Honoured to Receive the 2025 WA Mental Health Award for Lived Experience Impact & Inspiration
- Michael Elwan

- Oct 11
- 2 min read
Updated: Nov 9

This week, I was deeply honoured to receive the 2025 WA Mental Health Award for Lived Experience Impact & Inspiration, sponsored by the WA Mental Health Commission.
The award recognises the work I do through Lived Experience Solutions (LEXs) - supporting people and organisations to move from silence to safety, and from stigma to understanding. It celebrates the power of lived experience as both a source of healing and a driver of systemic change.
Through LEXs, I provide culturally-attuned counselling, mentoring, and consultancy for people navigating trauma, grief, migration, identity, and mental health challenges. Many of my clients come from culturally and linguistically diverse and faith-based communities, where traditional services have not always felt safe or accessible. Together, we work in ways that honour culture, family, and spirituality; creating new pathways to recovery that feel human and inclusive.
Beyond counselling, my work extends to advising national and state mental health systems so that policies and services reflect the diversity of the communities they serve.
This award is meaningful because it recognises what I have long believed: that lived experience is not a limitation; it is leadership. When we bring our stories, cultures, and truths into the room, systems change.
To my clients, colleagues, and community - thank you for walking beside me, for your courage, and for reminding me daily why this work matters.
You can read more about the WA Mental Health Awards and the remarkable finalists on the WAAMH website
Based in Perth, WA, LEXs provides telehealth counselling across Australia for individuals, couples, and NDIS participants. Services extend to Social Work supervision, Peer Work supervision, training, and keynote speaking on men’s mental health, CaLD community wellbeing, and culturally responsive suicide prevention; helping people and organisations make mental-health care more compassionate, inclusive, and effective. LEXs provides services across Australia, supporting clients in Perth, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, and beyond. To learn more about our work across Australia, visit LEXs' services page.



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