Post #24 Mental Health Awareness Week - Kindness

Mental Health Foundation

Mental Health Awareness Week

This week is Mental Health Awareness Week, with the theme KINDNESS. So I will be posting suggestions for promoting kindness all week :)

The Mental Health Foundation is hosting Mental Health Awareness Week, 18th - 24th May. The theme for the week is KINDNESS, with perhaps no better time to think about what kindness means, why kindness is important and how we can promote kindness. 

Why kindness? Mark Rowland, Chief Executive of the Mental Health Foundation says: We have chosen kindness because of its singular ability to unlock our shared humanity. Kindness strengthens relationships, develops community and deepens solidarity Why kindness? Being kind to others is good for our own physical and mental health, research showing five benefits:

1. Helping others feels good.
2. Kindness/altruism creates sense of belonging and reduces isolation.
3. Being kind and helping others, especially those who are less fortunate than yourself, can help to put things into perspective and make you feel more positive. 
4. Acts of kindness spread happiness.
5. The more you do for others, the more you do for yourself.

In previous posts I have considered ways to promote wellbeing in our children, including ways to think about 'good feelings' and strategies to promote resilience. Kindness to others can enhance good feelings, doing something for somebody else can make them AND you feel good. This is something we can promote with our children, helping them to see a different perspective and to do something that makes another person feel good. In addition, kindness contributes to our resilience, being kind to others helps us to also be kind to ourselves - resilience and kindness make us stronger. 

Think about the last time you received a random act of kindness and how it made you feel. Small acts of kindness can create good feelings for both giver and receiver. For example, my mum is almost 80 and living alone - not easy during these times. A small child living opposite posted a rainbow which she had coloured through the letterbox. What joy that child bought to my mum who now has the rainbow in her window as a constant reminder of an act of kindness. The child is excited to see the rainbow in the window each time she walks by and waves to my mum with a big smile. This may seem a small act, but it achieves each of the five benefits of being kind to others.   

So, let's use this week to give our children opportunities to be kind and also be kind to ourselves. All week I will post activities and suggestions for BEING KIND, hoping to spread some good feelings.