Welcome to The ‘Doing Well’ Guidebook. This guide was designed and illustrated by Janette Cabrera to help you reflect on the everyday activities that fill your days and how you can use them to get into the headspace you want to be in. This can be a powerful tool for your mental wellbeing and discovering more about how to stay well.
Daniel Sutton, a mental health occupational therapist, researcher and academic, explains how we can find ourselves switching between different modes of ‘doing’ during our lives—especially when we are confronted with mental wellbeing challenges. ‘Doing' refers to any activity that we choose to fill our days with.
Select one of the 'doing' modes below to learn more.
Periods of non-doing can be helpful for going back to the fundamentals of CARE and self-CARE. It is also important to remember that no one can complete this journey alone.
Periods of half-doing can help us feel present and grounded in the moment, in our bodies, and in our environment. Taking it SLOW can help us reestablish simple yet meaningful activities back into our days.
Engaged doing can be helpful for our social wellbeing. This mode is helpful for us to establish our place in the world with others. Doing things that SYNC us with others helps give structure and meaning to our lives.
The absorbed doing mode is about finding your FLOW. Doing things in this mode can help you find strength in your uniqueness and a connection to being your most authentic self.
To find healthy ways to use the modes, we need to recognise how we can get in and out of the modes that we want to be in, and what works well for us. This section contains prompts and activities that can help guide you towards reflecting on this.
You might notice that doing a certain activity doesn’t necessarily mean that you will be in any one particular mode. In the examples below, we can see that the same simple activity of sitting can be used to get into each of the four modes. The aim of these activities is to give you a starting point to learn how you get into each mode. By recognising the activities that you personally find the most helpful for getting into each mode, you can then start to plan the steps that you can take to get there.
Through visualising your story of ‘doing,’ hopefully you have discovered something that will be helpful to take with you on your journey of mental wellness!
If you enjoyed this guidebook, you can buy a physical copy of this guidebook at the Good Health Design shop to keep in a safe place for your future self to find again.
To Dr Daniel Sutton for supporting the development of this guidebook, which builds on his previous research.*
Also, to Prof. Stephen Reay and the Good Health Design studio for their extensive guidance and support.
To the clinical experts and design for health experts that were generous with their feedback, time, and knowledge during the creation of this resource.
Finally, to the young adults that contributed their lived experience stories in hopes that they might support others navigating their mental wellbeing journeys.
*Sutton, D. J. (2008). Recovery as the Re-fabrication of Everyday Life: Exploring the Meaning of Doing for People Recovering from Mental Illness [PhD thesis, Auckland University of Technology].
Sutton, D. J., Hocking, C. S., & Smythe, L. A. (2012). A Phenomenological Study of Occupational Engagement in Recovery from Mental Illness. Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy, 79(3), 142–150. https://doi.org/10.2182/cjot.2012.79.3.3
Why we made this guide digital
The 'Doing Well' Guidebook was designed by Janette Cabrera as part of her Masters research in 2022. Good Health Design, in partnership with Daniel Sutton, decided to make it available in our shop on Janette's behalf because we believe every young person deserves tools to help them navigate tough times. Until now, it’s only been available as a printed book for a cost. But we know not everyone can afford that — and we don’t want cost to be the barrier.
That’s why we’ve made the entire guide available here, online, free for anyone to use. All of the worksheets are free to download, print, or share, so they can reach as many people as possible.
Still love a book in your hands?
You can still purchase a physical copy if you’d like one for yourself, your family, or your workplace. Sometimes having the weight of a book and the space to write inside it makes all the difference. Go to the GHD Shop.
Help us share the book further
Here’s where you can help. For every $35 we receive in donations, we’ll give a physical copy of the guide to a young person through a local mental health service. It’s a simple way to extend the reach of this resource — from your hands to theirs.
Every contribution makes a difference. Together, we can make sure this guide doesn’t just live online, but gets into the hands of those who need it most.
