The Isle of Wight Council is highlighting 5 ways to well-being as part of Men’s Health Week.
Men’s Health Week is an opportunity to consider activities and events to remind men to prioritise looking after their bodies and mind.
The 5 ways to well-being are:
Connect —Meeting up with friends and family can promote positive well-being, with social connections helping ward against anxiety and depression and increasing self-esteem and empathy.
Be Active — Take steps to build activity into daily life. Spring and summer with more hours of sunlight are a great time to enjoy the Island.
Take notice — Slow things down. This can strengthen and broaden awareness and calm the mind.
Learn — Enhance self-esteem and encourage interacting with others for a more active life with continued learning.
Give — Committing an act of kindness once a week over a six-week period is associated with an increase in wellbeing. Giving can mean your time or your thoughts.
Mental and physical wellbeing are very dependent on each other. A key theme this year is anxiety, fuelled by the cost-of-living crisis.
Councillor Michael Lilley, the council’s Mental Health Champion, said:
“A big fall-out symptom from COVID-19 has been the rise in anxiety among our population.
“As Isle of Wight Mental Health champion, I have advocated for grant funds to be targeted to community-based groups near and accessible to people’s homes, such as the Veteran’s HUB in Ryde and mental health support groups in Ventnor. Our grant fund also supported Men Only Isle of Wight, the first targeted men’s mental health project on the Island.
“The council is working closely with partners to support residents. Healthwatch Isle of Wight has put mental health as one of their 2023/24 priorities and mental wellbeing is a key Public Health priority through the Mental Health Alliance.
“Help comes in many ways, if you feel you might need some, please seek it out.”
You can find out more about mental health and wellbeing by visiting www.iow.gov.uk/keep-the-island-safe/public-health/healthy-living/mental-health-and-wellbeing/.
The Pandemic has sadly affected many persons.
These last 3 and half years have not been easy.
I pray things improve soon.
I think most normal working class guys who get up everyday, work all year, and all their lives in jobs no one else wants, provide for their families would probably appreciate society ending the agenda of telling men how awful and horrible they are. Most of us aren’t and have never been oppressors. Most blokes work longer hours in dirty dangerous jobs, higher suicide rates, we work longer careers, more likely to go to prison for the same crime a woman might commit, shorter live expectancy. More chance of being pulled over, more chance of being murdered. Maybe society should consider some of these uncomfortable truths.