LAKings.com feature: Talk About It

My LAKings.com feature detailing The Guidance Center’s efforts to treat mental health challenges in Long Beach and South Los Angeles County communities has been posted. Sunset Sip, an annual fundraiser hosted by Jim Fox, helps raise money for The Guidance Center and will take place on Friday, September 6. For more information, you can “Like” The Guidance Center’s Facebook page.

“We’re catching up,” Fox said. “I think for the longest time hockey was behind the eight ball or a little bit slower than a lot of sports. But I think that’s almost completely gone. I think that most everyone in a leadership position now in the NHL takes a progressive outlook on a lot of things, and I think they include that with mental illness.”

Again, it’s never the easiest comparison when social challenges inherent to mental health outreach are put in the context of professional sports. But there are certainly lessons for both realms in that treatment is always easily accessible – or, in the case of The Guidance Center, literally in the middle of the neighborhood.

“I think the resounding vision that we try to convey is that there’s hope for anybody,” Costales said. “Anybody has the ability to be resilient, and no matter what has happened to you and what you bring to the table, everybody has strengths, and we look for those strengths and we believe in those strengths. We try to teach clients to learn how to be future-focused.”

LAKings.com: Talk About It

Other LAKings.com features:
Padded Down
Little Time for Rest
Make Them Better
Comfort Level
Getting There
Will to Win
Buying In
Fine Tuning
Battle Tested
Smooth and Selke
Up, Up and Away
In Their Eyes
Work in Progress
Committed
Scuderi’s Actions Speak
Brown’s Model a Path for Doughty