5th Place, 102 2nd Street, Linden, Randburg (2026)

15/12/2025

This season, may you go gently with yourself.

Emotional fitness isn’t about feeling happy all the time, it’s about meeting each moment with awareness and care.

Wishing you peace, nourishment, and renewed resilience.
— 5th Place

12/12/2025

The Slow-Motion Tea Ceremony (Home Edition)

How to Do It

Choose a tea. Prepare it as slowly as possible — noticing scents, sounds, colours, and textures. Sit down, cup in hands, and take three mindful sips while paying attention to warmth, taste, and breath. No devices, no multitasking.✨ Emotional Fitness in 3 Sips ✨

Just:

🌿 A warm cup
🌿 Three mindful sips
🌿 Your breath + your senses

This tiny ritual supports emotional mastery by helping you tune back into your body—one of the most important foundations of emotional fitness. When you slow down and feel instead of rush and react, you create space for clarity, comfort, and calm to return.

11/12/2025

A last reflection

A sunny and busy weekend that ended with watching a monster movie and had us reflecting on our year.
Saturday was warm and sunny. At last it felt as if summer had arrived. Perfect weather to take an Uber to Ellis Park to watch the Lions get beaten by Benetton. We had been gifted tickets by friends who weren’t able to go. It was fun to watch a live game even if our team did not play to their potential.

On Sunday we went for our early walk in glorious sunshine, early enough not to get overheated. We’d forgotten what it feels like to get hot but we did remember the sunblock.

Continue Reading: https://open.substack.com/pub/enablingthehow/p/a-last-reflection?r=yvd8w&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

10/12/2025

Shape of Emotion at the Mindfulness Conference:
23-25 March 2019

When we found out that the Institute for Mindfulness South Africa was hosting a Conference and it was being held in our neck of the woods, the Cradle of Humankind, we applied to present. Especially as the theme was one that we resonated with: The challenges of our inherited past mean that navigating diversity, inequality and multi-layered trauma are foregrounded in the development and healing of our country. We were offered a poster presentation. We took it.

Our presentation was titled: The Shape of your Emotion: A mindful approach for the African context. We shared how Shape of Emotion is similar to a guided meditation, and offers an opportunity to slow down, quieten an overactive mind, and get in touch with one’s feelings, without the need to talk about them, share anything or expose oneself. It is specific, personal inner work.

Our experience at the conference was eye opening. It was well attended by individuals from many walks of life, both locally and internationally. We attended a range of talks across the two days and made some friends along the way. There were clearly “gurus” and the view that mindfulness was really only about the “mindfulness of John Kabat Zinn’s Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR)”, even though he advocates for: “...people to take it, innovate with it, make it your own practice, so you can teach what you know…”.

Even so, we had fun talking around our poster in between sessions and sharing our take on what mindfulness can also beThere was curiosity and interest. Not much take up but we learnt so much and were exposed to so many people and presentations about how mindfulness could and is used.

The best part was meeting Kat, who was also presenting a poster and was staying at the same accommodation. We made a long standing friend in her.

09/12/2025

Emotions Matter. Really!
Bring the light
Tuesday May 17, 2022

During a visit to the Big Tree in Hoekwil, South Africa, Chantal and Matthew drew inspiration to develop the Act like a Tree principles and the ABC of life teachings that grew out of that. This week they explore the B of the ABC - Bring the light.

What they mean by bringing the light, why it is important and how everyone can do it.

Listen here: https://emotionsmatterreally.5th.place/e/bring-the-light/

08/12/2025

“I am not afraid of storms, for I am learning how to sail my ship.”

From Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

⛵This line beautifully captures the essence of emotional mastery: it’s not about avoiding life’s storms, but developing the skills to navigate them with steadiness and self-awareness. As we learn to understand, express, and regulate our emotions, challenges become less frightening and more manageable. Emotional mastery strengthens resilience, allowing us to respond to stress with greater calm and clarity. It also supports physical health by reducing stress levels and boosting immune responses, helping us feel more grounded overall. When we learn to “sail our ship,” our relationships deepen too, because we show up with more empathy, presence, and emotional stability.

🌟By learning how to navigate your inner world, you give yourself a calmer, more empowered outer world.

https://www.udemy.com/course/5th-place-emotional-mastery-for-a-better-life/

🔖

05/12/2025

“You cannot pour from an empty cup.”

— Unknown

🥣Nourishing yourself is a core part of emotional mastery because without replenishing your physical, emotional, and creative energy, it becomes nearly impossible to meet life with presence or resilience. The Nourishing pillar reminds us that caring for our bodies and honouring our emotional limits is not indulgence but necessity. Emotional mastery helps us manage stress and regulate big feelings, which in turn strengthens physical health by lowering cortisol and supporting immunity. When we make consistent space for rest, play, and creativity, we build psychological robustness and the capacity to respond instead of react. Ultimately, nourishing ourselves creates the inner stability we need to connect more deeply with others and move through life with ease.

🌱The Emotional Mastery for a Better Life course teaches simple, practical ways to refill your cup so you can show up feeling balanced and energised instead of drained. Your future self will thank you for finally choosing to prioritise you.

🔗 https://www.udemy.com/course/5th-place-emotional-mastery-for-a-better-life/

🔖

04/12/2025

242. Unexpected wins
4 December 2025

Both of us have a jaundiced view of many government run departments in this country. Mismanagement and corruption have eaten away at the effectiveness of these spaces. We expect mediocre service, if we get any at all.

When Matthew Bushell said that he was going to send a new set of Bluetooth microphones via Royal Mail we collapsed in spluttering laughter.

“We have no working government postal service to speak of,” said Matthew as he took a deep breath...

Continue Reading here: https://open.substack.com/pub/enablingthehow/p/unexpected-wins?r=yvd8w&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

03/12/2025

Shape of Emotion’s 1st birthday - 2 Feb 2019

On the 2nd February 2019, we held a big party. It was one year since we had introduced Shape of Emotion to the world through our pilot workshop.

We invited people who had been instrumental in the infant year of Shape of Emotion. There were the individuals that had unwittingly seeded the work. Some were brave souls who had signed up for our Foundation courses or attended an Emotional Fitness Class even when they didn’t have a clue what we were offering.

There were those that piloted programmes and provided us with spaces to work in. Some received the nod simply for just being so damn enthusiastic about our work, supporting and cheerleading us along the way.

Exactly a year to the day that we announced the birth of Shape of Emotion to a group of 11 guinea pigs (thanks to all of you!) we stood in front of the most colourful bunch of people to honour and thank them. What was then Gravity Cafe — our favourite place to meet, eat and celebrate — supplied the venue, and did the catering.

Balloons bobbed and bounced off the ceiling over an enormous sugar sensation of a cake. What’s a birthday party without balloons and cake? Both were guarded by the most beautiful ceramic Shape of Emotion rhinoceros named “Strong” by her winner, Elaine Mouton.

It was a night of connectedness, community, laughter, bubbles and love.

03/12/2025

Emotions Matter. Really!
Ep. 10: Act like a tree

Tuesday May 10, 2022

Last year we (Chantal and Matthew) went on a road trip to George, a town, in the Southern Coast of South Africa, to visit Tristan, Matthew’s son who he had not seen for over a year. The trip was full of learning and discovery and reconnection. On the last day they met the Big Tree. This meeting was important and impactful. It led to the Act like a Tree principles as well as the ABC’s of Life. A year later, Matthew is back in George with Tristan.

Chantal and Matthew use this opportunity to reflect on that trip, the learning and growing that has happened over this time in relation to the Act like a Tree principles and the ABC of Life. Tristan joins them for this episode.

Listen here: https://emotionsmatterreally.5th.place/e/act-like-a-tree

01/12/2025

A 2023 randomized controlled trial found that mind-body and art therapies significantly improved emotional regulation in adults with chronic illnesses.

That’s a powerful reminder that creativity and embodied practices aren't “extras” — they’re legitimate pathways to emotional mastery. Emotional mastery means understanding, expressing, and regulating emotions in ways that build resilience and psychological robustness, helping us stay present even in difficult seasons. These practices align beautifully with the Nourishing pillar of emotional fitness, which encourages nurturing the self through playful, creative, and restorative activities. When we nourish ourselves emotionally, we strengthen both the body and mind, improving immunity, reducing stress, and supporting deeper peace.

🎯 If you’re ready to nourish your emotional world more deeply, the Emotional Mastery for a Better Life course gives you the frameworks, tools, and practical guidance to do exactly that. You’ll learn how to regulate emotions more effectively, build resilience, and create a more grounded, peaceful experience of life — skills that make every relationship, decision, and challenge easier to navigate.

🔗 https://www.udemy.com/course/5th-place-emotional-mastery-for-a-better-life/

🔖

28/11/2025

The Story Stone Reset

Here’s a simple, grounding activity that supports emotional fitness: The Story Stone Reset.

Pick up a small stone, sit somewhere quiet, and gently “tell it the story” of what you’re feeling. Not to fix anything—just to express, acknowledge, and release.
Why does this matter?

Because emotional fitness (as defined by Matthew Green & Chantal Dawtrey of 5th Place) is an ongoing developmental process—a journey of self-awareness, attunement to your body, vulnerability, discomfort tolerance, and resilience.
This little practice specifically strengthens the thinking and feeling pillars of emotional fitness by:

✨ Deepening self-awareness
✨ Helping you name emotions
✨ Providing a grounding object for regulation
✨ Building the capacity to come back after faltering

This is emotional mastery in action: learning to understand, express, and regulate emotions in healthy ways so you can navigate life with more peace and clarity.

5th Place

15/12/2025

12/12/2025

11/12/2025

10/12/2025

09/12/2025

08/12/2025

05/12/2025

04/12/2025

03/12/2025

03/12/2025

01/12/2025

28/11/2025

Address

Telephone

Website

Alerts

Contact The Practice

Shortcuts

Share

Category