Saturday 11th April 2020 - Another application completed

Posted 3:15pm

It may be a weekend, but don't you find the days seem to blend into one another at the moment? I admit I woke up this morning and have to think about which day of the week it was.

But, we cannot stop in our target to help people around this time, and I have to say we have come up with a cracking idea for intervention around mental health of people in isolation. I am very proud of my idea, which I am actually going to keep to myself at the moment as we seek funding. I do not want anyone to pinch it.

We have though just completed a funding application that would cover this for the next four months - or seventeen weeks. I am hoping that people will see the potential, and that we are doing something different from others around. We did not want to copy anyone, but are naturally reliant on getting the funding to cover the costs.

I am thankful to Scott, our terrific business mentor, currently working from home, who ran his professional eye over our application and made suitable changes where necessary. It is sometimes easy to get a bit personal when you are filling in these forms, and he is able to focus on this for us.  We have asked for a total of juist over £4000 - this would cover all the costs for the 17 weeks, including four hours a week for four volunteers, a camera, some presentation packs, office paper, printer ink, and some resistance bands for exercise. We costed everything from Vistaprint and Amazon, as well as the london living wage per hour for the volunteer.

We will naturally be using up far more time than four hours each on the project. In fact for Lazza, this is almost a full time job at the moment. But it is important to cover some volunteer costs, which will include travel, and other costs.

If we get the funding I will naturally expand on the project idea.

Friday 10th April 2020 - How can we offer something different to others?

“Think of yourself as a brand. You need to be remembered. What will they remember you for? What defines you? If you have it in you, do something that defines you. Invent something, develop a unique skill, get noticed for something — it creates a talking point.”

Posted 5:55pm

Healthy Minds, Healthy Bods was created and developed to offer a something different to current intervention, to stand out from the crowd.  We are proud that so far we have managed to succeed, and garnered incredible feedback as well.

Now we are in lockdown, we are anxious to be part of the community help going around, especially for our users. I spoke with three of our older ladies on the telephone yesterday, and the first thing they all said to me was that they were bored and scared to go out. It actually upset me a bit, as none of them use the internet, and it feels like the television is their only outlet.

With that in mind, I have spoken with my colleagues Luke and Dean to see how we can offer our own unique delivery style and sessions and be part of the wonderful response from many organisations. There are some fantastic interventions online, especially around exercise and fitness, but they are all so samey. We want to be able to step it up a notch. And we have some cracking ideas around this.

It is also important to offer something around mental health.that is practical, fun and they can do on their own. We are coming up with quite a few good ideas, and I am sure we can provide some terrific assistance. That, obviously, comes down to money, so we are completing as many applications as possible, and if we are fortunate enough to be awarded some funding then we intend to crack on and complete this. There is a lot of food, shopping and contact help offered, but I have not seen any fund mental health activity packages as yet.

I just wanted people to know that we have not stopped, relaxed, or rested. We want to be part of the ongoing mental health intervention for years, as long as people give us the chance, and are desperate to help our users, and others, at this difficult time.

Wednesday 8th April 2020 - Website, Funding, and blogs

Posted 10:50pm

I am trying to be as constructive as possible during this lockdown. Part of that involves our social media, and seeing how we can grow and get more known.

We are currently updating our website. Our terrific colleague, Kacper, who is up in Edinburgh finishing off his work for his third year University degree, and Lazza have been jointly chatting and adding pages. We are looking to get five new pages on by the end of next week. Our first went live today - but we have only added a little to it, so I will give more details in a couple of days.
Lazza has never really done website work, so this is a real challenge and learning experience for him, but he is well guided by Kacper. We also made a small adjustment to our main page, which people see when they type in the web address, so it mentions the Covid virus.

Funding is becoming more important. Despite our pleas, the venue we were using in March for the course we then had to cancel suddenly due to the Covid 19 virus guidelines about staying in, has refused to budge and is charging us for the use of the site. Yes, it is in their regulations that if we do not give 72 hours notice we have to still pay, but frankly I am very disappointed.
We have put our GoFundMe page on twitter, asking for retweets and share. We had one!!! I am quite despondent. We desperately need seed funding. Our feedback alone shows we deserve our chance. But how can we possibly do anything if no-one is prepared to risk five figure sums on us? I will continue to apply for money, but this is now a time where everyone is going for the funding, and the bigger companies are bound to win. It is quite unfair.

I am loving updating our health blog with relevant and appropriate entries. I try and make them simple and how I would like to read them if I came across them. Recently I looked at the Respiratory System and the Immune System. We are wanting to encourage, motivate and inspire as much as possible.

Finally, we are anxious to get our unique intervention online. So many videos and talks just copy each other. They do not try and be original. That is us. Again though, this will come through some small funding - not a huge amount is required. I hope we can achieve this.

Tuesday 7th April 2020 - Funding plea on GoFundMe

Posted 2:35pm

Like a lot of small projects, with big ambitions, we are reliant on the kindness of funders, especially at times like this. And that can be tough, as everyone is applying for the funds available - so we need to be lucky in our attempts.

We have not been helped by a venue we were using on Wednesday 18th March. We were working with Barnsbury Job Centre to run a course with their users. On the Tuesday we were contacted and asked if we were going ahead. At that time there was still no problem, so we said yes. Luke was actually at the Job Centre at the time, promoting our course with the Legacy users (long-term unemployed and struggling).  It was during his visit that the DWP decided to close job centres and advise people to stay at home and not come in.

That left us high and dry the next day. No-one came. It was clearly not out fault, and out of our hands.
However, the venue are still charging us!!!!  They have agreed to halve the fee, but say we have to pay. I actually contacted the Chief Executive of the venue to ask if they could waiver it, as we are a small project and it was not in our control. But even he has come back and said we did not give notice so therefore we pay.  Truly astonishing!!!  I guess I understand in some small way, but surely common sense should prevail?

So it has pushed me to put our GoFundMe page back on Twitter. We get virtually nothing though. It is so frustrating. People go on the site asking for people to fund their holidays, and they get hundreds. We put on there to nothing!!!  Maybe this time, who knows?

If you are reading this, and would like to share our page, we would be very grateful.

www.gofundme.com/hmhb2016

Monday 6th April 2020 - Trying to boost our users

"Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained." - Marie Curie

Posted 2:15pm

It is very easy to say, but staying positive will naturally be a good thing for your mental health during this time of lockdown. As the simple message in the photo above describes, your attitude to any given situation is what defines us all.

Healthy Minds, Healthy Bods core target is to improve the mind-set of our users, as everything then develops from that. People will be more active, they will look to make better choices, and they will be proactive in improving their lifestyle and overall well-being.

Having a Growth Mindset (the belief that you are in control of your own ability, and can learn and improve) is the key to success. Yes, of course, hard work, effort and persistence are all important, but not as important as having and underlying belief that you are in control of your own destiny.

But we also like to improve interaction and that, at the moment, is not easy, as we are currently now allowed to mingle with non-family members, and adhere to the social distancing guidelines.

So HMHB is trying to speak with as many of our users at least once a week, either via email, telephone, or other internet communications - like Whatsapp and Messenger. We realise we are just a very small cog on the current wheel of organisations offering help, but over the last three years we have built up a network of users and friends (which is a good word for it).

Healthy Minds, Healthy Bods has always tried to be different from current intervention, and go that extra mile when it comes to users. Maybe that's because we are mentor led, having all of us gone through some difficult periods in our lives. It has been commented on, and praised, by our groups how they like the way we treat everyone as equals. It's how I would have wanted to be managed.

Please use this time to rebuild some lost friendships, reconnect with loved ones and friends. Life is far too short, and we waste so much on trivial events, when the really special part of being alive, being able to interact on an amazing level with others, we seem to have lost over time. Let's be ready to relight that spark. Yay!!!

Sunday 5th April 2020 - First funding application done, plus online hopes

Posted 10:45am

Yesterday we completed our first funding application, and over the next few weeks we will be getting off as many as possible. Hopefully, we will get lucky and get a few of them. I imagine they will be inundated and overwhelmed with requests, so chances are slim. It was with the Charities Aid Foundation, and it was recommended by Voluntary Action Islington - but our Lazza still needed to be proactive and get the application in - which was completed in one day as the deadline was imminent.

We are very anxious to do our bit during this period. And we have our own unique delivery style and outlook towards mental health, mind-set and health.

We have asked for just over one thousand pounds, as we want to start providing a quality online service for our users around exercise, nutrition and routine. We are anxious not to copy current access, as there are some amazing Youtube sites, as well as fitness videos and motivational sites available. However, we believe we can provide a slightly different service.

We had been providing three free gym studio sessions a week, in partnership with Better UK - in Islington and Camden. Instead, we want to film some unique fun sessions for our Youtube Channel, with our unique delivery and patter. It is very important to us that no-one can feel excluded, and we can provide something that is available to all (except maybe the most physically or mentally afflicted, who will be getting their own practical and appropriate assistance).

We therefore need various pieces of hardware and software. I have chatted with our terrific website creator, Kacper (who is finishing his third year at Edinburgh University, and is delighted that it is being judged on coursework). We are working out the dynamics, and will also be conversing with our very own Personal Trainer, Dean. Without an idea of just how long this lockdown is going to go on for, we want to be able to get a lot of content online as soon as possible. Personally, I am a bit of a technophobe, and am a little nervous about all this. But, that's the challenge I guess!!

We have identified several other funding streams, and will be starting on another today.

Meanwhile, we are also doing daily updates on our health blog - a cracking entry around "Anxiety" yesterday.  Please do sign up for them - it means a great deal to us: The address is:

www.healthymindshealthybods.blogspot.com

Friday 3rd April 2020 - HMHB Update - please follow, share and like

Hi - from Dean, Lazza and Luke

Posted 3:00pm

Well, here we are in lockdown.  It does feel strange, and I guess none of us thought anything like this would ever happen in our lifetimes. However, this is just another challenge to overcome - physically, mentally and emotionally. This can be a defining time for us all - and when we look back in a few years time I hope we all be proud of our actions.

Healthy Minds, Healthy Bods would like to acknowledge all the people who are helping us through this virus outbreak, from medical to practical. We see so many fantastic community projects and so much spirit. It does go to show just what we can do when we put our minds to it.

We are trying to do our bit too. We are devastated our weekly fitness sessions have stopped, as we know those who attended were enjoying our unique delivery style. PT Dean and I have been chatting about doing online sessions for a while - and we are currently applying for some emergency funding so we can do this properly and professionally. Yes, there are quite a lot of fitness videos out these in the ether, especially Youtube. But, as people who know us are aware, we like to do things differently from the norm, and aim to help older generation, people with confidence issues, and make it fun and a laugh as well. I don't see many things like that.

We have also ordered a Go Pro, and will be putting some walk stuff online when  that happens, so people can walk on the spot at home, but still enjoy our wonderful green area. We are also looking to connect with many of our older users, as they are in isolation, many do not have family near, and we want to try and involve them in some live link ups - which should be interesting as I am a technophobe, but probably know more than most of them.

What a terrific time to give yourself an M.O.T., as well as have a rummage/declutter where you live. Amazon is still delivering, so why not perk up the kitchen or bathroom, bedroom or lounge, and put a smile on your face. Treat yourself to a present. But keep busy - and that means mentally as well as p-physically. If you struggle to get out, we will be putting videos online. However, use the open spaces (which we can do under current Government guidelines and recommendations - once a day for exercise - and social distance naturally).

Try not to binge watch the television - but if you are sitting for a while ensure you get up and stretch for a couple of minutes, and move too. Stretching is terrific.

Nutrition and diet wise, please look to eat as healthy as possible (but do have some treats now and then). Remember your body needs certain items in your diet that are "essential for life" - as well as protecting your immune system, respiratory system (vital at the moment), and your organs and focus. Protein, Carbohydrates (fibre included), Fats (good ones), Sugars (not refined), Vitamins, Minerals, Water etc. Maybe look to try out some new recipes, try foods you have not experienced before, or for a while. What an opportunity to do all this.

We are going to try and put at least two items a day from tomorrow onto our health blog, looking at present situation, as well as general health, nutrition and fitness matters.  We are trying for funding, so knowing people are reading it is vital to us. Please can you follow the health blog, save it, read it, share it on media if you can, and make comments if you like.  Address is:

www.healthymindshealthybods.blogspot.com

Finally - keeping a good routine is vital. People say they are bored online, or have nothing to do or get up for. Codswallop!!!!  No need to be bored. Use your imagination. Read a book, learn something on the internet etc. But try and get up as you usually would, keep a good sleep routine (which I personally know is not easy), and don't allow this situation to overwhelm you.

HMHB sends our best regards. If you do need us - please contact  hmhb2016@outlook.com.
Be safe, be healthy, stay in, save lives. Social Distancing Hugs to everyone.