fbpx Wellbeing in lockdown - what works?  - London Youth

26 February 2021

During the third national lockdown, many of us have been trying to look after our wellbeing and mental health. Lockdown, coupled with the colder, darker days, have meant we are all finding this one more challengingIn fact, when we asked our Youth Boardall of them said that this lockdown has been the toughest.  

1. Sticking to a good routine

Elena, one of our Young Advisors, wanted to share some tips with how the importance of sticking to a good routine:

Over the course of the first lockdown, I found it hard to keep to a routine, and ended up falling into a pattern of sleeping all day and staying up all night as I had nothing to do. However, as school approached, I realised that I needed to fix my sleeping pattern.

Once I got into a routine of keeping busy, I realised that the routine was becoming repetitive, and I noticed that I wasn’t able to remember things I had done just last week.I came up with the idea to begin a ‘key word diary’. Every day, I would write out 2 key words that summed up my day, designed to jog my memories and remind myself of all the meaningful activities I take part in.

I believe the lack of getting out was correlating with my deteriorating mental health. I pledged to myself that I would go out for a walk every morning with my dogs. I live a 15 minute walk from the river, and quite early in the morning the tide goes out. This motivates me to get up in the morning and get down onto the rocks before it comes back in again. 

– Elena, Young Advisor

2. Keeping connected with others

matthew headshot

Matthew, a member of our Youth Board, has been engaging in activities through his youth club to keep connected:

During lockdown, I have been getting involved in a project through my youth club to teach the elderly how to use technology so it would be easier for them to stay in touch with their families and the people they love, so we did a fundraiser and raised over £1000. With this, we were able to purchase over 10 amazon fire tablets. During late December / early January, I met up with a few other people from the youth group who were involved with this project and, whilst maintaining social distancing we helped teach the elderly that were able to come in, how to use the basics on their tablets.

At first, they had trouble with completing the applications, but with a little bit of reminding and prompting, they were able to work the tablets for themselves. They were all very pleased and really thankful that we were able to help them. Their newly acquired knowledge proved to come in very handy for them as we had also organised a competition for the over-50s where we had sent out a number of food items to the participants. They had to come up with their own recipes with those items we had supplied and they then had to show their creations over Zoom. 

– Matthew, Young Ambassador

3. Getting active to support your wellbeing

red january 2021Our team members took part in RED January 2021, which challenged them to do something active every day in January. We kept connected via a WhatsApp group, offering words of encouragement and motivation for one another.  

We also set out a RED January Challenge for our members; inviting all young people and youth workers to show us how they’ve been active at home for their physical and mental wellbeing. The challenge had a great response response, with over 75 submissions sent to us; people shared their youth club’s activity sessions on zoom, as well as photos of themselves walking, cycling and working out with their families.

We’ve now awarded 30 young people and youth workers from 13 different youth organisations with £50 sports vouchers for their efforts.  

As the days get longer, the weather improves, and with news of restrictions easing in the coming months, there’s a lot to be hopeful for. We all need to take the time to look after ourselves and our wellbeing. Hopefully some of these tips will help you too.

 – Jasmin Campbell, Sports Development Support Officer

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