Mental Health Awareness Week: Eulogy’s #MilesForYourMind
Written by: Ben Southworth and Daniel Sheehan
It’s Mental Health Awareness Week and this year the theme is anxiety. Anxiety is a normal emotion for us all but sometimes it can reach unmanageable levels and affect our mental health wellbeing.
Anxiety, is in fact, one of the most common mental health problems we can face, with over a quarter of adults saying they felt so anxious it stopped them from doing the things they want to do some or all of the time.
In an age where the demands on our time are numerous, it is easy to see how prioritising our own mental wellbeing can often fall down our list of priorities. Fortunately, there are a number of steps we can all take to help manage anxiety in our lives.
One way of dealing with anxiety is exercise. So, to get moving and support our wellbeing this month, Eulogy has launched our #MilesForYourMind challenge.
With six teams participating, we are challenging ourselves to rack up as many kilometres as possible as we walk, run and swim our way through the month.
Already we have travelled 1462km – the equivalent of walking London to Madrid!
Here’s what the team had to say about why they joined the #Milesforyourmind challenge and how they’re finding it so far.
Alexandre Bougherara, Senior Data Manager
2 birds, 1 (mile)stone
We have a saying back home in France: “In May, do what you please”. So, if I can do something I enjoy for a good cause (and not just working on the summer body), I’m more than happy to contribute :).
I have always loved walking and running. Going out in a slow or fast pace is a great way to explore but also to reconnect with myself and my surroundings. Me, my music, my legs, and my unlimited competitiveness are ready for the challenge!
Daniel Sheehan, Account Manager
With summer on the horizon, I’ve been looking for the motivation to get more active. So, you could say this challenge came at a perfect time for me! It’s the push I’ve needed to make a conscious effort to get out and go for a walk on my lunch break or a morning run through Victoria Park. I’m already feeling a lot better and will definitely keep these habits up after the challenge ends.
Richard Ware, Director
How have I found it? Hard. Only because I keep forgetting to log my walks but also because most of my commute is sitting on a bus and then a train. But what it is doing is making me consider how to change up my commute to include more walking and also how to make more of getting out and about in my free time.
Julia Horvath, Account Manager
I’m really enjoying the walking challenge with the Eulogy team. It’s a fun way to engage in friendly competition with co-workers while staying active. Walking is definitely my go-to activity to help with my mental health. I love going on lunchtime strolls to clear my head and going on long walks to unwind and discover new areas of London on the weekends!
Josh Parker, Content Executive & Junior Copywriter
To me, mental wellness is all about taking the time to check in with yourself. Life can get so hectic, so even something as simple as a walk gives you the time and space to take stock and recharge. It’s not that a small choice like this is going to fix everything, but small choices can build into big change. Every mile I’ve added to the leaderboard has been a chance to prioritise my needs and appreciate what’s around me, and that’s made a real difference.
Lis Field, CEO
I’m always surprised at how many things I tackle when I walk or run. For me, walking is fruitful thinking time, so the more I’m walking, the more productive my mind seems to be. This #MilesForYourMind challenge has reinforced this, but it’s also reminded me of the great communication moment walking provides. As a family, we talk more when we walk together than when we’re moping around at home. And walks with my colleagues during our ‘walking meetings’ are often more productive than the static variety. I’m also ridiculously competitive so topping the leaderboard for 5 seconds was a career high.
What else we’re doing at Eulogy
Our industry is no stranger to stress and what can feel like hectic workloads sometimes. We have a range of initiatives in place to help support workplace wellbeing, including our four Mental Health First Aiders. And, of course, mental health and issues such as anxiety deserve urgent attention year-round, which is one of the reasons why we have created the Eulogy Wellness Group. We started the wellness group earlier this year to enable the business to regularly assess and address how we manage and support wellness across our team. Since forming, the group meets monthly and has helped our team to find moments to address their own wellbeing at regular intervals throughout the year.
For more information on how to get involved and support Mental Health Awareness Week, please visit www.mentalhealth.org.uk/our-work/public-engagement/mental-health-awareness-week.
