In this month’s Automobil I thought it opportune to move away from my standard message and rather reflect for a minute on the importance of mental and physical wellbeing.
The recent tragic loss of two of our Cape Town-based RMI colleagues, Randall Langenhoven during March, and Deon Rademeyer during April, has poignantly brought into sharp focus how fleeting life can be and how devastating such a loss is for family members and colleagues. Our deepest condolences go to the Langenhoven and Rademeyer families. Deon was our RMI Consumer Affairs Officer in Cape Town and assisted us and the Langenhoven family when Randall, our Western Cape Regional Manager, unexpectedly passed away.
We appreciate what a shock these two passings have been to our RMI colleagues nationally and the Cape Town office staff, as well as many members within our organisation who worked with these two gentlemen.
In fact, 2023 is the year of mental health and wellbeing and I recently read an interesting article, which referred to a Forbes survey. It noted that this year’s top resolution for respondents wasn’t the old familiars: eat better, exercise more, spend less money, or reduce alcohol intake. Improved mental health was the most common response to the survey, with 45% of respondents putting it as their top goal for 2023. It seems that, instead of avoiding the refrigerator and hitting the gym, we’re looking for advice on how to combat loneliness, strengthen our relationships, and be more at peace with ourselves – without remaking ourselves.
In the workplace, we need to be cognisant of rising rates of depression and anxiety and appreciate how stress can impact our physical well-being. It is very important to find ways of assisting our employees by giving them the tools to manage the current environment.
Finding a balance between our work and home lives and practising techniques that help us reduce anxiety are becoming increasingly important. As an organisation, I would like to see us focusing more on these issues.
That well-being must also extend to employees’ families, and we have a responsibility to guide our employees in thinking about their future and ensuring they have made provision and have their affairs in order to make it easier for family members in the event of something unexpected happening.
Losing a loved one is bad enough without trying to sort out complicated admin issues. This is where a valid will and a list of all the essential information someone might need to organise your estate could make all the difference.
In the coming months, I would like to expand on a number of these issues and would encourage our Associations to do the same.
I thought I would close my message this month with a quote from concentration camp survivor Viktor Frankl. It struck a chord with me as I believe it is very apt for the current times. He said, “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way”.
Read the May 2023 Automobil here: Automobil May 2023 (joomag.com)
