CandleX has been hoping to establish a mental health support group ever since the beginning of our project. We want to provide a space where people who are going through a difficult time can meet to offer and receive support.
It isn’t easy to set up this kind of group. We don’t have a sufficient budget for such activities and it is a constant struggle to pay for the required media publicity to enable those in need to find out about our group. We need a private space in a good location that can provide a comfortable and soothing setting – we also need this space to be freely available for us to use. We were also worried as to whether or not the people who sign up to attend would actually come – and if they did would they be comfortable enough to share their deepest feeling in order to receive support or would they feel as though they had to keep their thoughts hidden? We were also worried that that the attendees would not get on with each other.
Friends of CandleX kept on prompting us to start this group and helped us to spread the word that we were looking for a space. We were generously offered the ideal space to use at no cost and so we decided to be brave, and mustered up the courage to face our fears, and held our first peer support group on 27th October 2017. People came without knowing what to expect and we are so grateful to these attendees for taking the chance to meet with us. Attendees reported after that they felt warm and supported and would like to continue to meet in the future.
And so it was that our fears of organizing this group were proven wrong and thankfully relieved. This session officially marked the beginning of a English language peer support group in our own Beijing community.
We will meet once every 2 weeks. Please email info@candlex.cn to reserve a spot.
The power of connection and compassion heals. Do not suffer alone when you can heal in a group!
