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* Inside This Issue:

• Editor's Note -John Pistorius

• This Week's Jumpstart -Denis Waitley

• Emotional Memory Study Reveals Evidence for a Self-reinforcing Loop

• Scan to Reveal Brain Disease Clue

• When the Door of Opportunity Opens -Chris Widener

• TBI Raiders Launches New Site -Alicia Payne

• The Cookie Thief -Valerie Cox

• Word Wealth -ciao (chou)

• Using Your Head -Ending Procrastination by Jim Rohn

• BIA Seeking Field Testers -Participants to be paid $80 USD

• A little Levity -Can you hear me now?

• International Conference on Accessible Tourism

• Did You Know? -ADA Lawsuit Facts

• Ten Insider Tips -for Starting or Improving a Peer-to-peer Support Group

• Support Group Development Tools -Free help for starting or running peer groups

• Upcoming Support Group Meetings

• Thank You!

• B-NEWS Subscriber Policy

• Subscribe/Unsubscribe Instructions

• ETC.

• Picture of Pittsburgh

* Editor's Note

 

Hi Folks,

 

We have some new subscribers since the previous edition was sent out. Welcome to the B-NEWS, Support Lines. I hope that you find this publication to be informative and useful. Feel free to send your comments to me at jp@bisga.org.

 

Please remember to forward this newsletter to others and encourage them to subscribe. If you decide to unsubscribe for any reason, you will never have to hunt for a way. Unsubscribe information is prominently placed in every edition of B-News and on the http://www.bisga.org and http://www.pabia.org websites.

 

I know it has been awhile since the previous edition of the B-NEWS went out.  It takes time to assemble and edit this newsletter. To get it done, I must commit the time. Suffice it to say that my schedule has been full.

 

I do not want to send you a substandard newsletter. When my schedule permits, I compose and compile the B-NEWS. I will not bore you with the details. At least I'll have more material for the Cognitive Dissonance series when I'm able to sit down to write it out!

 

I had other activities scheduled for today, however, the rain that's falling has changed my plans. I can't do what I had planned in the rain. So I'm finally getting this message composed. And the rest will do me some good.

 

I hope that this newsletter inspires you to think, uplifts your spirit and encourages you to become all that you can be in your life. And maybe you will learn a thing or two.

 

Till next time-
John

 

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by Denis Waitley

It was a stormy night many years ago when an elderly couple entered the hotel lobby on the outskirts of a mountain resort area and asked for a room.

"I'm very sorry," responded the night clerk. "We're completely full and so are all the other hotels in the area, but I can't imagine sending you out into the storm again. Why don't you stay in my room?" the young man offered with a smile. "It may not be a luxury suite, but it's clean. I need to finish my bookkeeping here in the office."

The distinguished-looking man and woman seemed uncomfortable, but they graciously accepted his offer. When the gentleman went to pay the bill the next morning, the clerk was still at the desk and said, "Oh, I live here full-time, so there's no charge for the room. You don't need to worry about that."

The older man nodded and said to the clerk, "You're the kind of person that every hotel owner dreams about having as a staff member. Maybe someday I'll build a hotel for you." The hotel clerk was flattered, but the idea sounded so outrageous that he was sure the man was joking.

A few years passed and the hotel clerk was still at the same job. One day he received a registered letter from the man. The letter expressed his vivid recollections of that stormy night, along with an invitation and a round-trip ticket for the hotel clerk to visit him in New York. Arriving a few days later in Manhattan, the clerk was met by the distinguished gentleman at the corner of Fifth Avenue and Thirty-fourth Street, where a magnificent, new building stood.

"That," exclaimed the man, "is the hotel I've built for you to run! I told you at the time that it might happen and today you can see that I was serious."

The clerk was stunned. "What's the catch? Why me? Who are you anyway?" he stammered. "My name is William Waldorf Astor. And there is no catch. You are the person I want managing this property for me."

That hotel was the original Waldorf Astoria, and the name of the young clerk who accepted the first managerial position was George C. Boldt.

This is a true story, and there's a personal message in it for us. Why do we need a benefactor to come along and make us believe in our dreams? How is it that an outsider can perceive more potential in us than we can sometimes see in ourselves?

Usually, we hold ourselves back because of a little voice from the child of our past that recalls foolish mistakes we made or rejections we experienced. Don't listen to those doubts and fears.

This week, don't put your big dreams on layaway. Focus on believing you are worth the effort. -Denis Waitley

* Denis Waitley has studied, counseled and trained leaders in virtually every field including Apollo astronauts, Olympic gold medalists, Super Bowl champions, returning POW's, heads of state and Fortune 500 top executives.

Denis is recognized as a world class speaker and author and has traveled the globe sharing success ideas and strategies to thousands of companies the past 25 years. To book Dr. Waitley to speak for your company or to be part of your upcoming Regional or National Convention send an email to speaker@deniswaitley.com or call 877-929-0439 and ask for Hilary.

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* Emotional Memory Study Reveals Evidence for a Self-reinforcing Loop
 

Public release date: 8-Mar-2005
Contact: Dennis Meredith
dennis.meredith@duke.edu
919-681-8054
Duke University
 

DURHAM, N.C. -- Researchers exploring the brain structures involved in recalling an emotional memory a year later have found evidence for a self-reinforcing "memory loop" -- in which the brain's emotional center triggers the memory center, which in turn further enhances activity in the emotional center.

The researchers said their findings suggest why people subject to traumatic events may be trapped in a cycle of emotion and recall that aggravates post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). They said their findings also suggest why therapies in which people relive such memories and reshape perspective to make it less traumatic can help people cope with such memories.

The paper by Florin Dolcos, Kevin LaBar and Roberto Cabeza, was published online February 9, 2005, in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The researchers are in Duke University's Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, and Brain Imaging and Analysis Center. Their work was sponsored by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.

"This study is the first to really test recall of emotional memories after a long time period," said Cabeza. "Previous studies had only allowed a short time interval, for example minutes, between encoding of the memory and retrieval.  Hence, they could not distinguish between the process called consolidation -- in which memories are being established -- and retrieval.  Also, they did not distinguish between true recollection of a memory and a vague familiarity.  In memory studies, it's very important to distinguish between these two phenomena," he said.

In their study, the researchers showed volunteer subjects images that were pleasant, unpleasant or neutral while their brains were being scanned with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). In this widely used technique, harmless magnetic fields and radio waves are used to image blood flow in regions of the brain, and increased blood flow is a signature of higher brain activity. The pleasant images were of romantic scenes and sports; the unpleasant images involved injured people and violence, and the neutral pictures depicted buildings or other emotionally non-involving scenes. The subjects were asked to rate the emotional aspects of the images they saw.

Then, a year later, the researchers showed the same subjects a combination of images they had previously seen and new images -- pleasant, unpleasant and neutral -- while their brains were being scanned. They asked the subjects to indicate whether they had seen the images before and whether the memory also brought back associated details. Such details indicated the impact of the picture on the subjects.

The researchers found that the subjects did recall the emotional pictures -- both pleasant and unpleasant -- better than the neutral pictures, and this recall was based on specific recognition of the pictures. This recall was associated with a correlated higher activity in both the amygdala -- the region of the brain responsible for processing emotional memories -- as well as the hippocampus, the main memory-processing center. The study also revealed greater amygdala-hippocampal correlation during recollection of emotional pictures than during recollection of neutral pictures, they said. The researchers said that one way of explaining the "co-activation" of these two centers was that they could be part of a "synergistic mechanism," in which each activates the other during recall of an emotional memory.

Said Dolcos, "One way to interpret our result is that emotion can trigger recollection, and vice versa. The synchronicity between activity in the amygdala and hippocampus could go either way. The emotion enhances recollection, but at the same time by recollecting those events, you would also remember the emotional response. It could be like a loop in which the amygdala interacts with the hippocampus." According to Dolcos, this memory loop could help understand the searing recall of traumatic memories in people with post-traumatic stress disorder.

"In such people, an emotional cue could trigger recall of the event, which would then loop back to a re-experiencing of the emotion of the event," said Dolcos. "  Or, remembering the event may trigger the emotional reaction associated with the event, which in turn could trigger more intense recall, in a continuous loop."

Such insights into the nature of emotional memory support a therapeutic process that can affect "reconsolidation" of traumatic memories, said Cabeza.  "Some studies have suggested that when you retrieve a memory it can not only be re-encoded, or reconsolidated, but you also put it into a labile state in which it can be transformed. While in such labile state, either the memory itself or the person's perspective of it may be altered."  According to Cabeza, therapists working with people suffering from PTSD as a result of the 9/11 terrorist attack have used this technique to alleviate its symptoms.

In further studies, the researchers plan to manipulate the degree of emotion experienced by the subjects, as well as how much detail is remembered, to explore the specific interactions among brain structures in processing emotional memories. They also plan to analyze activity of other regions -- such as those that process spatial, auditory, or visual information -- during emotional memory processing to understand their role. Such studies would yield insights into how emotional memories involve integrating multiple brain regions, they said.
 

From:
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2005-03/du-ems030805.php

Ian Pitchford PhD CBiol MIBiol
http://human-nature.com/ep/

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* Scan to Reveal Brain Disease Clue

A high resolution x-ray scanning technique can look inside a single brain tissue cell. Scientists say it will help to pin down the role of iron and other metals in neurological disorders such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease. The new technique, developed by Keele University, can identify where the compounds are within the brain, and thus whether they are harmful. Details are published in the journal Interface.

The researchers hope the scan will aid the development of new treatments and techniques for early diagnosis. High concentrations of iron compounds in brain tissue have been linked to degenerative neurological diseases for more than 50 years. Iron is an essential element for living organisms - but in some circumstances it can be toxic. However, its precise role in the development of conditions such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease is not known. This is because the staining techniques used for identifying iron compounds to date cannot identify precisely where the iron is or what type of iron compound it is.

Researcher Professor Jon Dobson said: "This work will enable
scientists to understand the properties of iron compounds and where they are in relation to structures in the tissue. "Using this information, we are designing techniques that can identify them in the early stages for people at risk which will aid the development of suitable treatment. "It also means that we may be able to develop treatments for those whose symptoms are already well-established."

For Full Story
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4184417.stm
(C)BBC
 

* When the Door of Opportunity Opens

by Chris Widener

Anybody can achieve anything – do you believe that? I do. But there is a caveat. Those who succeed are those who walk through the door of opportunity when it swings open. That we know. But what is the secret to getting through the door of opportunity?

Being outside the door when it swings open.

As the story goes, Frank Sinatra got his big break while working as a waiter. One day, as he was waiting tables, who does he see sitting in the restaurant, but one of the biggest names in the music industry. Old Blue Eyes did the unbelievable: He cleared off a table next to the gentleman and got up on it and sang! He knew he was done at the restaurant for doing so, but how many times would this door of opportunity open up? Needless to say, the rest is history.

You've probably never heard the story about the stagehand for Kenny G who one day was in the auditorium with Kenny, just the two of them, when he started to play every song for him on the piano that was set up. Kenny didn’t even know the guy could play the piano. Guess who is now the lead keyboardist for Kenny G? You got it!

You see, you never know when the door of opportunity is going to open wide. For some, the big break comes early in life and for others later on. But for all of those who become successful, there is one key similarity: They were ready. And for every one of those who were ready, there were thousands more who weren’t.

So, the principle for us is: Be ready!

Are you ready? Here are some thoughts for you to consider.

Are your skills as sharp as they could be? Are they enough so when your shot comes you can perform?

Is your character deep enough to handle success? Let’s face it; you don’t want big success if your character won’t be able to handle it.

Are you working hard to position yourself now? The job to do while waiting for the door to open is to develop your skills and your character, so as to position yourself to get through that door before it closes.

Your door will open someday. It opens for everyone. It may only open once or it may open many times. It is different for everyone and life just isn’t fair that way. But everybody gets a shot. Will you be ready?

When that huge door of opportunity opens up, will you be able to walk boldly through it?

Do everything you can to be ready. Don’t just sit and wish and dream. Be proactive and make sure that you are the most qualified when the door opens. Make sure that you are the hardest worker. Make sure you are the closest to the door.

When it opens – Be Ready!

Shhh. Do you hear that? Hinges creaking! It is the sound of the door opening. Your door of opportunity! Are you ready? -Chris Widener

Reproduced with permission from the Chris Widener Ezine. To subscribe to Chris Widener's Ezine, go to http://www.chriswidener.com or send an email with Join in the subject to subscribe@chriswidener.com Copyright 2005 Chris Widener International. All rights reserved worldwide.

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*The Cookie Thief - by Valerie Cox

Read by Wayne Dyer
 

---

A woman was waiting at an airport one night
With several long hours before her flight
She hunted for a book in the airport shop
Bought a bag of cookies and found a place to drop
She was engrossed in her book but happened to see
That the man beside her as bold as could be
Grabbed a cookie or two from the bag between
Which she tried to ignore to avoid a scene
She munched cookies and watched the clock
As this gutsy cookie thief diminished her stock
She was getting more irritated as the minutes ticked by
Thinking "If I wasn't so nice I'd blacken his eye"
With each cookie she took he took one too
And when only one was left she wondered what he'd do
With a smile on his face and a nervous laugh
He took the last cookie and broke it in half
He offered her half as he ate the other
She snatched it from him and thought "Oh brother
This guy has some nerve and he's also rude
Why he didn't even show any gratitude"
She had never known when she had been so galled
And sighed with relief when her flight was called
She gathered her belongings and headed for the gate
Refusing to look back at the thieving ingrate
She boarded the plane and sank in her seat
Then sought her book which was almost complete
As she reached in her baggage she gasped with surprise
There was her bag of cookies in front of her eyes
"If mine are here" she moaned with despair
"Then the others were his and he tried to share"
"Too late to apologize she realized with grief"
That she was the rude one, the ingrate, the thief.

(Editor's note: How many times might I have given instead of taken if I had been a little more observant?)

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interj. -Used to express greeting or farewell.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Italian, from dialectal ciau, alteration of Italian (sono vostro) schiavo, (I am your) servant, from Medieval Latin sclavus, slave, servant; see slave.]
Word History: Ciao first appears in English in 1929 in Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms, which is set in northeast Italy during World War I. It is likely that this is where Hemingway learned the word, for ciau in Venetian dialect means "servant, slave," and, as a casual greeting, "I am your servant." Ciau corresponds to standard Italian schiavo; both words come from Medieval Latin sclavus, "slave." A similar development took place with servus, the Classical Latin word for "slave," in southern Germany, Austria, Hungary, and Poland, where servus is used as a casual greeting like ciao. At the opposite end of the world, in Southeast Asia, one even sees words meaning "slave" or "your slave" that have developed into pronouns of the first person, again to indicate respect and humility.

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2003. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

(Editor's Note: If schiavo started out as the word that represented slave, one might wonder about the husband who ordered his wife's execution. To whom is he enslaved? Ciao (schiavo) is also used to express farewell. Till death do us part. Is that irony?)

* Using Your Head

 

Ending Procrastination

by Jim Rohn

Perseverance is about as important to achievement as gasoline is to driving a car. Sure, there will be times when you feel like you're spinning your wheels, but you'll always get out of the rut with genuine perseverance. Without it, you won't even be able to start your engine.

The opposite of perseverance is procrastination. Perseverance means you never quit. Procrastination usually means you never get started, although the inability to finish something is also a form of procrastination.

Ask people why they procrastinate and you'll often hear something like this: "I'm a perfectionist. Everything has to be just right before I can get down to work. No distractions, not too much noise, no telephone calls interrupting me, and of course I have to be feeling well physically, too. I can't work when I have a headache." The other end of procrastination - being unable to finish - also has a perfectionist explanation: "I'm just never satisfied. I'm my own harshest critic. If all the i's aren't dotted and all the t's aren't crossed, I just can't consider that I'm done. That's just the way I am, and I'll probably never change."

Do you see what's going on here? A fault is being turned into a virtue. The perfectionist is saying that his standards are just too high for this world. This fault-into-virtue syndrome is a common defense when people are called upon to discuss their weaknesses, but in the end it's just a very pious kind of excuse making. It certainly doesn't have anything to do with what's really behind procrastination.

Remember, the basis of procrastination could be fear of failure. That's what perfectionism really is, once you take a hard look at it. What's the difference whether you're afraid of being less than perfect or afraid of anything else? You're still paralyzed by fear. What's the difference whether you never start or never finish? You're still stuck. You're still going nowhere. You're still overwhelmed by whatever task is before you. You’re still allowing yourself to be dominated by a negative vision of the future in which you see yourself being criticized, laughed at, punished, or ridden out of town on a rail. Of course, this negative vision of the future is really a mechanism that allows you to do nothing. It's a very convenient mental tool.

I'm going to tell you how to overcome procrastination. I'm going to show you how to turn procrastination into perseverance, and if you do what I suggest, the process will be virtually painless. It involves using two very powerful principles that foster productivity and perseverance instead of passivity and procrastination.

The first principle is: break it down.

No matter what you're trying to accomplish, whether it's writing a book, climbing a mountain, or painting a house the key to achievement is your ability to break down the task into manageable pieces and knock them off one at one time. Focus on accomplishing what's right in front of you at this moment. Ignore what's off in the distance someplace. Substitute real-time positive thinking for negative future visualization. That's the first all-important technique for bringing an end to procrastination.

Suppose I were to ask you if you could write a four hundred-page novel. If you're like most people, that would sound like an impossible task. But suppose I ask you a different question. Suppose I ask if you can write a page and a quarter a day for one year. Do you think you could do it? Now the task is starting to seem more manageable. We're breaking down the four-hundred-page book into bite-size pieces. Even so, I suspect many people would still find the prospect intimidating. Do you know why? Writing a page and a quarter may not seem so bad, but you're being asked to look ahead one whole year. When people start to do look that far ahead, many of them automatically go into a negative mode. So let me formulate the idea of writing a book in yet another way. Let me break it down even more.

Suppose I was to ask you: can you fill up a page and a quarter with words -- not for a year, not for a month, not even for a week, but just today? Don't look any further ahead than that. I believe most people would confidently declare that they could accomplish that. Of course, these would be the same people who feel totally incapable of writing a whole book.

If I said the same thing to those people tomorrow - if I told them, I don't want you to look back, and I don't want you to look ahead, I just want you to fill up a page and a quarter this very day - do you think they could do it?

One day at a time. We've all heard that phrase. That's what we're doing here. We're breaking down the time required for a major task into one-day segments, and we're breaking down the work involved in writing a four hundred-page book into page-and-a-quarter increments.

Keep this up for one year, and you'll write the book. Discipline yourself to look neither forward nor backward, and you can accomplish things you never thought you could possibly do. And it all begins with those three words: break it down.

My second technique for defeating procrastination is also only three words long. The three words are: write it down. We know how important writing is to goal setting. The writing you'll do for beating procrastination is very similar. Instead of focusing on the future, however, you're now going to be writing about the present just as you experience it every day. Instead of describing the things you want to do or the places you want to go, you're going to describe what you actually do with your time, and you're going to keep a written record of the places you actually go.

In other words, you're going to keep a diary of your activities. And you're going to be amazed by the distractions, detours, and downright wastes of time you engage in during the course of a day. All of these get in the way of achieving your goals. For many people, it's almost like they planned it that way, and maybe at some unconscious level they did. The great thing about keeping a time diary is that it brings all this out in the open. It forces you to see what you're actually doing... and what you're not doing.

The time diary doesn't have to be anything elaborate. Just buy a little spiral notebook that you can easily carry in your pocket. When you go to lunch, when you drive across town, when you go to the dry cleaners, when you spend some time shooting the breeze at the copying machine, make a quick note of the time you began the activity and the time it ends. Try to make this notation as soon as possible; if it's inconvenient to do it immediately, you can do it later. But you should make an entry in your time diary at least once every thirty minutes, and you should keep this up for at least a week.

Break it down. Write it down. These two techniques are very straightforward. But don't let that fool you: these are powerful and effective productivity techniques. This is how you put an end to procrastination. This is how you get yourself started.


To Your Success,
Jim Rohn

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Reproduced with permission from the Jim Rohn Weekly E-zine.

All contents Copyright (c) 2005 Jim Rohn International except where indicated otherwise. All rights reserved worldwide. All trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Contact Information:

Jim Rohn International
2835 Exchange Blvd., Suite 200
Southlake, TX 76092
800-929-0434
International and/or Dallas/Ft Worth - 817-442-5407
Fax 817-442-1390 or visit the website at www.jimrohn.com

To read previous articles, quotes, and Q and A from the Jim Rohn Weekly E-zine Archives, or to get a complete listing of Jim Rohn's books, audios, videos and seminar schedule, or to place an order; please go to: http://www.jimrohn.com or call 800-929-0434 M-F 8:00-5:30 CST.

 

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With support from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), The Brain Injury Association of America (BIAA) has an opportunity to field test a number of Brain Injury Awareness posters with a tip cards and booklets on content and design.
 
Per the CDC's recommendation, the Association has retained Alan Newman Research, a firm out of Richmond, Virginia.
 
We are asking you to direct us to:
 
1) People with brain injury who are comfortable being interviewed over the phone, are able to complete the task of giving their opinion and assessment of the materials and able to communicate these to the interviewer.  These people with have individual interviews.
 
And
 
2) Caregivers and family members of persons with brain injury.  This group would participate in focus group discussions.
 
Due to the nature of this testing eligible participants CANNOT be employed by a State Affiliate, employed in a health care field, or even a volunteer board member for an affiliate. 
 
The focus-testing of our materials would require approximately an hour of time by telephone.  Some individuals will be in a group discussion and some would have individual interviews.
 
If selected, individuals would be compensated $80 for their time.  There may not be room to accommodate everyone who is interested.  The testing is scheduled for early to mid September, 2005.

Please forward this request to appropriate individuals and groups.
 
Interested persons should respond with their name, address and phone number to Annie Starler, BIAA Administrative Assistant, at astarler@biausa.org
 
Feel free to contact me if you have questions.
 
Geoff
 
Geoffrey M. Lauer
National Director of Affiliate Relations
Brain Injury Association of America
741 Dearborn Street
Iowa City, IA  52240
319-621-7078 Phone
202-478-2966 Fax
glauer@biausa.org 
www.biausa.org

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* A little Levity

Can you hear me now?

A man feared his wife was not hearing as well as she used to, and he thought she might need a hearing aid.

Not quite sure how to approach her, he called the family doctor to discuss the problem.

The doctor told him there is a simple informal test the husband could perform to give the doctor a better idea about her hearing loss.

"Here's what you do," said the doctor. "Stand about 25 feet away from her and in a normal conversational speaking tone see if she hears you. If she can not, go to 20 feet, then 15 feet, and so on until you get a response."

That evening, the wife is in the kitchen cooking dinner, and he was in the den. He says to himself, "I'm about 25 feet away. Let's see what happens."

In a normal tone he asks, "Honey, what's for dinner?" ............No response.

So the husband moves closer to the kitchen, about 20 feet from his wife, and repeats, "Honey, what's for dinner?"....................Still no response.

Next he moves into the dining room where he is about 15 feet from his wife and asks, "Honey, what's for dinner?"
................... Again, no response.

So, he walks up to the kitchen door, about 10 feet away. "Honey, what's for dinner?" ......................... Again, there is no response.

So he walks right up behind her. "Honey, what's for dinner?"

(I just love this.)

His wife says......"Bob, for the 5th time, CHICKEN, PEAS and MASHED POTATOES!"

* International Conference on Accessible Tourism

The Kenya Disabled Development Society is hosting an International
Conference on Accessible Tourism scheduled for 17-19th October, 2005,
Nairobi, Kenya.

Those interested in attending can visit the conference website at http://rdi.pl/kdds and register as a participant. It is a unique conference where participants will get full benefits of their registration fee ranging from lunches at the conference venue and transport from hotel to the conference and back among others.
 

Submitted by:

Peter Bodo Ong'aro
Secretary General
Kenya Disabled Development Society
P.O. Box 40500 - 00100 GPO, Nairobi, KENYA
Tel: 254-20-826157
Fax::254-20-821375 /230060
Cell: 254-720-261239 /721-938757

"Kenya Disabled Development Society is a Member of ATLAS"

(Editor's note: Maybe they can learn a thing or two from some of our readers who are enlightened about the issues surrounding disability.)
 

* Did You Know?

ADA Lawsuit Facts

In order to file any lawsuit you need to have what is called "standing." Standing for ADA purposes means:

1. that you are an individual with a qualified disability;

2. the place of public accommodation that you visited had barriers to access in violation of Title III of the ADA;

3. you suffered discrimination as a result of those
   barriers to access; and

4. you have an intention to return and therefore, there is a threat of future injury that can be prevented by a positive result of the lawsuit.

(Editor's note: Thanks to Attorney Joel Zuckerman for providing this information.)

 

To learn more about the ADA visit: http://www.usdoj.gov/crt/ada/publicat.htm

 

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Created by and freely offered by
John Pistorius of the Brain Injury Support Group Alliance
http://www.bisga.org  jp@bisga.org

Copyright 2004, John Pistorius

Insider Tip Number One: ......................................Support Begins with Respectful Language

Insider Tip Number Two: .......................................Recognize the Need for Peer Support
 

Insider Tip Number Three: ....................................Plan Your Work

Insider Tip Number Four: ......................................Organize Your Tools and Work Your Plan

Insider Tip Number Five: .................................Announce, Publicize, Promote, Broadcast and Publish your Meeting Notice

Insider Tip Number Six: .....................................Contact Local Government Representatives

Insider Tip Number Seven: .....................Network with Local Hospitals and Medical Centers

Insider Tip Number Eight: ................................................Contact and Network with Schools,
School Nurses, and Athletic Directors

Insider Tip Number Nine ...............................................Establish a Regular Course of Action

Insider Tip Number Ten .....................................It Starts With You Making Accessibility Real
 

(Editor's note: To receive a copy of the Ten Insider Tips Manual, visit www.bisga.org and click the "Tools" tab. You can freely download the manual and all available tools from the Tools page. I can also mail a full-color, spiral-bound, printed copy to you for the cost of postage.)

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* Thank You!

B-NEWS Contributors- your insight, articles, poems and comments are vital to the success of this publication.

B-NEWS Subscribers- Without you, I'd have no reason to publish. Please forward this newsletter to those whom you believe would benefit from reading it.

It recently occurred to me that Love is action that improves another person's life. Not just words, but action. Doing something, anything, that positively impacts other people's lives and leaves them even just a little bit better off physically, emotionally, psychologically or spiritually, that's love. -John Pistorius

Do something to leave someone a little better off today.

The Beauty of Love:

The question is asked, "Is there anything more beautiful in life than a young couple clasping hands
and pure hearts in the path of marriage? Can there be anything more beautiful than young love?"
And the answer is given. "Yes, there is a more beautiful thing. It is the spectacle of an old man and an old woman finishing their journey together on that path.  Their hands are gnarled, but still clasped; their faces are seamed, but still radiant; their hearts are physically bowed and tired, but still strong with love and devotion for one another. Yes, there is a more beautiful thing than young love. Old love." -Unknown Author