Posts tagged mental health

Mindapples on the festival circuit

3 August 2010 · Filed under Events and promotions, The Project · Tagged , , , , ,

The Mindapples Tree in action

The harvest is in

This summer, we’re taking Mindapples to the masses.

First, we launched our campaign with our health showcase pop-up health farm, The Big Treat, with Courvoisier, Crussh, SavvyCook and many other great brands. Now, we’re taking the Mindapples Tree on tour to festivals all round Britain, spreading the word about looking after our minds to people who are out to party and enjoy the summer sunshine.

Two weeks ago we were at the Secret Garden Party near Huntingdon, where the good folks at Limina hosted the tree in their lovely tent and we got hundreds of amazing responses from people, as well as quite a few people sleeping under the shady branches.

I’ve posted some photos here, and there are loads more on our new Flickr page too.

Last weekend, Lucy and Marilena took the tree to Camp Bestival, and had a great response there too, particularly from kids. We’re awaiting their report now but initial feedback suggests we collected even more responses there than at SGP, which is brilliant stuff.

Want to see us in action? This weekend we’ll be at The Big Chill in Herefordshire,and then the ultra-exclusive Playgroup Festival on 13-15 August. Come and find us under the Mindapples Tree!

Andy x

Two excited gardeners

A mindapple card

The Mindapples Post

A little inspiration

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Are resolutions good for you?

31 December 2009 · Filed under The Idea, The Team · Tagged , , , , , ,

It’s that time of year when people start making New Year’s Resolutions. But according to psychologists, most of the time we just end up being unhappy at our failure to do them. We make promises that we don’t keep, which makes us feel bad, and so we do things to feel better. Like comfort eat. And drink too much. And all the other things we probably resolved not to do in the first place.

Here at Mindapples we like to take a more positive approach: we ask people what they’re doing already, and encourage everyone to do more of the things that work for them. We can all think of dozens of things we *should* be doing, but unless we’ve done it, how do we really know it’s right for us? Personally, I’m not interested in promises: I want to know what already works for you, so I can do it too.

So this year, I’m encouraging everyone to resolve to do more of the things you know work for you, and celebrate that we’re all doing better than we sometimes think. Naturally, I’d like one of your resolutions to be doing your five mindapples to look after your mind. But there are probably lots of other things you’d like to do more of in 2010, like playing with your kids, or doing WiiFit yoga, or having your friends round.

So, for 2010, I resolve to do the following things:

  • Play more music
  • Have more conversations with people about Mindapples and other projects that get me excited
  • Spend more time walking in the natural world, particularly climbing things and looking at nice views
  • Learn a bit more Spanish
  • See more of the people I love

And if I don’t do any of those, I resolve to be fine about it, because there was probably a good reason.

Happy New Year from all of us here at Mindapples

Winter apples: image by rabasz from flickr.com

Andy xx

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Pitching Mindapples to the mental health sector

15 September 2009 · Filed under The Project · Tagged , , , , , ,

Mindapples has been on its summer holidays for a month, but with World Mental Health Day and New Year’s Resolutions fast approaching, we’re back and kicking up a gear again (in a nice sustainable, healthy sort of way).

So, to kick things off, here’s a video of me pitching Mindapples at the Innovation Exchange Festival of Ideas two weeks ago, in which I invite ideas from organisations about how Mindapples can support their work and partner up to get the word out about everyday mental health. If you’re an organisation looking to fund innovations in stigma reduction and public mental health, or if you’d like to run a Mindapples 5-a-day survey on your website or promote us to your community, e-mail me at andy[at]mindapples.org.


(sorry about the sound quality…)

Posted by Andy Gibson

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Solitude

10 July 2009 · Filed under Famous Fives, The Results · Tagged , , , , , , ,

Ed Wardle, Alone in the Wild

We’ve been a bit quiet here on the Mindapples blog (my book coming out, Lauren’s MA due in, Tessy on holiday…), but there’s a lot going on behind the scenes.

One of the things I’ve been up to is contributing to a new Channel 4 programme, Alone in the Wild, in which Ed Wardle will be living alone in the Yukon wilderness for 3 months, starting this week. Adam Gee at Channel 4 tells me that no experiments in human isolation have ever gone beyond 8 weeks, so no-one is sure what Ed will experience towards the end of his stay. He’s a brave guy and I’m watching his progress with interest.

Channel 4 interviewed me for their website , along with Terry Waite, Sarah Maitland and other more qualified people than me, about what I thought would be the impact of solitude on Ed’s mental health. I drew on many of the Mindapples responses to inform the discussion – thanks to all of you for contributing – and as you can see, from reading your 5-a-days it’s clear that solitude is good for the mind, but connection with people is really important too. Spending time with people is the most popular of all the activities you picked. I also mentioned some of the other things which you said helped you, including reading fiction (also a popular choice), and attention and relaxation techniques such as morning pages and mindfulness.

I’m not sure I was quite as confident as I sound from the interview – I’ve certainly never wanted to be seen as an expert on mental health – but I hope it’s interesting and gives you food for thought. Let me know what you think, or if you have anything to add, either here or on the Channel 4 site. You can also follow Ed’s progress on Twitter and join the conversation there too. After all, it’s nice to know we’re not alone!

channel4.com/programmes/alone-in-the-wild/articles/andy-gibson-on-solitude

Posted by Andy Gibson

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Steph’s five a day

28 March 2009 · Filed under The Idea · Tagged , ,

My lovely friend Steph , a product designer, has shared her five a day with us…

“I’ve heard of this from a friend…Lauren gives good hugs too”

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  • I heavily daydream and all the time. Here is what are in my daydreams-when I listen to piano music I believe I am playing that tune (by the way I play the clarinet), having superhero powers is cool. I enjoy exploring my own mind.
  • Draw everyday
  • Having someone to tell me I’m doing a good job and I am going to be fine.
  • My excitable pup always helps me to forget the worries of the day by insisting to play.
  • Receiving a text to wake up to in the morning. Or racing my mum to the post, that will always get me up.

So from the team at Mindapples… Steph you are doing a great job and you are going to be superfragilistically fine.

Posted by Lauren

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Times for your mind

5 March 2009 · Filed under The Results · Tagged , , , , ,

Interesting piece in the Times a while back (thanks to the lovely Katherine at the RSA for sending it my way) about simple daily activities you can do for your mind. Paul Farmer of Mind is quoted but the ideas seem to come from all over the place. I’d be interested to hear what people out there in the Mindapples orchard think about their suggestions…

Posted by Andy

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Like clockwork

25 February 2009 · Filed under The Idea · Tagged , , , , ,

The secret life of your bodyclock by Horizon was on last night. It took me on a journey into the secret world of the human internal body clock

Our body clock controls what we do and how well we do it.

In relation to When is asleep not asleep? This program explored the idea of ‘light’ improving our sleep patterns. One third of over 65 year olds have trouble sleeping. Elderly people with Alzheimers and Dementia typically sleep undisturbed for fifteen minutes at the most! This often leads to symptoms of depression…

clock-work

Every moment of our 24 hour day is influenced by our body clock. We think best between the hours of 10am and 12pm . We all suffer from a ‘post lunch time dip’ which generates ‘natural depression’, as we all feel the pit falls of life more severely after lunch time. Modern life tends to ignores the body clock. We think we can do what we want when want. We can’t!

Keep your health ticking over and choose to follow your clockwork. How do you over the come the ‘post lunch time dip’ or the urge to take a nap?

Posted by Lauren

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When is asleep not asleep?

22 February 2009 · Filed under The Idea · Tagged , , ,

New Scientist asks “Are bad sleeping habits driving us mad?”

mindapples

“TAKE anyone with a psychiatric disorder and the chances are they don’t sleep well. The result of their illness, you might think. Now this long-standing assumption is being turned on its head, with the radical suggestion that poor sleep might actually cause some psychiatric illnesses or lead people to behave in ways that doctors mistake for mental problems. The good news is that sleep treatments could help or even cure some of these patients. Shockingly, it also means that many people, including children, could be taking psychoactive drugs that cannot help them and might even be harmful.”

The assumption that poor sleep is a symptom rather than a cause of mental illness has never really been questioned before. Dreams, sleep walking, afternoon naps…how do we begin to untangle the way we sleep?

Posted by Lauren

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Andy Gibson explains Mindapples

16 February 2009 · Filed under The Idea, The Project · Tagged , , , , , ,

Craig at the O’Reilly GMT blog has very kindly posted a video interview with me explaining the Mindapples project and talking a bit about how far we’ve got. He caught me on the hop a bit: no time to do my hair, although I did manage to dress up a bit.

Here’s the video from YouTube below. Please do reblog it, Twitter it and send it round to friends and associates, and help us get a bit more attention.

Posted by Andy Gibson

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Nature delivered

16 February 2009 · Filed under The Idea · Tagged , , , , , , ,

Graze is officially recognised by the NHS as supporting the 5-a-day scheme. It was started by seven friends who shared a passion for food.

It allows British office workers to improve the way they eat at work. You can order tasty food online and get it delivered to your desks. With boxes containing everything from exotic goji berries to fresh pineapple, graze.com is all about making it easy to eat better at work.

Priced at £2.99, you can choose a box put together by the graze nutrition team, or set your own preferences so graze can make you the perfect box with that days freshest produce. You can even choose to have three of your five a day guaranteed in every graze box.

box-ongrass

Graham Bosher, managing director of graze.com and founder of LOVEFiLM says, “We want to help people eat better at work. Lunch doesn’t have to mean soggy sandwiches and junk food with lots of artificial ingredients. You can eat amazing, natural food that just arrives at your desk. In less than five minutes online, you can revolutionise the way you eat during the day.”

Graze is a great way to ensure you have good energy all day long. Learn how it works and find out more here.

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What would Mindapples look like if we could get them delivered through our letter boxes? What would a healthy mind by post be?

Posted by Lauren

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