Meet Lapinlahti people: Taina Laaksoharju
Love for the nature has defined Taina’s diverse studies and career path
Taina Laaksoharju has worked as an instructor in Lapinlahden Lähde City Nature Centre for around four years. She has come up with a vast number of different workshops and mindfulness classes related to nature and well-being. In addition to that, she acts as a project manager in Pro Lapinlahti mental health association’s first EU project called ‘Escape to Happiness‘.
—A key factor in choosing a career has been that the work has to be connected to nature. I am continuously searching for new information and ways to promote and deepen a connection with nature that improves well-being. I have studied to become a gardener, a doctor of agriculture and forestry, an environmental educator, a nature exercise instructor, a guide, and a mindfulness instructor. I can draw on everything I have experienced and learned throughout my life, both at work and in personal life. My favourite hobbies are gardening and tending to a vegetable garden, meditation, cooking and preserving food, going out in the woods with my dogs, and swimming. Living in the country allows me to do all this.
Taina Laaksoharju came to Lapinlahti in 2018 as a part of the Paikka auki program. The work assignemet in Lapinlahti has had a healing effect on the difficult situation in her life at the time.
—I had become a widow and my working capacity was not very good due to grief. I had also experienced a serious burnout in my previous job as an executive director. I started in Lapinlahti as a part-time event organiser, and I immediately felt that this place and I were a great fit. The best thing about Lapinlahti is that people are allowed to be who they are and you can implement your own ideas very freely.
—Almost right from the beginning, I was able to organise meaningful events related to nature and well-being. You could well say that I found my own ‘ecological niche’ in the Lapinlahti ecosystem. Working as a director of the Yhteisöviljelykerho (Community Gardening Club) has been especially great!
“Lapinlahti helped me get back on my feet and rise to a new level of prosperity”
—I feel a great gratitude that a place like Lapinlahti exists. Lapinlahti helped me get back on my feet and rise to a new level of prosperity. The milieu of Lapinlahti is good for the soul, but in addition to the environment, you can feel the goodwill and solidarity between people in Lapinlahti. Community spirit means not looking for a ‘feather for your own cap’ but doing things for the common good. In Lapinlahti, you feel that you can influence things.
—Lapinlahti is full of skilled and brilliant people who have done great things for the community without asking for anything. I expect and hope more than anything else that the City of Helsinki will finally give recognition, legitimacy and all its support to the current actors. I also hope that the City Nature Centre will receive permanent funding, which would help us to have sufficient employee resources and functional permanent facilities.
—The City Nature Centre is already on its way to becoming a network of nature schools in Helsinki, and I hope that in the future we can better serve Helsinki residents of all ages.
Well-being and its promotion are a central driving force in Taina’s life. She has focused on the topic in the EU project ‘Escape to Happiness’.
—The project seeks best practices to promote the well-being of adults in hobbies, adult education and course activities. A well-being-themed escape game for adults is also in the works. We have just published a comprehensive guide to the best practices of the project partners, and the guides can be downloaded in Finnish or English from the project website.
—I am very proud that the well-being work done in Lapinlahti is receiving internation attention and people want to learn from us!
You can follow news and updates from ‘Escape to Happiness’ project from its website.
Photo and original text: Taika Korpinsola