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CoronaTime with Kids

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CoronaTime with Kids

There are SO MANY awesome education initiatives coming out of this crisis so we are pooling them together in a one-stop-shop for helping to entertain kids if they are being kept at home.

Isolation doesn’t have to be so isolating! There are still plenty of things we can be doing to keep our little people stimulated and in good spirits so let’s be kind to each other and share tactics.

If you have suggestions of things to add to this list, send them in using this form.

Thanks to Matt Zdun for creating this infographic that highlights 12 free streaming services to boost mental and physical wellness. Why not decompress with a digital painting video from Ctrl+Paint or learn how to decorate a drip cake on the baking s…

Thanks to Matt Zdun for creating this infographic that highlights 12 free streaming services to boost mental and physical wellness. Why not decompress with a digital painting video from Ctrl+Paint or learn how to decorate a drip cake on the baking streaming service Cakeflix?

  • Ask kids to start a diary and write in it every day - practise creative writing with feeling, including all their senses

  • Find and help frog spawn (from yours or a neighbours or community pond) to grow in tupperware in your kitchen for the kids to watch, draw and log how they grow

  • P.E. With Joe - Tune in to Joe Wicks' YouTube channel every morning at 9am sharp for a live home workout designed especially for children. You don't need any equipment, but you will get 30 minutes of fun.

  • Joe Wicks may have beaten him to the 9am slot, but from 9.30am you will be able to join Steve Backshall on YouTube, Instagram and Facebook where he will be covering information from "habitats to holotypes, parasites to pademelons...bringing the wild world into your living room". We'd recommend accessing Steve's Facebook site for the video content as your first point of call from Wednesday 25th March

  • #EarthLiveLessons was the idea of wildlife biologist and broadcaster Lizzie Daly. She has built a community of scientists, conservationists and wildlife filmmakers to share and make free content available to school children. The content is shared directly on Lizzie's YouTube channel

  • Friends at the Galapagos Conservation Trust have put together some brilliant free resources together about all things Galapagos. Find out everything you've ever wanted to know about the chain of islands made famous by Charles Darwin and its utterly unique wildlife. Some great content on geographical processes and sustainable development. 

    You might also want to check out Discovering Antarctica; and Discovering the Artic for your geographical fix of information. Some excellent resources across all three websites.

  • NatGeo Kids provides a vast array of learning materials for children. From content explaining what the coronavirus is, through to challenges designed to tackle the challenge of plastic pollution. The site really has it all.

  • You can also get a similar set of resources from WWF if you wanted to get a little bit wilder with your lesson plans and materials for children.

  • Travel to and explore the USA, Nepal, Peru, the U.K., Greece, Japan, and many more through video games - yep, they can be educational too! With travel and education being affected by the outbreak, many turn to virtual tools for exploration and learning. While Virtual Reality (VR) might help you to visually see a place, video games can offer a more immersive storytelling experience. So, is a review list of the best of them!

  • Take part in virtual run/walk: Rundinavia! How about using your one outdoor activity of the day to take part in a 3,000km family adventure? Record your daily kilometres, send them to me each week and I will send you a weekly update of how far you have gone! Click here to register and get your starter pack

  • Create A Fill-My-Bucket List:

    Get together with your kids and draw up a (fill my) ‘bucket list’ of things they want to do during a quarantine. You can just write it as a long list that you tick off, or you can chart it in other creative ways, including different points allocated for different activities and effort. For example, to reach 100 Happy Points, over your time together. The key here is that you are engaging with them, getting not just their buy-in but really taking into account their feelings, their needs and their wishes.

  • Rack up Some Rhythm:

    Make a conscious decision to create a rhythm to your days. Schools do this. Try to build in little touchstone moments, segments the kids love, come to expect and look forward to, sprinkled through the day. Examples for include:

    • Play a board game in the morning

    • ‘Magical reading hour’ (more about that, in a moment) – which we literally ring in with a bell, each time;

    • Daily green smoothie;

    • Piano practice

      Special Time (again, more about that in a mo). All of these segments come at a predictable time in our routine.

  • Ready to Read Aloud: We call it ‘magical reading hour.’ Reading aloud to/with your kids has so many benefits. From building attention span and vocabulary to nurturing empathy, creativity and imagination as well as providing a launchpad for myriad deep, juicy discussions about history, politics, music, social context… not to mention literary analysis, of course!

  • Special Time: This is the awesome sauce that relieves behavioural issues and sibling rivalry. It’s quite simple but incredibly powerful. Set a timer and spend a short amount of time (usually between 10 and 20 minutes – certainly not more than 30) giving your COMPLETE attention to ONE child. That is key. It is one-to-one time with a guarantee of no interruptions (Read about how to do Special Time when you have more than one child). AND the kid gets to lead 100%. It is their time, their choice. They get to chose what to play or not play. You can have some safety limits but that really should be it.

    This is about them. They lead. You follow. Your main job is to pour your delight into your child. Focus on what they are interested in, for those 10-20 minutes.

  • Be positive and supportive. Do not fix, rescue or ‘adjust’ their ideas, plans and creations.

    Your warm attention and joyful connection is like balm for their soul. And as you ‘fill their happiness bucket’ in this way, you really re-set them emotionally and have a bigger chance of seeing the best of them in the hours to come.

    A connected child is a contended and cooperative child. One note…sometimes Special Time creates so much safety that it actually allows kids to show us MORE of their pent-up emotions/tears/tantrums. That’s another story. That’s them being smart and using your attention to offload those feelings…you can read more about how that in this guide to Special Time. But for now, know that Special Time is a real go-to for maintaining a connected family.

  • Bake and Cook Together. Because it’s fun… and then you can eat it.

  • Spend Time in Nature:

    You have to be apart from other people… that does not mean you have to be apart from a forest or field or beach. Nature is just the best way to re-set, re-energise and spend HOURS playing without even remembering or thinking about screens. In fact, if the kids are squabbling and you add space, that is often enough to completely change the mood, giving them a new focus as they naturally take to climbing, racing and imaginative play in the woods.

  • Skype Playdates with Family and Friends:

    Anything to give the kids (and you) some extra connection and FaceTime with people they love and who love them AND to give you 15mins off to think or, you know, go to the toilet.

  • Let the Music Play:

    Music is healing and uplifting. Play music, sing, dance. Explore music linked to books you are reading together. Have a dance party in the kitchen. Make up songs together. Or, pick up some instruments and have an impromptu jam session.

  • Milk the Resources:

    There’s plenty online that can make good teachers. For this short time at home, consider using educational apps, play books on audible or Spotify, watch documentaries, use online thinking games, sudoku, and logic problems, and download activity sheets or books.

  • Get Physical:

    Do as much roughhousing, full-body style play as you can pull off. Play tag, hide-and-seek, wrestle, have pillow fights, sock fights, balloon pong, bucking bronco, airplanes, wacky races.

    Even if you play for just 5 minutes a day but do it with your full heart your kids will thank you.

    The more you all giggle together, the happier your time together will be – not just in those moments, but after, too, as laugher is really one of the best ways to relieve stress.

  • Join Wild Dog Fitness for online classes for adult and kids

  • Get on YouTube Tutorials:

    This platform gives plenty of step-by-step in art, crafts or science projects, providing a whole focus for a day or week’s worth of self-paced projects. Letting your kids choose what to do keeps them more engaged. You can do the project with them for more connection or let it be something they do on their own, while you use the time to catch up on chores or your work.

  • Do a Daily Challenge:

    If you are trying to pack in some education, you might find your children resist.This can happen because they’re used to associating school with (enforced) learning and you with time off.

    Try making this more fun by daily challenge up on the fridge or pinboard.

    My kids love this, not least because it is always optional. They get to do it if and when it feels fun to engage with. You can try this with subjects they are studying, from numbers counts and multiplication to language skills, or try some challenges less obvious educational bent (while being educational!). There are 10 great challenge ideas here.

  • Get Support and Connection for you:

    You won’t be able to take good care of your kids and create ‘wonder and joy’ at home if you are overwhelmed, underwater emotionally or struggling.

    Do whatever you can to top up YOUR cup. The best way I know if Listening Partnerships, which are free, can be done online and are such a great way to offload tension and re-find your own centre. Get this free guide to Listening Partnerships to get started.

  • Don’t Shrug Off Self-Care:

    Meditate, do some yoga, chant, sing and dance for you…on your own or WITH the kids. Like Listening Partnerships, self-care is about keeping yourself as grounded and uplifted as you can.

    The more resourced you are, the better you’ll be able to respond to your kids. You’ll do better being creative and making this strange time we find ourselves in a positive time they remember.

  • Plan In “Surprises”:

    Rhythm is important, but so is being crazy, spontaneous and surprising your kids. There’s plenty of ways to mix things up:

    • Hold a candlelit dinner

    • Plan a movie night with popcorn

    • Camp out in the living room overnight

    • Play an impromptu game of charades

    • Hide a string of clues or a treasure map to find their breakfast

    These ideas have sparked my creativity in our own homeschooling experience, helping us connect, have fun and turn this ‘challenge’ into a time to remember… fondly!

    It won’t always be easy, with rainbows and unicorns, so here’s the biggest thing to remember: Be kind and forgiving of yourself along the way…

Since many kids are/will be home from school, sharing an awesome list of ideas from a parent who homeschools.

  • Online resources:

    • BrainPop

    • Curiosity Stream

    • Tynker

    • Outschool

    • Udemy

    • iReady

    • Beast Academy (Math)

    • Khan Academy

    • Creative Bug

    • Discovery Education

  • YouTube Channels:

    • Crash Course Kids

    • Science Channel

    • SciShow Kids

    • National Geographic Kids

    • Free School

    • Geography Focus

    • TheBrainScoop

    • SciShow

    • Kids Learning Tube

    • Geeek Gurl Diaries

    • Mike Likes Science

    • Science Max

    • SoulPancake

Lots of board games, library books (and Kindle), tinkering/upcycling with household junk, etc.

Some resources to help with kids at home:

  • Scholastic has created a free learn-from-home site with 20+ days of learning and activities. https://classroommagazines.scholastic.com/support/learnathome.html

  • Pretend to travel the world. Go on a virtual tour of these 50 famous museums

  • This is the awesome free curriculum that we use. Everything from preschool activities to 12th grade is here! https://allinonehomeschool.com/

  • List of thinking games by grade: https://allinonehomeschool.com/thinking/

  • More awesome free learning websites that we like to use

    • https://www.starfall.com/h/

    • https://www.abcya.com/

    • https://www.funbrain.com/

    • https://www.splashlearn.com/

    • https://www.storylineonline.net/

    • https://pbskids.org/

    • https://www.highlightskids.com/

    • https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/

    • https://www.coolmath4kids.com/

    • http://www.mathgametime.com/

    • https://www.uniteforliteracy.com/

    • http://www.literactive.com/Home/index.asp

    • http://www.sciencekids.co.nz/

    • https://www.switchzoo.com/

    • https://www.seussville.com/

    • https://www.turtlediary.com/

    • https://www.e-learningforkids.org/

Massive thank you to Hand in Hand Parenting and IBEX Earth for some of these suggestions.

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Ideas to help the community during Covid-19

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Ideas to help the community during Covid-19

There are SO MANY awesome community initiatives coming out of this crisis so we are pooling them together in a one-stop-shop for helping people.

Isolation doesn’t have to be so isolating! There are still plenty of things we can be doing to help those in need in our local communities and around the world so let’s be kind to each other.

If you have suggestions of things to add to this list, send them in using this form.

  • Write postcards, emails or send video messages to elderly people in care homes who can’t have visitors. Email this one in Dorset to start off with: trinitymanor.reception@barchester.com

  • Donate blood - the need for donations hasn’t stopped and donation stations are still open

  • Volunteer for the NHS! Even if you're worried about leaving home and exposing yourself or loved ones, you can volunteer from home to contact those at risk of isolation.

  • Making masks, scrubs, scrub bags etc for essential workers - more info and instructions here

  • Download a free toolkit for Community Leaders

  • Join your local Covid Mutual Aid group and offer your support - Covid-19 Mutual Aid Local Groups are small groups of people setting up independently in communities to support vulnerable people in their local area through the outbreak. 

  • Cook/prepare a school lunch, post it on the OLIO App withe the #cook4kids for families to collect. No-contact pickup is available. If you have food that will go to waste, share it :)

  • Volunteer with the British Red Cross within your community - more info here

  • Purchasing gift certificates to local restaurants, record stores, and brick & mortar retailers to provide an alternative revenue stream

  • Hosting virtual happy hours with friends and family to bolster human connection

  • Support Foodbanks - use Google to find your nearest one and see what they need to support those who need it the most

  • Support the homeless community - see the Crisis website to find out how

  • Buying tickets to future community events to show support for the greater community

  • Go and work on a local farm to help feed the nation!

  • Offering grocery store runs or meal delivery to the elderly and immuno-compromised

  • Contributing financially to food banks for children who have lost access to daily meals during school closures

  • Donating to artists, performers, and venues to show solidarity and continue the celebration of the arts

  • Creating wishlists for direct delivery to non-profit organisations and shelters that cannot currently receive in-person donations

  • Providing online attendance options for classes, concerts, church services and more to connect communities to meaningful experiences

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Swifty Scooting 231 miles of JOGLE

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Swifty Scooting 231 miles of JOGLE

Sophie Rooney - Swiftly Scootering from Chepstow to St Just.

As I sat and swirled my second coffee of the morning around an almost empty cup, I chanced a look up and out of the window, hoping that the rain outside was slowing. Huge smears on the window and the occasional flash of colour as a pedestrian ran past told me that the rain was actually getting heavier, not what I wanted to see but also not a big problem for me just yet. I still had an hour of waiting to go and it couldn’t possibly keep raining like this for long.

Me running in Scotland

Me running in Scotland

I returned to the tiny screen in front of me, eager to finish this Facebook post before Claire arrived. I was eight stages through a multi-discipline John O’Groats to Land’s End challenge and I was just uploading details and photos from the previous stage, running from Prestatyn to Sedbury along Offa’s Dyke National Trail. I had finished the trail the previous evening with Nikki Love (the lady who ran 63 marathons in 63 days) and had now been left alone to meet with my new travel companion. A complete stranger who had enthusiastically volunteered herself to join me for part nine of my journey – scooting from Chepstow to St Just in Cornwall on the SayYesMore pair of Swifty Scooters. 230 miles no less, across (what I was about to find out were) some seriously hilly parts of the country.

Claire and I had arranged to meet in this coffee shop and as I had no idea who she was or what she looked like, I figured it was best to sit still and drink lots of coffee whilst I waited. I may have had a humongous slice of cake too, just to be polite.

Around an hour later a smiling lady rushed into the café followed closely by her other half. Somehow, I knew this was them and they recognised me too, though after three weeks of being on the road this was probably less surprising. The smell of my kit was more than likely what gave me away. We had a brief chat (over yet another coffee) and we talked about the fact that our scooter experience was very limited and we had no idea how hard this would be, and then decided it was time to head off, despite the fact that somehow the rain was now stronger than ever. We had an aim to cover around 30 miles a day and it was already approaching lunch time. We couldn’t wait for the rain to stop – it was time to find out just what we had gotten ourselves in for.

With our waterproofs on and our kit safely inside the support car, we each grabbed a scooter and got on our way. Cruising through huge raindrops and knowing that I would be wet through within ten minutes I couldn’t help but feel elated. Here I was riding a beautifully crafted bit of kit (thanks to Swifty Scooters!), in a town I had never visited before, with a lady who had volunteered herself to join me on this unknown journey, after running 185 miles the past seven days and travelling to this point from the northern tip of Scotland, grinning from ear to ear.

Tortoise and Hare - the SayYesMore Swifty Scooters

Tortoise and Hare - the SayYesMore Swifty Scooters


To most people I must have seemed mad. But to me, I was enjoying that sweet taste of adventure. From this point on and for the next seven days I was to enjoy riding the Swifty on the road, on trails, down grassy footpaths, through overgrown ferns, over moors, along the coast and finally into my final handover town, St Just.

Me and Alan the Labradoodle made it to Land's End

Me and Alan the Labradoodle made it to Land's End

Claire and I scooted together for three days – and I finished off the last five on my own – missing her positivity and that infectious grin. But the biggest grin of all belonged to me when I reached St Just on that final evening having scootered 210 miles over the past week – proving that even if people had told me I couldn’t, sticking to what I believed in (in this instance that scootering 30 miles a day is perfectly possible) paid off in the end.

All I had ahead of me now was a 7-mile dog walk to Land’s End.

 




Here are the daily distances covered on the Swifty Scooters:

  • Day One – Chepstow to Bristol (20 Miles)

  • Day Two – Bristol to Crickham – over the Mendip Hills (20 Miles)

  • Day Three – Crickham to Thurloxton – over the Quantock Hills (25 Miles)

  • Day Four – Thurloxton to West Middlewick Farm (Nr Tavistock) (38 Miles)

  • Day Five – WMF to Lydford – skirting Dartmoor on a beautiful trail (30 Miles)

  • Day Six – Lydford to Bodmin – with awesome support crew but into Cornwall so SUPER hilly (35 Miles)

  • Day Seven – Bodmin to Truro – with interesting off-road sections (30 Miles)

  • Day Eight – Truro to St Just – with RAGING headwind and a coastal soaking (33 Miles)

Keep up to date with Sophie via Facebook or Instagram. If you’ve been inspired to take on your own adventure and would like to borrow the SayYesMore Swifty Scooters or Ice Trikes then click here to find out more!



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Caving: The time we almost regretted saying yes!

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Caving: The time we almost regretted saying yes!

Trying new things can be daunting. There’s that little part of you that always says, ‘what if this happens?’ or ‘what if that happens?’. I’m sure everybody has it and at some point it will have stopped every one of us from doing something we probably should have done. Be bold and brave. Give it a go! Be prepared, but do that thing you’ve always wanted to do and you might just discover, like us, that most of the worries we have are nothing like the reality (for the better!).

It was during a trip to Wales that we visited the National Showcaves centre. We had talked about caving, but neither of us really imagined that we’d be crawling around in tunnels that were dark, wet and only just wider than our shoulders anytime soon.

“Would you ever try caving properly? I wonder how you’d get into something like that”

“Perhaps you’d have to join a club? I’m not sure if they’d be very VI (visually impaired) friendly and it’s probably dark and cold’’

A few weeks later, we met Fraser, an outdoor instructor who seems to love being wet, cold and jumping off things into pools of water. We also found out that he’s a keen caver, working towards one of his qualifications, and he invited us to go caving with him ‘some time’. We all know that when somebody says ‘some time’ it usually never materialises, but not so with Fraser. A few weeks later we met him in the Inglesport Café (a place where cavers seem to hang out) in North Yorkshire. We sat down with a cup of tea, looked over a map and discussed plans. He seemed to have considered the fact that John can’t see, so we confidently left the café to collect our equipment.

We drove to the cave, got kitted up and felt super toasty in our bright red suits (a feeling that was to be short lived!) We reached the cave entrance; a fast flowing stream that disappeared into darkness. We put our head torches on, scrambled around holding on to the sides while we waded through the stream. We laid on a flat rock and entered a small tunnel. Lauren went first, John was in the middle and Fraser was at the back.

The route into the cave was tricky. Lauren guided John over steep sections where he sometimes used his hands too to feel the steps and rocks he had to negotiate.

The tunnel wasn’t much wider than our shoulders and moving was a struggle. We’d gone perhaps ten metres down the tunnel and John said “I’m not sure I can do this. I think I may be slightly claustrophobic.” The tunnel seemed to widen, so we continued a little further, which is when Fraser realised that we’d taken a wrong turn. We went back through the twisty tunnel, back through the puddles and just 20mins into our caving career, we were wet, cold, had wellies full of water and were unsure as to whether or not we should call it a day.

We didn’t. John decided that as long as we didn’t have to ‘belly crawl’ too much, he could give it another try. Fortunately, things were much better down the right path and we were almost enjoying ourselves. It was a challenge for us. There were deep pools in places, key hand holds and lots to hit your head on, all of which John had a hard time seeing (his 3% vision becomes zero in the dark). Considering John was the first blind person Fraser had taken caving, he did a superb job of guiding.

We reached a place known as ‘Dolly tubs’ (a series of deep pools of water with just a small ledge of rock between) which needed crossing before reaching the abseil point. Fraser worked some magic with the ropes and told us what to do. The descent was pretty interesting. It was incredibly wet for starters! John had to take out his hearing aids but luckily, he still seemed to be able to hear thanks to the cave acoustics. It was a bit daunting dangling on a rope between walls of rock and a waterfall, but we made it down to ‘Allum Pot’ which was an opening in the cave. It was a great view, and one that we’d worked hard for, but getting there had taken a while and it was all too soon time to turn back.


Lauren ready to abseil down the waterfall of doom (not it's actual name!)

Allum pot. We made it to an opening in the cave where you could see a waterfall dropping from a stream above ground.

‘Back’ involved ascending up the rope we’d previously abseiled on. It was tough and the water flowing on to our heads felt icy cold. The extra weight of the water in our wellies wasn’t at all welcome while we were trying to haul ourselves back up the rope with our climbing kit. We did it, but our hands were numb, we were soaked through to our undies and we were freezing cold. We upped the pace to warm back up and retraced our steps towards the cave exit. Daylight! Feeling the warmth of the outside air was incredibly welcome.  

Lauren guiding John out of the rocky cave entrance

“How was that?” asked Fraser

“HORRIBLE!”

 It was almost everything we were worried about. But would we do it again?

Most probably*

 *in a drier and slightly less squeezy cave

The route in was muddy. Lauren and John both wearing red caving suits, wellies and helmets.

While caving for us fell firmly in the ‘Type 2 fun’ category, it was a great experience all the same and we look back on it surprisingly fondly. We had worries and doubts before giving it a go but what was true for this little adventure and as it is with nearly all others: the stuff we were worrying about beforehand wasn’t at all the stuff that gave us problems! We didn’t get trapped underground and have to cut off one of our limbs, but we never expected that John would be claustrophobic!

The lesson in all of this – don’t worry too much and definitely don’t let those worries stop you from stepping out of your comfort zone or saying yes. Things won’t always go to plan, but it’s part of the adventure and often the bit we talk (or laugh) about and remember the most. Problems will occur, but they are rarely insurmountable. We deal with problems all of the time and there’s some great comfort to be had in being able to think ‘I know problems are going to happen, I don’t yet quite know what they are but I’m prepared and I will probably be able to handle them’.

Check out the T-Shirt Twins’ video for more details on their caving adventure - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKDDrjgTrso

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Founder's Blog: #bethebird

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Founder's Blog: #bethebird

A seagull sits atop a sign, a sign showing a red line through a silhouette of a seagull, which happens to be facing exactly the same way as the real-life bird sitting on it.

A seagull sits atop a sign, a sign showing a red line through a silhouette of a seagull, which happens to be facing exactly the same way as the real-life bird sitting on it.

If there's a photo that sums up the idea behind the YesTribe it's this!

Originally it was shared by Avani, one of the team at Facebook looking after this year's Community Leadership Fellows. She said,

"This bird is really inspiring me today. I've been reflecting a lot on the journey with you all - watching you lead, deal with the craziness of the world, your communities and sometimes your lives.

Then I watched a talk by Seth Godin about building tribes and I realized a large part of your work is sitting like this bird, pretty much openly flouting some "rules" made by some authority - to not do exactly what you are doing to make the world better by connecting people.

I won't be over philosophical here. I love you all for being this bird. This bird is cool."

--

For me, SayYesMore has always been an idea that helps me ignore the self-set or ingrained rules in my head, a reminder that it's ok to do something that other people might think is wrong, it's ok not to look for guidance and safety before we land, it's thoroughly encouraged to ignore (or even poo on) the silly, restrictive rules that are there for the plonkerish of reasons (ie. I can put a sign there, so I will).

I'd like to think you're all here because you recognise that life isn't transactional and that every single day you bosh down some barrier that someone else thoughtlessly put in your way, led by a sense that the other side has a lesson, or a new friend, or maybe just a cool place to camp for the night.

It's mental health week this week, but let's keep up the conversation all the time. Remember that if your mind can be the bird that doesn't care and the bird that isn't influenced by rules or thrown stones or even the sharp edge of the surface it happens to arrive at, then your mental health will be in a pretty good place.

You're awesome, regardless of what they say and even what you think sometimes. You're the cool bird living life your way.

#bethebird

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