This Spring, after coming home for spring break to south Florida, I abruptly shifted to an online school year without returning to campus, saying goodbye to many friends, or finishing my first year of college. Over a few days, my life shifted dramatically from normalcy of flying home, spending time with friends, and enjoying the break to a quarantine with my family at home with my county and, then, the entire state of Florida instituting stay-at-home orders. I went from things planned in the future to do and attending a lively school to all online or socially distanced schooling, work, and communications. However, in the Flawless Foundation spirit, I looked at the silver lining of the situation, and that was starting at Flawless six weeks earlier than I had originally anticipated for my summer 2020 internship.
In the nearly four months that I have been part of the Flawless Team, either part-time or full-time, I have learned so much about mental health, business, and non-profit operations. I have also seen first-hand how an organization like Flawless survived an economic recession, a pandemic, and so much more this year. I have learned valuable skills and understanding in how to keep an organization operational and impactful, despite a chaotic and rapidly changing world. Being involved first-hand in the front-line of mental health when so many people are experiencing long-term or first-time mental health challenges has been important to be a part of an impactful foundation and movement during this difficult situation in the world. Practicing flawless self-care, routines, and real “how are you?” conversations is very important now more than ever to be supportive as a member of the Flawless Team for people that are experiencing hard times.
Flawless has given me vast exposure in many facets of communications, finance and fundraising, and business operations. I have many different roles, focused on communications tasks such as Board of Directors reports, social media, biweekly emails, budgeting, and other administrative projects. I have learned through Flawless how integral social media and communications are as resources in working to promote advocacy and brain health normalization goals at Flawless. Since starting work, I have learned more than I could imagine about mental health advocacy. I have always been interested in physical health but I have learned so much necessary information about mental health, social-emotional learning, self-regulation, and self-care. Since beginning this internship, I have learned a great deal from webinars, to self-care, to mental health political advocacy. The most impactful and interesting ideas that I have learned about in webinars are the Collaborative Problem Solving approach by Dr. Stuart Ablon of Harvard University Medical School and Think:Kids as well as emotional intelligence by Dr. Marc Brackett from the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence. I have attended many webinars and written a couple of blog posts on the Collaborative Problem Solving program that teaches parents, educators, clinicians, and other adults how to address children with challenging behavior as well as how to deal with people with challenging behaviors in other spheres of life. I have also found that Dr. Marc Brackett’s work is very important and more applicable than ever right now. I sometimes go into his webinars stressed or slightly dysregulated but then recognize using his “mood chart” and analysis to calm down, be present, and learn how to emotionally regulate to be more understanding and receptive.
For me, the proper self-care and routine building at Flawless have been so important during this uncertain time of COVID-19, quarantine, and distance learning in college. I appreciate our founder Janine’s emphasis on brain health and self-care practice within the organization because this makes a highly functional and properly working organization, rather than a team that is stressed and lacks good communication and regulation skills. In addition, the collaboration and emphasis with each team member elevates the work of the team by letting everyone work together in their areas of interest and strengths. I am appreciative of the education, collaboration, and communication skills that I have learned as a member of Team Flawless, and I think that these skills that I have learned will bode well for me in the future.
