The war broke into every home, divided life into "before" and "after", and became our new reality. New and new questions appear every day - how exactly to coexist with this reality, not to lose ourselves in it, and what challenges we should be ready for.
How can we prepare ourselves and the country for an increase in the number of people with disabilities? What vector will we move on? Shall we not retreat from the values for which our people give their lives — freedom of speech and equal rights? How to prepare for the post-war state — the possible level of violence, radicalism? Where can empathy disappear during the war, even in the most empathetic people? And why can we never be like before February 24?
Public activist Tania Kasian's book "Our. Common. How to Keep a Person in Yourself during and after the War" is filled with stories of both non-public and media personalities on an equal footing with others. Were they aware of the possibility of a full-scale invasion, were they packing their alarming suitcases, where they were on the eve of February 24... And also the thoughts of a psychotherapist about why people did not believe until the last that an escalation of the war could happen.
The author also talks about her own experience, recalls what 2014 was like for her native Mariupol, and describes her anxiety at the beginning of February 2022, conversations with a psychotherapist, a veteran of the ATO.
Together with the reader, Tania Kasian will travel from the first awareness of war to the answers to the question "How not to lose after victory?". Because even when it seems that the light has gone out, it is worth remembering that it is always inside us. And we can definitely keep it.
Why should you read the book?
The book is based on five stages of acceptance of the inevitable, which describe our reality: denial - anger - bargaining - depression - acceptance.
Conversations with a psychotherapist, real stories and emotions of people, stories of public figures, civilians, and the military.
"Our. Common. How to Keep a Person in Yourself During and After the War" helps to go from denying the war to accepting reality and the actual future.
The book contains an additional section that collects the correct wartime terminology: how to talk about IDPs and refugees; about the war - why it is not a conflict, not a crisis; about victims of violence and other terms that may refer to vulnerable groups: people with disabilities, etc.
About the author:
Tania Kasian is a writer, journalist, and public activist. Born and raised in Mariupol. Lives in Kyiv since 2014. She worked as a journalist and editor-in-chief. He is now the head of the human rights organization "UA Support Point". The author of the book "What They Are Silent About" and the editor of the "Handbook of Barrier-Freeness", the author and host of the "Potroshku" podcast.
