And what can you do if you need a boost?

Inspired by a conversation with members of @MenScotland, we co-designed the Battery Dude. 

The idea is to have a think about how charged your own personal battery is and if it's in need of a boost, with some ideas of things you can do that may help.

We co-designed a wee 'Recharge your batteries the Drumchapel Way'  Offering ideas of things to do and get involved with locally to recharge your batteries if people were maybe looking for ideas.

We launched the Battery Dude at D in the Park @G15Youthproject. 

An amazing day and well done to the organisers for a great event, with a heap going on and a chance to connect with others. We invited people to think on a scale of 1-10 how energised they felt at the moment, and if they didn't mind sharing what charged their batteries. 

We were delighted 86 people agreed to help and received a wee kindness bag from us as a thank you.

This was a very relaxed, fun wee exercise, we didn't capture ages, sex or ethnicity, but we did try and connect with a diverse range of people of all genders, ages and ethnicity who were at the event. What did the responses tell us? 

Inspired by a conversation
with members of @MenScotland,
we co designed the Battery Dude

While some people shared, they felt below 5, the majority of people were 5 and above with nearly 50% of people saying they were sitting around 7 or 8 which was 'Make time to recharge my batteries'  and 'got time to have fun as well as everything else'  and over 10% saying 10 which was 'Heaps of energy and really enjoy life'. 

There were, however, a small group of people when asked didn't know how energetic they felt or what recharged their batteries, but asking the question offered an opportunity to have a conversation about this and offer some ideas. More work does need to be done so everyone is aware of their personal energy levels and how to boost them, so more people feel more energised. 

The point to note though is the fact on the day so many people shared a positive response. This was a fun relaxed informal survey at a fun family day in the park during summer, BUT the responses are great, and we need to build on this.

We are delighted to say The Battery Dude is now visiting with the Health Defence Programme at the CHSS Community Hub in Drumchapel, so it will be good to see if we can carry on capturing these informal scores and exploring what else we can, do so more people feel energised and are aware of the amazing opportunities locally which can help.

We would also like to share about THE LOOP This is an idea of the G15 Youth project to offer a place for local groups, organisations and agencies to let people know what is happening. If you live in Drumchapel, then checking out THE LOOP is a good way to find out what is going on.

At D in the Park we also asked people what recharged their batteries, we are going to list these in groups, but wanted to share Music was by far the highest single activity which people mentioned which recharged their batteries, some people shared more than one thing which is why the score is higher than the number of people who took part.

• Some kind of physical activity 22
• Being with others who are important to us 13
• Be involved /have purpose 12
• Listen to music 10
• Online games, apps, YouTube 8
• Me time 7
• Sleep 5
• Reading 5
• Watch films and TV 4
• Being creative 3
• Not feel ill 2
• Weather 1
• Buy energy drinks 1

This is the beginning of a series of blogs we plan to do around what to do if you feel 'wabbit ' and how to recharge your batteries, thank you for reading. 

Next time we will look at how we are all different as individuals so maybe what we need to recharge our batteries is different too, and finding something that works for you.