In Canada, one in five people wrestles with mental health challenges at some point in their lifetime. It affects all of us, whether personally or through a family member, a friend or colleague. Communitas offers a variety of services to people who live with mental health challenges. A new grant from Bell Let’s Talk has enabled the organization to expand these services further.

Matt Dirks is Communitas’ chief innovation officer and says that Communitas is always looking for creative ways to support people better. He explains that the $20,000 grant was used to translate mental health support materials into several languages, enabling Communitas to expand its reach.

“Our idea was to take a public resource that we already use internally and expand its reach by translating it into more languages,” Matt says. “The English language version of this tool was co-developed with Fraser Health Authority, and it’s been incredibly impactful to people on their mental health journey.”

The Life and Recovery Journey Workbook has been in use since 2022 through Communitas’ Peer Support Services. It is a tool that helps people explore wellness, create strategies to stay well, all to help people pursue the life they want. This free resource is available on the Peer Support website as a download but until now was only available in English. The workbook has been translated into Ukrainian, Punjabi, Arabic, Spanish, French, and both Simplified and Traditional Chinese.

The workbook was first translated into Ukrainian and was given to staff from the Florence Centre, a sister organization based in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, supported by Communitas. Several staff members were in Abbotsford in the fall of 2024 and took part in a training session on how to effectively use this tool with the people they serve, even in the midst of the war.

Olha Buhai is an administrative assistant with Communitas and as a native Ukrainian was able to work as a translator during the training. She said that one of the valuable pieces of the training experience was for the team to recognize that self-care needs to be a priority when supporting others.

“It was valuable for them to have time and a safe space to think about their hopes and dreams, resiliency, and self-compassion,” Olha says. “The team was very happy and thankful for the training session.”

The translation project is actively happening now and is available for download in English from the Peer Support website. As the translations are completed, they will be added to the website as well. “We hope that translating this tool into other languages will help open up further conversation about mental health and do so within these additional language communities,” Matt says.