Grow Your Business
“Everybody deserves the right to go to a restaurant. Everybody deserves the right to go on a date. Everybody deserves the right to be employed and have an opportunity. But for people with disabilities, these things aren’t there.”
Dylan Alcott, wheelchair basketball and tennis player, radio host and speaker.
Positive Shift has a sliding scale for Life Coaching.
Life Coaching teaches you how to stop bullying,
self-advocacy skills, and improve self-esteem.
Disability awareness company training can lower staff turnover, increase profits and customer loyalty, and improve staff happiness score.
Positive Shift is owned by a woman with a disability.
Living with a disability or chronic illness takes skills that none of us learn even when we need them.
Hello
My name is Wesdyne Otto (Wes-deen)
Life Coach/Disability Advocate
“I was confused and heart-wrenchingly sad to the point of numbness. I just couldn’t understand what I had to do to be seen as an ordinary person.”
― Judith Heumann, Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist
I acquired a physical disability in 2004, on top of being neurodivergent. I thought it was a medical issue. I looked for a cure and was a good patient. I accepted being treated with pity, a hopeless charity case, being excluded form places and events, and as the object of inspiration for living my life.
I was confused before I learned to be proud.
Then, I started meeting people who introduced me to new ideas. 2014. I researched how women living with MS express personal Growth through art.
I am happy, loved, educated and disabled.
While writing the American Disability Rights history I learned that the longest protest in American history, 26 days, was lead by a group of people with disabilities. My mentor, Alan Holdsworth, helped write the British Disability Discrimination Act. Canadian disability rights are 30 years behind the times.
Anyone can join at any time in their life. If you live long enough you will probably become a member. I help people with disabilities and chronic illness discover their ability to tell others what they need and to stand up to attitudes that disable us.
I a proud member of the disability community.
I do this work for every adult and child who accepts the ableist labels like "stupid", "lame", "useless", "not enough or too much", hurled our way.
You are resilient, creative and worthy of love and respect.
I use the internet to coach people with disabilities and chronic illnesses and teach disability awareness to companies and schools.
I love my work.
I live in Spring Lake, pop. 770. I spent 35 years in Edmonton. It was okay. I finished degrees in Art, Education, and Art Therapy while there.
When I'm not doing disability work, I garden, knit, write, and enjoy hanging out with my neighbours.
The folks at the John Humphrey Centre for Peace and Human Rights keeps me smiling and going.
Wesdyne
Member of Post-Secondary Accessibility and Disability Resource Association of Alberta,Canadian Art Therapy Association, Ontario Expressive Arts Therapy Association
Partner with the Rural Development Network, CANWiN
Presentations
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2014, Canadian Art Therapy Conference.
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2023, Canadian Art Therapy Conference,
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2023, Ignite Conference: Commemorating the 75th Anniversary of the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights
