May 9, 2014
This past week, Active Minds hosted its third annual Relaxation Celebration. In the midst of final’s stress, the week encourages students to take a break from studying to participate in stress-relieving activities such as chocolate meditation, dance and yoga.
During the school year, Active Minds promotes conversations about mental health. Specifically, the group focuses on how mental health intersects with other topics such as philosophy, the prison system, socioeconomic class, and the LGBT community. The club also hosted talks called the “Psychology of Love, Sex and Mental Health,” “How to Help a Depressed Friend” and the “Power of Introverts.”
While typically an academic club, Relaxation Celebration is a tradition that allows club members to reach outside of intellectual conversations about mental health and into advocacy work.
On Monday, April 28, members ran a booth called Stigma Stompers in Beinecke. Stigmatized and insensitive words and phrases used to talk about mental illness such as “crazy,” “OCD” and “I totally failed that test, I’m so depressed” were written on bubble wrap. People walking by were encouraged to pop (or “stomp on”) the bubble wrap (much to the dismay of the mail center workers) and sign a petition to help end the stigma surrounding mental illness. Active Minds was also responsible for the paper and crayons left on the Commons tables for breakfast and lunch.
On Tuesday, April 29, Active Minds hosted a chocolate meditation with Meditation Club and discussed the benefits of incorporating meditation into a daily routine which include decreasing anxiety and increasing self-awareness and discipline.
On Wednesday, April 30, Student Assembly, the Chaplaincy, the Days-Massolo Center and the Dean of Disabilities sponsored Jordan Burnham, a suicide survivor to speak in the Barn about his life-long struggle with depression and road to recovery. Over 50 Hamilton students attended and asked many questions after the speech had ended.
“The Jordan Burnham talk was unbelievable!” said TC Topp ’16. “He was such a charismatic speaker and brought the audience closer together.” From the enthusiasm of the audience, it as clear to see that Jordan had created a much needed venue on campus to talk about mental health.
Burnham is a nationally recognized mental health advocate. He was a recipient of the 2010 “Best of Philly” award. He received the 2012 Emerging Humanitarian Award from the Asomugha Foundation and he has been featured in The Washington Post, Sports Illustrated, and USA Today, in addition to appearing on ESPN’s E:60 and Outside the Lines, CNN and Good Morning America.
After Burnham’s emotional and powerful speech, the rest of the week focussed on putting on relaxing, fun events for students. Thursday night, HACE hosted a calligraphy workshop. Calligraphy has been shown to having relaxing effects similar to those of meditation. On Friday, Tropical Sol hosted a dance lesson for interested students. I had the chance to learn the bachata and salsa. To wrap up the week, Kaitlin McCabe ’16 hosted yoga on the Glen House porch on Saturday.
Though Relaxation Celebration is still fairly new to Hamilton, this week was a success. The club’s focus on intersectionality and promoting dialogue about the not-much-talked about topic of mental health is indispensable.
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