Founded in 2016
Initially inspired to make a difference in the lives of children, whilst working in the under resourced school space, Chantal & Matthew set out on a journey to solve the problem of delivering scalable, innovative mental health interventions to both adults and children.
Chantal Dawtrey
Chantal educates for, and enables, a greater understanding and appreciation of emotional fitness. She co-creates strategies to build and sustain emotional, mental, physical and relational fitness through coaching, training and speaking engagements.
Chantal’s mission is to support the growth and development of emotionally fit, connected human beings that want more for themselves and the world that they live in.
She facilitates sustainable personal, group and team change. Leveraging strengths and diversity, she offers a "both and" approach to improved performance that includes building emotional fitness, self care and heart centred leadership.
She spends a large portion of her time curating content for a variety of platforms to advocate for greater awareness about emotional fitness, including the 5th Place podcast, Emotions matter. Really! that she produces with Matthew.
She lives by the maxim that change starts with you. And the way to improve work, life, health and wellbeing is to reconnect to your body's intelligence.
Chantal is the co-founder of 5th Place and co-creator of Shape of Emotion and the Model of Emotional Fitness.
Chantal is a credentialed coach and registered coach supervisor with COMENSA (Coaches and Mentors of South Africa) and a past chairperson of the Research and Supervision Portfolio Committees. She is a qualified teacher, a Neuro Linguistic practitioner, and has an MPhil in Management Coaching (cum laude) through the University of Stellenbosch Business School.
Matthew Green
Since discovering meditation at age 10, Matthew has dedicated himself to personal development, more recently focusing on the crucial role of emotion regulation in mental health and well-being.
As an emotional fitness coach and affective science researcher, he empowers individuals to understand, manage, and constructively express their emotions, enabling them to cope with stressors and maintain healthy relationships.
With over 30 years of experience, Matthew helps clients develop resilience and enhance overall mental health using therapeutic coaching and the innovative "Shape of Emotion" model.
A sought-after speaker and workshop facilitator, he works with athletes, high-achieving professionals, young people, and adults from diverse backgrounds.
As the co-founder of 5th Place and co-creator of the groundbreaking emotion regulation tool Shape of Emotion, Matthew is passionate about guiding others to emotional well-being.
His favourite saying is, "If you don't know where you are, how can you move to somewhere else?"
Team 5th Place
It takes a village or so the saying goes and Matthew & Chantal are ably assisted by Clive Sibindi, Portia Mpofu and the incredible creative talents of Tristan Green.
Clive Sibindi
Portia Mpofu
Tristan Green
Why the name 5th Place?
We often get asked why 5th Place? Why not 1st or 2nd or 3rd?
There is a story behind the choice of the name. It is short. Here it is.
Ray Oldenburg, author of The Great Good Place defines the first place as home, the second place as work and the third place as the place where community gathers for recreation, such as coffee shops, parks and sports facilities.
The fourth place we have defined as social media spaces and places like Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, TikTok, Twitter and so on.
What then is the fifth place?
5th Place is the space of connectedness, community, possibility, well-being and equality of all people. 5th Place asks us to build a better world through the realm of feeling. It is anywhere and everywhere that asks us to feel more, heal, learn, grow, engage and it starts with me.
First place
Second place
Third place
Fourth place
The Fifth Place