Cornish Guardian (Bodmin & East Cornwall)
Get moving to improve mental health and help restore Cornwall’s ancient monuments
MENTAL Health Awareness Week 2024 will take place from May 13 to 19, centred on the theme of “Movement: Moving more for our mental health”.
The Cornwall National Landscape’s Monumental Improvement (MI) project incorporates mindful movement into its conservation events and activities, promoting the benefits of movement in improving our mental health.
The project seeks to remove up to 40 sites in Cornwall from Historic England’s Heritage At Risk register, and is funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.
Many people feel intuitively that movement is good for our mental health. As a direct result of the endorphins released by our bodies when we engage in some form of exercise, it also facilitates other key components of good mental health.
The NHS advocates five steps to mental wellbeing:
» Connect with other people.
» Be physically active.
» Learn new skills.
» Give to others.
» Pay attention to the moment (mindfulness).
Moving in a landscape which holds cultural, aesthetic or sentimental value can only enhance the benefits of the exercise.
In the work the Cornwall National Landscape team have been carrying out at scheduled monuments each of these five steps have been at the forefront of our minds. In hosting guided walks, sharing myths and legends, talking through new discoveries and survey results and repairing our ancient monuments, present movement has been a common theme.
In April the Monumental Improvement project held three days of activities at Tehidy Country Park. On a beautifully sunny Saturday, Elizabeth Dale led participants around Tehidy Round, an Iron Age/
Romano-British enclosed settlement, and told stories of giants, piskies, knockers and smugglers while her audience wandered through the woods and explored the remains of the monument.
The effect of mindfully walking, imagining the site through history, and all the characters who once inhabited the local area should not be underestimated. It combines two areas which, research increasingly shows, promote good health and wellbeing: heritage and exercise.
At Tehidy, as part of the MI project’s programme of archaeological and conservation work, volunteers and staff started work repairing three eroded areas on the earth bank of the round.
Trimming vegetation, trowelling back the surface, filling and laying hessian sacks and covering it all up again with turfs to restore its preeroded state, there was a lot of movement from everyone on site and spirits could not have been higher.
Volunteers from across Cornwall were able to connect with people through a shared interest in our heritage and work physically, learning new skills and techniques to be able to enhance and protect a monument for others to enjoy.
On the day of repairs the project was being evaluated against its key purpose of promoting people, place, nature and climate. In interviews conducted with our volunteers, again and again themes of mental health, inclusion, connection and a sense of place were mentioned as benefits of volunteering – physically getting out into the environment and working to raise the profile of the monument, which will help ensure its removal from the Heritage At Risk register.
Volunteers working with the project have described how “working to make it a nicer place to come and visit... [has] just been amazing” and that their anxiety “is so much better” after engaging with their surroundings in a physical way.
I work every day, often from the office, to protect and enhance our protected environment, but the days when I am out in the field, walking through our landscape, repairing stone circles or clearing vegetation from barrows are the days that help maintain my mental health, building the resilience and connections that enable a good quality of life.
The Monumental Improvement project is continuing to celebrate National Walking Month in May with a series of guided show-andtell walks at various historic monuments, surrounded by tranquil and picturesque scenery.
You can find out more and book your free place at www.cornwalllandscape. org/ monumentalimprovement-events-page/
I’ve noticed this shrub in many locations this week, probably because it is in full blossom now, covered with white starry flowers with a sweet fragrance.
Otherwise known as Mexican Orange Blossom, it’s a common enough shrub and easy to grow.
It’s handy as it is evergreen and keeps a pleasing rounded shape without pruning. Position in full sun or partial shade and in a sheltered position if necessary to protect from bitter winter winds.