With such fast-paced lives, we all need a break from our daily stresses. These demands have physical, mental, emotional and spiritual effects. The best solution is a vacation, but that may not be possible. Instead, indulge in a hobby or two to take your mind and body to a happy place. Every day you do things for everyone else. It’s time to put yourself first! You’ll be so glad you did, and you’ll have a lot of fun while doing it. Here are a few crafting ideas to get you started:
Worried you might get Alzheimer’s or Dementia in the future? Do you know someone who has Alzheimer’s/Dementia and are trying to find ways to slow the rate of deterioration? This series all about Alzheimer’s Avoidance will hopefully answer those questions as well as any other questions you have on the topic!
Hello and Welcome to Sweeney’s Blogs!
Today’s blog is going to be the first blog in our brand new Alzheimer’s Avoidance series. This series is all about the steps that we can take to reduce our chances of getting Alzheimer’s/ Dementia. If you know somebody that has got Alzheimer’s/ Dementia this series will be helpful to find out some of the things we can do to help reduce the rate of deterioration for these cruel illnesses.
Although we cannot directly stop someone from getting Alzheimer’s, there are a few steps and methods that we can do to help reduce their chances of getting the illness. The methods that I talk about in this series are not going to be guaranteed to work but there is a chance that it can help someone. I will be writing about all of the methods and techniques that I have found through research when I found out that my grandmother had Alzheimer’s. If you know any methods/ techniques yourself and would like them to be in the series please get in touch with me and we can arrange something.
The blogs in this series are more than likely going to be a little bit shorter than my usual blog size but I assure you that the content will still be worthwhile and will be planned and thought about with great detail. At the minute I am planning on writing about one technique/method per blog but that can be subject to change.
In regards to how many blogs are going to be in this series, I have not set an exact number in place yet. At the minute I feel like it is going to come down to a few different factors. First of all is how the series is being received by all of you, our readers. If people are not enjoying the series or want to see something else being covered then I will more than happily move on to a different topic. The second major factor is the content that I am going to be covering in the series. If I do get through all of the content that I want to cover in this series and there are no more ideas for future blogs then I will finish the series and start a new one up to replace it.
I am really looking forward to writing this series as Alzheimer’s is a topic that I feel very strongly about. For new readers to the page, the first series that I wrote on this page was all about Alzheimer’s Acceptance. I cover quite a lot of interesting points in the series so if you are interested please check it out. You can find the links to all of the blogs in the series through our Blogapedia page.
Thank you all for reading and I hope you have a great day! If you have any thoughts or queries about this blog or indeed any other blog I have written please get in touch with me! All feedback is appreciated – be it positive or negative!
Sweeney’s Blogs
Any money donated here will be put back into the business. This can be through marketing campaigns, upgrades to plans or for setting up future events!
By Troy Headrick I’d like to do something a bit different in this blog. It’ll start with me posting a fascinating TED Talk by Leon Berg. The title of his presentation is “The Power of Listening: An Ancient Practice for Our Future.” By the way, before I tell you the true aim of this post, […]
“What we can or cannot do, what we consider possible or impossible, is rarely a function of our true capability. It is more likely a function of our beliefs about who we are.” – Anthony Robbins The realists will say this is a lie, but we are what we think we are. What we consider to […]
Yesterday marked the last day for out Stuttering in Mainstream Media series for now. Since I started this page back in February 2019 we have always had a blog series running and now we can start a new one. We have covered topics such as Alzheimer’s Acceptance, Male Mental Health and Being Different already. The question that I want to ask is what type of series do you want to see next?
Do you have an idea for a blog series? Do you want me to cover a certain topic/topics? Would you yourself like to write a blog series and then I can publish it? This page thrives on audience participation so I think now is the time to bring it back. I can work around any ideas you have so please feel free to message me your thoughts!
If anyone wants to collaborate on writing a series too that is excellent! Let me know what you think!
Thanks for reading and I hope to hear from you soon,
Sweeney’s Blogs
Any money donated here will be put back into the business. This can be through marketing campaigns, upgrades to plans or for setting up future events!
Today’s blog is going to be the twelfth blog in the Stuttering in Mainstream Media series and is going to be a summary of the series. In today’s blog, I will be recapping some of the key points I have made over the course of the series and bringing up some important points to remember.There’s more than one kind of Stutter/Stammer!
Have you ever wondered if what you know about self-improvement is accurate? Consider the following paragraphs and compare what you know to the latest information on self-improvement. Have you run across an individual who is so naturally friendly that when you put them inside a room of strangers, they are friends with almost everyone in…
A lot of people know Bruce Willis from his roles in films such as Die Hard, Glass and The Sixth Sense to name but a few but did you know that Bruce Willis used to have a stutter? The fact that Bruce Willis, a very successful actor, has lived with and got past having a stutter just goes to further my firm belief that a stutter does not stop you doing anything in life. In today’s blog, we will be looking at his story.
Hello and Welcome to Sweeney’s Blogs!
Today’s blog is going to be the eleventh blog in the Stuttering in Mainstream Media series and is going to be about Bruce Willis’s story. I find Bruce’s story a really inspiring and emotional one and it is a great story to see the effect that a stutter leaves on a person even after they have gotten over it. The emotion and body language that Bruce shows when he talks about his childhood and growing up with a stutter helps give everyone an insight into what living with a stutter is actually like. The video below is taken from a speech Bruce made at the AIS (American Institue for Stuttering) Gala in 2016 and helps back up the points that I have made. When you watch the video the sheer emotion and passion that Bruce has when talking about Stuttering and the work that AIS do is truly inspirational.
Bruce started stuttering when he was around 9 years old. Bruce describes himself as a shy child due to the problems he had with his speech. An Article published by Making Peace with Life, http://www.makingpeacewithlife.com/uncategorized/how-bruce-willis-has-overcome-stuttering/, helps us to take a deeper look at Bruce’s story and how he managed to overcome his stutter. It is important to remember that Bruce does still stutter from time to time, it is just now he knows how to manage it. Due to the control that Bruce has over his stutter, it is no longer an issue for him.
Bruce’s stutter did have quite a large effect on Bruce’s school life. To try and avoid speaking situations, Bruce started to skip classes in high school. This led to him starting to get into drama and different plays. As mentioned in the article he ” would play roles such as the joker so that he can bring smiles to the audience’s face without much talking”. He became a bit of a class clown by pulling pranks and making jokes in front of his classmates as a way of compensating for his stutter.
Over time Bruce started to get more confident speaking in front of a crowd due to all of his plays. He found that when he was acting on stage, he did not stutter. The interesting thing was that even though he would not stutter on stage, as soon as he came off he would start stuttering again. Around 1 or 2 years after finishing school Bruce managed to get a place at Montclair State College in New Jersey, “as a drama student.”At the college one of his professors, Jerry Rockwood discovered Bruce’s potential as an actor and advised him to start going to speech therapy. The combination of acting and speech therapy was what led Bruce to help manage his stutter.
Bruce says that stuttering helped make him a “better person”. In the article, he talks about how his stutter led to him being “more compassionate towards other people’s pain and struggles.” He goes on to say that his stutter led to him discovering an “inner strength” that he did not know that he had before.
Bruce’s story is an incredible story to look at and it does go to show that you can still be successful even with a stutter. To reinforce the point that I have made numerous times in this series, a stutter does not stop you doing what you want to do. A stutter may make it a little bit more difficult but I’m sure we can all agree that hard work does ultimately pay off.
To finish this blog off I want us to revisit a quote Bruce made in the Youtube video I included in this blog from the AIS Gala in 2016. In his speech, Bruce mentions a quote made by Eleanor Roosevelt. The quote itself is “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent”. Don’t stop speaking just because one or two people made fun of your stutter, You have a voice – make sure you use it. Your stutter does not make what you have to say any less valuable, remember that.
Thank you for reading today’s blog! What do you all think? I have only briefly covered Bruce Willis’s story, there is still plenty more to look at if you are interested. What else would you like to see covered in this series? Did you know acting can be a form of a stuttering solution? Let me know what you think of the blog and any thoughts/questions you have in the comments below!
Thanks for reading and I hope you have a good day,
Sweeney’s Blogs
Any money donated here will be put back into the business. This can be through marketing campaigns, upgrades to plans or for setting up future events!
For most people, being a teenager is perhaps the most exciting stage in life. But being a teenager is full of ups and downs. A teenage girl is mostly bombarded by images of how Hollywood defines “beauty.” Billboard and magazine advertisements, t.v. and radio commercials, and even the Internet is saturated with images and messages…
I am looking for a new writer for the page. What I am looking for from a writer is either a few individual blogs or for them to write a series of blogs that I can publish. There will be no salary for the blog however you will be given full credit on each post you do. The blogs can be about anything as long as we can find a link back to Stuttering, Stress or Mental Health.
Everyone is welcome to write a few blogs for the page, there is no restriction on who can write and who cannot. I will read through each post before it is published just to make sure it is okay and reads well but it is very unlikely that I will actually make changes to someone’s work. If I do see any changes that need to be made then I would discuss it with you beforehand.
To apply for the blog writing job/position simply fill out the form below or you can complete the form on our Facebook page if that is what you prefer. I will try to look through all of the forms ASAP. If you do not want to become a fully-fledged writer for the page that is also completely fine. If you just want to write one or two blogs or one every so often then that is great as well, as long as you let me know!
The form on this page is going to be really easy to fill out. The name and email address fields take a few seconds to fill out then we get to the comments part. In the comments section try and write about why you want to write a few blogs/ what sort of blogs you want to do and any experience you have in writing. Experience isn’t needed to be a blogger on my page but it is nice to see some work beforehand if there is any available.
Thanks for reading and I will see you all in the next blog! If you are interested in being a blogger for the page please fill out the form below!
Today’s blog is going to be the 10th blog in the Stuttering in Mainstream Media and is going to be about the Do’s and Don’ts of Stuttering. Even though I have mentioned in a few previous blogs about how stuttering affects everyone differently, there are a few trends that have emerged. In this blog, I will be briefly talking about some of these trends and just bullet pointing others. If you can think of any that I haven’t included please let me know. I have seen a few other posts about the do’s and don’ts of stuttering but they only focus on stuttering in children, whereas stuttering affects people of all age.
Do’s
Allow the person to finish their sentence, don’t interrupt them.
Be Patient – if a person is stuttering, please give them time to finish. Rushing someone who stutters will make them stutter more and will cause them to get stressed.
Encourage a person with a stutter to speak, don’t leave them alone in the quiet.
If someone is stuck on a word and cannot get it out, try rewording the sentence/question? Rewording the question allows the stutterer to think of a different word that they may not get stuck on.
If you’re meeting someone new, mention that you have a stutter if you think it is important too
Live a normal life – A stutter doesn’t stop you doing what you want to do in life
Maintain eye contact and concentration when talking to someone with a stutter
Reassure a stutterer if they are nervous
Speak to a speech therapist about your stutter
Don’t
Allow a person with a stutter to isolate themselves.
Be embarrassed about stuttering
Criticise /Mock their stutter – There are some things that you just cannot joke/ have banter about. A stutter is one of them.
Don’t say phrases like “slow down” or relax”. Even though they sound like you’re helping, they just make it worse.
Finish a sentence for them – People think it helps but all it does is make a stutterer feel worse about themselves and think that their voice is less valuable than someone else.
Lose your patience if someone is stuttering a lot
That’s all for today’s blog! Even though this blog may seem a bit shorter than the others in the series it is still very important. Like I said at the start of this blog if you can think of any points that I have missed, please let me know and I will add them. There are lots of guides out there for stuttering but they are mostly aimed at children. I wanted to do a series that was targeting every age.
In regards to the future of this series, I think that I am going to keep it going for a little bit longer. The polls that I ran last week came back fairly in favour of keeping the series going so I will do around 2/3 more blogs for it and then I will put it on hold for a while. I am not 100% sure at the minute what the next series will be but when it comes closer to the time I will run a few polls on the Facebook page.
Thanks for reading and I hope you all have a great day!
Sweeney’s Blogs
Any money donated here will be put back into the business. This can be through marketing campaigns, upgrades to plans or for setting up future events!
“I’m such a jerk. How could I have said that?” “I’m a looser. I’ll never get anywhere.” “I’m so stupid. I should have learned this by now.” “I don’t fit in. I don’t belong with these people.” “I’ll never be good enough. I’ll never do it right enough.” “I’m permanently emotionally damaged. I’ll never be…
Musharaf’s Story is a really interesting story that was brought to life through the Bristish Documentary series, Educating Yorkshire. In this blog, we are going to be looking at what his story is and then we are going to look at the reactions that people had to his story on the TV show Gogglebox.
Hello and Welcome to Sweeney’s Blogs!
Today’s blog is going to be the 9th blog in the Stuttering in Mainstream Media and is going to be about Musharaf Asghar’s story. Musharaf, like most teenagers with a stutter, got bullied a lot through school. This bullying dramatically lowered his self-confidence and worsened his stutter. The story that the show focuses on is how Musharaf is preparing to do his GCSE English Oral exam.
Here is the video of Musharaf’s Story:
Close to the start of the video Musharaf tells us that when he stutters he feels like someone is keeping his mouth closed. I found this quite interesting at first because it is not similar to most of the other definitions that I have heard and made. I think that his form of stuttering is a mix of the effects of bullying on his confidence and the type of stuttering where you just cannot get your words out. I feel like this what Musharaf meant by someone is keeping his mouth shut.
The effects of bullying on someone who stutters do go a lot deeper than most people think. Coming from a background where I have experienced this I feel like I can give a fair view on the matter. If we take it at face value the bullying does obviously have an effect on your self-confidence. This damage to your self-confidence can make you stutter more which makes you feel more nervous about speaking. This creates a mental cycle of being scared to speak in case you stutter and get bullied for it.
The people who are around you when you are being bullied also carry a huge effect on the person stuttering. As more people find out that you have been/ are being bullied for your stuttering then it just makes the anxiety even worse. It gets to a point where even if you are with people you trust you just do not want to talk anymore in fear of being bullied for stuttering. It is a really bad cycle that can be really hard to break.
Close to the start of the video we can also see a coping technique that Musharaf uses to help manage his stutter. When he is answering the question in class he taps out each word that he speaks. I like to think of this as a simplified Rhythmical Thinking approach. Sounding out the words helps you to break down each sentence word by word it can help reduce the number of times you stutter. It is not a permanent fix but it can be very helpful for situations like answering a question in class.
The video also shows us how Mr.Burton tries to help Musharaf with his stutter. He uses a technique that he saw in the King’s Speech which involves speaking when listening to music. This style of stutter solution is a mix of distraction and Rhythmical Thinking. If you want to see more about Rhythmical Thinking you can view the blog here, https://sweeneysblog.com/2019/02/07/rhythmical-thinking-a-stuttering-solution/, but the basic of it is is you think of a beat in your head, speak to it then slowly increase the speed until you get back to speaking at a normal pace.
The Distraction solution is where you distract yourself from thinking about speaking. If we look at this case Musharaf is listening to music. While he is listening to music and reading the poem he hasn’t got time to think about/ worry about stuttering. Although this style of reducing the number of times you stutter may seem basic it does work very well if executed under the right circumstances.
Musharaf does go on to do his presentation very well and he does achieve the grade that he needs to get into college. The story itself is quite a positive one that does make you think of the effect a stutter does have on people. At the end of the video, when Musharaf is doing his speech to the other students, we can see how emotional all of his fellow students are getting. In my opinion, they can see the courage that he has and the determination he has to still speak even with his stutter. It just adds to a comment that I made on a blog a few weeks back, a stutter doesn’t stop you doing anything, the only thing that stops you is yourself.
We’ll now take a brief look at what the Gogglebox reactors thought of Musharaf’s story.
If you watched the video the whole way through you can see how their reactions change. At the start of the video, we can see a few of the reactors getting annoyed at Musharaf when he is struggling to get the words out. Phrases like “spit it out” are thrown about and they are not called for. People do need to start appreciating the effort that some people go to just to say a few words. It would be easy for Musharaf to just not say anything because of his stutter but he still tries, which shows a real judge of character.
Patience is one of the skills that most people do need to work on. I am not trying to have a go at the reactors in this video but I think that it goes to show the cultural “norms” that do need to change. As soon as they find out that Musharaf has a severe stutter they are more than happy to wait for him to speak but if they weren’t told they would continue to be angry at him stuttering. It does give us a look into how people do address people who stutter and how we do need to try and change it for the better.
Closer to the end of the video we do see them appreciate the confidence and determination that Musharaf has. We see them get emotional over him doing his speech and see them really appreciate what he has gone through. The main point of this part of the blog is to say, be patient. You never know of the struggles going on in someone’s mind when they are speaking so take some time to understand.
That’s all I want to talk about in today’s blog! Thank you all for reading! What do you all think? Have you heard Musharaf’s Story? What do you think of speaking while listening to music as a stuttering solution? What techniques do you use/ have you seen to help manage a stutter?
A quick few messages just before finishing today’s blog. Musharaf is now doing talks on his story and about his stutter. Although I haven’t been to one of his talks I have heard that they are very good and very insightful. I highly recommend seeing one if you are interested.
There is also a poll up now on the Facebook group regarding the future of this series. I am not sure whether to keep the series going or whether to put it on pause for a while. Vote in the Facebook poll on what you think should happen to the series!
Thanks again for reading!
Sweeney’s Blogs
Any money donated here will be put back into the business. This can be through marketing campaigns, upgrades to plans or for setting up future events!
One day it could be bright, the next it could be raining,
The sun always comes back though to brighten up your day,
The sun makes us feel happier, taking the sad times away,
Whatever we do in life we must take with pride,
Take each opportunity with a positive mindset and try to enjoy life’s ride.
Each year of our life can be turned into an episode,
Lessons we learn, the knowledge bestowed,
Embrace every chance to meet new people and friends,
Let them be there with you as you go through life’s bends,
Move forward through life with a positive mindset,
If you’re nervous about something get help, don’t sit there and fret.
Whatever we do in life we must take with pride,
Take each opportunity with a positive mindset and try to enjoy life’s ride.
Life isn’t always easy, but we need to try and see the good from the bad,
Always aim to be positive and happy, not negative and sad,
When life throws you a curveball it’s okay to get stressed,
When you surround yourself with good people, they help you to feel blessed,
Remember that everybody in life is writing their own book,
Each day a new page, a new mindset and look,
Whatever we do in life we must take with pride,
Take each opportunity with a positive mindset and try to enjoy life’s ride.
Thanks for reading! I hope you liked the poem. Let me know what you think in the comments below or on our Facebook page. Have a great weekend and I’ll see you in the next blog!
Sweeney’s Blogs
Any money donated here will be put back into the business. This can be through marketing campaigns, upgrades to plans or for setting up future events!
Drawing: – pencil, charcoal, crayons, colored pencils, chalk, markers, pens
Pottery & Ceramics: – figurines, serving pieces, vases, jars, ornaments
Ceramics
Paper Crafts: – scrapbooking, card making, origami, quilling
Jewelry & Watches: – beaded, woven, wire
Flower Arranging: – fresh or artificial, wreaths…
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