'From walks to workshops': Checking in on a friend sparks well-being movement

The Tongan family man behind “Mens Medicine”, a wellbeing group that works with men, women and couples through walks and workshops, says it all started from a check-in with a friend.

Speaking to Carolanne Toetu'u on Pacific Days, Siofilino Hola said Mens Medicine was a community he started in 2019.

At the time he was coaching, both online and in the gym, the latter is what led him to check on a friend.

"I went into the gym and saw a friend who was struggling. It looked like something was going on.

"I asked him if he'd like to go for a walk. He shared with me 'I think we should take more people on these walks' and I said 'sure'."

Hola followed up on this promise, taking a group of men on a walk eight weeks later. They recorded and uploaded their sessions, which went viral hitting 100,000 views within 24 hours.

"We had people across Australia and New Zealand asking us to come and walk with them so that's what we did.

"We walked through Sydney, Melbourne, Hawke’s Bay, Hamilton, Queenstown, Christchurch, and Auckland - that's what we did in the first year.

"We've evolved from walks to workshops, to not only working with men, now we work with women and couples."

Watch the full interview via 531pi’s FB below:

Couples workshop
Hola's team plans to travel to Aotearoa to run a couples workshop on Saturday for 25 couples, as requested by the twosevenfive team based in Māngere.

Twosevenfive applied for the Ministry of Social Development's Changemakers fund, which finances projects on masculinity, gender norms, and healing.

"Our three pillars at Mens Medicine are community, connection, and culture,” Hola said.

"Sometimes, even people that love each other struggle to get along because they're not on the same page.

"So, we focus the first half of the day on connection as well as unpacking some of the challenges that the people are struggling through.

"Then we'll break for lunch and then the afternoon is around communication.

"Helping provide some communication tools for our couples to help navigate their way through their relationships after they've left the workshop."

He said the response has been positive, citing a couple from three to four years ago who are together today.

"For some people, it saved their relationship, some relationships aren't together - they've come to hopefully fix their relationship - some relationships are disconnected.

"If anything, the couples workshop is an opportunity for couples to come together especially if you have children.

"That very rarely do Mums and Dads have an opportunity to come together and work on the relationship - you're busy working, running errands, children - the busyness of life.

"Very rarely do both a man and woman come together to work on the relationship itself and that's the space that we provide."

To register interest for this Saturday’s couples workshop, reach out to twosevenfive’s Facebook via a direct message.