Written by Olga Bednarski, August 2026 | Liverpool I used to experience speaking as if I were sitting an examination. Every conversation had a predetermined outcome, standard, and expectation. Every phone call was a test. Every introduction, question, or social interaction was an opportunity to either succeed or fail.The strange thing was that the examination […]
Tau ji: How are you, beta? Shreya: Fine. How are you? So difficult to connect to India… T: Never mind. At least I can see you, sitting there in America! What more could I ask for? Silence. T: So, how are you, beta? And your job? S: Fine. Our company has paid for our shots. […]
Many PWS practice self-help ideas haphazardly, randomly and sporadically. I did that myself at one time. And that is one reason we fail. Having a systematic plan—and sticking to it—is essential. A practice ladder can be the first step towards success. Start at the bottom, at your Comfort Level, and gradually work your way up. […]
It was a beautiful cloudy ⛅ Sunday morning. And cubbon park 🌲🌳🌴 was absolutely beaming in bright 🔆✨ green 🟢!!!! Today, we had a *new member* of bangalore shg, *Somya*, joining us. He is from orissa. And moved to bangalore a few months back. We began with a few physical exercises.And then sat for a […]
A professor totally confused about the recent events..
Together for Mental Wellness Building a Community of Hope, Support, and Emotional Well-Being In today’s fast-paced world, stress, anxiety, depression, overthinking, loneliness, and other mental health challenges have become an unavoidable part of everyday life. At TISA – Together for Mental Wellness, we believe that mental well-being is just as important as physical health, and […]
Feedback from a participant TISA is offering a 10-week online course (on rolling basis) for PWS (People Who Stammer) who: The course will be facilitated by: The course will use the Google Classroom (MOOC-style) interface. Both Hindi and English will be used. What will participants do? This is not a passive “watch-and-listen” course. Participants will actively engage in: You […]
Dear Friends, For the last 7–8 years, TISA has enjoyed an open and organic culture. Many Self-Help Groups (SHGs) came into existence, and that phase served us well. We are now entering a new phase—one of consolidation and quality improvement. As part of this process, I have been reviewing all SHGs closely, and I have […]
I want to sincerely thank the Women Who Stammer (WWS) who came forward and shared difficult experiences they have faced within the The Indian Stammering Association community over the years. Instead of circulating the original PDF document, I am sharing selected summaries and my own understanding of the issue. I felt this was necessary because […]
Case Study: “Ravi’s Turning Point” Part 1. Ravi, a 24-year-old graduate, had struggled with Stuttering since childhood. In school he managed, but in college and job interviews his speech blocks became more noticeable. After a few failed interviews, he began avoiding conversations, stopped meeting friends, and refused to answer phone calls. He would often say, […]
I was reading a paper on how children develop gender identity (“I dont want to play with dolls; I like trucks”). A certain line caught my attention. It seems, that a very young child (1-2 yo) may not have any gender identity, but by 3, it begins to identify itself as a “boy” or a […]
There was a man—Jiwan Das—full of life.One day he ordered a shirt on Amazon, and somehow his name got changed to Jivan Das in the cloud. India is full of languages and dialects. An Amazon employee in India changed the name to Jiban Dash. A few days later, another employee dictated the same name to […]
(Ed. Pariah dog: an ownerless, half-wild mongrel common around Asian villages, especially in India.) After the brisk morning walk, as I turned into my lane, I saw her sitting at her favorite spot. She was wagging her tail, her mouth with a little drool, and half open- as if smiling. Her face had that funny […]
Many years ago, when I was a wide-eyed social worker (still “wet behind the ears”), I met a gender expert. She said, rather casually, “Every man is potentially a rapist.” I was both shocked and impressed—being a man myself. I knew that such men did exist in our world, and perhaps she was pointing to […]
You influence everything but control nothing. Having practiced and shared (“taught”) techniques for a long time, let me offer some thoughts. Many PWS have an unconscious resistance to “techniques”: What! I have to use artificial tricks just to say my name now? And yes, it is a lot of “work”—not just drudgery, but the need […]
These are notes to myself: I will revisit these before I launch -God Willing! – TOPG 3.0 or any group activity for that matter. We need to have a long warm-up or run-up before ANY event. Because people need time to make up their minds and the organizers also need time to screen, select, and […]
Slash and Burn is another name for Jhum cultivation which is prevalent in some countries. Trees are burned and cleared- cropping is done for some years. When the ground fertility is gone, a new patch is cleared- and the cycle goes on. This is what was happening at the edge of an ancient forest. One […]
This Yamuna valley where I live, roughly stretches a hundred kilometers, between Paonta Sahib and Dehradun, in the Shivaliks. Here, Tons River joins Yamuna, as they both come tumbling out of the mountains, into the Terai. From Pathans, to Mughals, to Maratha, and finally to British – they all came, ruled this region and eventually […]
Jaipur Communication Workshop Report 22-24 Sept 2023 This is a brief narrative report about what was accomplished in the 3-day TISA workshop. It was organized by the Jaipur Self-Help group, very efficiently and in a cost-effective manner. About thirty participants (three women) took part in it; one participant joined with both parents and another, with […]
The fact is- it was a picnic, a get-together, which we gave a fanciful name of “mini-workshop” ☺️ – and to prove the point we did have a little (but serious) discussion. So before we had a boat ride and a picnic lunch under the trees in the vast sprawling grounds of Patna Zoo, we […]