All Articles, Toolkit 4 - Developing Young Women's Leadership Through Youth Work

PROMOTING YOUNG WOMEN’S EMOTIONAL WELLBEING

What does wellbeing mean? What is emotional wellbeing?

Wellbeing refers to the condition of being content and happy in life. It refers to the quality of one’s life or lifestyle. There are many aspects of wellbeing: physical, mental, spiritual and emotional.

Emotional wellbeing is how we deal with both the positive emotions, such as happiness, and the negative ones, such as stress, fear or anger.

There are five ways of wellbeing, which are:

  • Connect with others (nurturing our relationships with others and surrounding ourselves with people we love—e.g. calling or messaging a friend, spending quality time with a member of our household).
  • Take notice (noticing the simple things, being in the moment, and being mindful—e.g. doing some breathing exercises, guided meditation, eating something, and thinking of all the sensations we’re experiencing including smell, texture, taste, and consistency).
  • Keep learning (learning or trying something new—e.g. cooking a new recipe or trying a new art project).
  • Be active (e.g. going for a walk or doing a workout at home).
  • Give (this doesn’t have to be a physical gift but could also be a smile, hug, or just doing something kind for someone).

Here are practical ideas of how to incorporate it. Use one or more with your mentee. 

  • Check in—on a scale from 1 to 10, how do you feel right now?
  • Think of examples for each of the five ways of wellbeing and discuss how they can help us (e.g. learning something new gives us a purpose, raises our confidence and is a good distraction; being active is a good stress relief, increases the happy hormones, and decreases the stress hormones).
  • Do a little 5-minute activity for each or some of the pointers: doing ten star jumps; sticking your head out of the window and writing down five things we can see, four things we can hear, three we can feel, and two we can smell; playing a game together; or sending someone we care about a quick text message.

Our Latest Posts:

Spread the love