Ajmer SHG: First SHG Report

Ajmer 1st Shg meeting report:
Members
1:Pawan
2:Murlidhr
3:Gaurav

Meeting started 10:00
Location :  Anasagar lake , Ajmer

Starting with introduction then yoga and meditation.
Speech on general topics like politics by Murlidhr , Ajmer tourism by Pawan and Indian history by me (Gaurav).. then story making by loud speaking in public, this activity was very interesting one because we had choosen a public place so kids and public got gathered and all were listening story with great interest and enjoying with there local food by vender..
Then we had photo session at beautiful location of Anasagar lake.
Finally we dealt with public , telling and asking them about stammering, very interesting it was .. people listened with great interest and replied us. They all took it positively.. we talked with 9-10 peoples there..

For joining SHG meetings in Ajmer, contact:
Gaurav : 09887245139
Pawan : 08104053393
Murlidhar : 09001868105

Communication Workshop Report by Delhi SHG

If you missed Delhi SHG Communication Workshop, Don't Worry, You can get almost 60% of the workshop just by reading this report. You would have never read a meeting report like this one :) 

Jaipur SHG meets at central park

A meeting was conducted of Jaipur SHG on Sunday 5 January. Five members managed to attend the meeting and it was a good percentage as there are only 7 PWS who know about the SHG in Jaipur .

The meeting started with introduction , where Ravikant , Ravi , Pramendra , Chandan and Siddharth introduced themselves and shared their thoughts about stammering .
Most of them had positive thoughts but Chandan also focused on negative feeling associated with stammering and thus a debate started which continued till the end of the meeting .Pramendra and Ravikant managed to take some notes about the some points they found useful in the meeting .
In between the debate , the members put in some activities to serve the purpose of the meeting . The activities were round robin and singing .Round robin was accompanied with slow speech and voluntary stuttering and was done near the jogging path so that people passing from there can hear us .
Meeting was concluded with greetings and hope of meeting rather regularly . Jaipur SHG has grown more than the last year , may it keep growing .

By: Siddarth Sharma

Minutes of the meeting - Seven Islands SHG

Venue: Five Gardens, Wadala

Time: 6 May, 2012 from 3.00 to 6.00 PM

Attendees: Shyam, Amey, Ravindra, Laukik, Gaurav, Gulshan (New member) and Benett

Regrets: Ritesh, Romi, Mustafa

Activities and Discussions:

1. We started off the meeting with Breathing exercises. We focused on the based principles of breathing as taught in Brahmavidya. Next we performed 2 cycles of Pranayam. 

Before we proceeded to the next task, we made it clear that all feedback given needs to be taken in a positive way inorder to improve our speech.

2. Gaurav shared the slow reading technique that he uses in daily Skype calls with the group. We all then practised a round of passage reading slowly with this technique. 

3. Next we did a round of Tongue Twisters

4.  Inorder to lighten the mood, we played Dumb Charades. The objective was to help people take centre stage, make eye contact with the group and communicate non verbally. 

Himachal SHG meet

Next Himachal SHG meet is at Chamba. Below are the details. Do drop in if you nearby.

Bangalore SHG Meeting report - 25th March 2012

Hi All,

This time the meeting started bit late at 10.30 AM as we were expecting some more participants, strength was less as 5 of them were attending communication workshop in Chennai. Also we were expecting 2 more new joinees but they were not able to make it.


We started off with slow reading practice and general introduction about our family.


Later there was a prepared speech by Sairam, who told us a very inspiring story about American actor Christopher Reeve who played the Superman character in Superman series films in 1970’s. Reeve felled from horse while jumping over fence and sustained a cervical spinal injury that paralyzed him from the neck down.  After considering his situation, believing that not only would he never walk again, but that he might never move a body part again, Reeve considered suicide. Great support from his wife made him to reconsider the decision and develop a positive approach towards life. Reeve was elected Chairman of the American Paralysis Association and Vice Chairman of the National Organization on Disability. He co-founded the Reeve-Irvine Research Center, which is now one of the leading spinal cord research centers in the world. He created the Christopher Reeve Foundation (currently known as the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation) to speed up research through funding, and to use grants to improve the quality of the lives of people with disabilities. The Foundation to date has given more than $65 million for research, and more than $8.5 million in quality-of-life grants.


Then we had a group discussion on “ Is caste based reservation is necessary in Education system”. We shared our views, exchanged our thoughts and discussed about its drawbacks for around 30 Min.


We concluded the session by getting determined to practice slow reading /slow speaking for at least 30 Min everyday and to get involved in any hobbies so that our mental stress gets reduced.


Also there was a suggestion from Jittu that we can practice yoga/breathing exercise for 10 mins in every meeting. This suggestion will be taken up in the next meeting.


Attendees : Sairam, Chandrashekar & Jittu. 


Written by : Chandra kumar.

A New Dawn in SHG Bangalore: 26th Feb

Yup..It did happened after a lot of email exchanges and many phone calls. Thks to Dinesh for organizing it.


Place:
Paradygmlaw Coaching Center
2nd Floor, 322/ 2 Hosur Main Road,
Above RNS JCB/ Hedege Securites
Adjacent to Wipro Parking Bay, Madiwala
[Landmark - On the same side as the Wipro office, there is a left lane just before you hit the flyover. The first building when you take that left lane]
Time: 1000 to 1300 hrs


We a group of 12 met at the place mentioned above (organized by Mr. Dinesh Chauhan). He took the responsibility in organizing the event and I along with Sudheendran & Alok reached there. The agenda of the meeting was Introduction, success story on Stammering by Tajeshwani (HR by profession) and next SHG meeting points.
The introduction of each member involved the following points:
- Name
- Native and How many yrs. in Bangalore
- Profession
- The techniques used for stammering


Sudhee being the oldest and also one of the experienced members spoke his heart out on the techniques he followed and told on some point of time each technique has helped him in some way or other. He told people stammer, "When they try not to stammer" i.e. When a person feels that he/she should not stammer at this word/situation, he/she is making himself/herself more conscious of the situation and the fear grips & hence the stammering. He also told why he stopped attending or conducting the SHG meetings.


This followed by other member confession that "He tried to avoid responsibilities so that he can talk less. This resulted him not growing properly in his profession". One of other member told that his boss used to stammer but now he talks smoothly. His boss asked him to go for regular Jogging and Meditation. Also, he is a tech lead in one of the IT Major but as per him; only few of his team members knows about the problem. He usually have problem while speaking over the phone. Then, a young engineering guy spoke how he got fed up in giving interview again & again. He shared how disheartened he has become on unable to clear the interviews of top notch companies. There was a rude remark given by one of the HR to him "If you are a stammer why you have done engineering". (May not be exact words but kind of like that only). This has discouraged him more. His vision is to open his own business instead of giving interview.


Here is the song sung by Karthik: "Karthik Unplugged"
(As per I and Sudhee remember; He never told that he sings)

The intro was followed by success story by "Tejaswini". She shared her story how "Brahmavidya" has helped her to overcome her problem. The video quality was not good and hence I cannot upload it.  She is an Ex-stammerer. She was explaining us how she got over stammering. It was a very inspirational speech. She explained us how EFT and Brahmavidhya helped her from getting over stammering. She is still practicing Brahmavidhya and  EFT on daily basis EVEN TODAY which is much appreciable. She has not left the habit of practicing which shows her commitment and sincerity towards her Goals.


This was followed by Dinesh vision for SHG and thoughts.
- Intro for 1-2 weeks
- Then, Ice breaker sessions 


Check the pics below for few more information.

1. What benefits do we gain from SHG meetings?
- Gives us space to talk - no fear of failure
- Builds confidence as we speak in front of group
- Sharing of different techniques
- Self-realization of one's own mistakes and weak areas
- Emotional relief - as we share.. keeps as calm
- Can be used as a stepping stone to graduate to Toast Masters..


2. Why do we avoid SHG meetings?  
- No time - Because of work and family 
- No returns
- Afraid to face public
- I know everything attitude
- No scope for improvement


For the point 1, No time - Because of work and family : Here Dinesh explained us that each one's priority is first Family and then work. All rest comes only next But here he beautifully explained how a good speech can enhance a person's involvement in family and workplace multifolded. The growth for all areas in life is in effective Communication. 


For the next week, as an agenda, every person needs to come up with an icebreaker speech. Everyone was handed over a hard copy of what an icebreaker speech is and we concluded there.


The event ended by 1PM sharp. The session was enriching and in some instances we laughed to the core. Overall, every person enjoyed the session and it was fun filled activity.


Group Pic :) (Myself Missing)

Members:
Dinesh, Sairam, Anbu, Alok, Biju, Murli, Manoj, Sudheendran, Arvind, Karhik,  Chandhan


Writeup By:
Karthik, Tanoy


Video and Pics By:
Tanoy

Ahmedabad SHG Report

Vijay, Pinakin, Jagdeep and myself (Abhijeet) met near Gota circle at Vodafone tower on Sunday for second meet of Ahmedabad SHG. Vijay and Jagdeep were coming for first time. We started with our introduction and shared many experiences about stammering. Actually Vijay came with idea of watching movie “THE KINGS SPEECH”. He also brought all projector and necessary things to watch the movie but due to unavailability of room we were not able to enjoy it.
We decided two goals for this week.
1.We have to speak very slowly, smoothly and deliberately.
2.We have to do meditation every morning daily.
I have been assigned job to search for the room where we can meet regularly on every Sunday and can do our regular activities. And one most amazing experience for our meeting was that we talked with Mr. Windstorm through phone. Windstorm was not able to come to Ahmedabad because of some reasons. He introduced himself to all the TISA members and we were also happy to talk with him.

CHANDIGARH SHG MEET # 11 REPORT

Ishan, Dhruv, Varun and myself ( JP ) met at sector 33 park yesterday for the 11th meet of Chandigarh SHG! Ishan and myself were the first ones to reach the venue and since we had sometime before others joined, we started discussing a few things and i recorded Ishan's video while he was talking to me! Soon others joined and we started with laughter session (this is a good way to start with positive energy and happy faces :-). Next we did 15 minute meditation! After that we had a round of introductions where we had to introduce ourselves and at the end had to use a randomly selected sentence from a pool and fill in the blanks! Some of the sentences that came out were -
1. If I could throw caution to the winds and really risk, I would. . . . .
2. I like to imagine I'm the cartoon character _____________ because . . . . .
3. School for me was(is) ________________

After that I introduced pausing which all of us were aware but don't use! Pausing is a wonderful tool to get your breathing right and more importantly gives you time to plan and organize your thoughts. So we did an exercise of question answers where anyone of us could ask a question to anyone else and the other person would have to eat one piece of wafer from a packet that we had and then only answer the question! It can be a bit uncomfortable to take your time and then answer the question but it was worth it! The exercise makes us aware about our right to take our time, we can take 5 - 10 seconds to think about our answer! We laos tried to maintain eye contact whenever we spoke.

Next was Ishan's prepared speech. He talked about his journey as a child and a teenager who stammers! It was an honest talk direct from his heart and he communicated in an excellent manner! I again recorded his speech.

Next we moved to the tea stall to have a hot piece of bread pakoda and tea! Chai wala inquired about Mr Jasbir. (Actually Mr Jasbir couldn't come as he was not aware about the meet! And surely all of us including chaiwala, missed him for his humour and b-b-bouncing!) Next we reviewed Ishan's video and did some general discussions on this method of recording your videos, reviewing them, cataloging you stammer and then trying to reproduce your own stammer voluntarily and how it helps to work on the seconday behaviour and a lot of other things! Since the recorded files took some time to get transferred from my phone to Ishan's phone, both of us went for a long walk and discussed a few things going on in both of our lives!

P.S. Dhruv was on his mission to do voluntary stuttering 70 times and he will write a separate post about his experiences

Next Ahmedabad Meet

Dear all,

There will be two hour SHG meeting in Ahmedabad on this coming Sunday i.e.,on 20th Feb. If interested, please give me call on Saturday evening.

With regards,

Abhijeet (09687282262) abhiyeole08@gmail.com

This week's Chandigarh Meet

Hi all,

Chandigarh SHG will again meet this Sunday ( Feb 20th 2011 ) at their regular meeting venue (Sector 33 park ) from 1.30 p.m. to 3.30 p.m.

Agenda:
1. Laughter session
2 Meditation - 15 minutes
3. Introduction to pausing.
4. Introduction ( using a new activity )
5. "Take your time" game.
6. Can you draw it ? (This will need a pen and paper/notepad)
7. Ishan's speech
8. General discussions

Please be there!
Please come armed with a NOTEPAD AND PEN!

People who are interested in coming can call-
Mr Jasbir Singh - 09915006377
Mr Jai Prakash Sunda- 09915686678

CHANDIGARH SHG MEET # 10 REPORT

Ishan, Jasbir ji and myself met at our regular meeting place (sector 33 park) on 6th Feb 2011. It was my chance to coordinate the meeting. We started with laughter session and a nice 15 minute meditation and then I introduced bouncing (in detail) to the group. We used it in our next activity where we started by telling our name, our profession, our best friend's name, colour of our shirt, number of pockets in our trousers etc by varying the number of bounces from 2 to 9! The basic idea was not to speak sentences but just one word, which makes it easier to focus on the technique. Next was the round of table topics where all of had to speak on a given topic for 3 minutes. Then came the surprise and challenge of the day - face game! In this each person would give one emotion, feeling (can even give a situation and person will know how one feels if hes in that situation) and the other person would have to use his facial expressions to show that feeling ( link ) . One of the surprise was feeling of love! (Just stand in front of a mirror and try this :-)..The idea behind this activity was to make us aware that their are a lot of non verbal communication also that goes on between people. Also it was an activity to challenge all of us! Next all of us spoke on self respect for 2 minutes. We ended with a round of tea with a-again a round of voluntary stammering and bouncing with the chai wala (This guy may be looking for a new place by now! From next time we will spare him and find some other bakara :-)

As planned the next regular meeting will be on 20th Feb 2010 (I will post the venue and Agenda on blog on 17th Feb). For the weekends when their is no formal meet, we plan to meet over a cup of coffee and a round of snacks. This weeks casual meet will be on Saturday evening in sector - 17 Plaza (Ishan please post the details soon)! Also Mr Jasbir is giving his fourth project speech in toastmasters this Saturday. Please be there! (Sir please post the venue and timings)

Agenda for upcoming Chandigarh Meet - 6th Feb 2011

Hi All,

Chandigarh Chapter of TISA will meet this Sunday (6th Jan 2011) in Sector 33 Park from 10 a.m. to 12 noon. Here is the Agenda for the meet :

1. Laughter session - 5 minutes
2. Meditation - 10 minutes
3. Introduction to Bouncing
4. Introductions using Bouncing
5. Table topics - 3 minutes per person.
6. Face game
7. Can you draw it ? (Needs paper and pen)

Please come armed with a NOTEPAD AND PEN!

People who are interested in coming can call-
Mr Jasbir Singh - 09915006377
Mr Jai Prakash Sunda- 09915686678

Chandigarh SHG Meet - 30 Jan 2011

Dhruv, Mr Jasbir and myself met at Sector 33 park yesterday for our weekly meets after a long time! Jasbir ji requested me to share my experiences at Chennai workshop, which i did :)..We started with usual laughter session and this is something really good that I have learned from the SHG...I would recommend all the SHGs to start this way. It brings a great postive energy right at the start. Next we did a brief round of breathing exercises and meditation.Mr Jasbir shared a nice post from http://stutteringhub.com/ about doing the right thing and not the things that we feel we can do easily. (Sir, please share the link). We discussed ways to spread good word about Chandigarh SHG..And it was decided to invite a newspaper reporter to one of our meets (I am the owner for this task :-). Also it was decided to make the meetings once a fortnight and to put up an agenda every thursday about the upcoming meet. Also we decided to shift the meetings to morning as some of us felt that that way we can spend Sunday evenings with our families and may also increase the attendance. Next we had a round of table topics where Mr Dhruv spoke on - Mahatma Gandhi, JP on - "what India has and what needs to be done further to become a developed country" and Mr Jasbir spoke on "future prospects of SHGs".
I am also assigned the task for finding a hall where we can meet..We dispersed after having a nice Tea and a good round of bouncing and voluntary stuttering with chai wala.

So from next week Chandigarh SHG will be meeting once a fortnight on Sunday mornings from 10 a.m. to 12 noon.

P.S. - All three of us also made a voluntary contribution of Rs 100 to take care of snacks and drinks for every meet and also for other expenses involved in running a SHG. We plan to do this every month! and the expenses details and accounts will be put up on TISA's website regularly!

SHG Meeting with TOI Senior Reporter Sharmila

On every forth nightly Thursday we have SHG meeting in our office. But on last thursday we had meeting outside our office. Because Sharmila (Senior Reporter of Times of India) wanted to join us and outsiders are not allowed to enter into campus during working days.

Sharmila is working for Sunday Times and also write article for Crest Edition, where she write some unusual communities of India. She is writing an article about stammering as part of our petition filed in court against Golmal - 3.

We met around 4 pm outside office on chai tapari . Initially we were three (Manpreet, Sharmila & me - Devang). She wanted to know what kind of activities we are doing in SHG meeting. We explained her B B Bouncing, Pro...longation and volunteer stuttering. We also explained about Meditation. Manpreet explained light contact. Then she asked us about school experience. Meanwhile Sunny & Mahesh joined us.

We shared our school & college experience like vi via, when teacher ask some question to us and we kept quite even though we knew answer. because if we answered correct with stammering then students laugh at us so sometimes we preferred put ourselves back.

Also Sunny found one interesting fact about CAT exam. Recently he had visited CAT site & there he found that there is separate quota for disabled people like low eye sight, deaf and mentally disabled. So he raised concern if PWS (person who stammer) crack CAT and will may fail in GD or PI because there doesn't have special quota & treated as normal candidate even though having speech impediment. Mahesh had also same experience. He had tried 2-3 times CAT.

Sharmila asked us good/ bad experience about stammering. Sometimes we missed on site opportunities, client interaction. Experienced lots of interview problems while searching for job. Sometimes HR told that they can not hire us because of stammering.

We also explained what people belief about stammering. what people think about People who stammer. We explained some experiences those we had during Communication Workshop in October in Pune. People have some disbelief about stammering. After heard some disbelief she really laughed. We also shared some good experience of Anshul & till the time Anshul came there.

He also shared good experience of college and bad experience of stammering during school. That experience has bad impact on his mind till now. We also explained how child's life impacted by one bad experience regarding stammering. That's why we protest against movie like Golmaal -3. Children laugh at person who stammer they don't know what they are doing they just copied acting and that impact a lot child who stammer.

We also shared that some kind of awareness required in parent & society. Generally parent not talking about child's stammering. Its happen only in India, as Anshul had been in US for long time, he had seen there is acceptance of stammers in US.

We end up our meeting with photographs.

That was really good SHG meeting, in that meeting we even didn't try about techniques but we feel good because someone heard us and about our stammering for almost 2.5 hours. Generally stammers want to say but they didn't say because of stammering, but there we spoke almost 2.5 hours. Really Good Experience. :)

We really enjoyed and Sharmila also enjoyed a lot, that's good part of SHG. Because in SHG not only stammers enjoy but also normal person enjoy a lot. . .

Pune SHG meet: 6th June,10

This week we had our weekly meeting at Dhole Patil Road, Pune. Now a days we set the agenda for the meeting and share with all some 2-3 days back of meeting. This helps us utilizing our time more effectively and productively. So according to our agenda we started with the meditation for 10 mins. After this we did the slow reading exercise. In this exercise we use the prolongation technique and try to speak 4-5 words per breathe. Then we did breathing exercise. This exercise is meant to regulate our breathing pattern. We have to inhale and exhale air slowly and have to observer our breathing pattern. Then it was the time to play some game. The game was Two Truth and One Lie. In this game everybody, in their turn, have to speak 3 statements consisting of 2 true statements and 1 false statement. And other members of the group have to observer the person and have to identify the false statement. It was the fun game. We all become detective at one point of time. Then we started with next exercise that is impromptu speech. All of us have been given two paper chits to write 2 topics, it could be any personality name or could be any non living thing. Then we collected all chits. Then everybody on their turn has to pull out one chit and speaks on the topic for 5 mins, using some speech techniques. We all speak well. We share our idea on those topics. In between this exercise we got the surprise call from Anuj. Anuj is a member of Delhi SHG. We connected Jai’s mobile to speakers and we all hear his concern about the stammering at work place. Anuj is working in Tourism industry and have to speak on calls vey often. He was very calm at the call. After hearing his concern some of us tried to put some suggestion like; note down the points to discuss before starting any call, be calm and patient, continue to put your points even u stutter in between. At last some of us wanted to go for public speaking but out meeting time already reached to its end.

These SHG are very much helpful. Each of us has many questions about the stammering and how to tackle the day to day activities, be it on work place or in personal life. People share their views and ways of handling these events, which is very much helpful.

Report from Jammu SHG's 2nd meeting...!!!

On 9th sep,2009 we had our second meeting and this one lasted for 2 hrs i.e. from 5 pm to 7 pm .In this meeting,we talked about some techniques like Per-Block,Post-Block & In-Block corrections.After that we had a 'story telling' session. We have already planned all this a day before(on 8th sep) when Aditya(the other pws in the SHG) came to my place to get all the movies and videos related to stammering.We discussed some important things while watching some of the videos and we also decided that we will have a 'story telling' session in our meeting tomorrow(on 9th sep), where both of us have to tell a story to eachother.So from quite a few time I was preparing for a story of a movie called "If only". It was a very nice movie and after watching that movie I always used to say to myself that "how would I narrate this story to anyone if I ever got a chance to speak fluent....??". So I was having this story always in my mind and I was very excited about our 2nd meeting where I would finally get a chance to tell this story to someone, no matter if I even stammer.
After disussing about the Block corrections , we started our story telling session. We were suppose to speak slowly,with proper breathing,bouncing,prolongation etc. No matter how much time it takes us to complete the story, just be relaxed and speak slowly.So I started first and I think that I took about 20 mins in telling the story. Even though a normal person would have taken 10 mins in narrating this story but I was very happy with ma timing.Then Aditya started with his story of the movie "17 Again".He took 15 mins.But He was trying to speak at a slow rate of speech and thatz good.

Aditya says : " My 2nd meeting is slightly more intresting from first one.what matters is that you must use all the techniques in telling stories .On that day, I talked with manpreet for more than 15 minutes continuously . Next time I am going not to bother about time I take in telling story , but about the way I speak( using all techniques )".

Now in our 3rd meeting I m trying to invite some more pws and we'll try to do some tasks like asking the shopkeeper using bouncing or prolongation.I learned all this at Samagra and now I want each and every pws to try these techniquesand tasks in real life situations.

Report from Jammu SHG's 1st meeting..!!!

His name is Aditya.He also stammerers.He went for a speech Therapy course at chandigarh in 2006 and was fluent for about 3 months after that therapy.But then that stammer came back again.

I met him after I came back from Dehradun.I went to Dehradun for a 7 days intensive therapy programme at Samagra ashram.I was there from 16th of Aug to 23rd of Aug,2009.There I came to know, that it is very important to have a SHG(Self Help Group) in your own city bcoz stammering can't be cured in Isolation. So I started looking for some PWS in jammu .I searched on internet,social networking sites like Orkut,Facebook etc. Finally I was able to find 3-4 pws on orkut who were from jammu. And i sent them messages and scraps.But 2 of them replied to those messages and only one of them was really curious to do something in order to cure his stammer.His name is Aditya. He Has just completed his Engineering in IT this year. We had a meeting on 2nd september,2009.This was our 1st meeting, so it was ma duty to Motivate the other person in the same way as I was motivated by Sachin sir and JP at Dehradun. I told him each and everything whatever I learnt at Dehradun.I told him about "Acceptance", to love ur stammer and dont be ashamed of ur stammer.I also explained him some of the techniques such as Bouncing,Prolongation,Easy on set,Slow rate of speech etc. Our 1st meeting lasted for about an hour.Then on our way back to home ,I told him that I have got some very good and interesting Documentary movies on stammering that I got from Dehradun. So if he wants those movies and videos ,I can bring those DVDs in our next meeting. This was just the starting of our 2 member SHG in jammu. I am hoping more PWS in jammu to join this group and help each other .