Want to find inner-peace in 2025? Here’s one way . . .

January 2025 Vol 7 Issue 1

Tell your Story Newsletter (TYSN):

Teaching English-as-a-Second Language

Let us help you tell your story!

Welcome Mid-January 2025!

The first days of Saskatoon’s new year started in the minus twenties and descended further for most of the week that followed.

Now, two weeks into the month, we are in our second brief climactic reprieve. Today’s warmth is so welcome, as such days allow us to catch our breath and walk or exercise outdoors, before “Ol’ Man Winter” returns (this weekend)!

In “Article One” this month, I revisit one of my favourite (non-fiction) books of all time—(the late) Susan Jeffers’  Embracing Uncertainty: Breakthrough Methods for Achieving Peace of Mind When Facing the Unknown (2008). Whether you have been making “New Year’s resolutions” or planning the next calendar year, Jeffers’ stalwart wisdom and realism provide some unexpected (i.e. counterintuitive) guidance.

The book provides a path to finding some inner-peace when these times find us enmired in a world of political unrest, soaring inflation, fierce conflict and wars.

In “Storytellers’ Corner” this month,  I revisit an infographic from “GrammarCheck” that first appeared as a meme on Facebook. I share 10 of the source’s 33 misused words or phrases, explaining the correct form of each. Some of these may be errors you’ve made for years!

And in “Shop News,” I provide some new “thank-yous” to friends and supporters who have recently helped me with growing my ESL teaching business, and so put a “spring in my step,” even during one of winter’s harshest months.

Few would doubt that these are challenging times. But I hope that you, good reader, will continue with your work and the witness it bears to the justice, kindness and humility that still flourish in our community.

As you do that work, I especially hope you’ll treat yourself with kindness—as you would a loved one or friend—as part of the inner-peace each of us deserves.

Through the physical and emotional warmth cultivated indoors by reading books or sharing conversation. . . may the best of winter be with you, good readers, as we carve our pathways through another new year.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth

Principal

Storytelling Communications

www.elizabethshih.com

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IN THIS ISSUE:

ARTICLE 1: Want to find inner-peace in 2025? Here’s one way

STORYTELLERS’ CORNER:

Ten troubling words and phrases (from GrammarCheck)

SHOP NEWS

ABOUT US

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Article One: Want to find inner-peace in 2025? Here’s one way

Any of my readers born before the mid-1970s may remember the famously titled self-help book, Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway (1988). Twenty years later, its author, American psychologist Susan Jeffers, wrote a far subtler and more convincing volume on life’s uncertainty—how “to stop trying to control the uncontrollable.”

Many of Jeffers’ insights in Embracing Uncertainty: Breakthrough Methods for Achieving Peace of Mind When Facing the Unknown (2008) are more relevant to us now in 2025 than ever before.

Jeffers has heard many patients express the anxiety that has come as scientific technologies overwhelm us, breaking down long-held traditions in life, culture, religion and work. Acts of terrorism and violence embody a threat that has become a “new normal” of 21st century life.

Uncertainty characterizes all of our lives, because we do not know what the future holds— not only as entrepreneurs, but simply as people.

Society teaches us to try to control everything, including our careers, relationships, children, health, money, the state of the world, and so on. Jeffers says we unconsciously expect that life should be certain, safe and predictable and we are uncomfortable (even panicked) about life’s increasing uncertainty.

We pop pills to decrease our anxiety or go into denial (acting vainly to try to make life safe), become addicted to work and digital devices that take our minds off the reality that we have so little control.

Jeffers says that, sadly, we often spend so much of our lives worrying and trying to prevent the bad from happening that we forget to enjoy what’s good. And so we waste our very lives. She argues that we need to find a way to enjoy “a rich, joyous, abundant life” that can exist “in the presence of uncertainty” (5). Uncertainty may actually make life wonderful, however counterintuitively that sounds.

Jeffers identifies three challenging realities we need to accept so we can paradoxically make uncertainty easier for ourselves:

Reality #1:

“The only certainty is that life is uncertain”—if we truly believe that life is uncertain, we don’t look for “guarantees.” We must surrender to the reality that we “control nothing about the future” and view that as an affirmation, not as bad news. So: we must let go of the hope that we can create anything certain in our lives (8).

Reality #2:

“Once you surrender to the fact that you’re unable to control [life’s] uncertainty,” “you will, at last, be able to breathe a sigh of relief” (8). That may sound like a tall order.

But when we reach a state of “surrender,” we can’t help but feel peace because we stop struggling to do the impossible. We recognize that it’s a delusion to think we can control everything. So when we let go of the outcome of any situation, we experience calm, peace and rest. We can look for ways of being that actually embrace the uncertain nature of life itself. How amazing such a philosophy can be for entrepreneurs who by necessity work without safety nets (e.g. uncertain markets, clients, income, etc.).

Reality #3:

Jeffers contends that when we accept deeply that life is uncertain, it opens the door to a more powerful way to live. We look instead for the valuable gifts inherent in each of us, no matter how bad things may seem in any given moment.

Finding the gifts in each moment minimizes and “can even erase” our suffering. We look instead for a way of being in the world that assures us that we can handle whatever life hands us. So we live with a “bring it on” attitude, knowing that we can face anything that comes our way (10). We view uncertainty no longer as something to fear, but as an “enriching” aspect of life.

In other words, instead of wallowing in distress over not being able to create certainty in life, we can find delight and purpose as we explore our own power to deal with uncertainty.  Jeffers writes: “There is great adventure in the unknown that propels us to discover powerful parts of ourselves that we didn’t know were there” (11).

Every new moment, day or experience (good or bad) brings a challenge and sense of wonder to us, she says: “The trick is to learn to love the uncertainty of it all . . . to find, at last, the great satisfaction, the great joy and the great opportunity that lies within the uncertainty” (11).

Jeffers stresses that we all have a choice to make—to live “unhappy, exhausted and with futility” (by “soul-destroying ways of thinking and being”) or with a sense of excitement and possibility about uncertainty. In Embracing Uncertainty she provides 42 exercises to drop the old pattern (seeking certainty) and instead to embrace life as a “grand adventure” because it is uncertain.

When we open ourselves up to uncertainty, we can see “the beauty, miracle, joy and possibility in it all” (13), she writes. In this light, we realize that there will be no truly terrible thing in our future, if we can find the learning and growth that come from it, and convert our upset, panic and uncertainty into learning and growth.

Even if things go wrong, we can be an adventurer rather than a worrier or victim, wondering “What can I learn from this,” and “I wonder how this will all turn out” and “I wonder what I’ll learn from this?”

It’s better ultimately to be excited by uncertainty than miserable about it.

Jeffers contrasts the “Lower Self” (similar to the “Lizard Brain” in Seth Godin) as one filled with insecurity, doubt, pain, fear; to the “Higher Self,” filled with peace, confidence, power and love. Life always looks better from the latter self and there we find the power to embrace uncertainty.

When you live by “wondering,” she writes, you are open to both life’s positive and negative aspects. That allows you to relax as the future unfolds, not inflating your mind with hopes and expectations that can easily be dashed. You observe (but do not attach to) the facts and your emotions. (This awareness taps into Buddhist philosophy.)

By contrast, when one lives by “hoping,” the dashing of your hopes leaves you unhappy and depressed.  Those invested in hope tend to have blind certainty, want to be sure about everything and a stubborn need to be right (as a “know it all”).

Jeffers insists that wisdom inheres instead in knowing that we “know nothing” for certain. So we need to be open to wonder and to the adventure of learning. We can let go of how we think “life’s supposed to go,” and feel curious about what may happen. She offers this (buddhist-inspired)  statement:

“Don’t wish for it to happen.

Don’t wish for it not to happen

Just watch it happen.

Let the wonder of life unfold” (25).

We need to try to observe our own lives and avoid being caught up in their drama, because it’s hard amidst much drama to embrace uncertainty.

Embracing the uncertainty includes cultivating emotions like wonder, curiosity, humour, love and trust that are more powerful when based in a spiritual realm (which will differ among us—whether we choose God or another creative source of goodness in the universe).

When we work on embracing uncertainty, we can ultimately say, “bring it all on,” because we know that we’re up to the challenge and that life is “hard for the fun of it” (266). Moreover, our creativity thrives in the questions that flow from existential uncertainty.

One thing we can do is take time as we live out this philosophy, recognizing that spiritual change takes place slowly and that joy comes from patience. Jeffers suggests another mantra: “I let go and trust that it’s all happening perfectly,” because if we can learn and grow from it all, “it all is happening perfectly.”

In this, one’s power is a state of consciousness (not a force to control people or events): We trust our own power to know we can handle it all. “Trust that whatever you need will be there. And if it isn’t, trust yourself to find it” (279).

There are potentially endless uncertainties in our entrepreneurial, professional and personal journeys, which no degree program, workshop or great book can make safe. That should not be our goal. I still recommend Jeffers’ volume highly, including its exercises, as worthy companions for these journeys.

Now it’s your turn: how do you deal with uncertainty in your life and work? Do Jeffers’ insights make it easier to “embrace” uncertainty, rather than fear it?

Update: In late 2024, I gave a copy of Jeffers’ book to a friend who was facing life-altering surgery at a young age. She found helpful, as I have. I hope you will, too.

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STORYTELLERS’ CORNER . . . . 

STORYTELLERS’ CORNER: Words, Stories, Riddles and Jokes on Writing and Editing . . .

This month: Ten troubling words and phrases (with thanks to GrammarCheck)

Through a meme on Facebook, I recently saw an online posting from “GrammarCheck” on “33 Commonly misunderstood words and phrases.”

The content of the posting is relevant to newcomers and other ESL learners, as well as to native speakers of English, since all of us regularly misunderstand these words and phrases.

The cause of such errors (as “GrammarCheck” notes) can be poor hearing, lack of comprehension of words, and/or speakers’ errors in informal conversation–all of which can confuse listeners. Some listeners then start or else continue to misuse the word or phrase!

Although GrammarCheck’s posting includes 33 words and phrases, for this month, I’ve selected just 10 for your reading pleasure, (aggravation or clarity)! Here they are:

(1) “Lie/Lay” — Each of these words is often misused for the other. Here, “lie” means to recline or rest on a surface in a flat position. (“I lie the cat down on the bed”). By contrast, “lay” means to place something on a surface or location. (“I lay the tapestry on the table for viewing.”)

(2) “Supposed” — This word is often misused to mean “suppose to,” but the latter errs by not including the letter “d.” The correct form would be “supposed to.” (“I was supposed to write my paper, but was interrupted by my roommate.”)

(3) “Should have” — has a clear meaning. However, “should of” is not proper English. (“They should have cleaned the house before they left on holiday.”)

(4) “Literally” — This word is often misused to express intensity, when it instead implies something that is completely true. So, don’t use “literally” unless to express exactness, recorded fact. (“She spoke literally the words of the agreement, as they appeared on the page.”)

(5) “Toward/Afterward/Anyway”— These words are all correct, but never should end with “s.” Therefore, “towards,” “afterwards,” and “anyways” are all incorrect, however commonly we use them in spoken English. (“He moved toward the worktable where she was painting; looked afterward at the mess she made, and left it all for the owners of the building, anyway.”)

(6) “Fewer/Less” — “Fewer” is used to refer to things you can physically count, while “less” refers to things you cannot count. I learned this distinction as late as graduate school and often find it as an error in mainstream media. (“We would make fewer errors in our experiment if students poured less water down the gully.”)

(7) “Farther/Further” — “Farther” refers to distance. “Further” means advancement. (“Let’s walk farther toward the road to further our conversation.”)

(8) “Wreak havoc” — This phrase is often misused in the form of “wreck havoc.”  To “wreak havoc” means to cause chaos. The faulty form has no meaning. (“The storm will wreak havoc with power lines and cell towers.”)

(9) “Another think coming” — This phrase may appear laughable, when it’s actually correct! The mistaken form is “another thing coming.” In fact, “another think coming” means that you have another thought that is coming to mind, as you speak. (“Give me more time to consider your question, as I have another think coming.”)

(10) “Climactic/Climatic” — These words are often confused for each other. “Climactic” refers to something that reaches a “climax.” By contrast, “climatic” refers to the “climate” or weather of a place. As you can imagine, we must pronounce each of these terms carefully and listeners must listen carefully to us, if the distinction is to be understood.  (“The weatherman’s anti-climactic style of presentation still provided climatic advice that the travellers needed.”)

 Do you have questions about specific words or expressions you cannot answer? Please send them to me, via my “contact” page (www.storytellingcommunications.ca/contact). I’d be delighted to use them in a future issue!

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 SHOP NEWS:

Thank you to the team of Women Entrepreneurs of SK (WESK) for hosting another networking event this month, this time featuring the entrepreneurial insights of Praxis School of Entrepreneurship alumna, interior designer, Miranda Young (of Broadway Ave and Main Street’s “Alt Haus” design store).

Miranda is an entrepreneurial visionary, who shared her perspective on persevering through times of professional challenges and difficulties, like those most of us face, at some time or other.

Do please check out Alt Haus with its wonderfully creative atmosphere and commitment to Canadian and local suppliers.

I also encourage you to participate in WESK’s programming (www.wesk.ca) to benefit from the stories, sharing  and expertise their events  provide.

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My gratitude goes this month to my colleague, former student and friend, William Wang, Director, China Offices of Alberta; and Chair of International Relations, Executive Council, Government of Alberta. William has promoted my English language teaching services over WhatsApp to local Asian entrepreneurs.

William has very graciously done this while refusing to send a modest coffee card or any other “thank you.” I thoroughly enjoyed the classes I shared with him last summer and fall and will return some of his welcome generosity when we meet in-person– perhaps when he least expects it—ha ha!

May the “Year of the Snake” (2025) be a hospitable and prosperous one for you, William!

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While musing on connections with Asia, I must add my special thanks this month to the always modest Trung Nguyen, an elder of my church, founding member of Saskatoon Open Door Society; and to Kayson Tran, administrator of social media for Saskatoon Vietnamese Association (SVA).

These fine folk published my teaching poster on the SVA’s Facebook page this month. The association is hosting its annual Lunar New Year Celebration on January 18th (tickets have sold out), after months of committed organizing its tireless volunteers, spearheaded by Trung and Kayson.

The New Year’s gala will include Mayor Cynthia Block, MLA Kevin Waugh and MP Brad Redekopp. The same team of Vietnamese-Canadians (including Trung and Kayson) will similarly organize another engaging pavilion at next summer’s “Folkfest,” as they have, for decades.

I encourage you to attend “Folkfest,” as I plan to, and to meet the welcoming and very sociable members of our local Vietnamese community.

Some of these members, like Trung, have called Canada “home” for most (or all) of their adult lives. They have quietly raised the next generation (or two) of Vietnamese-Saskatchewanians and pioneered the work of settlement agencies, such as the Saskatoon Open Door Society.

Thank you, Trung and Kayson!

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Thank you to the service staff at CartoonStock Ltd ( www.cartoonstock.com ), especially Sean Hanley-Horwood, who have answered my questions when I’ve purchased a license and cartoons from them (in Bath, England) for my LinkedIn prospecting.

When any technical glitches have arisen on their website, the support staff have been a great help. I admire CartoonStock’s growing bank of cartoons and capacious licensing terms.

Thank you, friends at CartoonStock!

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There are always new “thank-yous” to share and new businesses and entrepreneurs to promote. But this is a wrap for mid-January, 2025!

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ABOUT US:

Between 2011 and December 2018, Elizabeth Shih Communications chronicled the stories of B2B marketing and communications on the Prairies and across the country.

Effective January 1, 2019, I rebranded as “Storytelling Communications.”

I now help newcomers to Canada find better jobs or secure better contracts by improving their English skills; and I also write and edit the legacy stories of major companies.

Interested in learning more? Please contact me through my CASL-compliant website (www.elizabethshih.com).

After I receive your message, I’ll be pleased to discuss projects with you!

Please visit my website for more information (www.storytellingcommunications.ca).

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Feeling the Christmas blues? Here are some solutions (and some hope!) . . . .

December 2024 Vol 6 Issue 12

“Tell Your Story Newsletter”

Teaching English as a second language
Let us help you tell your story!

Welcome Mid-December, 2024!

In contrast to 2023, when Christmas saw virtually no snow and few days below -10 or -15 degrees (Celsius), this year Ol’ Man Winter packed an early punch (on November 18th) that has since stayed!

However, many of my readers have written me over the years to say they prefer a white Christmas, Advent, Hanukkah, or other celebration at this time of year. The snow can be beautiful.

Through the “Advent Appeal” program in my church, we have continued our
annual practice of collecting thousands of dollars worth of winter coats and
clothing, warm blankets, food and hygiene supplies for some of the city’s
burgeoning homeless population.

For this last issue of 2024, “Article One” revisits “Coping with Christmas,” a
publication of the American Hospice Foundation (AHF). Given the financial
struggles many face these days paying for housing and groceries, “coping” may be the “new normal” for many of us.

Entrepreneurs are studying markets, coping with the national postal strike and
leveraging new or renewed strategies to keep their businesses successful.
For those of us who care for others on a daily basis and/or who face complex
health problems ourselves, the AHF reminds us to be aware of our own emotional needs, so as to avoid burnout.

And in this month’s “Storytellers’ Corner,” I share a joke attributed to Oscar Wilde on exceptions to rules for spelling and pronunciation in the English language! As an ESL teacher, I find it warrants repeating, if you’ve seen it before.

In spite of inflation at our grocery stores and gas stations and other losses in these ongoing times, I hope that you, good reader, have warm and safe homes, not just this season, but throughout the year.

And if you (like me) are so blessed, I know you’ll share with those who are less so, whether through your “office pool,” the Salvation Army Kettle Campaign, or
similar work done by your faith or neighbourhood communities.

I also hope you’ll enjoy the final days of 2024 with family and friends, giving
thanks for the family, friends, mentors and clients who grace our lives. (Sometimes these roles overlap in wonderful ways!)

May you find peace this holiday season; and good health, happiness and prosperity in 2025!

Sincerely,
Elizabeth
Principal
Storytelling Communications
www.elizabethshih.com
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IN THIS ISSUE:
ARTICLE 1: Feeling the Christmas blues? Here are some solutions (and
some hope!) . . . .
STORYTELLERS’ CORNER:
A joke on the (Christmas) potato: On the quirks of the English language
SHOP NEWS
ABOUT US
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Article One: Feeling the Christmas blues? Here are some solutions (and some hope!) . . .

For many of us, even if we have been blessed to enjoy Advent, Christmas,
Hanukkah or other spiritual traditions at this time of year, the holiday season can be painful.

Pain may come from to the loss of a loved one, a job or business, separation from a “significant other,” health challenges or financial difficulties, the excessive pressure to buy and give, and so on. The so-called “holiday season” can in reality be anything but “ho-ho-ho.”

This holiday survival guide, written originally by the American Hospice
Foundation, offers some ideas that may help as we plan (or, choose not to plan)
holiday festivities.

Please read on and share with others who may find this helpful.
And please know you are not alone if you have “holiday blues,” and that it is
important to live through the holiday season on your own terms.

Christmas or Holiday cards (choose one like these):
1. Mail (if Canada Post’s labour strike ends), or email to save on stationery and
postage
2. Shorten your list
3. Include a Christmas letter that you’ve written yourself
4. Skip it this year

Christmas or Holiday music (choose one like these):
1. Enjoy as usual
2. Shop early, to avoid Christmas music
3. Avoid turning the radio on
4. Listen to the music and allow yourself to feel sad (or to cry, if needed)

Decorations (choose one like these):
1. Decorate as usual
2. Let others do it
3. Choose not to have decorations
4. Have a special decoration for a loved one, who may have died or left
5. Modify your decorations
6. Make changes, such as putting up an artificial tree, instead of a real one
7. Ask for help from others

Shopping (choose one like these):
1. Shop as usual
2. Shop early
3. Make your gifts by hand
4. Make a list of gifts to buy
5. Shop online
6. Ask for help wrapping gifts
7. Shop with a friend
8. Give cash
9. Give baked goods
10. Ask for help
11. Give an “experience” gift, like a gift card to a much- loved restaurant, or a
concert or sporting event
12. Go giftless and (if possible) make a donation to charity

Traditions (choose one like these):
1. Keep the old traditions
2. Don’t attend Christmas parties
3. Open gifts on the usual day
4. Attend a worship service
5. Attend a totally different place of worship
6. Visit the cemetery
7. Attend Christmas or holiday parties
8. Travel to an entirely new place
9. Open gifts at another time
10. Do not attend a worship service
11. Light a special candle to honour a loved one
12. Bake the usual foods
13. Modify your baking and cooking, to save money
14. Buy the usual foods
15. Spent quiet time alone, in meditation or relaxation

Christmas or Holiday Dinner (choose one like these):
1. Prepare as usual
2. Invite friends over
3. Eat in a different location of the house
4. Go out to dinner (such as to a hotel restaurant), possibly with someone else who is alone
5. Eat alone, while listening to favourite music
6. Change the time of dinner
7. Have a buffet/potluck and share the clean-up, after
8. Ask for help

Post-Christmas and New Year’s Day (choose one like these):
1. Spend the days as usual
2. Avoid New Year’s parties
3. Spend time with only a few friends
4. Write in a journal about your hopes for the next year
5. Go out of town
6. Host a New Year’s Party
7. Go to a movie, watch a movie on a streaming service or even borrow a DVD
from the library (if it’s an old title)
8. Go to bed early and feel refreshed the next morning for the new year ahead

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A recent update on this holiday survival guide appeared from “Becoming
Minimalist,” over Facebook:
“De-cember:
De-clutter your home
De-tox your schedule
De-stress your mind
and De-cide what matters most.”
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And now it’s your turn: Does the Christmas, Hanukkah or holiday season present  challenges for you? Please consider some of the above options to experience the holidays on your own terms.

And remember that crisis counselling is available 24/7, such as at number

9-8-8.   Please do not suffer in silence.

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STORYTELLERS’ CORNER . . . .

 

STORYTELLERS’ CORNER: Words, Stories and Riddles on Writing and Editing . . .
A joke on the (Christmas) potato: On the quirks of the English language

For many cultures that will engage in Christmas, Ukrainian Christmas, Hanukkah,  Kwanzaa or other celebrations this winter, the lowly potato will be a part (in some cases, a staple) of the cuisine.

The potato may be thought “lowly,” as the late Queen Elizabeth the Second was reported to dislike the starchy vegetable (she apparently refused to have it served at dinners over which she presided).

Yet the potato has historically been an inexpensive, bland and versatile vegetable that easily becomes “comfort food” in holiday times (e.g. Bangers & Mash; Scalloped Potatoes; Latkes; Perogies; Poutine; etc).

Now, what has the potato to do with spelling or pronunciation of the English
language, you may ask? Well, I present from friends on Facebook a joke attributed to Oscar Wilde, on the underappreciated potato.

The word itself may be used to show some of the many exceptions that exist to the rules of English spelling and pronunciation! Exceptions that beset the newcomers who study English with me.

Buckle up! Here we go:

” If ‘GH’ can stand for ‘P‘ as in ‘Hiccough,’
If ‘OUGH’ stands for ‘O’ as in ‘Dough,’
If ‘PHTH’ stands for ‘T‘ in ‘Phthisis,’
If ‘EIGH’ stands for ‘A‘ as in ‘Neighbor,’
If ‘TTE’ stands for ‘T‘ as in ‘Gazette,’
If ‘EAU’ stands for ‘O‘ as in ‘Plateau,’ . . . .

Then the right way to spell (and pronounce) ‘POTATO’ should really be this:
‘GHOUGHPHTHEIGHTTEEAU!’

Now, if you try to explain the above (joke) to a newcomer to Canada, you may
soon join the late Queen in her distaste for the potato!

And now it’s your turn: Have holiday foods or activities familiar to you raised
challenges in the English language for you or others? Please write in and share
your stories for a future issue!

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SHOP NEWS:
Entrepreneur of the Month:
I’m pleased to introduce a new member to my writers’ group, “Saskatoon
Freelancers’ Roundtable”: Carmen Gilmore.
Carmen entered the freelance world after working in environmental and energy policy. Then, her “bread and butter” was writing briefing notes, memos and drafting policy.

For the past five years, family responsibilities have seen her hyper-focused on local environmental issues and on connecting families and children to nature, through art.

Carmen has experience in writing grants and annual reports for non-profits; and in creating marketing materials, websites and social media for small businesses. Her graduate degree in public policy keeps her interested in governance, lately on non-profit boards.

Like many freelancers, Carmen says she “tiptoed into communications work
through volunteer roles, putting her hand up to say, ‘I can write that
article/newsletter/report!'” A long-time enthusiast for heritage research, she is interested in place-based storytelling. Carmen created a history walk that landed her awards in both Provincial Heritage and in Regional Centre of Excellence UN Sustainable Development.

She enjoys creating hands-on learning resources on nature for families and educators.

To learn more about Carmen, or to explore the possibility of working with her,
please visit her website: https://www.woodlandartadventures.ca/

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Heartfelt thanks go out in this final issue of 2024 to friends, colleagues, followers and mentors who encourage me to facilitate language (ESL) classes; who respond to my blog postings and this monthly newsletter; who have coached or encouraged me to achieve greater clarity in entrepreneurial goals; and who have lightened some of the weight of elderly caregiving that I have carried for the past five years.

With apologies to anyone whose name I temporarily forget, here is a roundup of some of the truly beautiful people who regularly grace my professional and
personal lives:

Chief Visionary Officer, Monica Kreuger, and the amazing team at the Praxis
School of Entrepreneurship (PSE); English and ESL teacher, Steve
Cavan; Saskatchewan’s best entrepreneurial coach (and PSE facilitator), Deanna Litz, of Powerful Nature Coaching & Consulting, Inc.; Minister of Word and Sacrament, the very empathetic Rev. Roberto De Sandoli of St. Andrew’s
Presbyterian Church; the always supportive Ashleigh Mattern (of Vireo
Productions) and Julie Barnes (of Julie Barnes Creative Services) for co-leading our monthly writers’ group that we pioneered, more than 10 years ago, and for offering leads or contracts to fellow members, when available.

Fellow writers, including both Ashleigh and Julie, along with Merle (Massie)
McGowan, Adele Paul, Ashlyn George, Tara Kalyn, Meredith Hambrock, Carmen Gilmore and Dawn Loewen keep pushing the envelope as they write (illustrate and/or publish) their remarkable work.

A “thank you” and smile to the wonderful Katrina German for sending freelancer Carmen Gilmore to “Freelancers’ Roundtable”; and to Candiece Griffiths and Sydney Boulton, for connecting with us by prospecting through WESK or Editors SK.

Many of us in the writing world have shared insights on self-employment and
been the better for the camaraderie.

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Congratulations to my client and fellow writer, Greg Gilroy, on this month’s
publication of his memoir, Behind the Wheel: Ramblings of a Veteran Bus
Driver, which I had the pleasure of editing last summer and fall.

Fellow transit drivers and riders, past, present and future, will enjoy and benefit
from reading the stories of Greg’s 32+ years of driving city buses in Saskatoon.
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I’m also grateful, as always, for the support of dear friends, Erin Watson, Dani
VanDriel, Barbara McEown, MaryAnn Lyle, Martha Fergusson, Donna Briscoe,
Jane Campbell, Sharon Wiseman and other “St. Andrew’s women” (too numerous to name here), as well as lawyer, Ben Nussbaum, and–especially, this year, to parish nurse extraordinaire, Laura Van Loon.

With a grateful heart, I dedicate this issue of “TYSN” to Laura and her family.
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For providing me with a good home-office space, I am thankful to Colliers
McClocklin Ltd, including Gladys Fehr, Kirstin Halliday, Gabriela Valdez, Rick,
Ann and Brenda Dietner.

Thanks are due every year to Kanchan Manek and the Manek family of the Raj
Manek Mentorship Program, who since 1998 have provided monthly seminars and facilitated extraordinary relationships between junior entrepreneurs and seasoned mentors on the Prairies.

Thanks also go out to the team of Women Entrepreneurs of SK (WESK) for
hosting refreshing and collaborative networking events that prompted me to renew my membership well before the official start of their fiscal year in April, 2025.
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I have especially appreciated the chance to teach English phonics this past year to one of my (now graduated) students from North East Africa; I wish her every success in her future studies and career.
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At a time when senior care in our province is challenged and when many private care homes struggle to provide sufficient support at high costs, the geriatric transition ward at Saskatoon City Hospital provided a bulwark from the storm, for one of my family.

My family remains grateful to its staff (City Hospital) as well as to several of the hardworking staff at Sunnyside-Adventist Care Centre, where a “first bed” offered stability and support to my family.
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As we look back over the past year, I’m sure that you (like me) have experienced your own losses or disappointments–and not all small ones.
But I hope you have also felt the support and camaraderie of peers and
organizations in our friendly and beautiful city, for which we are grateful.

And . . . if you are, or know, a newcomer to Canada who wants to elevate their
degree of fluency in English (listening, speaking, reading and writing), please
reach out to me. (Email is usually fastest: shih.ea@gmail.com .) I’d be happy to
conduct a no-cost, 15-minute interview to assess the learner’s needs for English language lessons.

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Meantime, at the portal of a New Year, I wish all of you, good readers, the very
best!

Look out, 2025: Here we come!

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ABOUT US:
Between 2011 and December 2018, Elizabeth Shih Communications chronicled the stories of B2B marketing and communications on the Prairies and across the country.

Effective January 1, 2019, I rebranded as “Storytelling Communications.” I now
help economic immigrants to land better jobs or secure larger contracts by
improving their language skills. . . . And I help major companies write and edit
their legacy stories.

Interested in learning more? Please contact me through my CASL-compliant
website.

After I receive your message, I’ll be pleased to discuss services with you!

Please visit my website for more
information (www.storytellingcommunications.ca)

 

 

What are some of the (dis)advantages of having a global language? Alexandre Chemla weighs in

November 2024 Vol 6 Issue 11

Tell Your Story Newsletter (TYSN):

Teaching English as a Second Language

Let us help you tell your story!

Welcome Mid-November 2024!

November seemed to sneak in my back door, prior to this issue, bringing with it several days of overcast skies and brisk winds . . . . But since then, much of the first half of this month has more frequently seen days of above-seasonal warmth and sunshine. November has often felt like September and has thereby earned our collective gratitude for deferring seasonal snow and cold.

Since mid-October, Saskatchewanians’ emotions have run high, due to the Provincial election; today’s Municipal election; and a Federal one to follow (date TBA). If these weren’t sufficiently engrossing, social and traditional media have been abuzz over the extremity of the US election and all of the negative global implications it brings.

And yet, Canada remains a democracy where we defend a just rule-of-law, despite the incursions of bullies and their increasing authoritarianism in our world.

In “Article One” this issue, we return to language issues. I summarize a blog posting of trilingual Canadian, Alexandre Chemla, on the advantages and disadvantages of having a “global language” (i.e. English).

In these challenging times, the status of the English language does not seem to be threatened. But what are the implications of its dominant status? What have we gained—and lost—as users of English, worldwide?

In “Storytellers’ Corner,” as the year winds down, I visit an official (and a second, unofficial) word of the year (2024).

Have you heard of these? And what other words have developed in the English vocabulary throughout the past 12 months? That segment provides some answers.

And in “Shop News,” I return to the popular feature of “Entrepreneur of the Month” (this month: editor, Dawn Loewen) and find new organizations and people to thank in my multifaceted career.

If you’re feeling troubled by the “news,” good readers, I remind you of a meme that recently circulated on social media. It quotes The Talmud and was used by US Vice President Kamala Harris in her recent concession speech:

“Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief. Do justly now.

Love mercy now.

Walk humbly now.

You are not obligated to complete the work,

but neither are you free to abandon it.”

As we approach the final month of 2024, may you also continue resolutely with your work, and with the witness it bears to the justice, mercy and humility that still flourish in our community–and beyond.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth

Principal, 

Storytelling Communications

www.elizabethshih.com

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IN THIS ISSUE:

ARTICLE ONE: What are some (dis)advantages of having a global language? Alexandre Chemla weighs in

STORYTELLERS’ CORNER: What is the word of the year for 2024?

SHOP NEWS

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Article One: What are the (dis)advantages of having a global language? Canadian Alexandre Chemla weighs in . . . 

On the Government of Canada’s Language Portal and under its “Our Languages” blog, I recently read a posting by Alexandre Chemla, a trilingual (now former-) student at the U of Ottawa who studied environmental studies (in both the English and French languages). Chemla values languages that connect him to his family history–that is, both French and Italian.

He presents two clear advantages and two clear disadvantages in learning and using a “global language,” like English. He recalls that his mother showed him his maternal grandfather’s work card used during the Second World War.

Chemla’s grandfather had left his village in Calabria (S. Italy—incidentally, where friends Steve Cavan and Kathleen James-Cavan have recently retired; but I digress . . .). Chemla’s grandfather sought work elsewhere in Europe. During World War Two, his German work card notably lacked any English translation. It was instead translated into French—the language that then occupied the global position that English now does.

Chemla found himself pondering what the advantages and disadvantages are of having “global” or “universal” languages? This question should matter to anyone who, like me, studies or teaches languages, in general, and English-as-a-Second Language (ESL), in particular.

He observes two advantages:

(i)   A global language allows people from different cultures to communicate. Language is the foundation for cultural identity, so having one with global reach enables people to understand each others’ cultures.

As an example, he recalls in the 2010s speaking to an Argentinian university student, after watching a live European football game in Buenos Aires.

English was not the native language of either man. Despite coming from different countries, they could still connect culturally through their ability to speak English.

(ii)   A global language facilitates international trade. Chemla acknowledges that “with the rise of globalization and neo-liberalism since the 1970s, wide-scale international trade between different countries has occurred.” This is fairly obvious.

Business transactions require effective and accurate communication. The outcome is opportunities for economic growth on both sides.

By contrast, barriers caused by linguistic differences have been seen and statistically shown to decrease trade between countries.

Chemla also observes two major disadvantages:

(i)   The dominance of a language like English has meant that “scientists who access a vast amount of literature from around the world” find challenges in publishing on it, “when they are non-native speakers [and writers] of English.”

Scientists need to clearly communicate “their findings, conclusions and methods,” which isn’t easy when they fail to speak and write idiomatic English.

Chemla writes: “Scientists who want their work to be globally recognized need to attend English conferences or discussions and read English scientific papers.” He cites “The Atlantic” (2015) as assessing that “80% of scientific papers are published in English.”

(ii)   The global dominance of one language (i.e.  English) threatens minority languages. A BBC article that Chemla cites says that “some 400 languages have become extinct” in the last century (1921-2021). This amounts to “one language every three months.”

The same source says that “50% of all remaining languages will become extinct” in the next century. He asserts that this is worrisome, because “an extinct language means the loss of a unique culture.”

Chemla says that while speakers of a global language may access “greater opportunities for employment, education and overall success,” those gains should not be part of a “takeover of minority languages by a global language.”

He rightly says that having English as our “global language” has both advantages and disadvantages.

What other advantages and disadvantages arise from the domination of a “global language?”

What does it mean that English continues to be the world’s “global language” (and in the context of this blog, of education and entrepreneurship)?

How might the digital language of AI or the languages of billions of Asians (e.g. Mandarin and Hindi) eclipse English? What implications would follow?

And now it’s your turn: when should we start studying other, less dominant (or minority) languages?

And when should we teach them to our children and grandchildren, rather than relying wholly on English and a monolinguistic culture?

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STORYTELLERS’ CORNER . . . . 

STORYTELLERS’ CORNER: Words, Stories, Riddles and Jokes on Writing and Editing . . .

 

This month:  What is the word of the year for 2024? 

 The American “Collins Dictionary” has declared the word “brat ” to be the 2024 word of the year. The word, adopted by the Anglo-Indian singer, “Charli XCX,” as the name for her sixth album, has been redefined: it means “characterized by a confident, independent and hedonistic attitude.”

Some other words that have been added to the English language this year follow. (This is not an exhaustive list.)  Would you use these in common parlance?

–“Prompt” (verb)—instruction given to an AI program to influence or determine the content it generates. (“There is a job posting on Indeed.com for an AI prompt writer.”)

–“Bed rotting” (noun) – spending many hours in bed during the day, often with snacks or an electronic device, as retreating from activity or stress. (“The teenager celebrated his graduation from high school with a two-day episode of bed rotting.”)

–“Girl dinner” (noun) –an often attractively presented collection of snacks that involve little preparation, such as a small charcuterie enough to provide a meal for one. (“Feminists have queried the use of the term ‘girl dinner’ for a light meal.”)

–“Mid” (adjective) –mediocre or disappointing. (“It turned out to be a mid event, despite all the hoopla and promotion.”)

–“Bussin’” (adjective) – great; wonderful; amazing. (“It was a bussin awards show.”)

–“The ick” (a noun) –a sudden feeling of disgust or dislike, often in response to the actions of someone else. (“Hearing about his exploits gave me the ick.”)

–“Pretty privilege” (noun) – an unearned societal advantage that a person has, by fitting into the beauties of their culture. (“Until she developed cancer, many non-royalists thought Kate Middleton was a figure of pretty privilege).

–“Barbicore” (noun) – an aesthetic or style featuring playful pink outfits and décor, etc., modelled on the wardrobe of the Barbie doll. (“After raising three young daughters during the last decade, Jean-Paul felt he’d had enough of Barbicore culture.”)

However, I’d like to suggest an alternative “word of the year”–a term stronger than “brat.” It left the digital pen of British dictionary writer, Susie Dent, and dates to the 17th century: “recrudescence.”

“Recrudescence” means “the return of something terrible after a time of reprieve.”

References to Covid and cold and flu season may momentarily come to mind. But for many of us, “recrudescence” refers to the rise and/or return to power of abominable “leaders” like the one south of our border!

Communications newsletters (like this one) generally aim to be politically neutral. Not so, this month!

But based on your friendly comments and social media postings during the past year, I believe Dent’s word may strike a chord with you, good readers.

Just as authoritarian leadership will sadly last longer in our world than just four years, I believe “recrudescence” has staying power!

And now it’s your turn: What do you think of these commonly used words? And what is the word(s) of the year in your house?  Please write in; I’d be delighted to hear from you.

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SHOP NEWS:

This month—a return to the popular “Entrepreneur of the month” segment!

Introducing,  Dawn Loewen . . . a new recruit to my writers’ group, “Saskatoon Freelancers’ Roundtable.” Here is some of her story:

 Dawn is a certified copy editor who has worked in the publishing industry since 1998. She specializes in detail work (copy editing and proofreading), though “copy editing” for her usually includes line editing and even some substantive suggestions, where the brief permits.

Her work spans everything from academic journal articles to fiction, World Bank reports to picture books.

Dawn tries to balance jobs that she says (to be frank) “pay well, but may be less exciting, with book editing, which does not pay well but is almost always fun and rewarding.”

She has worked on close to 200 books to date, in a wide variety of genres.

Lately, Dawn has worked a lot for Greystone Books and Nature Saskatchewan, as well as for self-publishing authors and professors.

She also enjoys a fulfilling collaboration with a local editor who prefers the “big picture” work and trusts her with the finer grades of editing sandpaper.

Dawn came to editing via a nontraditional route, earning a BSc in biology and physical geography from U of S and an MSc in ethnobotany from UVic. She received specific training in the form of editing courses from Simon Fraser (SFU) and elsewhere, countless seminars, and in-house mentoring.

After working for two different publishers, she turned to freelancing in 2004.

To learn more about Dawn, or to discuss your project with her, please visit https://loewenediting.com.

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A very deep “Thank You” goes this month to my church’s parish nurse, Laura Van Loon; and to mentors and advisors, Monica Kreuger, Adele Kulyk and Linda Catton, who have been supportive, when an aging family member of mine has long needed the care of a nursing (long-term care) home.

The advanced senior care system in SK (and beyond) is broken and tough to navigate. But whether over the past five+ years (or just a few weeks), these individuals have become not only trusted mentors but also valued friends.

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And special thanks to the nurses, care aides and communicators of the post-surgical and seniors’ transitional wards at Saskatoon City Hospital. Their kindness toward seniors has been remarkable and gratefully received.

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A hearty thanks goes out this month to “Chris” at Amazon.ca’s headquarters in BC.

Chris processed a return by phone of some seniors’ supplies that were delivered before I could cancel the order.

Most of us small-business owners would much rather shop locally to support each other. For instance, we would frequent Steep Hill Food Coop, instead of Superstore; and “Turning the Tide” instead of Amazon.ca!

But sometimes life circumstances see us needing to use a conglomerate like Amazon, with its capacity to deliver quickly!

Notwithstanding the concerns many of us have about such companies, I remain grateful that Chris stepped up to improve what otherwise was a frustrating day.

Thank you, Chris!

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I’m equally grateful this month for another engaging networking event, provided by the current team at Women Entrepreneurs of SK (WESK).

Last week’s “Open mic” session gave both experienced and newbie entrepreneurs a three-minute opportunity to speak about their businesses and receive feedback from WESK’s team of strategists.

The engagement that resulted was powerful, especially when entrepreneurs had differing experience levels. Recent photos are posted on LinkedIn.)

Thank you to WESK’s team: CEO Miriam Johnson, Jess Paul, Cara Cote, Jenelle Yochim and Michael Betteridge. (And sincere apologies if I missed anyone else on the team that evening.)

There are always new “thank yous” to share and new businesses and entrepreneurs to promote. 

But this is a wrap for mid-November!

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 ABOUT US:

Between 2011 and December 2018, Elizabeth Shih Communications chronicled the stories of B2B marketing and communications on the Prairies and across the country.

Effective January 1, 2019, I rebranded as “Storytelling Communications.”

I help economic immigrants to Canada to find better jobs or secure greater contracts by improving their English skills (ESL); and I write and edit the legacy stories of major companies.

Interested in learning more? Please contact me through my CASL-compliant website (www.elizabethshih.com).

After I receive your message, I’ll be pleased to discuss projects with you!

Please visit my website for more information (www.storytellingcommunications.ca).

 

STAY IN TOUCH:

Follow us on Twitter  Become a Facebook fan  Subscribe to my blog

Contact us

What stories are behind your words? Susie Dent has some answers in this month’s issue of ‘Tell Your Story Newsletter’

October 2024 Vol 6 Issue 10

Tell Your Story Newsletter (TYSN):

 Teaching English as a Second Language

Let us help you tell your story!

Welcome Mid-October, 2024!

What does “October mean (to you)? What changes does it bring?Media reports in late September and early October have concentrated notably on social justice and public health issues in our community, and at a time when Saskatonians prepare to vote in upcoming civic, provincial and federal government elections.

On September 30th, we observed the “National Day for Truth and Reconciliation,” to honour the Indigenous children, who (as the Government of Canada acknowledges), “never returned home (from  government- and church-led residential schools), and their survivors, alongside their families and communities.”

Young Indigenous children faced emotional, physical and sexual abuse, and endured the forced suppression of their language, culture and familial relationships. But change has been slow to arrive.

The day has also become known as “Orange Shirt Day,” an “Indigenous-led, grassroots commemorative day, intended to raise awareness of the . . . impact of residential schools [and] to promote the concept that ‘Every Child Matters.’”

In my faith group on September 29th, we donned orange shirts and listened as guest speaker Patti Polowick discussed the need for change: through public apologies to the Indigenous people of SK (and beyond); through our refusal to condemn those who (intergenerationally) struggle with homelessness and addictions; and through recognizing the Biblical and spiritual basis of both truth and forgiveness.

 

And on October 10th, we observed “World Mental Health Day,” an international day (writes the the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union [UFCW]) “to raise awareness of the stigmas surrounding mental illness and the importance of promoting mental health.” Change here, too, is desperately needed.

Globally, close to one billion people now live with mental illness (reports the World Health Organization [WHO]); and the Covid-19 pandemic has further reduced people’s mental wellbeing. Yet mental health continues to be “one of the most neglected areas of public health.”

Efforts need to be mobilized to increase the quality and accessibility of good mental health care–and no place greater than in SK. On its website  (https://www.who.int/campaigns/world-mental-health-day), the WHO reminds us that good “mental health is a universal human right.”

Yet we find ourselves experiencing impoverished (some might say “third-world”) healthcare in a first-world province. Change is needed.

Indigenous healing and reconciliation with settler cultures and the improvement of human mental health are two of the greatest cultural and health-related movements we face world-wide. They demand that we work toward meaningful change (and surpass mere “lip-service”).

Survivors have important stories to tell that can yield change, as we advocate for more respect, tolerance and support than current times provide.

And appropriately, the month of  October is usually a month of seasonal change. As Environment Canada’s forecasts indicate, our current warmer-than-seasonal weather will be displaced at month’s end, by single digit degrees above zero, Celsius.

Yet our days are marked with the turning and falling of gloriously golden and crimson leaves, that bring great beauty to our lives, even as we brace ourselves for the change of winter.

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary tells us that the name “October” shares roots with  “octopus” and “octagon,” which originally meant “tenth” in Anglo-Saxon and Middle English—so that “October” designates the tenth month of our Gregorian calendar. That is one of its stories.

But to add to the complexity of linguistic history (a theme popular with this month’s featured dictionary writer, Susie Dent), the name “October” also reflects the earlier Latin “octo” and the Greek “okto” (both of which mean “eight”). So in the earlier Roman calendar, “October” occurred in the eighth month, an earlier story . . .

In keeping with stories of change, in “Article One” this month, I visit a recent book from acclaimed British lexicographer (dictionary writer), Susie Dent, on the meaning of words that have surprising (hi)stories to tell.

In “Storytellers’ Corner,” I cite Canadian entrepreneur and strategist, Arlene Dickinson on how, by exchanging the often harsh thoughts we have of ourselves with ones of self-worth, we can empower our minds and lives.

And in this month’s “Shop News,” I share sundry items of visits, events and news that energized me in recent weeks, making me glad to have exchanged time in my office to engage with peers like you!

What has October brought to you?  Have you plunged into your work, embracing the reality that summer has finally passed? Or have you stepped aside from the daily grind, mindfully, to notice the season’s beauty and distinctness?

And please send your updates and ideas for  future issues of “TYSN.” I’d be delighted to hear from you.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth

Principal

Storytelling Communications

www.elizabethshih.com

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IN THIS ISSUE:

ARTICLE ONE: What stories are behind your words? Susie Dent has some answers

–STORYTELLERS’ CORNER: Arlene Dickinson on retelling your story of self-worth

–SHOP NEWS

ABOUT US

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Article One: What stories are behind your words? Susie Dent has some answers

In her recent book, Interesting Stories about Curious Words: From Stealing Thunder to Red Herrings, Britain’s most popular “lexicographer” (dictionary writer), Susie Dent, shares some of the fascinating stories behind common English words and phrases.

Those of us who communicate for our living (I teach English-as-a-Second Language) are not surprised to know (as Languagelinks.ca reports) “that over half of the English language comes from French and Latin.”  In fact, “more than 60% of our vocabulary has its origins in France.”

And when we read the work of Susie Dent, it’s not hard to imagine her as the heroine of Pip Williams’ recent popular novel, The Dictionary of Lost Words, a plausible but fictional telling of the work of late Victorian and early 20th-Century lexicographers who developed the first-ever edition of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED).

Describing her career of researching and writing dictionaries, Dent cites Eric Partridge (Britain’s “20th-century chronicler of slang expressions”) as saying there are “more imagination and enthusiasm in the making of a good dictionary than in the average novel.”

Dent cites a favourite anecdote, also from Partridge–of an elderly Englishwoman who, after borrowing a dictionary from the public library, returned it with the comment that it was “a very unusual book indeed—but the stories are extremely short, aren’t they?”

In Interesting Stories, Dent brings together hundreds of her favourite eclectic histories of English words, whose criterion for inclusion was only that the stories “might elicit an ‘ah!’, an ‘of course!’ or maybe even a ‘what!’”

Dent writes that “curious minds will always need curious words,” so learning languages, such as English, including the fantastic words that she collects, need never be boring.

Here, this month, are ten of the favourite words Dent chronicles in her book:

(1) “Long time no see: “A mock traditional greeting to a person one has not seen for a long time. It is a form of Pidgin English based on Chinese “hăo jiǔ méi jiàn.”

(2) “Wotcher”: “A late 19th-century alteration of the greeting, ‘What cheer?’, or ‘How are you?’”

(3) “All one’s geese are swans”: “To overestimate; to see things in too rosy a light. All one’s children are paragons, and whatever one does is, in one’s own eyes, superfluous.”

(4)  “Booby”: “A species of ‘gannet’ (large seabird) is called a booby because of its apparent stupidity. The Spanish bobo means ‘silly.’ It was this that gave rise to the idea of a ‘booby prize.’”

(5) “As mad as a March hare”: “Hares are unusually . . . wild in March, which is their rutting [mating] season.”

(6) “A Leopard cannot change its spots”: “A person’s character never changes fundamentally. The allusion is to Jeremiah 13:23: ‘Can the Ethiopian change is skin, or the leopard his spots?’”

(7) “Teddy bear”: “A child’s toy bear, named after Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt (1858-1919), who was fond of bear-hunting. Roosevelt was shown sparing the life of a bear-cub in a cartoon drawn by C.K. Berryman in 1902 as a spoof on the president’s role as an ardent conservationist.

In 1906, The New York Times  published a humorous poem about the adventures of two bears named Teddy B and Teddy G, in Roosevelt’s honour. The names were then given to two bears newly presented to the Bronx Zoo, and manufacturers seized on the event to put toy bears called ‘teddy bears’ on the market.”

(8)Higgledy-piggedly”: “Jumbled up in a confused mess. The word first appeared at the end of the 16th century and may have been inspired by the slovenly reputation of pigs. It is an example of what linguists call a ‘reduplicative compound,’ in which two words are paired on the basis of their sound, and one of them tends to be a fanciful add-on.”

(9) “To get someone’s goat”: “To annoy a person. The expression, an old Americanism, is said to relate to a practice among racehorse trainers of soothing a nervous horse by putting a goat in its stall. Someone wanting the horse to lose could sneak in and remove the goat. The horse would again succumb to an attack of nerves and would not run well. But one can irritate a person by constantly butting in, and this may be a more likely reference.”

(10) “Dogsbody”: “Someone who does all the menial jobs that no one else wants to do, typically a young person or trainee employee. The term dates from the 1920s and was originally applied humorously to peas boiled in cloth on board ships and subsequently to a junior officer.”

And now it’s your turn: Do these “curious” stories about words appeal to you? How much of a role does storytelling (more broadly) play in the languages you speak and write?

 

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STORYTELLERS’ CORNER . . . . 

STORYTELLERS’ CORNER

This month: Arlene Dickinson on retelling your story of self-worth . . . 

From entrepreneur extraordinaire, Calgary-based Arlene Dickinson  (Dragon’s Den investor and Canadian strategist), comes some other words we can tell ourselves–these in keeping with the advancement of all entrepreneurs, but women, in particular:

“The next time you stop yourself from enjoying life’s moments, doing something new and exciting or putting yourself out there, because you don’t like your body or your looks, here’s a new short tape”– a change to your  personal story –“to play in your head”:

“I am more than good enough.
I am beautiful exactly as I am.
I can’t wait to show myself what I can do.
I am uniquely and proudly me.

And then, thank your body for its strength in getting you through the days and nights and for keeping your spirit alive.”

Dickinson concludes from her own experience that it’s not easy for entrepreneurs “to drown out the insecure thoughts” that run through our minds.

But she says: “Keep rehearsing these lines” and you will revise those thoughts–and with them, your story!

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SHOP NEWS:

This month, I am especially thankful for the collaborative articles I have co-authored with fellow women writers of “Saskatoon Freelancers’ Roundtable.” The fifth of our pieces appeared in this fall’s issue of  “Freelance” magazine and online ezine, publications of the Saskatchewan Writers’ Guild.

Thank you to Ashleigh Mattern, Julie Barnes, Adele Paul and Ashlyn George for the collaboration.

Our final article addressed issues of “time management.” And our group looks forward to writing collaboratively again, in the future. Perhaps we will then include our group’s photographers and designers.

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CORRECTION from last month’s (September) issue!

The Praxis School of Entrepreneurship’s 30+ year, “startSMART” program is not ending, as I earlier reported, but is instead changing shape through a new online network for January, 2025.

Alumni of the past 30+ years are cordially invited to a “refresher” socializing and networking potluck, with date and time forthcoming, early in 2025. Stay tuned!

And please let fledgling entrepreneurs in your circles know that powerful training and community building opportunities, via the Praxis School of Entrepreneurship, are coming soon!

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I have been deeply moved this month by a visit I made to Rev. George Yando, of Prince Albert, who served as a spiritual advisor and interim minister (five years ago) to my faith community (St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church).

During a recent visit, I was touched by Rev. Yando’s continued humanity, warmth and empathy for others, even in the face of his own terminal illness.

Sometimes hospital visits become visitations, in which the visitor themselves is transformed.

Thank you, Rev. Yando.

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Special thanks this month to WESK’s CEO Miriam Johnson, and WESK team members, including those I spoke with–Program Lead, Jenelle Yochim; Brand Manager Michael Betteridge; and Client Services Manager, Cara Cote, for developing a “speed networking” format for “YXE Connect” on October 9th.

All entrepreneurs were given 15 minutes in each of four sessions to ask questions and network with service providers.

The service providers included representatives from representatives from Saskatoon’s legal, financial, banking and other advisory services (who also deserve our thanks).

The smaller group format  enabled ambiverts (like me) and introverts and newbies (whom I met) to speak more openly and engage more deeply with others, thereby extending the event’s “connective” power.

I look forward to seeing what the WESK team does for YXE’s November meeting to encourage engagement from our diverse entrepreneurial community.

Thank you, WESK!

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I’m happy to share that my ESL/EFL training organization, the TEFL Org (formerly known as TEFL Scotland) founded in 2008 by EFL teachers, Jennifer MacKenzie and Joe Hallwood, celebrated its 16th anniversary on October 9th!

TEFL Org has recently been awarded the label of a “B-Corp Certified business” for “meeting high standards of social and environmental performance, transparency and accountability” in business. TEFL Org has won numerous awards, including the “Queen’s Award” in 2022.

The company “has trained over 185,000 TEFL teachers [including me], who have entered the industry as confident and capable educators” (www.Tefl.org)

Here’s a birthday video about TEFL org:  Congratulations on 16 great years to Jennifer, Joe, Alan, Carl and the entire TEFL Org team!

There are always new businesses or events to promote and new people to thank.  But this is a “wrap” for mid-October!

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ABOUT US:

Between 2011 and December 2018, Elizabeth Shih Communications chronicled the stories of B2B marketing and communications on the Prairies and across the country.

Effective January 1, 2019, I rebranded as “Storytelling Communications.” I now help new and economic immigrants to secure  contracts or find better jobs by improving their language skills. And I also write and edit “legacy stories” of businesses in our community.

Interested in learning more? Please contact me through my CASL-compliant website (www.elizabethshih.com).

After I receive your message, I’ll be pleased to discuss projects with you!

Please visit my website for more information (www.storytellingcommunications.ca).

Fed up with sugar addiction? Meet the Canadian entrepreneur who dissolves it, in this month’s issue of ‘Tell Your Story Newsletter’

September 2024 Vol 6 Issue 9

Tell Your Story Newsletter (TYSN):
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Welcome Mid-September, 2024!

Enduring record-breaking heat in much of Saskatchewan last weekend (September 6th to 8th), many Saskatchewanians gleefully restored our summer clothes and sandals to the fronts of our closets!

Along with a life-long friend and her family, I observed one of those “dog days of summer” at the annual Broadway Avenue Street Fair! The street’s shops and many artisans’ booths sold beautiful items of textiles, wood and jewellery that were particularly wonderful to behold.

But with the drop in temperatures that have followed, most of us feel that summer is now over.  The shortening of daylight hours is already appreciable. And yet, the start of a new program and school year has brought a spring to my step, even in these challenging economic and political times.

How are you living this new season, good reader?

One of the greatest joys of mid-September is that it marks the time for one of Saskatoon’s largest entrepreneurial gatherings, the annual Raj Manek Mentorship Program Banquet. This year–the program’s 28th–the business community returned to Prairieland Park, to hear an inspiring keynote conversation with Canadian entrepreneur, Tara Bosch, founder of “SmartSweets.”

Did you miss the banquet and want to catch up? Or is it new to you? Keep reading: this issue is for you!

In “Article One, I feature highlights from that inspiring interview with Tara Bosch, hosted by CTV journalist (and perennial emcee), Jeff Rogstad.

Then, in this month’s “Storytellers’ Corner,” I feature part three of a series on Latin terms to know and use! These “should” be used playfully in the classroom or boardroom, or else you may meet resistance (haha)!

And in “Shop News,” I acknowledge some of the wonderful industry of mentors, peers and clients in my network.

Local writer and woman leader, Linda McCann, recently blogged on “the promise of September”:

“It’s a time to reflect on the desires of our hearts and the longings of our souls, as we consider the months ahead . . . . September has always held a special promise, even in the most challenging times. It brings the anticipation of a harvest, the start of a new school year, reconnections with friends and fresh opportunities for learning. It’s also a time to walk in nature, savouring the changing colours, scents and sounds of this abundant season.”

Whether you’re criss-crossing the province, country or globe on business or personal ventures, or whether you’ve returned home after a summer (vacation) away, I wish each of you that awareness of September’s “promise” and “abundance.”

Whether savouring locally made pizzas and soups at Christie’s “Il Secondo”; a last mouthful of summer’s sweetness at Beppi’s Gelato; whether opening a new novel by a (perhaps local) favourite author . . . . or simply treading, with a beloved friend or pet, our leaf-strewn Meewasin Trail . . . may you live this new season with renewed energy, purpose and optimism, faithful readers.

As McCann reminds us, there will be both “challenges and gifts” in this new year, just dawning.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth Shih
Principal
Storytelling Communications
www.elizabethshih.com

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IN THIS ISSUE:
→ARTICLE 1: “Fed up with sugar addiction? Meet the Canadian entrepreneur who dissolves it, in the 28th annual Raj Manek Mentorship keynote address”
→STORYTELLERS’ CORNER: Six more Latin terms that everyone “should” know (part three)

SHOP NEWS
ABOUT US

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Article One: “Fed up with sugar addiction? Meet the Canadian who dissolves it, in the 28th annual Raj Manek Mentorship keynote address”

The 28th Annual Raj Manek Memorial Banquet was held last Tuesday evening (September 10th) at Prairieland Park, featuring a keynote interview with Tara Bosch, the Vancouver-based Founder of “Smart Sweets.”

Influenced by an “unhealthy relationship with sugar” as a teenager and by kitchen-table wisdom from her grandmother, some 20 years ago, Bosch began to research the damaging and widespread health effects of sugar. She then founded the first confectionary company to address the need to vastly reduce sugar, creating a recipe for gummy bears (and others followed) that
were the world’s “first candy [to] kick sugar.”

And Bosch didn’t stop there. She has rapidly become a global leader in what she describes elsewhere as “pushing back on foods with excess sugar.”
Her vision is of consumers who can “live their best lives by giving them the choice to kick sugar.”

Bosch has also pioneered “Bold Beginnings,” an entrepreneurial accelerator that brings “six to eight women entrepreneurs from all corners of North America to Vancouver,” to compete for a $100K investment in their startup.

Through what she describes as an arduous journey, Bosch has found much success! She was named Ernst and Young (EY)’s Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year Award (2019), one of both “Inc” and Forbes magazine’s “30 Under 30,” and has received numerous other awards from the likes of “Entrepreneur magazine,” “Business Insider,” The Bank of Montreal (BMO), and
“SmartSweets” distributor, Whole Foods.

Only four years after launching “SmartSweets” from her basement, Bosch sold it for $360M, with herself as majority owner!

So, I highlight here some of Bosch’s testimony and journey to make “smarter candy” to “better her community and herself”:

• Bosch’s business started with her wish to end “the silent epidemic of sugar in our country’s candy aisles.” As a child, she said: “candy was my thing. It brought joy and love until my teenage years, when excess sugar made me feel bad about myself and my body image.”

•She was spurred on to change that “unhealthy relationship to sugar” when her “Oma” (her grandmother and childhood best friend) told Bosch how much she regretted having consumed “too much sugar” in her lifetime.

• At the same time, Bosch consciously chose a niche with the most “radical value”—weight watchers who needed low-sugar treats. She simultaneously worked to make”SmartSweets” high in fibre, to add to its nutritional value.

• Bosch laments that food manufacturers target consumers’ “bliss points” – the combination of sugar, salt and fat that addicts children through their tastebuds. Virtually every food product in the supermarket intentionally contains (unhealthy) sugar —and Bosch knows that change is an uphill battle.

• She says she “wanted to create a community around sugarless eating,” and she has succeeded.

• Bosch says she “leveraged scrappiness of what was available to [her],” reading food science journals, accessing knowledge online and by “cold contacting people on LinkedIn,” many of whom were willing to share 10 minutes of their time, when she was honest and clear about her motives.

•She didn’t hesitate to enlist colleagues in the same business accelerator she was in, tech start-up people, as her candy taste-testers.

• Bosch advocates for “being honest about yourself, knowing both your strengths and your weaknesses.” She advises us to use experts to support you in those weak areas, as she assembled “a team of people who were smarter than I was.” Similarly, she brought on a COO as a “people leader,” who had run Starbucks and Lululemon, and who fostered a woman-focused culture to sustain the business. That kept the challenges of sustaining
growth from “draining [Bosch’s] cup.”

• Bosch acknowledges that start-up life saw her oscillate “between a pit of despair one day,” to a high, like” serendipity,” the next.

• To try to level out those extremes and to stay motivated, Bosch used (and recommends to entrepreneurs) a spreadsheet to track each day’s successes, whether big or small (“micromoments”). These moments can create “mind fuel” by keeping you aware of even incremental progress. For instance, if someone on her contact roster simply opened an email from her, she’d record it as a “win.”

• “All challenges are opportunities in disguise,” Bosch says. Some days involve “climbing a high mountain, but something magical lies just around the corner.”

• Bosch says in her work now, she “normalizes self-doubt, imposter syndrome and insecurities that all entrepreneurs face,” especially women. Therefore, she maintains gender parity on her board and keeps the executive team at “SmartSweets” 85% female. A further 80% of the company’s employees are female. Bosch says that shared and conscious vulnerability can become a form of strength.

“Think BIG” and let that goal subvert your fears and doubts of how you’ll get there. She said that mastering your fears allows you to tap into limitless potential.

• Remember, though, that “money is not a ‘why’ deep enough to take you through all the tough days.”

• So, don’t keep family at bay: Bosch has since added a three-year old daughter to her family, as well as several dogs and cats, all who remind her of the importance of being compassionate, kind and of seeking “lightness,” or happiness, whatever the challenges of entrepreneurship bring.

• Following the example of her COO (Cindy), Bosch urges us to respect the lives and schedules of mentors, collaborators, colleagues and staff, by being and keeping on time when in meetings and at events.

• Bosch also urges entrepreneurs to leverage government programs (e.g. debt protection and fundraising) that we’re blessed to have available to us, in Canada. (“SmartSweets” manufacturing headquarters remains in Vancouver).

• Bosch sold “SmartSweets” in 2020 for $360M at the age of only 29 but continues as its founder.

• After Malcolm Gladwell’s book, The Tipping Point, Bosch says: “It only takes 1000people to start a movement.” This is what she led “SmartSweets” to create.

• Since then, she has launched a business incubator called “Bold Beginnings” in North America, which offers a $100K award to help women entrepreneurs learn “they are infinitely capable”: she urges women to apply at  BoldBeginnings.com

• Bosch says that when crises arose (such as losing her manufacturer, 20+ years ago), she finally “gave up the problems to a larger force than [herself]” and remained “thankful to have the opportunities [she’d] had.”

• It’s hard not to wonder and imagine what future ventures lie ahead for this plucky, resilient and inspirational entrepreneur.

• Bosch’s creativity in devising methods to keep her mind and spirit strong through the most harrowing of entrepreneurial days is remarkable—and commendable! Even the names she’s given to her pet cats and dogs come from TV and movies, reflecting some of her irreverent spirit. (In the long-distance interview with Rogstad, Bosch’s cat Tarzan briefly stole the show.)

• So, if you’re a reader of business success stories, be sure to add Tara Bosch of “SmartSweets” to your list! Her own “lightness” illumined the evening of the 28th Raj Manek Memorial Banquet for hours (and over the social media that followed, too).

• As a leader, Bosch has said that she “is wildly passionate about empowering the next generation of entrepreneurs,” believing that “their big impact vision are needed more than ever before in the world.”

And now it’s your turn:
To join in the work and successes of the Raj Manek Foundation, please consider this your invitation! Visit www.manekmentorship.com for more details on monthly seminars and annual networking events.

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STORYTELLERS’ CORNER . . . .

 

 

 

STORYTELLERS’ CORNER: Six Latin terms that everyone “should” know
(part three)

The online editing website, Grammarcheck.net, recently published a list of 60 Latin terms that “everyone should know.” The latter claim may be a tall order, given that most writers and editors younger than 45 have not found Latin offered in Saskatchewan’s primary or secondary schools (although that changes at the university level).

But setting aside the perennial debate of whether Latin should still be taught to children, I suggest that numerous Latin terms are (or can become) recognizable, even to non-specialists.

And using such terms can create subtlety in our spoken and written word–and, maybe some fun, too?

This month, here are six more terms to recognize and enjoy:

(13) Curriculum vitae (C.V.) –“A formal resume.” (e.g. “Please submit your curriculum vitae for the HR Manager’s position.”)

(14) De facto—“In fact.” (e.g. “The neighbourhood is de facto segregated.”)

(15) De jure – “By law.” (e.g. “In some countries, women are granted de jure equality with men, but the day-to-day experience is much different.”)

(16) De novo – “From scratch.” (e.g. “The judge ordered a trial de novo after the first trial.”)

(17) E pluribus unum – “Out of many, one.” (e.g. “The US motto, E pluribus unum, reflects the country’s diverse makeup.”

(18) Ergo – “ Therefore.” (e.g. “He is a hard worker; ergo, he will succeed.”)

Do you have any favourite Latin terms or stories of people using them?
Please write in; I’d be delighted to hear from you.

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SHOP NEWS:

Following the introduction and “Article One” of this issue, you won’t be surprised that at the top of this month’s entrepreneurial news is my thanks to the organizers, mentors and proteges of the Raj Manek Mentorship Program (RMMP), for their dedication to personal and professional growth, across our province.

The Raj Manek Foundation and Mentorship program is based on a wonderful immigrant’s, and immigrant family’s, success story: the late Raj Manek Sr. settled his family in Saskatchewan, following globe-crossing ventures from his birthplace in Kenya, to the UK, later, Inuvik, the Northwest Territories, and finally, Saskatoon.

Special thanks go out again, to the Manek family, Kanchan, Raj Jr., Sona and Kinjal Manek for tirelessly preparing and launching another year’s remarkable networking banquet.

And the dedication of many mentors for another year ignited or rekindled connections, in a collegial, encouraging and generous environment.
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My professional, personal and long-term thank you goes (of course) to Monica Kreuger, Founder and Chief Visionary Officer, of the Praxis School of Entrepreneurship. As my long-time mentor and advisor (some 10 years!) through the RMMP, Monica has shared with me dozens of mentorly conversations and discussions, which have broadened my outlook and helped me to foster resilience.

The Praxis School of Entrepreneurship, where I taught business communications (2017-2020), and trained as a startSMART participant (2018-19), is undergoing invigorating change in its training opportunities for entrepreneurs, across all sectors, through a new, online network.
So December will mark the start of the final cohort of Praxis’ 30+ year, “startSMART” program, whose facilitation and content will be transformed in new dimensions and offerings. Stay tuned to learn more about this transformation!

So if you (or someone you know) has a business idea they have long pondered, wait no longer! Contact startSMART program administrator, Elaine Mantyka, at (306) 664-0500, so you can begin planning your business before the program and the year 2024 close!
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On the networking front, I’ve enjoyed talking with “Table 35,” a group of women entrepreneurs named after the table where we met at last spring’s gala of Women Entrepreneurs of SK (WESK). We took a summer break, but plan to reconvene for camaraderie and conversation shortly.
Many thanks to fellow entrepreneurs, Suzanne Anton, Keshia Gamola and Sandra Miller, for participating in the early summer. It was great to see Sandra at the Raj Manek Banquet last Tuesday night!

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Special thanks go to my French ESL student, Eliane, who lives south of Paris, for recently graduating from my language classes, after sharing nearly two years of spirited English language conversations, over italki.com.

Eliane and I have discussed the Arts, including opera, classical and popular music, literature, film and television, and shared life experiences working and travelling in our different corners of the world. I will miss our weekly discussions a good deal and wish her all the best.
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Thanks also go out to both my IT consultant, Jordon, and to my bookkeeper, Heather, for assisting me so fully in recovering many records, after an equipment failure in late August.

Both have been attentive to detail and highly skilled in showing me the needed changes, for which I am grateful.
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Thanks to my editing client, Greg Gilroy, retired Saskatoon Transit driver, for hiring me to edit his memoir–a legacy document that collects stories from Greg’s 32+ years as a bus driver, in an ever-changing (and challenging) environment.

I’m grateful to Greg for staying open to the “edits” I’ve made on a book whose publication will be his long-term “dream.”

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Thank you to my valued colleagues Ashleigh Mattern and Lenore Swystun, whom I’ll join in conversation this winter about “Communication in an Age of AI.” We’ll meet, along with co-host Christina Cherneskey, on local CFCR radio’s “Civically Speaking.”

We’ll discuss ways that AI is affecting our businesses (especially language learning) and I look forward to the discussion!
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And on the topic of AI and training, I’d be remiss if I didn’t also thank Montreal-based, English copywriter and coach, Nick Usborne, for his monthly Facebook events, where former students of his “Futureproof Copywriting” course (me included) discuss the nature and applications of AI.

Nick is generous and thoughtful and I appreciate his encouragement as we strive to be “Humans in the loop.” He recently said that “AI is not a Frankenstein,” and that the best way to avoid such an outcome is by curating and setting limits on what we do with it and how.

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And a final “thank you” goes to American sales and marketing coach, Jennifer Darling, who shared her “Storytelling for AI” workshop with me and other communicators, last week.

Darling’s model for turning personal experiences into scintillating marketing material is not totally new to me but is powerful and will transform some of my blogging and newsletter-ing work.
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There are always new entrepreneurs to promote and new people to thank for their interest and support. Please share your stories and acknowledgements with me, for future issues.

But for now, this is a wrap for mid-September!

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ABOUT US:
Between 2011 and December 2018, Elizabeth Shih Communications chronicled the stories of B2B marketing and communications on the Prairies and across the country.

Effective January 1, 2019, I rebranded as “Storytelling Communications.” I help new and economic immigrants to get better jobs or secure better contracts by improving their English skills. And I also help individuals and companies to tell their legacy stories.

Interested in learning more? Please contact me through my CASL-compliant
website (www.elizabethshih.com).

After I receive your message, I’ll be pleased to discuss projects with you!
Please visit my website for more information (www.storytellingcommunications.ca).