Personal Information Therapy – The Janki Foundation Lecture

Lord (Andrew) Stone learned about the value to wellbeing of other people’s stories during his 34 years with Marks & Spencer, where company involvement in the health of staff was a core policy. He discovered that when there are choices to be made, people want to know what others did in similar circumstances. This information is particularly useful in the context of ill-health: ability to cope is improved, outcomes are often better, and the wellbeing of carers, friends and family is also enhanced.

In his lecture, Lord Stone will focus on a health charity he chairs, www.healthtalkonline.org, illustrating his theme with video clips of real-life patient experiences. Using professional researchers based mainly at Oxford University, the charity has put online hundreds of such stories. The site is heavily used by patients and their friends and also for training health professionals. Lord Stone will touch on three other projects with which he is involved, which also illustrate how sharing information on a personal level can change the way we all live – both individually and collectively. These include:

•  Sindicatum Climate Change Foundation
•  A project to help Palestinian farmers sell their produce
•  A project to enable people to experience, sometimes for the first time, a spiritual awakening or ‘ping’.

Guest Speaker:
Andrew Stone started life as a ‘barrow boy’ in the street markets of South Wales, having left school with virtually no qualifications. He joined Marks & Spencer as a junior trainee in 1966 and left in 1999 as Managing Director. Now a working Labour Peer in the House of Lords, he also chairs an award-winning health charity; works with all factions in the Middle East, trying to engender mutual understanding and respect; chairs a climate change foundation; and has started to develop a new concept called ‘Space to Contemplate’, a visitor attraction designed to facilitate feelings of expanded consciousness.

Chairperson:
Dr Sarah Eagger MBBS, FRCPsych
Consultant Psychiatrist

Closing Address:
Dadi Janki, President of the Foundation

“Forget the things of the past and move forward. Then you will be able to have real feelings of mercy and love for others. This is the way to truly be of help to others.” Dadi Janki

There is no charge for this event (voluntary contributions are welcome).