Agape House is taking a creative approach to promoting mental health by sharing simple facts and helpful resources.
Lisa Fast, Outreach and Housing Counsellor at Agape House says the idea came after she received an email from the Healthy Living Team at Southern Health about the “Love My Community” challenge happening throughout May.
“They invited organizations in the area to get creative and think of an activity. It's a small act of kindness, playing a big role in the mental health and well-being of our community. And so we put our heads together to think of something creative that we could do that we haven't done before.”
Love My Community Day was created by students at Roseau Valley School in Dominion City and the initiative has now been spread across the southeast.
With help from Team Lead Amy, Fast came up with the idea to place informative posters around A.D. Penner Park in Steinbach.
“The idea was to just encourage people to get outside and connect with nature. Go for a walk. Just being outside in nature, and the impact that can have on your mental health.”
Each poster features interesting and encouraging facts related to mental wellness.
“Walking for an hour can reduce the risk of major depression by 26%. So, for those that are out on a walk and they come across this poster, they can maybe stop and just think for a minute about how walking can actually impact your mental health and can help improve it as well, so you can expect to see just little, fun facts about how being outside can improve your mental health.”
To make the campaign even more helpful, the posters include a QR code linking directly to local mental health resources.
“If you scan the QR code, there's different mental health resources from Southern Health for our area so that folks can also access some support if they're looking for that as well.”
The impact of the initiative was visible almost immediately. As Fast and Amy were putting up the posters, they noticed people taking the time to read them.
“It was actually really exciting to see that people, actually, we're reading them so. We were able to see a few people come across and just take a look and read them. I saw one person actually pull out their phone to scan the QR code. So, I thought that was really great and kind of what we were hoping to maybe see from these posters.”
Fast hopes this simple act of community kindness leaves a lasting impression.
“Right now, I would say a lot of the majority of us are struggling with mental health and really we're just trying to let people know that there are small things we can do to kind of take care of ourselves and that there is also supports available for those that are struggling.”
With files from Carly Koop