by Milan Santos | Mar 29, 2021 | Stories
Disable The Label (DTL), that title brings such fond memories, and Geneva park being home away from home. Filled with laughter, fun, connections, conversations, growth, learning, and of course lots of chocolate milk. DTL has held many individuals from many walks of life.
However this year we weren’t able to do that. We weren’t able to decorate our name tags, sit in our big community circle, or sit by the beautiful lake to soothe our souls. Gathering in the dinning hall to connect even further, and getting wild while lining up for chocolate milk. (I know I mentioned chocy milk before but it really is that big of a deal).
There was an unexpected turn of events this year due to COVID-19, and one of my first thoughts was “what is DTL going to look like this year?”. Not knowing what to expect or even if it would happen at all, I just knew this year was going to be different. And although with these unforeseen circumstances DTL was a go! Even if that meant it was going to be through our computer screens.
In a sense, I am sorry for those whose this is their first DTL, because they didn’t get to experience all of its wonders in its entirety. But DTL goes way deeper than that. It is something that isn’t physical, it’s magic and energy of all of our amazing agents of change.
As I know, I can’t speak for everyone but this DTL still felt like any other. We shared deep, meaningful conversations. We explored different areas of who we are. There was still so much vulnerability, bravery and with some tears being shed along the way. The DTL homies unified like we always do to address important matters and injustices within our society, and did important work in regards to anti-black racism. We spoke our truths with words or art, and allowed ourselves to grow. We still got to experience the TALENT of this group. DTL is its own community, I was still able to feel that and to see that. Along with being provided the space to build connections that are so precious and forever. All of this being thanks to the hard work of the hosting team, but also to the participants.
So, of course I will always say that an original DTL at Geneva park (with lots of chocolate milk) hands down takes the cake. But I’d be blind to not acknowledge that this year still held that same atmosphere even amongst zoom calls. The new mentality/DTL is family, and of course my home away from home.
by Milan Santos | Feb 18, 2021 | Uncategorized
These past 4 weeks have been amazing, getting to meet our New Mentality groups from across the province!
Last week, I had the chance to connect with the adult allies of our New Mentality group in Elgin and Oxford counties that are with our partner agency Wellkin Child and Youth Mental Wellness. Before I do my virtual group visit, I make sure that I connect with the adult allies beforehand. It is important to me to recognize the incredible adult allies that make up our network, and all the hard work they put in!
I was eager to meet the adult allies, as they have been so busy working hard to support their youth and their community. I’m a pretty big fan of these two adult allies, as I’ve seen how they uplift their youth and make sure their voices are heard at every level. As always, this group is so busy from working on implementing and building sensory walls at their agency, writing an open letter to the employers of youth in their community, working on a big Children’s Mental Health Week event coming up in a few months and on top of that running their weekly Youth Hub on Thursdays… and you might not believe me, but I’ve just touched the surface of all the work they are doing!
I really appreciate the adult allies as they continuously share with their youth the importance of flowing between rest and action. With all of us, having almost been a year into the pandemic, it’s important to make time for rest and play.
After many laughs, and connecting over the many accomplishments the group has done and continues to do, I was eager to attend The Hub where one of the youth would be hosting a games night for youth in the community. The Hub is a weekly drop-in wellness space for youth aged 13 to 25, and youth from our New Mentality group at Wellkin were leaders in creating this space. I learned that initially The Hub was supposed to happen in person, but due to COVID they quickly turned it into a Virtual Hub! In the times we are in now, it’s important to prioritize relationship building. To learn more about The Hub click here, and about the exciting news that Ontario Trillium Foundation’s Resilient Communities Fund has funded to expand the Hub here!
I was eager to attend and learn new games to play online! I was so impressed by the youth in our network who was leading and facilitating the session. There was fun music playing at the beginning to get us dancing, a warm welcome, and a powerful acknowledgement of the land we are on. I loved that everyone was given the option through Zoom polls to choose what game they would like to play, and the majority of us selected our first game to be Pop Culture Trivia which was so fun and so well put together, not to mention there were some big Marvel fans in the space! After that, we played emoji decoding, and again I was so amazed by how much work and effort was put into planning this…..and as the renowned PowerPoint queen, I might have to give my title up to this youth!
I’m looking forward to visiting all the youth virtually again soon, and can’t wait for when we can gather again in person, and connect about all the amazing work they continue to do!
See you all soon on zoom,
Fizza Abbas, Network Coordinator
by Milan Santos | Feb 12, 2021 | Uncategorized
Hello TNM Community,
Since our last update in November, a lot has been cooking behind the scenes that we would like to share.
For those who participated in Disable the Label 2020: Reconnect & Reconvene and the Open Forum: Why is it so hard to talk about race in our network? at the end of 2020, you know we were planning on launching an anti-racism program this month. We want you to know that we haven’t stopped, and our commitment still remains that we will continue to embed anti-racism frameworks into all our network’s advocacy work and community.
This is the first important thing we want you to know: we have learned that by going fast and by not thinking and feeling through things, we create problems and contribute to existing problems. A part of our learning about being anti-racist is to slow things down. This is also why we haven’t started meeting again as a network. We’re not quite ready enough.
We decided that we needed to take a step back before we planned more conversations with everybody. We did this for a few reasons.
We know that we’ve built trust when it comes to our annual programming such as Disable the Label, asking you to step into the unknown feels somehow comfortable at times because the vision, intention, and outcome is clear and is being held full heartedly by our hosting team. That took many years to build. We need some time to really develop our work before we ask our network to step in.
We want to slow down the processes in order to do it with intention. In order to deliver Disable the Label 2020, Disable the Label 2020: Reconnect and Reconvene, and the December 2020 Open Forum we had to move at a pace that was so quick it didn’t allow us to really communicate the purpose, goals, and plan of our work. It also didn’t leave space for the emotional labour of our work.
We are now working with an advisory team of folks who are familiar to the network to hold this work and build the container for it. They are Duane Hall (known as lighthaüs), Devonna Munroe (known as Devynne), Jenny Katz, and Vanessa Reid.
We know we will make mistakes, and that there will be roadblocks along the way – we are not striving for perfection – we know that with this group and engagement from our network, we will create something that allows our network to go deep with our anti-racism conversations and hold the space needed to host this important work.
The goals of this advisory group is to:
- Evaluate, reflect, and create documentation that highlights our journey thus far, lessons learned, things we would continue to do (timeline of this reflection is May-December 2020)
- Develop 1-3 actionable strategy for TNM to embed anti-racism frameworks into our advocacy work and network culture
We would like these two deliverables to be completed by April 2021.
We are now catching up with all that we’ve learned since June and in the past on the topic of TNM and racism and our efforts towards anti-racism.
We need your help.
We need our youth and adult allies’ wisdom and reflection – youth will be compensated for their time, energy, and knowledge through honorariums. *Please contact us before submitting to confirm honorarium.
Here’s a way to get involved. If what you read below isn’t what you want to do, but you want to be involved in some other way, let us know!
Reflect on:
- DTL 2020 (and/or DTL 2018, 2019), and/or
- DTL 2020 Reconnect and Reconvene and/or
- December 2020 Open Forum
We want your real, honest, and raw account through:
- One word or sentence or longer
- A piece of art
- A poem
- A song
- Multimedia
- A video
- A conversation with Mary-Anne or Fizza (let us know who)
Here are some examples of things to tell us about:
- What was comfortable?
- What was uncomfortable?
- What worked?
- What didn’t work?
- What did you love or what excited you?
- what do you never want us to do again?
- What did you learn?
- What did you learn about yourself?
- What did you learn about others?
- What did you heal?
- How did you get hurt?
- How did you deal with that?
- What advice or ideas or insights do you have for next steps or even far into the future?
Please send us your reflections pieces by: Monday, March 1, 2021.
Email Mary-Anne, TNM Program Manager at mary-anne@thenewmentality.ca and/or Fizza Abbas, Network Coordinator at fizza@thenewmentality.ca
If you have any questions, concerns, feedback please reach out.
With gratitude,
Mary-Anne & Fizza
by Milan Santos | Feb 10, 2021 | Uncategorized
As many of you know, I’ve been road tripping across the province via Zoom!
Last week I had the chance to visit our New Mentality group in Kirkland Lake, with our partner agency North Eastern Ontario Family and Children’s Services (NEOFACS). Before the pandemic I was eager to visit Kirkland Lake, as I had heard so many great things about it from Mary-Anne, The New Mentality’s Program Manager!
Even though I wasn’t able to physically visit, my virtual visit was nothing short of absolutely amazing. The adult allies have been doing an awesome job keeping everyone engaged in this virtual world by dropping off pizza and snacks before the meeting (I know, I know, super cool!)
For our New Mentality group in Kirkland Lake the restrictions with the pandemic have been quite different. A couple months ago, they were able to go bowling while social distancing and now are building relationships through Zoom.
During my group visit, we played a game of Scribbl.io which is a super fun game of Pictionary. Myself and one of the adult allies for our New Mentality Kirkland Lake group played this game during Disable the Label this past summer during a wellness night session! It is such a fun and competitive game, and let me tell you we really got into it… some folks even went and brought their stylus to play this game! I don’t think I’ve laughed that hard in some time. I apologize again to the group for my very poor drawing of Bambi….
After such a fun game, we talked about life in Kirkland Lake and I learned that some students drive a snowmobile to school, which solidified even more that I would like to move up there!
Though the meeting was only meant to be an hour long, we stayed on the line just getting to know each other and connecting. The youth and I talked about the issues that are important to us to advocate for in the Child and Youth Mental Health system. One issue that was important is the experiences of Indigenous folks accessing services, and how important it is to see your identity reflected in your counsellor. Racialized youth should not need to question their identity in order to appeal to a system that wasn’t built for them in the first place. There is a need to build a system that breaks barriers, and recognizes all cultures and experiences.
I can’t completely describe the feeling I had while visiting the youth and adult allies, but it was one of acceptance, laughter, and genuine connection. Ever since I’ve visited, I’ve been eager to visit again and also redeem myself in another game of Scribbl.io… I’m coming back for that #1 spot!
I look forward to continuing my zoom road trip across the province, and getting to meet all of you. I’m not surprised at all and very proud to see all of you continuously going above and beyond to change the Child and Youth Mental Health system.
See you all soon on zoom,
Fizza Abbas, Network Coordinator
by Milan Santos | Feb 3, 2021 | Uncategorized
Last week I shared that I would be visiting our New Mentality groups across the province… virtually!
Well I haven’t stopped, yesterday I visited our New Mentality group in Toronto who are with our partner agency Lumenus Community Services!
It was so great getting to meet the youth facilitators, one of whom is also a part of our Youth Action Committee! It was so nice to hear about how the youth facilitators actually began as volunteers for the group.
This group has consistently been doing amazing work in their community, and actually launched two resources last summer to help students with the transition to high school, and the transition out of high school.
We were so incredibly proud to see resources created by youth for youth!
Click here to read – The Transition to High School
Click here to read – The Transition out of High School
We began our call talking about TV shows we’re watching, specifically The Office which I needed to get everyone’s opinion on before I really get invested.. I know I’m about 16 years or so late.
During the group visit, it was so nice to hear from youth why they joined the New Mentality. Youth shared that they wanted a space to be themselves, to get involved and be a part of a positive space. As someone who was a part of the network in the past as a youth facilitator, it was nice to hear that many of our experiences of starting in the network were similar. For myself, when I was joining the New Mentality it was important for me to see people that looked like, and see better representation in our network which is primarily reflective of the mental health sector.
We took time during the meeting to brainstorm ideas on recruitment and project ideas for the group as they begin the early stages of their anti-stigma project for the year. With everything going virtual, the possibilities are endless for projects, outreach and recruitment!
I could tell how eager the youth were to get started, and I can’t wait to see what the group does as they work to better the Child and Youth Mental Health system. Thank you to the adult allies and youth for such a warm welcome, and I cannot wait for the day when I can visit your group in person.
I Look forward to continuing to meet the changemakers that make up this incredible network, and seeing all the amazing work you’re doing across the province!
Ps. In between my group visit and writing this blog I visited another New Mentality group, which I’ll be sharing about next week…. can you guess where I visited?
See you all soon on zoom,
Fizza Abbas, Network Coordinator
