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Eyeway Conversations with Guneet Sethi | Otter.ai

Eyeway Conversations with Guneet Sethi

Score Foundation23min

Eyeway Helpdesk

00:08

This podcast is brought to you by Cipla Foundation and Score Foundation.

George Abraham

00:32

Hi, my name is George Abraham and welcome to this edition of Eyeway conversations. Today, my guest is Guneet Sethi who is a communicator, trainer and a motivational speaker. She started her career as a teacher, she was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa and she lost her vision. And she decided to quit her job. Guneet, you opted to get out of your teaching job and you quickly got back into kind of a professional life. So can you tell us a little bit about that journey?

Guneet Sethi

01:08

George, yes, when I was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, well, I never saw it coming and it was absolutely a shock for me. It was as if everything went on a standstill mode. So I had lost my confidence completely, I was totally shattered. And I was not in a frame of mind to face the people. So my first reaction was to quit my job and be in the comfort of my own home. But that was not to be. I realized that was not my real self. And yes, I have to admit that I was on a denial mode for the longest time but I was fortunate to be surrounded by wonderful support system with friends and family that I could get on and pull up my socks.

George Abraham

02:15

So what exactly did you do?

Guneet Sethi

02:18

So George, to begin with, I had to deal with my own attitude towards accepting my eye condition. Since teaching was always my passion, I started helping a little, a few of the underprivileged children in and around my area. So once I started doing that, you know, gradually my confidence came back to me because I was able to do something for somebody in my own way. And so that was my first step to deal with my attitude. And once I got my confidence back, I started meeting people, I started moving out with my friends,

George Abraham

03:12

Let me interrupt here and ask you so when you went out with your friends, what exactly do you mean, you went out on holidays? Or you went out shopping or you went out? What did you go out for?

Guneet Sethi

03:23

Like anyone goes out with friends, George. So my friends we had we had a shopping spree, my friends would insist that I accompany them to the movie hall. Despite my saying that, you know, what will I do? You know, so they insisted, "no, you can still listen, and we'll explain you the visuals". So that was a sweet of them. And I think my initial hesitation to deal with my blindness in public places got over like that. And I went shopping with them. I went to restaurants. Yeah.

George Abraham

04:12

And meaning you know, being blind and, you know, going to a restaurant, did you have any kind of orientation to deal with certain situations or you learned the hard way by eating from somebody else's plate or drinking somebody else's glasses, a glass of water, you know? any kind of funny situations?

Guneet Sethi

04:36

Well, although my friends were quite conscious about my situation, and they would help me around the table and my chair and my crockery cutlery, but still, well, funny things did happen. I can laugh on it now. But at that point in time, I felt a little embarrassed. Let me give you an example I was trying to eat from my spoon. And every time I would put it close to my mouth, I felt that there was nothing there. And I till my friend told me you're holding the spoon upside down. *laughs*

Eyeway Helpdesk

05:20

If you know of anyone with vision impairment, who needs guidance on living life with blindness, please share the Eyeway national toll free helpline number 1800-532-0469. The number is 1800-532-0469.

George Abraham

05:56

I was reading in your CV that you started working with someplace called the Hunger Project. How did that happen? And what was your experience there?

Guneet Sethi

06:04

As I started developing my confidence, more and more, I began to realize that, you know, there were more things that I could do and Hunger Project came my way through a friend. So she out of concern, she gave me a place at the front desk and asked me to handle the telephone part of the front desk. And so that went very well but my biggest learning and my experience over there was that you know, I have to unlearn and learn a lot of things because trying to be in the main stream at the front desk. I realized that it is very important for me to rework on my body language, track the sound, eye contact. So these were very new experiences because I was learning to do things differently, you know.

George Abraham

07:09

Yeah.

Guneet Sethi

07:09

So this was one of my biggest learning and it was the first time I was working with my blindness away from home.

George Abraham

07:21

So how did you kind of transition to actually technology?

Guneet Sethi

07:28

George, I have to, I will happily give that credit to you because you were the first one who kind of told me that there is a technology like this exists where I can work on the computer. I had, honestly, was quite unaware of it. And so once I came to know about it, I went to the institute- National Association for the Blind in New Delhi. And I was introduced to this software called J-A-W-S JAWS. And I started working on the computer first time in my life and when I worked on it for a week or so I took my lessons. And honestly, that, George was the most elating moment of my life. I think it was the biggest turning point and when I was able to read and write, I think I just screamed to myself, "oh, wow. I can read and write once again!"

George Abraham

08:46

When you learn to use computers and you kind of realized that you could read and write, did that make a difference for you at the job front?

Guneet Sethi

08:56

Oh, it made a difference all over, you know, my confidence and honest and of course, they upgraded me at my workplace. And I had a PC to my own and I was working and I was taking printouts and I was doing a whole lot of things after learning the technology.

George Abraham

09:21

So you were kind of kind of doing a front desk kind of job initially. So how did that profile change?

Guneet Sethi

09:30

So the profile changed to getting new responsibilities, you know. I was always there at the front desk but I was able to do more liasioning, I was able to email, I was able to, you know do other administrative jobs in the office. So the my job profile per se upgraded.

George Abraham

09:52

So now after about 10 to 12 years of working with Hunger Project. I think you moved on to another organization called B-ABLE the name...

Guneet Sethi

10:01

Yes yes.

George Abraham

10:01

This is a training center setup.

Guneet Sethi

10:03

Yes, it's a skilling organization.

George Abraham

10:07

So, tell me the story behind how you made this move?

Guneet Sethi

10:11

So yes, George, while I've- so I was for a long time with Hunger Project doing a similar kind of job for several years. And like I said that you know, every, every single day there was you know, the level of my work and my own confidence in myself increased. And I began to realize that, for some reason that I am not being able to use my potential to its maximum.

George Abraham

10:46

Right.

Guneet Sethi

10:46

You know and when that happened, I started thinking for myself and I started exploring my own self as to what all, what else can I do to, you know, to satisfy that desire to do more. You know, for some reason, I was just doing the same job and somewhere down the line, I felt it was getting monotonous. So I began to nurture my skills and then you know, gradually doing other things at home and other home, you know, extra things that I wanted to do, maybe think about my hobbies. But down the line I got this opportunity to, for working in this organization, and a friend of mine asked me to, you know, apply there...

George Abraham

11:51

You're talking about B-ABLE now, right?

Guneet Sethi

11:52

B-ABLE. So I got a job, I mean, I applied there and things worked for me, although it was a big and a huge mainstream organization with over 1000 employees around. So they had never dealt with a blind person. And obviously, they went through a lot of series of interviews because remember, Hunger Project, I had a friend who put me in there but here, I had nobody. So it was all my own. You know, my own skill and my own thing that helped me get in there. And since I was a teacher by profession, and teaching has always been my passion and training was another form of teaching. I had to give a demo of how I worked on the computer and how I can handle tasks on the computer.

George Abraham

12:52

Yes.

Guneet Sethi

12:53

And I did tell them that I would need a little orientation and a little help to begin with. Once I am comfortable with the surroundings and the space, I'll be able to handle a lot of things on my own. So that confidence I had to give them and I was lucky enough to be a part of the team. And I had a very wonderful mentor and team members who helped me move on. And I think I did a pretty good job there. I was training the young learners, they were between what 18 to 30, mostly the rural youth, that's what the organization used to do. So I was able to you know, so teaching in school was different and here teaching was differeny. I was able to conduct training lessons, I was able to guide them to work towards the softer aspects towards that attitude building and, you know whatever the training module was, I was able to deal with deliver it and I graduated to training the trainers then you know but certainly, to reach that position, I must say that I had to work overtime, then what a sighted person would have done. I had to do a lot of homework, a lot of preparation to be able to deliver my work perfectly.

Guneet Sethi

14:41

To support our work with the blind and visually impaired, you can visit the donate page on our website, www.scorefoundation.org.in. Please note www.score.foundation.org.in.

George Abraham

15:07

So, Guneet, I also know that you have a passion and a love for broadcasting and voicing. And I know that you've done programs with radio and you've also done voiceovers and so on. Tell us a little bit about that.

Guneet Sethi

15:26

You know, George, a human body and a human mind is so amazing that it has the tremendous potential to do more. And if you are able to recognize it, I think lots of things come your way. And my desire and my stint at voiceover was one such thing, you know. I have always wanted to do voiceovers but never got a chance. And here because I was focusing on what is there, than what is missing.

George Abraham

16:09

Right.

Guneet Sethi

16:10

I realized that this is a skill that I should maybe work on and I took a little shot. That what is that called flash course training or whatever, 10 days training to kind of formally understand how voiceovers work. And of course, once again, credit goes to you for giving me that opportunity to speak on Yeh Hai Roshni ka Karawan, that Eyeway program? Yes and then my voiceover journey started and All India Radio came my way. And there were other organizations I worked with to give my voice on education based films.

George Abraham

17:14

Tell me, it's not very easy to get these assignments. Like, how did you go about it?

Guneet Sethi

17:19

It wasn't easy but my passion kept me. And I had gone to several organizations to give my audition. But it was always a polite answer that we will get back to you because they often questioned me that you know, you're unable to see so how will you do voiceover. My repeated answer to that question was that you don't need eyes to do voiceovers. So the next question was, how would you read the script? And it was a valid question and all I had to tell them that if you could give me a soft copy on my email, I will come back prepared. So it worked somewhere. It didn't work the other places, but wherever it worked, I did my best.

George Abraham

18:25

So tell us a little bit about this TED business. How did you get? What did you speak about?

Guneet Sethi

18:31

Oh, well. I wouldn't tell you much about my TED content. Maybe you have to ask your viewers to maybe listen to it.

George Abraham

18:47

They could they could search Guneet Sethi on YouTube.

Guneet Sethi

18:51

Yes but what I can tell you, George that in my TED talk, I used the metaphor of coffee and the perfect cup of coffee. And let me add, I want to tell you that I can brew a perfect cup of coffee now. And I work to make my coffee better every day and that was the message that I wanted to convey to my listeners and my viewers during the TED talk. You know, for me it was a very exciting and very cathartic experience because I could just put down my emotions in the way I felt.

George Abraham

19:44

Right. So did you go to California for this or you did it online?

George Abraham

19:50

No, unfortunately it was the Covid that put brakes in my travel but the organization there was an institute here in NCR who was supposed to conduct it. But since Covid came in the way, we had to do a live online program. So that was another challenge that came my way to speak online on an event as big as this but it worked.

George Abraham

20:30

Right. In fact, I've listened to this TED talk a couple of times, and I must tell you, Guneet, it was splendid, it was wonderful. And so, I also know that you have, in recent times, in the last couple of years, started traveling to different educational institutions, student bodies, universities, and even corporates where you have been actually sharing from your life and motivating people. So that's wonderful. I would like to ask you another question. You know, you've moved quite a bit since the day, you kind of stunned by the diagnosis of being blind. You've traveled quite a long distance. And I would like to ask you, what is your definition of successful person? What is your idea of success?

Guneet Sethi

21:26

You're right, George, I've come a long way but I haven't stopped, I still have a long way to go. But, you know for me, success, if you ask me to define success. Well, success for me has never really been materialistic you know, so to say in materialistic terms. For me, success has been more towards being happy and you know, happy and satisfied. So if I define success, well I could say that it's a continuous and an ongoing process towards raising your own bar.

George Abraham

22:16

Right.

Guneet Sethi

22:18

That's what I have been doing and I've been feeling very happy about it. And if you raise your own bar, the materialistic success comes your way.

George Abraham

22:30

Guneet, i's been wonderful talking with you. You've had a wonderful journey. It's truly inspirational. And I would like to take this opportunity that you would continue to raise your bar and continue to be happy. And may you have a great wholesome, wonderful life ahead.

Guneet Sethi

22:48

Thank you, George. Thank you for giving me this opportunity.

Eyeway Helpdesk

23:00

This podcast was brought to you by Cipla Foundation and Score Foundation.

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