Webinar - The Power of Story, Nature, and Community for mental wellness

Our second webinar in the Voice, Equality, Experience, Power (VEEP) series focussed on the power of nature, story and community for mental wellness.  Our speakers told us about their various projects which encourage healing through creativity, growing and achieving tasks.  We were delighted to have over 40 participants on the webinar from across Ireland.

The session was chaired by Kirsten Kearney from MindWise, who is a passionate advocate for using creative means to improve mental health, recovery and wellbeing.  Our first speaker, Tom Magill from esc films shared some of his own story of poverty and mental ill health before going on to showcase a powerful project called Snakes and Ladders which worked with a group of people with lived experience of substance abuse and mental health issues to create a series of short films telling the true stories of the ladders that former addicts used to climb out of their pits of addiction.

Nisha Tandon from ArtsEkta told us about the great work happening in Belfast with refugees and asylum seekers through their Art Route Collective, helping them feel valued and respected, participate in community life, build self-confidence, develop knowledge and skills to build their lives in NI, and be part of social networks and relationships.  Adele Leahy, Poet, Author and Blogger, told us about the transformative workshops she runs in Dublin using creative writing and poetry to explore mental health issues and truama and how they have been effective, not just in the participants recovery, but also her own.  Finally, Jeroen Holtkamp told us about his community growing project, where compassionate listening is a strong focus for those taking part.

We finished the session with a discussion around how the creative approach moves us towards a collective response to mental health. 

See a recording of the powerful presentations here

After the event,  we were treated to an original peice of poetry by Adele, who summed up the seminar with these beautiful words.

Connection is Key

From addiction to education and film.

From heartfelt stories into quilts.

From isolation to community gardening.

From a pen and a voice to conquer silencing.

Connection is Key.

An artistic community creates a catalyst.

Vital messages that cannot be dismissed.

Poverty, mental health, and addiction do not define us.

We are a united voice defying political egos.

Defying the privileged. Demanding the truth.

Taking ownership, agency, from travesty for our elderly and our youth.

Social inclusion and empowerment to overcome adversity.

We find resilience and sustainability in our community.

Having come from mental destitution.

We are now finding resilience in redefining our constitution.

Our voices chime with surrender, strength, and accountability.

Creating spaces for equitable and democratic strategies.

As peers, we lead and engage one another

Creating safe spaces to educate others to recover.

In sharing where we come from.

Our experience and our words.

We will always belong.

And rejoice in paying it forward.

By Adele Leahy