Positive response for the Big Feelings Tractor Trek as it rolls through Northland

The Big Feelings Tractor Trek group praised the "thoughtful drivers" who shared the road. Photo / Michael Cunningham

A troop of tractors took the scenic route through Northland on a tour to promote positive mental health to primary school students.

Cat Levine, from the Big Feelings Tractor Trek used her own story of growing up on a Waikato farm and moving to the city, to start a discussion about big feelings.

She said sadness was the "one feeling that grew bigger than the others."

Each student was given a mood cube to keep and Levine used a large version on stage to show each big feeling as a coloured ball, which could grow or shrink.

She then jumped into a Zorb on stage, to show how large feelings could become.

Levine said giving young people the tools, as early as possible, to name their feelings and talk about them with a trusted adult made the issues smaller and less overwhelming.

The presentation used Levine's own experience but had cognitive behavioral therapy as its basis.

Pitstop at Oakleigh for Gilly Brown's newly painted tractor. Photo / Michael Cunningham

She said it uses the functioning brain, the feelings brain and the thinking brain to look at the thoughts that are behind each feeling.

The idea that feelings aren't forever is one of the key messages and emojis on the mood cubes helped kids identify times when they were feeling overwhelmed, judged or lonely.

It also helped them understand the emotions that friends or whānau may be feeling.

This year the 11 tractors, with pilot vehicles at the front and rear, started in Auckland and will travel the scenic route to Cape Reinga and back, using back roads and pulling over often to let traffic pass.

The annual trek, formerly to raise money for Hospice, started in 2016 and took the full Bluff to Cape Reinga route.

In 2020, Levine teamed up with Mike King for a Gumboot Friday tractor trek, to include rural mental health, but it was called off due to Covid.

This year it is not a fundraiser and the focus is on getting positive messages to as many young people as possible.

Gilly Brown drove the tractor up from Whanganui, to start the trek in Auckland. Photo / Michael Cunningham

So far, parking hasn't been a problem, fields and courts opened up for the tractors, and Levine's own "Postman Pat van" as they rolled through.

"We always choose a camping ground that knows there are 11 tractors coming."

To find out more, visit bigfeelingstractortrek.org.