So i have today.
Participated in in day number one of the little kind of challenge i'm hoping to do all the way through february. So obviously with golf on lockdown here in england and wales and ireland at the moment scotland still be able to play golf and i'm sure many places around the world are having restrictions in golf to some capacity some aren't at all somewhere out playing later america playing still things i think it depends where you are. But it seems like on instagram everybody's still playing in america feels like that anyway um i feel that obviously with golf has so many benefits in the fact that you can go out. And enjoy yourself and set challenges for yourself and accomplish things and hit great shots and yet sometimes you'll hit bad shots but also it's four hours or however. long you take to play golf or go to the driving range of socializing talking to your playing partners talking to your pals having a drink after in the clubhouse grabbing some food whatever it may be it's a massive social life for many people and obviously at the moment that's a massive void that's that's been kind of neglected that's a big big void in people's lives so um there are mental health issues you know i was reading on the website that mind website which is a charity that helps support um people around england. And wales who have mental health issues um one in four people have mental health issues and i i would imagine that's going to go up massively this year yeah you know with with people not being able to see each other as much certainly here in the uk in england as well i can speak because obviously that's where we live lockdown is harsh at the moment it's it's a horrible winter a lot nobody's doing anything you can't go out to eat you can't go out to socialize you can't go out. And play golf and it is going to have a massively negative effect on people's lives yes. So i want to raise awareness and i think as a community i think we we should try. And look at raising awareness of mental health i think as men we don't speak about it as much i know we've had a few conversations about it on the podcast people have either emailed in uh when tubes was on as a guest he talked about it a lot as well um you know. And it does affect people regardless of your stature regardless of how well it looks like you're doing on instagram. Or facebook it does affect people's lives. And you know things like suicide rates up at the moment it's awful and it's predominantly men struggle with it as well struggle to talk about it but it's not it's not discriminative you know it'll catch up with people who are younger. Or old male female doesn't matter who you are where you are at the moment with life being. So tough with stresses of work and coronavirus and financial issues people are going to struggle. So i want to try and raise awareness and and money for mind charity and i'm going to do that with hopefully people's support on the community as well from the podcast. And youtube facebook instagram um i'm going to kind of strap up. And every day go out for a walk and it sounds quite easy that but a four mile walk which is the same length of around the gulf yeah. So it's about seven thousand yards around the gulf yeah. So quite that two miles it's about four miles but i'm going to do it with my golf clubs in my bag which i did today.
For the first time um felt a bit awkward yeah walking walking the streets with my golf club like full bag on full clubs everything um had a few funny stairs from drivers passing by. And from people walking the dogs but what was really nice do a golf gear um no no not really i might do some days um. But i was walking with a set of golf clubs completely out of place like on the streets around the local part to me um you know places where you wouldn't normally see did you stop at any point to take your bag off. Or was it constantly constant always with the shoulder saw um surprisingly no not massively you know i think it'd be quite good there's a bit of a treat. For you also quite funny dude with a motorcade power caddy one day so it's like you're getting into a rest but you look even worse so the plan is i'm going to try. And do this all the way through february. So first day today.
And i'm gonna do every single day. For 28 days to raise awareness for mind and mental health issues raise money um i'll be documenting it mainly on my twitter my facebook my instagram uh i released a youtube video on it last night explaining a bit more um and hopefully we can raise you know we've set a target on the just giving page of eighteen thousand pounds just because that's you know i've called the this project. Or this campaign or whatever walk 18 so it'd be nice to raise 18 grand hopefully we can only impress hopefully we can do more than that um. And yeah it's gonna be it's gonna be one of those things where. And i'm also thinking about this as an idea not massively spoken about this yet but obviously when you do go out. And play golf you communicate you talk to other people you know and someday sometimes it's really innocent conversations but it it ends up becoming something deeper like and you some of these very innocent interactions really do carry a lot of weight to people certainly if you know if they've got stresses. And they've got worries understandably and um so what i want to do in this walk 18 projects of what i'm doing through february is somehow set up a communication line whether out of you through zoom. Or whatsapp or facebook or however. it's going to be probably zoom well i'll put a link out on my social media. And i'll kind of be monitoring the zoom and people can come. And chat you know and it might be loads of people it might be only a few people but we can chat about anything we can chat about life we can chat about golf um it'll help me pass the time. But also if you're feeling down feeling lonely you can jump on a call with like-minded individuals. And and hopefully takes your mind off it for an hour or so it took me about an hour and ten minutes today.
An hour. And right okay. So it's what it's four miles yes. So that's pretty fast pace 17 minutes i think i can do it i think i can do around 15 minutes a mile i was because i was filming it a bit today.
As well. And i'm not going to massively be filming it after today.
So i think i can do it faster. And i might swap for a slightly smaller bag but still have all my clubs i'm not happy with that has to stay with the same bag if anything i want to back oh you rick shields tour back you know what was really funny obviously loads of people again looked when they were driving past me. And stuff today.
And i did feel like a bit of a plonk could all be true being told certainly if somebody recognized me as well they've like i'm sure that was rick shields walking down the street with us with his gloves on the back how desperate is he to get some more attention what about if you um were your shield tau um well i might do it i might try. And contact mine the charity i'm doing it with because they don't know i'm doing this i'm kind of just doing off uh you know they were the charity that seemed to be the most um offered the most advice. And i think it's very fitting at the time of year like i said with everything's going on yeah. And so i might do it in like a mind bib. Or something we'll see what happens but you know what i tried to do as well this was really interesting when people were walking the dogs. And walking past me you know i'll often smile back at them or say hello or whatever and normally it's just a nice little exchange it's just a eye and they say hi and you cross paths what was really interesting to say like i'd really try. And make the effort to smile at people and and try and get a reaction from them because surely they were looking at me going why has he got a set of golf clubs. And about five people i stopped with today.
And chatted with and when i say stopped for literally 30 seconds if that and they were saying you know what you what you're doing are you taking your clubs. For a walk like have you lost the golf course or what you're doing and i kind of just explain you know i'm looking at doing a charity walk is to help you know raise awareness. For mental health issues with golf being closed at the moment there's you know a lot of people who would normally speak to people and they're not having the opportunity to do. So and it was really nice just even on my little mile four-mile walk today.
I spoke to five. Or six people that i wouldn't have normally spoke spoken to like i would not have spoken to those people there was no reason. For me to speak to them but with the golf clubs on my back it kind of struck up a conversation which you know hopefully that might have hopefully not but you know you never know that might be their only communication today.
They might live on their own they might just be walking the dog you know a couple of them quite old elderly they might have had no interaction at all today.
And our little 30 second one minute you know chat might have been that the only communication they've had all day i think it's very good what you're doing we'll put a link in the podcast description. So whether your platform is if an apple. Or spotify you'll be able to find it here it'll be on your twitter and everything as well i said at the start of the show with um the uh mini egg bar store yeah i've got a big influence. And i wouldn't use that for the right so i'm gonna look down the camera now and say if you've got anybody to spur give it to this man for his call because it's uh very good what he's doing yeah not like. So hopefully we can raise a load of money raise a lot of awareness. And if people are struggling that they can they might not know about mind they might pick up the phone. And chat to somebody and you know and hopefully things aren't as bad as what they always kind of seem like and certainly if they speak to somebody but yeah hopefully raising a load of money um. And if you want to participate i don't mean you anyone watching. Or listening as such if you want to go out and you know walk four miles i've got a sick idea by the way and um you know post it on social media with the hashtag walk 18. granted you don't have to take your full set of clubs you might just take one club you might take a golf ball in your pocket you might wear a glove or your golf clothes or a golf your golf shoes whichever way you want to do it'd be great to get some support what about if next.
Week we do it together on monday we do the podcast while we're doing it oh well that'd be quite nice yeah then.
I would record it. But it should be even it might have been the best quality because it'll be cars going past etcetera. But we've recorded it'll be an hour long just around here i want to go on the streets i want that nervousness and embarrassment of walking around with golf clubs we can do the podcast i like that just whatever we see just chat rubbish. For an hour and ten minutes and they'll be loaded thanks yeah that'd be good i don't know i said i don't know logistically how we've recorded that. But let's do it together on iphones worst case. So you feel like this has gone a very serious and very mature.
