Buckle Up First is a ground-breaking new mental health awareness workshop for fitness employees.
We hear from our very own Lynne Briggs about her work during Mental Health Awareness week as joint director and co-founder of MH1 Global, providing a modern, practical understanding of mental health to fitness organisations.
Mental Health Awareness Week provides a wonderful opportunity to focus on yourself and check in on your own mental health. At MH1 Global we identified a gap in the market for mental health awareness that does just that and, as a result, we developed a workshop that can be delivered to employees called ‘Buckle Up First’.
Our first session was delivered during this Mental Health Awareness week to the senior leadership team at Active Tameside, which is testament to their commitment to leading from the top, and we have three more sessions planned for later in the year that will be delivered to management teams.
Our workshop is a non-clinical, face-to-face, four-hour workshop, which is endorsed with the Non-Regulated Distinction Award by Transcent Awards and offered as in-house training to fitness operators.
The primary aim of this awareness-based workshop is to provide learners with a modern, practical understanding of mental health. The workshop doesn’t provide counselling, diagnosis or treatment and doesn’t replace professional mental health support; instead, we move away from clinical theory and towards personal agency, giving every participant the tools to audit their own mental ‘headspace’ and implement sustainable self-care habits.
By the end of the workshop, attendees are able to:
- define the Mental Health Continuum, understand that mental health is fluid and identify the signs of ‘buffering’ before a ‘system crash’
- identify mental clutter and the science of self-care, recognising personal stressors (biopsychosocial factors) that diminish cognitive and emotional capacity
- apply the five battery boosters (The Toolkit), effectively utilising the ‘Five Ways to Wellbeing’ (Connect, Be Active, Take Notice, Keep Learning, Give) as daily clearing tools
- understand signposting and know when ‘headspace’ requires professional intervention
- create a Battery Boost Plan – a specific, grounded and achievable seven-day habit to improve internal margin. Participants culminate their learning into a personalised wellbeing plan for the following week and beyond.
Lynne Briggs
Reg Patel, CEO of Active Tameside, told us after the workshop, “The MH1 Buckle Up training Lynne presented to the team today was extremely beneficial. Senior team members shared their honest perspectives and experiences which were extremely revealing. This will help us target key areas for deeper assistance going forward. Thank you Lynne for getting all to contribute and truly listen to each other – proving it’s OK not to be OK. It’s what we are going to do about it together, which takes us to better tomorrows.”
MHI’s Buckle Up First is fully supported by our partner FitPro as offering essential guidance and understanding of your own stressors and how to identify and implement interventions to improve the situation. It’s not a luxury to focus on your mental health – it’s a necessity.
Teresa Wheatley, FitPro’s executive director, says, “Lynne has achieved some amazing things and Buckle Up First is her latest creation. We are proud to partner with MH1 because the work Lynne does is needed in the industry. Lynne has been an integral member of the FitPro team for many years and has been a huge support to me personally with my own mental health. She has a deep care for people and we fully recommend taking a look at the psychometric tool MH1 has created – the MHQ – as well as the workshop, while also asking you support one of the good guys in the industry, who has worked tirelessly for over 35 years. We talk a lot about mental health in the industry but Lynne is actually actioning change and providing tools you can learn and grow from.”
Lynne Briggs is joint director and co-founder of MH1 Global, the innovator of the validated Mental Health Questionnaire (MHQ) which is a non-clinical tool that measures the trajectory of mental health using lifestyle factors as marker. She has worked with FitPro for over 30 years and is currently Client Support for the MOSSA pre choreographed group exercise programmes. She is a qualified tutor/assessor and has a passionate interest in mental health – especially the positive impact of movement and physical activity. For more information, contact: [email protected]
