Gotcha4Life launches Mental Health Month campaign with six new emotions

Gotcha4Life has launched a Mental Health Month campaign introducing six new emotions, each linked to an exercise in its free Mental Fitness Gym app.

The emotions are part of the charity’s dictionary of modern emotions, which uses light-hearted language for feelings people experience but don’t always have words for. They range from feeling overwhelmed and ‘stretched too thin’ to relief, optimism and connection. Gotcha4Life says awareness is only the first step, which is why each emotion comes with a practical exercise.

The first three are Spiralo, when your mind jumps to the worst-case version of everything; The Blahs, when nothing’s wrong but nothing’s moving; and Breatho, when the pressure eases and you can breathe again.

Additional emotions include Pullaparted, when life is pulling you in every direction; Crisped, when you’re trying to hold it together and close to burnout; and The Glimmers, a small lift from things going right.

The campaign is the latest from the charity’s partnership with creative agency ScienceFiction and Omnicom Media agency Initiative.

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Belinda Elworthy, CEO, Gotcha4Life, shares: “Mental Health Month gets more people talking, and we want to build on that by going beyond awareness to something people can use every day. Naming what you’re feeling is an important step in building mental fitness. Each of these new emotions comes with an exercise in the Mental Fitness Gym app, so people can take that step and then do something about it.”

Last year’s campaign secured more than $15 million in donated media and drove close to 7,000 app downloads, almost half of all Mental Fitness Gym downloads that year. 

Matt Arbon, Creative Partner, ScienceFiction, said: "Plenty of Australians are feeling Pullaparted right now. This partnership is the opposite with Gotcha4Life, Initiative and ScienceFiction all pulling the same way, year after year. That’s what turns a social cause into a national campaign. This year we want these words to travel even further, into the places people are actually feeling them.”

Danielle Galipienzo, Head of Impact, Initiative:" Our role in media is to help bring this conversation into everyday life, reaching people in the moments and places where these emotions are already showing up, and connecting them with practical tools to support their mental fitness.

"Consistency in our media approach over the last four years has resulted in growing use of the mental fitness gym app, showing the impact of driving meaningful action and outcomes for the mental fitness of all Australians."