This month has brought lots of reasons for me to anxiously write about. Did I say anxiously? We’re all exposed to stress and anxiety every day. However, in the last few weeks I’ve seen some extreme cases of stress, anxiety and yes, depression. It actually moved me to write about it again. I believe I’ve touched about this in some of the past posts. It seems to be all around me! Thus, my decision to bring out awareness about mental health!

You may recall I helped produced a very important event on July 12 and saw the level of stress of the people involved increasing dramatically as the event got near. I also was part of a 5K to help end homelessness during the same weekend AND attended the funeral of a friend that committed suicide. I saw first hand the effects of Mental Wellness.

Whether you’re an event coordinator, a project manager, an entrepreneur or work for a corporation…whether you’re old, young, single, married, with kids, with older parents that need help…whether you own a house, rent, or live with family, own a car or take public transportation…no matter what your circumstances may be, you’re going to encounter situations that increase your stress level.

I just met with a wonderful group of people that serve on the board of A Safe Haven Foundation. The purpose was to kick off the planning of the 25 year anniversary of this organization that has been helping the homeless and veterans of Chicago transform their lives by becoming self-sustainable and be productive citizens again. Somehow the prevalent theme was Mental Health. After discussing several ideas among all of us and how to bring awareness of the effects these conditions cause to homelessness, at one point, we all agreed that mental health was only one of the issues why some people become homeless. Regardless of this clarification, it impacted me because like I said, I’ve seen the effects of mental conditions all around me.

This morning I got on a leadership training call and guess what the theme was? You got it! Mental Wellness! Did all of the sudden I became more aware of these circumstances? Just like when you plan to buy a car and you start seeing the model you want everywhere or you want to buy a house and notice all the “for sale” signs. Was it all around me before and I just started noticing it more?

This is too important to stop it! So, I’m committed to embrace mental wellness, learn more about it, help more people that suffer from it and become a voice that reaches out to others for help. Let’s do it together!