative emotions in our mind. You might not necessarily experience positive emotions either while engaged in a flow activity, because you are focusing on the practical aspects of the task at hand, for example if you are climbing a mountain, you aren't thinking about how you feel, you are just focused on taking each step and reaching the top.

When we complete flow activities, we usually feel a surge of positive emotions. We feel a sense of achievement for completing our activity, we feel happy because we enjoyed that activity, and we feel motivated to increase our abilities. We are encouraged to stick with difficult tasks and see them through to the end. This increase in positive emotions can help to balance out any negative ones that we have.

Exercises and activities to try:

Hide and seek! -  Kid's games are the greatest example of flow activities; you are focused on the game and your goal is clear - to win! Grab a few friends or siblings and have a big game of hide and seek in your house, your garden, or in the park.  It may feel silly at the start, but it is so much fun, and helps demonstrate how it feels to be engaged in a flow activity, because you are focused on finding your friends and winning the game, not on your thoughts and feelings! Alternatively, if you feel like too much of an adult for hide and seek, have a Nerf gun war instead! 

Challenge yourself! - One of the key things to achieving flow is having realistic goals for the activity. Things like playing football, mountain climbing and video games have clear goals, but others, like drawing, running or reading do not. If your chosen flow activity lacks goals, then have a go at assigning yourself some challenges! This gives you something to focus on and helps you find your Flow!

Do you enjoy painting? Challenge yourself to paint something new once a week. Maybe you enjoy swimming, so you could set yourself a goal lap time. The key is to set realistic goals that challenge you, but that are ultimately achievable. If goals are too easy, you become bored, and if they are too hard, you become anxious, so keep this in mind when setting your goals. If you find your goals to be too easy or difficult at first, don't give up, just adjust them until they are right for you!

I is for Intrinsic Motivation!

We all have the desire to feel that we are in control of our lives, that we are improving ourselves, and that we have a purpose in the world. 

Finding the hook that motivates you in life can feel difficult. You sometimes aren't sure what you want from life, and struggle to find the drive to move forward.

When we think of motivation, we often limit our thinking to the extrinsic motivators: the rewards and punishments that we get. At school, many people try hard in exams to satisfy their parents, because they get rewarded for doing well, and get punished for doing badly. In work, we usually do our job because of the financial reward.

There is another form of motivation that we rarely consider: intrinsic motivation. 

This is the motivation that comes from within, which drives us to do things not for other people, or for rewards or to avoid punishment, but we do it for ourselves, to make us feel good about ourselves and because we genuinely want to get better at something.

That isn't to say that extrinsic motivation isn't useful, there are many situations where it is effective and necessary, but having intrinsic motivation drives us much further when it comes to creative thinking, problem solving and self improvement. When we have intrinsic motivation to do something, we are more persistent, enthusiastic, driven, excited and confident, because the task actually means something to us, and isn't just a means to an end.

Examples of activities that can help build our intrinsic motivation include fishing, reading, playing an instrument, drawing, blogging, playing sports, gaming and writing. We don't get any external reward or punishment for doing them, we do these things for ourselves because we find them enjoyable and exciting, and have a desire to improve our abilities while doing them.

Different people are passionate about different things, so below we have listed some activities for you to try to help find the right intrinsic motivation activity for you!

Exercises and activities to try:

List your passions - Have a go at writing a list of all the things that you like in life, that you are interested in, that you have a passion for. Listing everything that you are passionate and seeing it on a page can help you see links between the things you are passionate about, and may help generate ideas for an activity to try. 

Maybe some of the things you like are photography, make up, fashion, writing, and being creative. You could start writing a personal fashion blog! Or you might be into drawing, writing and reading comics. You could have a go at writing and illustrating your own comic! These are simple examples, but by doing this activity yourself you may discover a theme in your interest that you didn't realise before, and this could lead you to find the right activity to build your motivation!

Pursue new opportunities -  Sometimes we don't actually know that we are passionate about something until we try it for the first time, or sometimes we have something that we would love to try and we just feel a bit scared to try. Pushing ourselves to try new things is the best possible way to build our motivation, all it takes is a little step outside our comfort zone!

Have a look at your local arts centre or college and see if they have any courses or activities that might interest you, or look for some free online short courses to try. See if there are any local clubs or community groups near you that you could take part in. Going out and trying something new, even just once, will help to build that motivation and make us more willing to try other things!

L is for Learning!

Learning new things and broadening our skills is one of the greatest ways to build our mental health, because doing tasks that stretch our abilities can help us develop thinking and activities that will help us cope in tougher times.

Learning is always full of risks. When we try something new, there is the chance that we will 'get it' right away, or we might not. To learn something new, we have to be prepared to mess up or to miss the mark at first. If you are scared of failure this can stop you from trying new things. If you see failure as a weakness in yourself, then your self esteem will crash if you mess up.

Changing our perception of learning is key to getting past that fear. 

We need to accept that failure is a necessary part of learning, not a negative consequence! If we are ready and expect that failure is a part of learning, then we will be less likely to turn back after the first failure. Learning from failures is just as important as being rewarded for successes.

If you don't 'get it' first time round, you have a choice whether to give up or to go again. Choosing to keep going in the face of failure is one of the greatest ways to build resilience and perseverance. If you can try again when you fail and stick at something to get better, then you will find it easier to recognise and enjoy your improvements, and these things are vital skills for building your mental health.

Exercises and activities to build mental health through learning:

A simple activity to show how much failure can be useful us is to think back to a time when we personally failed at something, and think of what you learned from that experience. 
Say for example you took your driving test and failed first time. If you failed, you get feedback on why you failed, and this teaches you to avoid those mistakes when you take the test again, and as a result you may end up being a more careful driver than if you had passed first time, as you are aware of those mistakes and you are more careful not to make them again as a result.

Another exercise to help put learning hurdles into perspective is to draw 5 hurdles on a page, with a finish line at the end. Write a goal at the finish line: something that you would like to achieve, that is realistic but needs some attention to get to. Write down the hurdles or barriers that could prevent you from reaching that goal (these could be outside circumstances, practical issues or your own internal barriers). Spend some time thinking about actions to use to overcome each hurdle, and write these down.

This sort of exercise can help build problem solving abilities and actions that we can use when encountering barriers to learning, and help us to overcome those hurdles rather than give up at the first problem!

We hope you found this post helpful and informative, as always please follow us on Facebook for more information about our events! Thanks for reading!

LIFEMAPS: an introduction

Mental wellbeing is so important!

YouthAction has recognised the need for new approaches to developing young people's mental health, and has developed a new mental health model entitled LIFEMAPS to address this need.

LIFEMAPS clearly demonstrates how youth work approaches can build the mental health of young people. It clearly states that mental wellbeing is not uncovered or discovered, it is built through actions, skills and attitudes, and fostered through positive relationships. 

LIFEMAPS is your map for the journey to positive mental wellbeing!

LIFEMAPS is an acronym for 8 interlinked concepts that describe a full approach to developing positive mental health;

Learning - Accepting that failure is a necessary part of learning rather than a negative consequence, which enables us to find the courage try new things, build resilience and approach challenges without the fear of failure.

Intrinsic Motivation - Finding activities that we really enjoy and are interested in, and have an internal motivation to pursue because they brings us a sense of personal reward and pride, and contribute positively to our mental wellbeing.

Flow - Finding activities that fully immerse and engross us, causing us to lose ourselves in the moment, which can give us a break from negative emotions and build positive feelings of achievement in their place.

Emotions - Balancing out the negative emotions with positive ones; not by forcing positivity, but by being open to new experiences, people and ideas to help us build a wider range of positive emotions like joy, inspiration, hope, awe and serenity.

Mindfulness - Promoting a positive outlook by taking time to notice small, everyday moments that bring us pleasure in order to bring balance to our minds and counteract the negative moments.

Accomplishments - Building self esteem through accomplishing personal goals, and realising that life isn't about winning or losing, but more about learning and growing, and that small milestones pave the way to big successes.

Purpose - Finding a sense of meaning in the world outside yourself by finding ways to help others, through small acts of kindness to your friends and family, volunteering or joining a cause you are passionate about.

Social Connections - Building our sense of belonging and community by building strong connections with others through work, school, family and friends. This satisfies our desire to be valued, cherished and listened to, which is critical to mental health.

These 8 elements are interlinked and we can find many activities that will satisfy several of these elements, for example learning to play a musical instrument will satisfy Learning, Intrinsic Motivation, Flow and Accomplishments. Asking an old friend to meet for coffee and catch up would satisfy Emotions, Purpose and Social Connections. Going for a walk in the park and stopping to smell the flowers satisfies Emotions and Mindfulness.

Lifemaps is easily tailored to any individual, as some people may have plenty of Social Connections but no sense of Purpose, and others might have a lot of Intrinsic Motivation but struggle with Learning. All it takes is a knowledge of yourself and the areas of your life you want to work on, and then finding activities and behaviours you can practice to help build those elements.

Starting this Wednesday, we will be writing a weekly post exploring each element in more detail and suggest activities that you can try to help satisfy the needs of each element. We really hope you find them helpful!

Please follow us on Facebook to keep up to date with our posts and upcoming events, and see you on Wednesday for ways to improve your mental wellbeing through Learning!

Hello!

Hi everyone! Welcome to the Lifemaps blog, where I will be writing about the Lifemaps initiative, and exploring the steps that young people can take to help build mental wellbeing.

I'm Amy, the Media Coordinator for the Lifemaps project, and I have been fighting depression and anxiety for 8 years now, so I know a fair bit about the difficulties of dealing with poor mental health. I am happy to say that I am doing very well these days, and the positive behaviours and activities that are central to the Lifemaps model have been instrumental to my recovery.

I'll be the one writing the blog posts over the next few months, and will be keeping you all up to date on our Facebook and Instagram, where I will be posting positive photo messages every Monday as part of our Monday Motivators series, sharing articles about mental health, sharing information on our events, and posting video productions exploring Lifemaps from our training sessions and youth led events.  I am really passionate about this project and think it can go a long way to help those struggling with their mental wellbeing.

Please share this blog with anyone who you think would benefit from some exercises to improve mental wellbeing, and if you have any questions please feel free to contact me through this blog, by messaging the Lifemaps Facebook page, or dropping me an email at amy@publicachievement.com.