Helping is Healing: Part II - Bob Spensley (it feels great, even when I am behind the scenes)
An outstanding week was had in the south of Sri Lanka.
In October 2019, three world-renowned clinicians gathered to volunteer for a week at Navajeevana Rehabilitation Tangalla (www.navajeevana.com and follow on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn). The volunteer therapists, led by Kim Barthel (occupational therapist from Canada), were Sarah MacInnes (occupational therapist from Australia) and Logan Gurusamy (physical therapist from India). They offered their services as trainers for the local teaching/therapy staff and for others who participated from around the country, India and Hong Kong. For two days they facilitated a workshop called “Behavioural Detective: Understanding and Supporting Complex Children with Special Needs” and then for three days there was hands-on training and collective problem-solving supporting local children with special needs. The take-away for all was to understand that there is always a reason for the behaviour. There was also heart-warming reinforcement about the scientifically proven fact that healthy relationship is the key for both regulation and learning. Some participants claimed this training will change their practice forever, others reported the networking with the therapists across Sri Lanka was invaluable.
This week at Navajeevana was a time to put trans-disciplinary team teaching into practice in a relatively under-serviced area, and it strengthened the instructors’ bond as colleagues to do more such volunteer work in the future. The other upside is that this part of Sri Lanka, about 3.5 hours south of Colombo, is a truly wonderful part of the world. As a place to visit, it’s got stunning geography, and genuinely warm and authentic people. While this specific area was directly ravaged by the tsunami in 2004, and the local economy of the whole country is still recovering from the terrorism earlier this year, we all felt safe and very well-taken-care-of the whole time. We would all return to this still relatively under-developed part of the world without hesitation.
Navajeevana Rehabilitation Tangalla is a special place. Its management is aiming for it be a centre of excellence for a wide range of services for people with complex needs. We heard from them that this kind and quality of training very rarely, if ever, happens in this area. Some training comes to Colombo, but even then, neither the special needs schools or clinics that are remote, nor these participants themselves, have been able to financially access it.
What made this unique training possible is the outstanding generosity of another special place: Anantara Peace Haven Tangalle - a leading resort that happens to be in the neighbourhood. Recently it won an award in the top 10 resorts in all of Asia (and the only one in Sri Lanka) as voted on by Condé Naste's “Traveler Reader’s Award". (www.anantara.com/en/peace-haven-tangalle) This stunning resort has long supported its local and regional rehab centre in different ways, but the week of training was a huge symbol of its commitment to helping make its community stronger. It was the management of Anantara that first introduced Kim Barthel to the management of Navajeevana, that got this initiative in motion. Anantara then backed it up by offering the therapists complementary room and board throughout, and provided snacks every day to all the workshop participants (therapists/teachers/parents and kids). Anonymous donations were also given from individuals in Singapore, Kamloops (Canada), and Sri Lanka that covered local transportation for everyone involved, which was especially critical for some of the local families to be able to join.
What made this week outstanding for me personally, as a support coordinator of the process, was witnessing the pulling together of resources that made something truly positive happen.
The reason for writing about this experience is to encourage others to also wonder - with a bit of creativity and collaboration, what other positive projects could be happening? If we (people in positions to support people who support people) wait for government programs or third-party funding until we do something spectacular, we may never get to see it happen. But with a sense of shared responsibility, as I witnessed both at a personal and a corporate level in Sri Lanka, the limits on any initiative become much smaller.
I believe that John F Kennedy’s famous line “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country” actually applies internationally. As we are all, ultimately, interdependent on this planet - when we can (of course), it makes sense to try to help others who are asking for help. It is often in our own interest to try to make everyone around us stronger and healthier.
In any case, it was an amazing week in Sri Lanka - a beginning of sorts - and I was truly grateful (feeling stronger and healthier) to have been a part of it.
Thank you to Anantara, Navajeevana, the volunteer therapist instructors, the individual donors, the therapist/teacher participants, the children and the families involved. Collectively, these people made a truly remarkable and inspiring week happen.
Bob Spensley
CEO, Relationship Matters
http://kimandtheo.com/blog/uncategorized/helping-is-healing-2/