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What Peer Support represents?

Peer support is based on the idea that people who have experienced mental health challenges can support one another through understanding, empathy, and shared experience. Rather than focusing only on treatment or clinical care, peer support creates spaces for connection, inclusion, and mutual encouragement. It recognises that recovery and well-being are strengthened through community, trust, and meaningful participation in everyday life. Within REMESOS, peer support is approached as a community-based and prevention-oriented practice that can help reduce isolation, strengthen resilience, and promote mental well-being.

The essence of Peer Support

At its core, peer support is built on:

  • mutual understanding,
  • equality,
  • shared lived experience,
  • and community connection.

Unlike traditional support models, peer support is not based on hierarchy or expertise alone. Instead, it values personal experience and recognises that people can learn from and support one another in meaningful ways.

Guided Functional Peer Support (GFP), developed in Finland by Kukunori, combines peer connection with shared activities such as art, movement, music, sports, or creative participation. These activities help create low-threshold and inclusive environments where people can connect naturally and build supportive relationships.

Finland - Kukunori

Real-world example

Guided Functional Peer Support (GFP) was developed in Finland by Kukunori as a community-based approach to strengthening mental well-being and social inclusion.

The model brings people together through shared activities and peer interaction, helping create supportive spaces where individuals feel safe, included, and connected. GFP has been recognised by the European Commission as a mental health best practice and serves as one of the core approaches implemented within REMESOS

Implementing Peer Support in Other Countries

Through REMESOS, the GFP model will be adapted and implemented in:

  • Greece,
  • Slovakia,
  • Portugal, and
  • Bosnia & Herzegovina.

The aim is not to replicate one identical model everywhere, but to adapt the approach to local communities, cultures, and needs.

Step 1 - Understanding Local Contexts

Partners work with communities, organisations, and people with lived experience to understand local mental health challenges, available support systems, and community needs.

Step 2 - Adapting the GFP Approach

The peer support model is adjusted to fit local realities while maintaining its core principles of inclusion, participation, and community connection.

Step 3 - Building Community-Based Support

The objective of this Work Package is to review and analyse existing tools for measuring population mental health across Europe. This includes identifying suitable frameworks, comparing leading measurement tools, and engaging experts to support the development of evidence-based recommendations for population-level mental health monitoring.

Step 4 - Sharing Learning Across Europe

Experiences and insights from implementation countries will help support future community-based mental health approaches and policy development across Europe.

Step 1 - Understanding Local Contexts

Partners work with communities, organisations, and people with lived experience to understand local mental health challenges, available support systems, and community needs.

Step 2 - Adapting the GFP Approach

The peer support model is adjusted to fit local realities while maintaining its core principles of inclusion, participation, and community connection.

Step 3 - Building Community-Based Support

The objective of this Work Package is to review and analyse existing tools for measuring population mental health across Europe. This includes identifying suitable frameworks, comparing leading measurement tools, and engaging experts to support the development of evidence-based recommendations for population-level mental health monitoring.

Step 4 - Sharing Learning Across Europe

Experiences and insights from implementation countries will help support future community-based mental health approaches and policy development across Europe.

Haris Shekeris

My name is Haris, I am a Liverpool FC supporter (the anthem is “You’ll Never Walk Alone”), harmoniously married to a lovely wife who has been tolerating me and enabling me to live and flourish for the last eight years (since 2018), a postgrad in philosophy, bipolar and medicated for more than half my life, Greek-Cypriot currently in Cyprus, working at a small private applied AI research company. The above, in no particular order :) 
I decided to join the REMESOS advisory board as a way of giving back to the mental wealth (note: not a typo :) ) community, as a means of trying to affect research by voicing my opinions, and as a means of socializing with like-minded and idealistic people, in no particular order.

Joao Carrapa

“Hi! My name is João Carrapa and I’m based in Portugal. I have studied Economics and the topics that interest me the most are: Ecology, Mental Health and Technology. I’ve also published a few books of poetry and short stories. I was delighted by the invitation to participate in the REMESOS advisory board! Why? Every little contribution to improve mental health counts, even though sometimes we underestimate our skills or value to be part of this collective endeavor; being a person with lived experience in Mental Health, I acknowledge that what I have to share is not known by many people. In dialogue, all of us have things to learn. Learn well

Manuela Cipriano

My name is Manuela. I am Portuguese and have lived with a diagnosis of Bipolar II Disorder for 25 years. 
Throughout this time, I have undertaken a sustained personal journey of self-acceptance, awareness and education in the field of mental health. 
I hold a degree in Communication Sciences and a postgraduate qualification in Journalism, and I have worked professionally in television entertainment and print and online journalism. 
For three years, I ran a mental health blog and I currently collaborate with a magazine dedicated to this subject. 
Combining lived experience with professional expertise, I actively advocate for mental health awareness and for the design and implementation of genuinely inclusive social programmes. 
I firmly believe that effective public policy and social initiatives must centre the voices, rights and dignity of people living with mental illness.

Svatava Česelková

My name is Svatava Česelková and I work in mental health education in Slovakia. I focus on raising awareness about eating disorders and mental well-being. I cooperate with the League for Mental. Health and support activities that help reduce stigma and encourage open discussion. I am interested in better support and services for people who experience mental health problems. I believe that community support and personal experience are important for positive change.

Arthur Celta

Hello, my name is Artur Jorge Silva, I’m from Portugal and currently live in Porto. Since my youth I’ve been interested in the area of​​personal development. I studied Neuro-Linguistic Programming and from there I’ve been educating myself in various areas related to the mind. I’m interested in this project because it’s linked to mental health, an area I’ve been developing over the years due to a mental health problem I went through

Susanna Kaste

I work as an Office Assistant at Kukunori and have over 26 years of work experience in a large listed company, where I worked as a sales assistant and in customer service. For the past six years at Kukunori, I have been responsible for several tasks, including working with the accounts ledger, scheduling the director’s appointments, introducing new employees to practical workplace procedures, and serving as the Board Secretary. I am very detail-oriented and enjoy interacting with many different kinds of people. I live in Vantaa with my partner and our two cats, and I am 58 years old. I also have lived experience of recovering from a severe mental health condition. In my free time, I sing in a pop music choir and enjoy writing about my life experiences.

Angela Mollar Pastor

Hello! I’m Ángela, a Spaniard living in Belgium. I’m a mother and a biologist, and I’ve been working on my mental health from a young age. As an Expert by Experience, I’m committed to opening conversations about mental health in a positive, natural, and stigma-free way, so both younger and older generations can feel better supported—especially by their immediate environment. I’m also deeply interested in the latest research approaches in psychiatry and psychology, both from a personal and also a professional perspective, since I have more than 10 years experience in the field of clinical research.