Reflecting on my senior year, I am truly glad that I continued working with the Signature programs this year. Not only am I grateful to have had the chance to teach some of the community about mental wellness, but I also feel better equipped to bring the practices I learned about with me to college.
This ties in to what I feel has been my biggest success: my own education. I touched upon this in my Signature presentation, but studying mental wellness was quite different than my previous work in mental illness stigma and mental health education. I was able to develop a better understanding of the value of maintaining one’s holistic mental wellness, much like we improve our physical health. The biggest surprise for me was probably how incredible the scientific evidence is that backs up the value of mental wellness practices. Some of the neuroscience findings relating to increased gray matter in meditators, decreased cortisol levels in people who spend time with animals, and the interplay between stress and sleep neurotransmitters, truly gave me an incredible appreciation for the practices I studied. The two main challenges I faced were finding the initial topic of my project, and then encouraging people to attend the seminars. I will say I never received the attendance I wanted at the seminars, but even low attendance confirmed my thesis that people don’t treat their mental wellness with enough respect. I am so excited to bring everything I learned in the Signature program over these past two years to college with me. I am certain that my work with Signature has influenced my college path, as I plan on attending Washington University in St. Louis and studying Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology and Anthropology with a Global Health focus. Additionally, I received a full-tuition merit scholarship at WashU (and I wrote an essay about psychiatric treatment in the application for the scholarship). I am so thankful for the help of Ms. Moore, my mentor, for her wisdom and time, and Evangeline, for her guidance and sharing of the READY Center. I am also so grateful for the whole Signature team for providing me and other Emma girls with the opportunity to dive deep in to projects that excite us.
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(this is the blog post for April)
As my Signature project has come to an end, I was able to bring three different workshops to the Emma community. First we ran the Mediation and Mental Wellness event. I created a PowerPoint detailing a brief history of meditation, and showed a video about the scientific benefits of practicing meditation. Additionally, Ms. Bendall ran a guided meditation. At the end of the event I distributed handouts to the participants that listed recommendations for Youtube videos and books about meditation. The next event I ran was a Pets and Mental Wellness seminar in the READY Center with the help of Rosemarie and Treena. Rosemarie presented some of the benefits of spending time with animals on people’s mental wellness. I then showed the participants videos relating the different applications of therapy animals, ranging from mental health clinics to schools. I also had people rate their stress levels before and after spending time with Treena, and on a 1-10 scale, participants decreased on average 1.6 stress points. The last seminar we ran was Sleep and Mental Wellness, where Ndidi presented her work studying stress, sleep, and mental health. Her survey results for the Emma Willard community were extremely interesting. Also, the scientific relationship she researched relating to increased stress levels and decreased sleep quality were extremely pertinent to the community. I then distributed handouts to the participants about the benefits of sleep on mental wellness, tips for sleeping better, and the recommended amount of sleep for different age groups. Overall I was pleased with how each of these events went, and was happy to share this information with the community! "Free Guided Meditations." UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Apr. 2017. This site provides multiple free guided meditations produced by the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center. With free and online guided meditations, incorporating mediation in to your daily mental wellness routine is very simple. I've recommended these short meditations to students, and have encouraged them to utilize this resource (and others like it on Youtube) to better their wellness.
Group, The Millon Personality. "The Role of Personality in Mental Wellness." The Millon Personality Group. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Apr. 2017. <http://www.millonpersonality.com/theory/role-of-personality/>. This website is dedicated to the work of a psychologist, Dr. Millon, who suggested that personality is the barrier between psychological distress and the onset of psychological symptoms. Thus one's personality, and understanding the weaknesses of one's personality, are vital in preserving mental wellness. Publications, Harvard Health. "Sleep and Mental Health." Harvard Health. N.p., July 2009. Web. 11 Apr. 2017. <http://www.health.harvard.edu/newsletter_article/Sleep-and-mental-health>. This article in the Harvard Mental Health Letter details the significant effects of sleep on mental health, namely its possible role in the development of mental illnesses. One of the many issues I see with incorporating sleep in to a mental wellness routine is a lack of time, and also the inability of people to take their body's need for sleep seriously. This article is a reminder of just how vital rest is to the mind and mental wellness. Salehinezhad, Mohammad Ali. "Personality and Mental Health." Essential Notes in Psychiatry (2012): 461-94. Web. 11 Apr. 2017. <http://cdn.intechopen.com/pdfs/36309.pdf>. This article published by a researcher at the University of Tehran outlines the effects of personality on mental health. More specifically, the author discuss the ramifications of personality type and characteristics in increasing risk for developing mental illness. This article helped me understand the significant impact a person's disposition can have on their mental wellbeing, and the ways in which understanding personality can aide in developing a mental wellness practice. The Scientific Power of Meditation. ASAP Science, 18 Jan. 2015. Web. 11 Apr. 2017. <The Scientific Power of Meditation>. The short Youtube video outlines the scientific research surrounding meditation. Namely, it cites studies that have show the physical changes to the brain after meditation practices. This video is very helpful in understanding the extent of the benefits of meditation, and in taking the practice seriously. Note: This is just the beginning of my bibliography! I'll add more sources, especially for the end of the year presentation (March blog post)
Didi and I have been in contact about running a sleep awareness event in the coming weeks. Didi’s research and Signature is extremely relevant to this topic, and I know she has run a survey about the school’s sleep patterns that I think would be interesting to present in the event. In terms of the next event, Ms. Moore and I discussed in our March meetings possible events revolving around resilience, empathy, personality types, and aromatherapy. We agreed that the most feasible event to run in terms of popularity and time-limit is an event centered around determining personality type. We’ll take the Myers-Briggs test, then discuss the strengths of each personality type. If time permits, I’d love to run one more event this year. Ms. Moore told me that one of the nurses in the health center is a fan of aromatherapy, and I think it would be fun for her to host an event that allowed participants to make their own scent blend. On Thursday, April 6th Ms. Bendall and I will be running an Intro to Mediation Workshop in the READY Center. I’ve been prepping by doing some research (and the sources I’ve used are in my bibliography), and Ms. Bendall has prepared a suitable guided meditation. The event will be run from 6:30-7:00, which I think will be short enough that people will feel ok sacrificing that time.
This week I am hanging up posters and encouraging the health teachers and Ms. Bendall to promote the event to their students. I’ll also be creating flyers and handouts that participants can take with them to continue their mediation practices or try out some new Youtube meditations. I will write a post for the month of April detailing how the event went. As I have been researching the ways in which one can improve their mental health, one technique consistently pops up online and in books: meditation. And since I had already been planning to run a meditation event in the READY Center, I figured that February would be the perfect time to experience meditation for myself.
For one, I've been involved in the yoga PE class, at the end of which Ms. Mossop always makes a point to give us time for mindfulness meditation, and then for relaxation pose (which is less deliberate than meditation). In addition, I've been testing out multiple You tubers to find my ideal mediation videos that I can then recommend to others. And since I believe that what I am looking for from meditation is relatively similar to what other Emma girls need, I was particularly focused on anti-anxiety, generally de-stressing mediations. Out of this research, I found my favorite mediation, called Meditation for Anxiety and Finding Inner Peace. I've found mediation to be a more more deliberate thing than I thought it was; in a way, it almost is a workout for the brain since one must brush aside any thoughts that pop into one's head. And most of the meditations I've done have involved very specific visualization technique, which require the meditator to picture an image, or reflect on the self (for instance, doing a body scan to release tension, or visualizing a boat on the sea). I've come to realize that one of the main prerogatives of my project is to encourage people to treat their mental health like their physical health, in the sense that they should care as much about it and spend as much time with their brain's upkeep as with their body's. And I think incorporating meditation into the daily (or weekly) routine is great way to begin this process. Here is the link to my favorite mediation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDLrEaBc978 February just flew by! At the beginning of the month my weekends were consumed with ESYO concerts, and then over long weekend I had my wisdom teeth taken out, so I’ve not had as much time to dedicate to my Signature as I would like.
That being said, I’ve just scheduled a meeting with Ms. Bendall to plan for our first mental wellness event in the READY Center. The event will be an Introduction to Meditation, as per the request of NAMI@Emma members. I’m hoping to keep this event short and sweet to encourage as many people as possible to attend. I was hoping to run the event before the end of March, and I think that we could have the materials ready by the first week back from break, and run it then or the first week in April. In terms of what the actual event will consist of, I will be giving an introductory presentation, maybe lasting about 10 minutes, about the basics of mediation, my favorite meditation Youtube channels, things along those lines. This would be followed by Ms. Bendall leading a meditation session with the attendees. In terms of advertising for the event, I plan on connecting with Peer Eds and the health classes to encourage people to attend, and I’ve discussed having a meditation flash-mob to raise interest in the event with Ms. Moore. I'm excited to see my Signature project picking up speed this month!
This month saw the opening of the READY Center, and I know many students have already come to enjoy the cozy space. A majority of what I spoke about with Evangeline and Ms. Moore was regarding the programs that could be run in the center either after school, during lunch, or in the evenings. It is my goal to run one or two programs next month, and I was able to run some ideas by NAMI@Emma to determine what workshops students would find both helpful and would that they would actually attend. After this discussion, I've focused in on running a workshop somewhere along the lines of Meditation 101, which would serve as a very basic, casual introduction to the practice. Additionally, given Evangeline's enthusiasm for the benefits of sleep (as one can see in the her interview below), I think it would be very approbate and necessary to host a workshop on the benefits of sleep on mental wellness. Other programs to run in the future include an introduction to essential oils, resilience, and empathy skills. I am also very excited to be working to expand the mental wellness book section for the READY Center. After speaking with Ms. Moore, my main focus for literature resources will be to find workbooks for mental wellness that can provide students with concrete steps to promoting mental health. We also discussed ways in which we could advertise the space and promote mindfulness, and a plan is in the works for an event in March to achieve this. I had the opportunity to sit down with Evangeline and discuss both her previous inspiration for the READY Center and her future goals for the space.
I first wanted to hear more about the root of Evangeline’s passion for women’s wellness. She described that, while she hadn’t truly encountered many of these issues in her high school years, when she went to college she was “confronted by feminism… and realized how much [she] had not known or been exposed to.” On Barnard’s campus the Well Women Office was a haven of these ideas, especially in regard to women’s emotional and physical health. “Being in that office was completely mind-blowing and eye-opening” for Evangeline, since people “could have really open and honest conversation and ask questions about all sorts of topics from body image to nutrition to sexual health.” This sort of open dialogue and focus on women’s issues was a “completely new concept” to her, but she “found it at the right time in [her] life.” Evangeline described the actual physical space of the Office to be “very cozy, womb-like;” the quintessential image of this sort of space on a women’s college campus. She found the space to be extremely inviting, acting as a sort of “open living room” where “everybody… feels like it is their home or that they belong to it,” without being “intimidated by the person who is sitting at the desk.” The leader of the Office, Jessica, also served as a great role model for Evangeline, as she “let [people] start [their] own exploration” into wellness, simply greeting them as they walked in to the Office, but then giving the girls privacy to research and explore the resources of the Office. Overall, the Office was characterized by “women engaging in thinking, and expressing, and sharing.” I also wanted to learn what Evangeline’s top tips for wellness were, and sleep was “definitely at the top of the list” for her. More broadly, she also hoped that girls would feel comfortable “asking questions” to discover their wellness plan, especially since she noted that “everyone’s wellness plan is going to be different and is going to change.” She whole-heartedly believes that it is of vital importance “for young people and women especially to have practice in thinking about how they care for themselves, especially in the kind of society we are in now.” Ultimately, Evangeline wrapped up her goals for the READY center by expressing her hope that one day and alumnae would think back and appreciate the skills that had been instilled in them from the READY Center, skills that will “keep them happy, keep them safe, and keep them important, engaged parts of society.” January: Visit Barnard Well Women Office to get inspiration for READY Center, run test group with NAMI@Emma to propose ideas for workshops in the space
February: Complete updated book resource list, run mental wellness event in READY center March: Pick out posters and pamphlets for the center, mindfulness awareness event April: Run two more mental wellness events in the READY Center, prepare Signature presentation May: Run Mental Health Month event, present Signature project Additional Ideas: Get READY Center staff Mental Health First Aid Certified? Team with Peer-Eds in May? |
Mental illness is nothing to be ashamed of, but stigma and bias shame us all. -Bill Clinton
Katherine WallaceEmma Willard Class of 2017. Archives
May 2017
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