Welcome to the February edition of the Personal Supports Network Newsletter

Making new friends in Kamloops! Susan, Karen, Carole, Aaron, Gwen, Jule and Tracy-Jo – the CLBC StartwithHi Poster Person for the area

Hello friends!   We had a great time in Kamloops with a two day workshop, the first day for the public and the second day with five individuals and their support networks, working with the various tools we’ve discovered in a more practical way than we’ve had a chance to before.  We’re excited about the possibilities of this.  

Over the next months we’re in Burnaby for a few days and confirming sessions in Fort St. John which we’re excited about visiting.   Our project ends at the end of March; if you had hoped we’d come to where you are, or that there would be more opportunities to do more together, let us know so that we can forward the message to Jule, who has been such a great support to our work.   email us at psn@spectrumsociety.org  or leave a message with Judy at our office 604-323-1433.  

and do PLEASE fill out the survey about personal support networks – it would be great to know who is out there helping folks make connections!   We’re hoping for the deepest, biggest snapshot of what’s going on in the province.

Important: Personal Support Networks in BC Survey

If you or your organization offers any kind of support to personal support networks, please take a moment to complete this survey.   We’re trying to get the fullest possible picture of what’s going on in the province right now.   If you’re not sure that what you do qualifies, complete it anyway!   The more information the better.   If you know of someone or some project that might be interested, please forward the link below or this article.   Thanks!  

Steven’s dream – by Chad Clippingdale

Three months ago I attended a course on Optimal Individual Service Design in Vernon put on by Michael Kendrick and Janet Klees. One of the aspects of the course was that we would be paired up with an individual from the local community who was presently receiving services and together we would create an optimal plan that would look to meet that individuals unique needs. Rumor had it that there was one individual who was really interested in drinking beer and watching hockey, two things I am extremely fond of myself. I silently hoped that I would be matched up with this person. Later when I found out that I had been matched up with a man named Steven, I inquired to some of the course participants who were familiar with the local agency and would you believe it, he was the one who liked hockey and beer.

I spent lots of time over the next few weeks getting to know Steven and working with him and those in his surrounding network to create a plan for what Michael Kendrick called a “good life”.  At the end of the course, my group and I presented our proposal for Steven to the rest of the course participants. One point of feed back was that we didn’t dream big enough in our proposal of what would constitute a meaningful life for Steven. Hearing this, I decided to throw out a question to the rest of the group: What if Steven had the opportunity to fly down to Vancouver, meet up with me, and watch his favourite team in the whole world, the Vancouver Canucks, from really great seats. People agreed that that would be really great, and that was the extent of the discussion.

During the break from the course I was approached by Gary and Henry, the directors of the two local community living organizations, who both mentioned their connections to being able to get Canucks tickets. We all agreed that Henry would look into getting Steven and I tickets through his connection.

Fast forward to a couple of weeks later and I hear from Steven’s mother, Joan, that Henry has come through with two tickets to a game on January 5^th, and that she is looking into flights for her and Steven to come down to Vancouver. Amazingly, January the 5^th is Steven’s birthday. A couple of weeks later the flights were finalized and there are plans in place for me to meet Steven and his mother at the Coast Vancouver Airport Hotel for dinner, before Steven and I go to the game. After dinner at White Spot on the night of the game, Steven and I headed downtown to GM Place. After parking at an overpriced lot, we walked over to the arena and tried to find a way inside. After walking around basically the whole building, we had still not found a wheelchair entrance (Steven had recently started using a wheelchair). We came to the outside entrance to the Canucks merchandise store and asked the man at the door if he knew of a wheelchair entrance to the building. He asked me where my tickets were. I showed him and he suggested going through gate 16. For some reason he decided to accompany us there. He asked about the tickets and I showed him where we were sitting. He replied that our tickets were not in a wheelchair zone. I said that was okay as Steven could walk with my support.

This is where things got interesting. The man asked us to wait while he got his supervisor on the phone, and while he was waiting for her to come and talk to us we got to telling him the story of how we got the tickets, finishing with the part about how coincidently the game happened to fall on Steven’s birthday. Once they found that out they were determined to get us a better set of seats.

We sat there for awhile while 3 members of the Canucks host team looked for seats for us. Eventually we were asked to follow them down a corridor, through a door, and into the bottom of GM Place. We got to there area where the zambonis were parked just in time to see the referees go running out onto the ice. It turns out they put us in some of the best seats in the whole place. We were at the glass, right behind the Canucks goalie, Roberto Luongo. By some chance of fate, the people who usually sit in the best seats in all of GM Place could not make it to the game on the night where Steven happened to be in town, which also happened to be his birthday. I’m not religious, but if that is not a miracle then I don’t know what is. Oh, and the game, the Canucks kicked butt. Pucks, sticks and bodies smashed the glass in front of us, Fin the mascot was standing beside us on numerous occasions, and hats flew over our heads after Alex Burrows scored his third goal of the game, completing his hat trick. The Canucks ended up winning 7-3.

The best part is that it couldn’t have happened to a better guy. Steven is an individual who is so friendly and accepting of everyone he meets and his positive attitude is contagious. He is a person that welcomes new people into his life without hesitation. I know because I experienced it first hand. He is a great guy, who got a great birthday present, and I am so grateful that things came together for him to make this night a reality. Someone once said “Dream no small dreams for they have no part to move the hearts of men”. Consider my heart moved.

I would like to thank everyone who made this experience possible for Steven: Michael Kendrick, Janet Klees, Henry from Kindale Society, Gary from North Okanagan Community Living, Joanne and Julie from Kindale, and Steven’s mother, Joan.

Inukshuks at the Olympics

If you’re in Vancouver you’ll notice the Inukshuk symbol that was chosen from thousands of entries to represent the Olympics in British Columbia.   This design was created by one our friends, Elena Rivera MacGregor, who is a participant in a class that Susan and I have been taking.   Elena is, we believe, pretty much one of the faster thinkers we’ve ever met and it’s a gift to have her with us.  

Inukshuks are one of the oldest forms of art in the world, and are situated throughout the Arctic and into Greenland – they served many purposes, to direct hunters, to mark food caches and also as a kind of spiritual and tribal marker.   One of the things we like about them is the idea that some authors talk about, that an Inukshuk was made to simply break the loneliness of the isolation of what seemed to be an endless landscape of ice and snow, and that travellers would build Inukshuks at intervals so that, no matter where they were going, they would feel they were seeing a friend on the horizon.  

Did you know that the Olympics organizers have tried to ensure the participation of folks with disabilities in all kinds of roles.   I ran into a friend the other day who was just coming from his orientation, with all kinds of great shirts and a blue Olympics coat.   He was very proud to participate.   You can find out more at the 2010 Legacies Now site. 

From Wikipedia:

The word inuksuk means “something which acts for or performs the function of a person.” The word comes from the morphemes inuk (“person”) and -suk (“ersatz” or “substitute”). It is pronounced inutsuk in Nunavik and the southern part of Baffin Island (see Inuit phonology for the linguistic reasons). In many of the central Nunavut dialects, it has the etymologically related name inuksugaq (plural: inuksugait).

Despite the predominant English spelling as inukshuk, both the Government of Nunavut ^[9] and the Government of Canada through Indian and Northern Affairs Canada ^[10] are promoting the Inuit preferred spelling inuksuk.

A structure similar to an inuksuk but meant to represent a human figure, called an inunnguaq (ᐃᓄᙳᐊᖅ, “imitation of a person”, plural inunnguat), has become widely familiar to non-Inuit. However, it is not the most common type of inuksuk and is distinguished from inuksuit in general.

Valentines!

who do you give valentines to?  who might you give a valentine to?  here’s your chance!   February 14th!!!

Seth Godin: thinking about linchpins in our lives

From Seth Godin comes this terrific idea, on his blog.   ”Many months ago, I asked my readers to send me pictures of people who mattered, who made a difference–people they couldn’t live without. The result of that shout out is now published on the inside cover of my new book. …Celebrate the linchpins. We need more of them.”   Seth’s idea has been so popular, with people wanting to pay homage to people who’ve made a difference to their lives, that he’s created a new site for just this purpose:  linchpin   Check it out, upload a picture of someone who is a linchpin for you, see if you find yourself there…

I just uploaded a picture; see if you can find it

As we travel around the province and talk to groups about who’s important in their lives and why we’re thinking more and more of the kinds of roles that people have in our lives.    While we’re focusing on what we can learn from folks with disabilities but with an ongoing and increasing awareness that, in fact, people with disabilities might be the leaders in this field of connections and growing leverage through love…   they and their families have been figuring out how to connect with their neighbourhoods for 50 years, knowing that the more connections they grow, the less likely a return to a history of isolation and institutionalisation is.  And the more connections, self-advocates with disabilities tell us, the more likely that they’ll find jobs that speak to their passion, and expand their range of interests and possibilities…

for a very cool “linchpin manifesto” that you can print out go here

Welcome to the first e-newsletter of 2010 for 101 Ways to Make Friends

We hope that all of you have had a great holiday season and are looking forward to 2010.   We’ve certainly got some plans and are working on a couple of new workshops around community based instructional strategies and positive programming, as well as some new materials (articles, books and DVDs).   We hope to continue meeting folks all around the province through the coming year!   One of the gifts that we’re certain of has been the opportunity to meet so many wonderful people, doing so many great things, all around the province, and to be welcomed in ways that we all want to promote!   Thanks!

Important: are you working on a project related to personal support networks or do you know of someone working on a project?

John McKnight has been a seminal force in BC's development of supports for personal support networks, circles of friends and asset based thinking. Is your organization or are you involved in something based on his ideas? Let us know! you might also want to see the excellent podcast of John McKnight and Peter Block at www.tyze.com!

We are currently working on a provincial database of folks who are working in the area of personal support networks.    This is exciting for a few reasons – it gives us the hope of sharing information, it will let us know what’s going on around the province, and it might lead to opportunities to get together and do new things.   If we don’t know about a project that you’re working on, or if you know of great work being done in a community that has incorporated folks with disabilities to create networks with them, please let us know so that we can include you in the initial draft.    email psn@spectrumsociety.org

Is your New Year’s Resolution to Read More?

Some of us who have been reading Peter Block’s Community: Structures for Belonging are feeling like we’d like to get together and talk about his ideas…  or about other ideas around building community that we’re reading about.   If you’d like to join us for a monthly group and talk about where we might meet and what we’d read and talk about it, let us know: psn@spectrumsociety.org     This offer is open to anyone at all who is interested in this conversation.

Jules’ site of the month: story-telling

This month Jules has been looking at “The Moth – Live Storytelling” – it seems like in many of the conversations we’re been having, people are talking about storytelling – who holds your story?  how do you tell it?  what is your story?  what if you don’t have a story?  “The Moth” is a great site to take the conversation further.

welcome to the December 101 Friends Newsletter

Thanks to Shirlane Colban for this wonderful Santa-Frog! www.shirlanecolban.com

Hello friends!   I’ve just come back from walking the dog around the neighbourhood and already people have got their holiday lights twinkling and some of them have Christmas trees in the window – and, as I write this, it’s not even December yet!   Eek!

Different folks have different holiday traditions and all of them are important to us and to the networks of support; they are ways to bring us together, again and again, year after year, and deepen our connectedness by repeated experiences of something that is the same and yet, because we are always changing, different.   Last week we went to a “whimsical gift exchange” that, although it’s only a couple of years old, we’ve come to look forward to.   People bring things that they no longer want (you’re told not to buy anything for the purpose), wrapped up nicely, and we take turns choosing  a mystery gift and unwrapping it.   People getting gifts later in the game can go around and take someone else’s gift up to three times.   If someone takes your gift, you can choose a new one.    You might end up with Joanne’s baking (amazing) or this very odd set of picnic plate holders that turned up last year and then came back again this year like a bad penny.   What fun!   If we’re lucky those picnic plate holders will turn up again. 

In a couple of weeks we’ll be attending the Universal Gospel Choir, which is a tradition for many folks I know, but which I have yet to make it to.   Two of the most interesting and insightful people I know, Chris Horrocks and Avril Orloff, sing in the choir…   so not only are they amazing people to work with in any sense, but they apparently sing.   Wonderfully.   We are all layers and layers of interests and passions and it takes years to uncover all the bits…   This year thanks to a great friend we have tickets and are going as a small gang of new and old friends.   The thing that will probably happen there is that, given it’s at the Jewish Community Centre, they’ll light the menorah.    Since we were married, our family has done this every year and I’ve come to love the 8 days of Hanukah candles, each evening at dusk, the room getting brighter and brighter and my partner telling stories about the Macabees…    He and our son just got back from Connecticut where they celebrated a second (American) thanksgiving.   Some years, when they don’t go, we host a second Thanksgiving at our house for our American friends and anyone who likes turkey!   (Turkey is the reason I can’t be a vegetarian!)   Our friend Judy, known to many of you, has taught us all to barbecue turkey and it doesn’t matter how cold it is or how snowy many folks from our agency now spend their holidays outside basting and poking around over the barbecue!   Our family’s variation of this is “Jerk Turkey,” sort of  a Caribbean version of the holidays.  

So, there’s a lot more going on at this time of the year, as we traditionally have more time to spend together and more need to rely on each other, than merely shopping.   For many of us shopping is the least of it.   What’s a holiday tradition at your home or in your family?   We’d love to hear from you.  

On another note, check out www.bcacl.org for information on the recent changes to the makeup of the board of CLBC and information on how to make your views about these changes known to government.    We’ve had some amazing meetings with groups of self-advocates and got to hear lots about how people are directing their own lives and resources and making great inroads into taking their place in their communities.    Our own letter expressing our belief that folks with disabilities and their families have the capacity to give valid and thoughtful input into the direction of their services will be sent out today.  

From Susan and Aaron, and from everyone affiliated with our 101 Friends Personal Support Network project, we wish you all good things in the coming year and many, many connections with friends new and old. 

Feel free to forward this to friends or others who might be interested.   You can subscribe to the newsletter on our website www.spectrumsociety.org or see it as a blog at http://101friends.wordpress.com/  Click on any heading to read the full article.  Feel free to forward this to those you think might be interested.   Our other e-publication is also a monthly newsletter that documents the work of our agency, Spectrum Society.   You can find out more about our Personal Support Networks project, including our publications, at our site www.101friends.ca   You can also subscribe to our 101friends newsletter from this site.  If for some reason you’ve decided you don’t want to receive these newsletters, unsubscribe at the bottom of the email you were sent.   To subscribe to our agency’s newsletter, Spectrum Society In The Community, go to our main website and click on subscribe in the top right corner: you will have a choice of subscribing to this newsletter or the agency one.

“We were born to unite with our fellow men, and to join in community with the human race.” Cicero

Facebook and YOU

Facebook has quickly become one of the most popular forms of social networking – staying in touch with people you see all the time, or people you have lost contact with, or playing games…    Our agency, Spectrum Society, recently started a Facebook Fan Page and within a month we had more than 150 fans.   You can visit us here, whether you’re on Facebook or not.   One of our favourite Facebook sites is “StartWithHi” – the CLBC campaign of ads, videos and discussions about folks being included in their communities.    Another is the Asperger’s Awareness Page which features almost nightly conversations by self-advocates and families. 

Recently one of our young friends, an aspiring Chef, practising for an exam that might lead to a scholarship in an integrated Chef’s college, published a photo of something he’d cooked and I watched as 50 people within a couple of hours sent messages of support (and hunger!).    This month’s poll is about Facebook – how do you use it and what do you like (or dislike) about it.   You can vote as many times as you like.

 

“If you have come to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.”  Aboriginal activists group, Queensland, 1970s.   Often attributed to Lila Watson, who has said she was not comfortable with something not born out of a collective process – the attribution here is the one she accepts.

 

Workshop news – Edenvale Retreat Self-Advocates Rock!

We had a great time at the 10th Annual Self Advocacy Leadership Institute at Edenvale, making some new friends and enjoying visiting with some old friends and some folks who we have met over our travels during the last couple of years.    One of the things that folks told us there is how much they look forward to coming each year and seeing people they’ve met, learning new skills, sharing information and ideas and growing stronger.   For only $170 per person for the weekend, inclusive, what a great deal!    Way to go, SelfAdvocateNet.com, Gregg, Arlene and Cam and whoever else is involved in putting all of this together!  

Each of our workshops is different, depending on who is there.   In this one we were delighted to have some folks who had attended workshops we had given in other areas, who had gone off and thought about the conversations we like to have with people, and had new ideas to share.   The other thing that is always interesting is how Self-Advocates support and share with each other, in different ways than they do as part of a larger group.    Definately there’s good reasons to support the Edenvale Retreat. 

We have some funding still available through CLBC to do more workshops until about March.   We hope to be in Kamloops in January, and do a couple of days there, but if you’d like to host a workshop for your group, agency or even a gang you put together for the purpose of looking at what you might do diffferently, let us know.   email psn@spectrumsociety.org

At every workshop we do, we try to gather feedback on what people want to focus on and how it could be best presented.   Here’s some feedback from a recent workshop:  “2 full days next time, with maybe a day in between.”  “[liked] Information presented, ideas that have come about.”  “Shared experiences.”  “Balance of presented info and useful groupwork.”  “Useful information and dialogue.”  “Content was relevant…”  “The comfort of interaction, relevant material, global picture.”  “Inspiration, vision, re-energizing.”

“Whether community is seen as a place, a network of caring people, or a community association where people gather around areas of common interest, hospitality is the ingredient that creates true community.    We have learned from New Story approaches and from our own family and friends that community and hospitality are essential ingredients to quality of life.”   John Lord, Pathways to Inclusion: Building a New Story with People and Communities.

urgent – Personal Support Network Facilitators contact info

If you are in British Columbia and working on a project, or if your job has shifted in some way to include the creation, expansion or sustaining of personal support networks we’d appreciate your contact information for possible inclusion in an upcoming listing.   We’d also like to know about community inclusion outside of the disabilities sector.   Please email psn@spectrumsociety.org

“Your entire life journey ultimately consists of the step you are taking at this moment. There is always only this one step, and so you give it your fullest attention.”  Eckhart Tolle 

welcome to the november 101 friends e-newsletter!

Well, we had a great time in Grand Forks with a group that included a self-advocate, some students from Selkirk College, their professor, a city councilman, some dedicated Personal Support Networkers and family members.    We could have easily been convinced to stay another day… or six.    Next month, the Edenvale Retreat, the largest gathering of self-advocates in the province (we’re feeling so honoured to have been included) and Kamloops, where we’ll be meeting with folks from the Community Council, self-advocates and family members.  

One of the things we really like to talk about with groups is the leadership that has grown out of British Columbia and created so many innovations that have spread around the country: PLAN, Vela Microboard Association, Individualised Funding, People First…  when we speak in other places, people have an almost mythic sense of what B.C. has accomplished.   Often they know more than many local folks about what we’re known for.   Many of these movements have been initiated by people who should be celebrated – Al Etmanski, Vickie Cammack, Barb Goode, Linda Perry, Gordon Fletcher, Brian Salisbury, Jule Hopkins, Pat Mirenda, Mildred DeHaan, David and Faye Weatherow…   that’s absolutely not a complete list, but it’s amazing that so many great thinkers and advocates have gathered in our province and been able to make themselves heard and create changes that have affected so many.   There’s a book in it all and, it seems to us importantly, there’s a history to the community living movement.  

Feel free to forward this to friends or others who might be interested.   If for some reason you’ve decided you don’t want to receive these newsletters, unsubscribe at the bottom of the email you were sent.   To subscribe to our agency’s newsletter, Spectrum Society In The Community, go to our main website and click on subscribe in the top right corner: you will have a choice of subscribing to this newsletter or the agency one.  

“I have lost friends, some by death … others by sheer inability to cross the street.”   Virginia Woolf

Reciprocity

One of the people we met in Grand Forks this month was talking about activities in which folks take turns deciding what they’re going to do together, and even if it’s not one’s favourite thing, it’s an opportunity to demonstrate reciprocity just to show up and give something that someone else likes a try when it’s their turn to lead the way.   It was such a simple and elegantly stated thought…  

In an early issue we gave Susan’s banana bread recipe as a way of quite easily making a gift for someone and at least some folks made and the idea of reciprocity was one of the first conversations that came up when we began focusing on this work.  Last month we met a family who wondered what more their daughter could offer – what were the other opportunities she might have to reciprocate.    We were moved and educated by others in the room who also knew her and talked about things they found special – the things about her that they found to be “gifts” – her ready, huge smile, her glorious hair, her very presence…   reasons they wanted to spend time with her and were glad to see her when they did.   She might well be able to take on other roles that were recipricol, and that’s one great conversation, but she is also just fine just the way she is, and that’s another great conversation.   A gift.   As are we all…   and that constant realization is one of the many reasons that some of us do this work.  

In our last issue we polled readers about reciprocity:

Reciprocity is the act of giving back something, to friends, family and community. How do you do that?

I make things for people I care about 14%

I tell people how I feel about them 14%

I do things for people 43%

I like to surprise people who have done things for me! 29%

You can still participate in this poll by clicking here to add your thoughts.

“be patient to all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”  Ranier Maria Rilke, Letters To A Young Poet

a great idea: a personalised newsletter just for someone you care about

Part of the fun of having a book called “101 ways to make friends” is that people are always trying to come up with the 102nd, 103rd, 104th idea…   it’s really exciting with self-advocates in workshops (we’ve gotten up to 118 !).   But the truth is it’s a world of infinite ideas and our point was just to share some of what we’d learned from folks we’d talked to about relationships because sometimes each and every one of us has a failure of imagination or gets stuck.   It’s been interesting to hear how audiences we hadn’t intended have used our book – immigrants, students away from home for the first time, kids in school, teachers in classrooms.    Each month we hear great ideas that we hadn’t thought of. 

“I want to thank all of the folks responsible for making the 101 Friends Newsletter work.  Three weeks ago I fired off a copy of it to Cheryl’s home (a group home she shares with 4 other folks) and Krysten, the head Co-ordinator there said that the response from everyone was very positive,” writes Edward Fontaine.

Edward is one of our long-time friends whose dedication to this field and all the nuances of authentic, heart-felt supports to folks with disabilities has been evident over a long career; as with many of us in this field, he has a family member with a disability, his sister Cheryl, living in a group home in Ontario.   Edward for some time has lived in British Columbia and was inspired to create his own personalised newsletter for Cheryl: “I enjoyed the 101 Friends newsletter so much, I came to the conclusion that I could make it a point of staying in touch with Cheryl on a much more frequent basis, and do so in fun ways.  The newsletter I made and sent this evening is a first step.”

Edward’s newsletter is in Word format and is a combination of journal, update and travelogue, telling Cheryl and those around her about his life and events around the city that he’s been involved in.   One of the things I like about it (aside from the fact that he’s an excellent writer) is that as well as including lots of photos, there are links embedded in the newsletter so that Cheryl and those who support her can read a story about what he did, see a photo of him there, and then click on a link that leads to more information about various things – Granville Island, the Fraser River, the Writer’s Festival.  

It’s also really clear throughout that the newsletter is for Cheryl – others might share it if she wants to do that, but it’s personalized and designed for interaction, ”…here it is Sis, the first of many newsletters from your brother in Vancouver, British Columbia.  I have intentionally gone with lots of pictures and will keep the writing to a minimum; my hope is to give you snapshots of life out here from the view of my eyes.  Later, if you have particular interests, or something catches your fancy, I will gladly go into greater detail.”   If Cheryl expresses an interest through gesture, her supports will help her ask for more pictures of something.   Edward is now on his second issue and the response has been great, from Cheryl and the folks in her home. 

Great idea, Edward!   thanks for sharing it.

the hope lady: Wendy Edey

Well what a wonderful morning…  it started off as an ordinary “good” morning – not exceptional… a little cold and rainy, a little too much to do, friends off for an ultrasound that i was excited about, a weekend away with the one I love looming on the horizon, a day of too many meetings about too many different things just an hour away…  and then someone sent me a notice about a workshop I really couldn’t get to, unless I cancel my weekend away (not), and I ended up on the blog of “the hope lady” thinking yeah yeah yeah blah blah blah…  someone else who wants to inspire us (part of me was thinking that) and more emails started flying in and my own hope was diminishing quickly…   So I was not feeling really hopeful.   I mean, she’s from edmonton.  I’ve been to edmonton.  and then I started reading and got immersed…  I luxuriated…  I went from month to month at random, laughing, hoping, yearning.   I started thinking maybe I could miss the weekend away… maybe, instead of going out for an amazing dinner in seattle, we could go spend the day at Sunnyhill Children’s Hospital and listen to Wendy Edey?  

This is a great example from her blog, which is full of great stories, and will give you a sense of where she’s coming from:

CALLING ON HOPE

Troubled people call on hope,
Thinking nothing short of magic can help them now.

They say: ”I am the sum of my experience.”
Hope says: ”Yes, that plus your hopes for the future.”

They say: ”What if I don’t have any hopes for the future?”
Hope says: ”Then we’ll find some.”

They say: ”Where will we find them if no hopes are there?”
Hope says: “We’ll find them in your past experience added to the past experience of others, added to the future you haven’t explored yet.”

”Past experience has tied you in knots,” says Hope. ”Hold on to me as we work at the loosening.”
Then they, with surprising frequency, say: ”Okay.”
And before they have time to think about it, they are working the knots, making room for hope to perform the magic.

Visit Wendy Edey’s Hope Lady blog here. 

“From Relief Measures to Reduction Strategies: poverty and people with disabilities.”

We love talking about recipricol relationships with folks with disabilities and how things can and do work around the province, but we’re also very aware it’s one of many necessary conversations.   Perhaps one of the most important is poverty and disability, as one of our good friends reminded me the other day.   Click through for more information about an upcoming workshop hosted by BCACL…

BCACL has organized, “From Relief Measures to Reduction Strategies: poverty and people with disabilities.” 2 days of collaborative exploration to address profound poverty faced by people with intellectual disabilities. november 16 – 17, 8:30 – 5 p.m., Vancouver Public Library, Alice MacKay room, 350 West Georgia, Vancouver. to register: http://www.bcacl.org/documents/Events/2009/Poverty_Forum_Flyer_RegForm.pdf

contact Cindy Chapman for more information cchapman@bcacl.org

NurtureShock by Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman

I’m very excited about this new book about parenting and support strategies, which looks at issues of praise and performance, as well as grounding factors such as getting enough sleep and watching t.v. in relation to more active pursuits. Bronson and Merryman have looked at overwhelming research and meta-studies around contemporary parenting and teaching (based on ideas around self-esteem which came out of research in the 80’s) and want us to revisit what we think we know about how to support those we care about. We are not born knowing how to parent, suppor and teach (“nurture shock” is a term used to describe parents who find, after the birth of a child, that a whole array of skills have not instinctively dropped into their brains). Media reports are simplifying their ideas, unfortunately, as being just about over-praising children but that’s only one part of a whole other holistic picture about better ways to provide specific praise and constructive feedback, and how to re-think teaching strategies. A short video is found here, but it’s really the whole book that’s important. Bronson talks very honestly about a parent’s role as a “praise-junkie” and how difficult it’s been for him to change his ways, and how many of us are invested in attributing “good performance” to our kids and those we support to address our own self-esteem issues. A fascinating read (or listen, I’ve got it as an audio-book).

The NurtureShock website can be found here.