JCI Beirut "Mind Your Mind"

Member

Jessica Al Haber

Local organization

JCI Beirut

National organization

Lebanon

Member

Jessica Al Haber

Duration

From January 1 to July 31, 2022

Target

Support 100 people from diverse backgrounds in their mental health journey by providing six mental health trainings and community-based open discussions on the following topics: how to train your mind to face overthinking, secrets to transformative change, resilience, the art of bouncing back, and many more.

Target population

100

Target avg age

30

People impacted

100

Sustainable Development Goal

Good Health and Well-Being

Development stage

Health and Wellness

Purpose

Lebanon’s current economic crisis, coupled with years of unresolved collective trauma, have led to depression rates reaching 35% and suicide rates skyrocketing, with an 8% surge in 2022. Whilst the youth is ready to break the taboo and take a step towards healthier mental health, access to individual therapy is unattainable to most.

Thus, the program's purpose is to provide bimonthly collective mental health sessions and open discussions to groups of 15 to 20 people from diverse backgrounds.

Overview

Over the span of three months, Mind your Mind is set to host six internal JCI Beirut trainings and six public sessions. It aims to train JCI members to become beacons of mental health support and to provide the public with concrete tools to cope with mental health issues. Mind your Mind destigmatizes mental health by taking on a collective approach. Community-based mental health has proven to be effective in creating real-time solutions. We are halfway through the campaign at the time of the submission of this award entry.

Results

On the individual level, 25 members have attended a Mind Your Mind training, and until now, 50 attendees have participated in the public sessions. As we are halfway through execution, three sessions are remaining, thus, allowing us to reach (if not exceed) the initial goal of positively impacting the minds of 100 participants. These sessions came as an alternative to individual expensive therapy and allowed those attendees to work on collective trauma from events like the atrocious Port of Beirut explosion that took place on August 4, 2020.

On the community level, those active members of society will carry their knowledge, self-awareness, and emotional well-being into their lives and the workforce. This will have a direct impact on their role in both the society and economy, especially during Lebanon’s worst crisis which it is currently passing through.

On the JCI Beirut level, Mind Your Mind:
- Increased the JCI Beirut membership by 15%, so far.
- Contributed towards the financial sustainability of the Local Organization.
- Created brand awareness about our Local Organizations because all 100+ participants will be directly exposed to JCI and JCI RISE and will start spreading the word about our mission.

Recommendations

To ensure better results, we would reach out to partners earlier in order to have them on board of the project from the start, instead of once the project is ongoing.