Big Happiness
At Big Happiness, we offer a softer approach to changing behaviours, as we deliver practical ways to both build new neural structures in the brain, and consciously regulate the nervous system. These can have long-lasting effects on health and wellbeing. The confidence and good feelings gained from our programmes are not ‘quick fixes’ but life-altering practices.Hardwiring Happiness
B.O.O.S.T
We are a family run company based in the Midlands delivering a range of initiatives and programmes that support mental and emotional health and educate organisations about Self Intelligence.
We have been delivering specialised mental and emotional health keynotes, training, consultancy and coaching programmes for the past 15 years to a wide range of organisations and sectors. These include the public and private sector, schools, the military, parents and families. We have designed and facilitated programmes for organisations such as Mind, Homestart, YMCA and the RAF Benevolent Fund and have also successfully run a funded Building Better Opportunities (BBO) programme in Staffordshire for the past two years.
We define our work as Self-Intelligence which is being able to recognise, understand and manage your own thoughts, emotions, physiology and connection to the wider world. This knowledge impacts on your daily habits, behaviours, feelings and your overall ‘sense of self’. It does this through various elements including: “checking in” to our thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations on a regular basis; practising attentional control; improving the ability to step back and think and act more rationally.
Self-Intelligence also helps you to recognise, understand and influence the reactions/responses of others. In practical terms, this means being aware of what drives your own human behaviour and how you have the power to impact people both positively and negatively, by recognising both yours and their level of Self-Intelligence.
Big Happiness Academy
Big Happiness Academy is the training arm of Big Happiness CiC , our comprehensive courses provide staff, support teams, volunteers, residents, members of the local community and other third party entities, with knowledge and tools in order that they can develop healthy attitudes towards mental health and greater emotional resilience, whilst strengthening their capacities to manage stress, anxiety, depression and other mental health issues.
The training, tools and practices we offer within our Self-Intelligence model provide individuals who are struggling with stress and overwhelm with the knowledge and strength to make sense of their thinking, their actions and their behaviours which can then decrease tension, increase energy and finally broaden their limited ‘past perspective’ viewpoint of the world.
We educate individuals in seeing through a new lens of ‘present perspective’ which separates them from old familiar ‘stinking thinking’ and connects them back to all that they have lost!
“We use a synthesis of tools and techniques to deliver innovative solutions to the growing problem of emotional stress and mental health illness in the UK.”
Within our Self-Intelligence model, we have developed the BrainTech System™ which is the core of all our training. We are passionate about everyone having access to a much greater knowledge and understanding of their brains, bodies and emotions and have, therefore, developed a system that identifies the key modes that our brains and nervous systems function in and how these have a direct impact on our thoughts, behaviours and actions.
Our body and mind do funny things when we are anxious, nervous, worried, scared or under any form of pressure. It defaults into a programmed system whose primary role is to protect us and keep us safe. When this system is operating, we often make ‘bad choices’ which can impact negatively on our results. When we are happy and feeling safe, we operate from a different system altogether and this supports us in making ‘good choices’ that, ultimately, lead to more positive outcomes.
Whilst our brains have developed and evolved over the last few thousand years, unfortunately, our ‘programmed- protective’ system has not! We have not yet developed a ‘fear filter’ which separates real danger from a perceived threat, so we can often find ourselves ‘overreacting’ and feeling anxious far more than we need to.
Our BrainTech System™ equips individuals with vital knowledge and tools to finally understand how human beings tick; why we so often react in anger or frustration and HOW we can access the more productive, calm and purposeful system on a more consistent basis.
“At our core is the desire to help individuals to nurture their ability to be confident, self-aware, resilient and self-regulating.”
At Big Happiness, we offer a softer approach to changing behaviours as we deliver practical ways to both build new neural structures in the brain and consciously regulate the nervous system. These can have long-lasting effects on health and wellbeing. The confidence and good feelings gained from our programmes are not ‘quick fixes’ but life-altering practices. The programmes offer self-improvement tools, mental and emotional resilience skills, increased confidence and motivation and a range of soft life skills specifically tailored to enhance the lives and opportunities of individuals and their families.
Jules is at her happiest delivering insightful talks about human behaviour to audiences both big and small. Check out her 10-minute TEDx talk below:
Military Personnel and Family Support
In September 2020 Big Happiness attended MOD Stafford where we were awarded the Brigade Commanders Commendation for our work in supporting military families during the first wave of Covid 19 lockdown. Our BOOST programme, which was specially formulated for serving personnel, their families, and children alongside our daily vlogs were provided to help boost mental and emotional health and cultivate resilience during these extremely uncertain times. This commendation has to go down as an extremely proud moment for Big Happiness, not because of the recognition of our efforts, but because of the difference our teachings and tools are having on those that need our support whilst they support us. We are now working with the 16 Signal Regiment on a commissioned project to develop a children’s resilience book and online resources which will be published early in 2021 and will provide continued support to the families of serving personnel. We are also signed up to the Armed Forces Covenant, which, as a business we are very proud support.
In 2018 we were commissioned by The RAF Benevolent Fund to write four books specifically for RAF families https://www.rafbf.org/news-and-blogs/unique-wellbeing-books-aimed-raf-children-launched-raf-benson which focused on topics to aid RAF parents and children with practical life skills. These were written to help support the families with day to day stresses and moments of crisis. Our Cloud Nine book series and workshops not only provided education for both the children and the parents but also a wide range of practical ‘day to day’ tools that they could integrate into their daily routines to ensure they were constantly ‘checking in’ on their feelings and states, and able to self-regulate themselves, cultivating both confidence and resiliency.
In a nutshell, she’s MAD ABOUT HELPING YOU TO HACK YOUR HUMAN!
Everyone ‘thinks’ they want happiness because that’s what we’ve been conditioned to believe in. But the ‘I’ll be happy when I GET the house, partner, money, fill in the blanks …’ will only bring us quick fixes and short bursts of those happy hormones.
What everyone really wants is FREEDOM. A deep sense of inner peace, meaning and purpose, an emotional freedom that comes with the knowledge of knowing who you really are!
Jules helps her clients to climb off the ‘GET Ladder of Life’ and step into the world of Self Actualisation. The old paradigm of ‘getting happiness’ paradoxically gets you nowhere, but when you truly GET how life really works, when you GET yourself, and live with the knowledge that, ultimately you are in creative control of life on your own terms this brings you FREEDOM! Jules has spent the last 20 years exploring and experimenting with the science and spirituality of happiness and is now regarded as an expert in her field. She’s a professional speaker inspiring her audience to access both ‘their human’ and ‘their superhuman self’ through a process of self-exploration and the implementation of some simple Jules’ Joyshots ™.
“I’m on mission to wake the world up, one ‘stressed- out’ client at a time, to the fact that we are all truly amazing human beings who ALL have a well of unmet potential; however, many of us are unaware of that potential and become hardwired to accept stress as the norm. This state of being can manipulate our thinking, chip away at our self-worth, and keep us living SMALL stressful lives. In fact, our worth is often defined by our perceived status or the opinions of others and not by the things that really matter. My mission is simple; to introduce my clients to ‘Their Human’ ; both the smaller ‘survival, programmed part’ and the BIGGER, consciously awake, purposeful version of themselves, their whole self; and to impart simple life bio hacks – including my Joy Shots, that will uncover that hidden Self and send stress packing. Change is inevitable for all of us and it is either by CHOICE or by CHANCE that your life will change, which one would you prefer?”
ABOUT THE FOUNDER
Jules Mitchell
I am extremely proud to be the founder of The Big Happiness Experiment, which we now affectionately refer to as Big Happiness and the varied programmes we offer at our Big Happiness Academy. We, like most organisations, have been adapting our services in 2020 to ensure we can still reach those that need us the most. We pride ourselves on the unique approach we have to maximising human potential through our Self-Intelligence models, and our BrainTech System™. Our tag line is ‘Bringing Living to Life’ and we support a wide range of organisations and individuals to do this. Over the years we have delivered emotional and mental health training programmes , stress awareness and wellness events to the public and private sector, delivered community mental health projects, supported the military with commissioned resources and programmes, provided training and consultancy to the education sector with our Happy Schools Programme and provided personal coaching and mentoring for individuals who have reached breaking point!
My USP
Simply put, I have a gift for helping people to understand how they tick, why they react the way they do, and what simple tools, techniques and practices they can implement into their daily routine to improve their health and happiness. I’m a trailblazer in my field, cutting through the negativity that surrounds mental and emotional health; giving people back the power and the positivity that both a conditioned society and ‘the system’ can so often strip them of. I share my own mental health struggles openly and am passionate about others accessing the level of emotional freedom that I have today. I have a talent for synthesising the latest neuroscience, positive psychology, epigenetics, mindfulness, laughter therapy, behavioural science, and somatic psychology into a simple language that people can easily understand. I then present this knowledge in a fun, interactive and high energy presentation, whether that’s in an online course, a community programme or delivering a keynote to a conference of 10,000 people!
Author
In 2017, I was commissioned by The RAF Benevolent Fund to write a series of four books for RAF families, focusing on wellbeing, mindset and resilience. https://www.rafbf.org/news-and-blogs/unique-wellbeing-books-aimed-raf-children-launched-raf-benson.
Because of the success of these books, I am now in the process of writing another commissioned book for the military, this time for the children of the army and look forward to sharing these in early 2021.
I am one of the Warrior Women featured in the book of the same name https://www.amazon.co.uk/Warrior-Women-Magnificent-Through-Self-Kindness/dp/1907308113 and am a passionate article writer, having written for many glossies such as Psychologies, Top Santé and Woman; I was also a columnist in the Birmingham Mail sharing my ‘positive perspective’ with the Midlands region and I’ve also been featured in the Guardian and other mainline press on many occasions.
Clients, Credibility & Media
I’ve appeared on both ITV’s This Morning and BBC Midlands Today and have been an expert ‘go to’ person for the BBC for years, doing countless radio appearances, most recently on Radio 5 Live. The BBC once quoted me as ‘the happiest woman in the Midlands’ and my professional laughter teacher qualification from Dr Madan Kataria from The Laughter University in India contributed to this title.
There are too many clients to list from my 15 years in this profession, but a few include ITV, BBC, TEDx, Nottingham University, Comic Relief, Evolve, BBO, The RAF Benevolent Fund, The British Army, Spectra Experiences, numerous NHS Trusts, Duke of Kent School, Weetabix, Laser UK, BNP Paribas and The Wilderness Festival.
“Jules knows how to deliver high-impact deep scientific information based on the latest behavioural sciences, which always comes brightly wrapped in a fun, energetic and engaging presentation that will captivate any audience”.
Contact Us
Business and Finance Manager:
M.A.D. about happiness! Jules: