On October 10, Fox World Travel joins in observing World Mental Health Day. According to the World Health Organization, close to 1 billion people are living with a mental disorder. Especially as we look at mental health through our travel lens, 2020 has brought many changes that might cause anxiety or uncertainty for business travelers.

Related Article: Will Business Travelers be Affected by Anxiety?

At Fox, we do more than just help get travelers from one place to the next. We truly care about our travelers; we care about YOU.

Fox builds our services around the traveler journey, and an important piece of that is making sure travelers feel confident and at ease. That’s why we have spent this year digging deeper into the traveler experience to create new duty of care protocols, as well as investing in and creating new technology.  And, just as important as having the right tools is simply supporting each other as humans.

“Everything we do at Fox, from our processes, customer service training and even the technology we create holds the traveler experience at its core,” said Fox Director of Customer Experience Mia Beltran. “It’s not just about getting people from A to Z, but making sure that before, during and after travel they are supported. We work closely with our travel managers to identify how a potential traveler is feeling each step of the way, from the excitement of getting on a plane to the anxiety of being away from home. This helps an organization a create custom travel program based on their travelers needs.”

There are a number of simple things your organization can do to incorporate mental wellness into your travel policy. Fox recently partnered with co-founder of the Business Travel Wellbeing Community, Matthew Holman,  for our webinar, The People Behind Your Policy: Wellbeing of the Business Traveler.

“The Business Travel Wellbeing Community (BTWC) was founded almost 12 months ago when we recognized the increased discussions around wellbeing across the travel industry. One thing that was clear at that point was the need to gain a much greater awareness of the challenges that travelers face when on the road.

Since then, we have seen this seismic shift in the way that we travel, and how we are more focused now than ever on the wellbeing of the traveler. However, there is still a long way to go to really understand the balance between physical challenges (the pandemic) and the psychological impact of the travel – anxiety, stress and so on.  We still need to define Travel Wellbeing into an understandable definition, and this is the core area that we are working on today. We will help to define this and bring greater clarity once and for all, to answer the question; ‘what is Business Travel Wellbeing?” said Holman, who founded the community to be a group of business travel experts, mental health professionals and others who bring awareness to business traveler health.

Fox encourages you to learn about your travelers’ feelings while on the road, and to contribute to creating a world where people can feel comfortable talking about mental health. We can all do something today to make a difference.

Six Tips to Improve Your Mood in 10 Minutes or Less

In large part, wellbeing is about making room for being comfortable, healthy or happy amid the stresses that are an intrinsic part of life. Here are some of our favorite quick tips for resetting or improving your mood in less than 10 minutes, all of which can be done while on the road.

1. Close your eyes and inhale for four seconds and exhale for five seconds. Continue for five minutes.
2. Have a solo dance party. It might sound silly, but don’t worry no one is watching! Blast a feel-good song that makes you feel empowered or reminds you of a happy time. You will be surprised what a little physical activity can do.
3. Grab a notebook or your iPad and list a few things that you are grateful for. Taking time to concentrate on the positive helps change your mindset.
4. Brew yourself a cup of your favorite coffee or tea, read a few pages of your favorite book or just enjoy a few moments in silence.
5. Crush a workout. There are plenty of workouts that accomplish a lot in a short amount of time and with a little amount of space for those of us in our hotel rooms. The endorphins released when you exercise help you naturally relieve stress.
6. TREAT YOURSELF. At the end of the day, you deserve it.  Find the thing that makes you happy and go for it.  Buy yourself that extra something, put on an outfit that makes you feel good — at the end of the day, whatever it is, celebrate you.

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