We've consulted many people who found recovery from ME or have progressed meaningfully. Two themes appear again and again. The first one is a process of people refinding or 'reconnecting' with who they are - or connecting with the kind of person they feel they need to be to build recovery. The second theme involves people with ME making concerted attempts to remove themselves from sources of stress and things which deplete them. MEMap Lighter Load stitches these two themes together so that 'reconnecting' to the things which lift and nourish us can be done in a focused way which helps us spot stressful or depleting things that may be hindering our progress. It's so hard to begin and stick with initiatives to tackle ME when you just feel rubbish. It is usually much more doable when the way you want life to be is in clear view .

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If you have not had ME it can be hard to imagine how much the sheer exhaustion the illness ordinarily brings can make taking things forward feel impossible. If you use the meMap 'Stress Stuff to Best Stuff' App (for those who don't have ME) yourself you will be fully equipped to help your friend with ME set up and use their ME App. That COULD turn out to be a life changing gift to them. meMap 'Stress Best' is completely free - and, honest guv, it may offer you a wonderful overhaul of your own life.

Most people with ME are surely right in believing that better biomedical research and multidisciplinary service provision are needed. While waiting or campaigning for that, many - either by choice or lack of OTHER choices - take on the task of planning recovery or often profound lifestyle adjustments. MEMap 'Original' is carefully designed to optimise that process. It offers a format to capture and bring to life clear, imaginative thinking. And it allows users to adopt and adapt the kinds of pathways and tools 'ME recoverers' seem to utilise with some success. MEMap Original is intended for people with ME able to commit to the idea that recovery is likely to involve real investment in themselves.

Click here to see why using MEMap in even the most basic way can be a great no cost way to help you

At its simplest MEMap is a format to grab hold of your best strategies, your grandest dreams, the untapped powers of your creative brain, and get them really working for you.

Across time you have no doubt assembled various good strategies and 'habits' which help - at least to some extent - tackle ME. ME can be so shattering that these good habits and tools which you know work are most likely under-used and under-sharpened. Their full potential naturally gets lost in the struggle and tiredness of ME.

Changing this dynamic matters because there is pretty strong evidence that ME recovery is probably not 'just going to happen', and a magic bullet or pill is probably not just around the corner. The observable trends seem to be that 'ME recoverers' frequently take ownership of the process of building better - making little steps and connections away from illness and towards health. MEMap aims to bottle what works for you and any antidotes you have for the things that are really not working in your life. The anecdotal evidence about ME does suggest that progress is found where people have an organised approach, consistent habits and engage imaginatively and creatively with what body and soul are telling them. Those who have made steps forward with ME often feel years could've been gained by committing to this approach sooner.

Change is tough - really tough when you are shattered. MEMap aims to make mapping the path away from illness towards wellness more attractive and enticing. It is designed to be engaging, enjoyable even, and social - supported by others making the kind of journey you want to make. If the recovery process can feel like a genuinely life-enhancing journey from ME to the 'me' you long to be, hopefully sticking with what helps may just feel doable. If your body and foggy brain are grounded, perhaps your spirit is the thing to float free a little and lead you forward.

MEMap exists because we spent years watching (open-mouthed) our friends with ME being asked to pay vast sums for treatment. We were initially told to make the MEMap project sustainable by charging a little. But now it is free, as we always wanted.

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MEMap Lighter Load

MEMap Lighter Load is designed to help you create a direction of travel from difficult to easier, more nourishing terrain. The completely free App aims to illuminate the path AWAY from stressors, any load you carry and anything which depletes energy, and TOWARDS lighter load lifestyles, more evenly balanced energy, genuinely relaxed healing states and better connections to things that inspire and energise. You are initially helped to rapidly create an evocative and very personal picture of the place you'd like to head towards. MEMap Lighter Load then sets out some fertile areas where it may be possible for stressors to be sidestepped, stress busted and load lightened. It provides a format to adopt and personalise these areas, and indentify your own more individual stressors and the strategies which help. The App offers tools to build the habit of journeying towards kind-to-self, nourishing living. Communication and sharing with other MEMap/meMap users is offered as an optional extra. You are strongly encouraged to get a friend or family member who is comfortable with tech to use meMap 'Stress Stuff to Best Stuff' themselves. This way they can support you getting to grips with, and getting benefit from, the App.

MEMap Original - the original recovery planning tool

MEMap Original helps you map a 'big picture' of wellness, from the peak spiritual wisdoms which make you YOU, to the healthy wellbeing you ultimately want, to the smaller skills and strategies which save your day. The App then helps you develop a clear sense - a complete map - of the illness and anything else which gets in the way of the wellness you've described. And offers a format, tools and a space to tackle symptoms and build strategies. Being explicit about what works for you and the areas where nothing much works is an invaluable way of offering yourself - and intuitively feeling your way towards - the kinds of inputs you may need. Support from others comes in two forms. Access to the reported wisdom of 'ME recoverers' allows you to personalise what others found useful. And MEMap has communication functionality so the recovery process can be shared - both in caring supportive ways and in positive, creative collaborations. Others who have more energy than you can also remotely help you create and develop a good plan/App. Used in a certain way (see steps here), MEMap Original offers a full 'App-sized' protocol to plan a genuinely holistic recovery path. Its website is written blog style to allow you to really invest in the issues that surround ME. Though ways to keep things short and simple ARE highlighted.

meMap 'Stress Stuff to Best Stuff'

meMap 'Stress Stuff to Best Stuff' aims to help you build a direction of travel in in your life from days that involve too much stress or load - or are simply too average - to days more 'centred' on what you value, who you want to be and the fabulous peak perceptions about life you almost certainly have. Whether it's the small stuff that makes your day work or the big stuff that makes it a day you were born to live, you are encouraged to capture and bottle all the things that comprise the best living you can live. meMap 'Stress Stuff to Best Stuff' sets out some fertile areas where stress may be busted and load may be lightened. It provides a format to develop your own thinking in these areas, and identify or express your own more individual stressors and difficult issues. The completely free App offers tools to build strategies and the habit of journeying from anything involving too much stress or load, towards your best stuff. Communication and sharing with other MEMap/meMap users is offered as an optional extra.

meMap Pro

meMap Pro is designed for practitioners - or those offering a package of support - to remotely communicate with their clients, or make key concepts, goals or strategies accessible in an App/social media type format. One of the possibilities is for clients to use meMap to build a picture of the issues they face and what they want at an early stage of their relationship with the practitioner, so that relationship begins with rich 'sharing' in a format designed to evolve. Practitioners can remotely configure clients' Apps with the concepts they use or with food for thought. They can use a computer to build a library of the ideas they favour - reusing this information for multiple clients. For clients with ME, they can also utilise the categories developed for MEMap Original. Communication functionality comes with the App. Various additional services are available: for example, the ability to broadcast info to workshop attendees and online groups, or the design of a bespoke Configuration Journey or web resource where clients can populate their Apps by selecting from and responding to concepts provided by the practitioner.