How spirituality, art, massage, story telling, meditation and mindfulness can help your mental health

Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust has held its third annual spirituality conference in Burgess Hill, allowing guests to take part in activities such as massage, painting and meditation to encourage mental wellbeing.

Richard Harlow, Sussex Partnership’s Multi-faith and spiritual care team leader said: “As well as talking about faith, religion and human believing, spirituality includes the vast range of activities that people practice to feed and heal their ‘spirit’ or ‘soul’.”

“Mental healthcare has outgrown its suspicion of religion and belief. Meditation and mindfulness, prayer and yoga, sacrament and belonging are all recognised as key to many people’s recovery from acute mental illness.”

“Conferences like this help us to increase our understanding of what has been found to help, and what is useful to avoid. It builds confidence in our staff in how better to support our service users who have religious or spiritual needs.”

‘Treasure in Jars of Clay’ was chosen as a theme to emphasise the fragility of human nature and the personal value that people carry. 140 professionals from across Sussex attended the conference and were able to hear presentations from national experts on spirituality and mental health.

Richard continued: “Spirituality is a topic of increasing interest to both staff and service users. It looks beyond physical and psychological means to find ways of enhancing human well-being. There are vast sources of knowledge, experience and healing potential within the major world faiths.”

The Trust already has 90 Spirituality Advocates; members of staff who have undertaken specialised training to enable them better to understand and support service users. This conference was treated as part of ongoing training, but was also open to other members of staff, service users and members of the Trust