Listen up!

National Mental Health Week, from May 7 to 13, 2012, will kick off an annual mental health promotion campaign. This year’s theme focuses on the important link between sense of security and mental health. Individuals, groups and organizations are invited to mobilize and create activities in their own way. In this regard, the Quebec Division of the Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA) offers ideas as well as multiple tools that can be downloaded or ordered from the etrebiendanssatete.com website.

Living means accepting a certain amount of insecurity and taking a certain degree of risk. However, when insecurity takes over, it can severely affect a person’s health. Insecurity can prevent someone from being happy, confident or building relationships with others. In fact, without some degree of physical and psychological security, living life to its fullest can be challenging.

Physical security is an ever-present concern in our society. Most individuals try to attain it through various means: alarm system, police presence on the roads, airport security, protection in sports, etc. What about our inner security? How is it protected, and by whom?

Inner or psychological security develops throughout life. It stems from early relationships children experience with family members and significant adults in their environment. Then, it develops in relationships they establish with peers either at daycare, at school, in the workplace or in the community. Security concerns everyone including municipalities, institutions and the State.

In 2012, CMHA messages will revolve around the psychological health of Phil Wellinside. These messages will demonstrate that to feel good psychologically, action is needed at both internal and external levels.

The Support Phil Wellinside campaign promotes “listening to our inner self, the part that holds our fears, doubts as well as our strengths and capabilities to find solutions and a sense of security suitable to us”, explains Louise Latraverse, actress and National Mental Health Week spokesperson. Support Phil Wellinside also encourages us to listen to others, giving them the opportunity to develop their own inner sense of security. So let’s keep the campaign’s slogan firmly in mind this year:

It’s important to feel well and secure, inside and out!