How to activate personal resource state – training for media at Ivano-Frankivsk JSC

The Ivano-Frankivsk Journalists’ Solidarity Center (JSC) of the National Union of Journalists of Ukraine (NUJU) conducts training sessions on psychological support for media workers at the Center. A series of such classes for colleagues was started by Tetiana Bieliavtseva, a displaced journalist from Zmiyiv, Kharkiv Region, and now a qualified psychologist, who has been forced to live with her family in Prykarpattia region since the beginning of the full-scale invasion.

Among the participants of the training were employees of the Center, representatives of regional media and departmental press services, own correspondents and freelancers, as well as displaced students of the relevant department of King Danylo University.

The first training session, called Circle of Support: in Active Search for Your Own Resource was aimed at creating an atmosphere of trust and support, activating personal resource states. Together with the psychologist, the participants looked for common and unique things in everyone present in the friendly circle of support. In the course of respective exercises and games, they analyzed additional sources for psychological resources and identified important life supports and hidden internal resources that everyone has, but, perhaps not realizing the presence of extreme ones; we often do not use them.

At the end, those present created a joint list of personal glimmers, and each received their own list of things to do for inspiration and resilience from the coach.

Interesting exercises to get to know each other and find common ground, games, movement, and a relaxed atmosphere, according to the participants of the class, really helped each of them find their own hidden resources.

The network of Journalists’ Solidarity Centers is an initiative of the National Union of Journalists of Ukraine, implemented in collaboration with the International and European Federations of Journalists and UNESCO and with the support of the People of Japan. Our primary goal is to assist media professionals working in Ukraine during the war. The Centers are active in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipro, Lviv, and Ivano-Frankivsk. The project is part of UNESCO’s broader efforts to support the Safety of Journalists and Freedom of Expression in Ukraine.

Call the Ivano-Frankivsk JSC at 066 677 0726 (Viktoriya Plakhta, coordinator of the Ivano-Frankivsk JSC). The Center’s address is 25 Sichovykh Striltsiv Street.

Bohdana Zasidko

Ivano-Frankivsk JSC