Collaboration for generating
Hope
Masayoshi Morioka ph.D.
Faculty of human development and environment,
Graduate School of Kobe University

morioka@crystal.kobe‐u.ac.jp

multiple forms of psychological support• The living person is always centered.
Psychosocial support has to be oriented
toward recovering their sense of agency.
• A system of mutual aid is necessary for rescue
workers to share their difficult experiences.
• Indigenous cultural resources are importantfor healing.

• “We don’t need
unnecessary words.”(People in Kamaishi,Iwate)• “Please do your bestin your own workrather than sharing inour grief.”(A woman’s voice inOzuchi, Iwate)personal viewpoints• Mental care isessentially contingent
on multiple layers ofactual practice. It is an
outcome through joint
action with the persons
affected.

• We never deprive themof their sense ofsubjective agency.

The IASC Guidelines on Mental Health andPsychological Support in Emergency Settings• Inter‐Agency Standing Committee in WHO• basic support as keeping security and relieving
people’s suffering• The second type is social support for families, which
is deeply rooted in the local community.
• The activity of non‐professional, limited support ismaintained side by side with professional mentalsupport.
• Mental support is not first. Safety support is first.

足湯(Ashiyu; to soak their feet in warmwater )• natural conversation
occurs• The recovery ofcommunication
becomes a form ofmental care.
• The mind will becoordinated according
to the actual movementof the body.

Psychological first aid• Being beside the person• The warmth of another person is the first aid
for mental care.

Voices of emotion• “People still expressed
negative emotion, strong
anger, and hard feelings ofgrief two months after thedisaster. It was similar in myexperience. I was surprisedthat not only so muchnegative emotion wasexpressed, but thatpeople’s laughter did not
fade out in the shelter.”• People’s emotions seemed
to seriously swing between
the negative and thepositive.

• “But after three months had passed, theirvoices seemed to be withdrawing inside them.
Their voices became weak.” （Kataoka; TohokuUniversity）

silently swept his home‐place•

Photo by LieAn elderly man whose home wasuprooted in an instant by thetsunami went to the ruined areaof his house. There was no clear
sign of the place where his house
had been. Nevertheless, hereturned repeatedly to the areathat was supposed to be theplace of his house. He silently
swept and cleaned up his home‐
place, especially the area thatwas once his front door.

The prospects for his future areuncertain. The schedule forreconstruction, including the siteof his town, has not been
determined.
• He might be anxious that he will
no longer be able to live in hishome.
• The design for reconstructing thetown indicates that his house will
also be relocated.
• Still, he returned to his homerepeatedly and swept up.
•

Person‐centered activity– The basic form of support is person centered. The
person concerned is himself the agent.
– Support must never injure the natural power forself‐recovery.
– The person‐to‐person link can maintain needed
support.
– The link will generate hope.

welcome back• An elderly man came backto a preliminary school, aplace of refuge, but hedidn’t enter the room. He
remained standing for along time.
• He called “welcome back”
to each high school student,and each student also
answered, “Hello, I’mhome.”•

Every person there might havelost his home and family.

Photo by Liethe voice has the power• These figures calling to eachother seem to have asignificant meaning.
• His voice is only brief, but
the voice has the power ofsurrounding the space. He isa man concerned, and so
are the high school students.
They encouraged eachother by their voices.

• “The basic starting point of
mental care is exactly thisinter‐relationship.”
Tsukasaki,N. psychiatrist

Sharing experiences• Psychosocial care is also necessary for supporters
themselves.
• Youth volunteers have to maintain such a sharing
group. Having peers is a basic condition forsupportive activity.
• Members reflect on their experiences in meetings
after their volunteer activity.
• Sometimes they discover new aspects of themselves.
This reflection is very meaningful in their life.

Indigenous cultural resources• The ethos includes folk rituals, ceremonies ofinitiation, and funerals that are related tosupernatural beings.
• The treasure house of folk arts
• the person and community cannot be divided
ｔama‐shizume (soul soothing)tama‐furui (soul raising)Monument; Namiwake Jinja
as a fed forward loop
Namiwake is roughly translated
as “split wave.” It implies theboundary of safe land and sunkby tsunami land.
This shrine is built 5.5 km (3.4mile) inside from sea side. Brown
color on the map bellow is thearea attacked by Tsunami.
It is now thought that this shrine
was originally built on a point thatwas spared during the Jogan
tsunami of 869 A.D.
photo by Tatsuya Sato

The Tanabata ritual• The Tanabata ritual at
Rikuzen Takada in Iwate
prefecture• During the Buddhist
Bon Festival, it iscustom for families inwhich someone has
recently died to hangout red or white flag towelcome back the soulof the dead.

The Legends of Tono
• Japanese folklore
researcher Kunio Yanagita
recorded the tales andlegends told by Kizen Sasaki
who lives in Tono in1909.
• There collected many shortstories tales of rituals,
connection to the nextworld.
•Tono town is near the coast of
Kamaishi and Otsuchi town gotten
severely disaster.

A Story•

A man names Fukuji married intoa family in Tanohama on thecoast. He lost his wife and one of
his children in Tsunami thatstruck the area last year.

•*the northeastern coast of Japan wasstruck by Tsunami seven times
between 1600‐1850. The reference inthis legends is to tsunami 1896.

•For about a year, he was with thetwo children who survived in a
shelter set up on the site of theoriginal house.

• On a moonlit night in earlysummer, he got up to go to
the toilet. It was off at somedistance where the waves
broke on the path by thebeach.
• This night, the fog hovered
low, and he saw two people,
a man and a woman,approaching him throughthe fog.

• The woman was definitely
his wife who had died.
Without thinking, he trailed
after them to a cavern on
the promontory in the
direction of Funakoshi
village.
• When he called out hiswife’s name, she lookedback and smiled. The man
he saw was from the samevillage, and he too had diedin the Tsunami disaster.

• It had been rumored that
this man and Fukuji’s wife
had been deeply in love
before Fukuji had been
picked to marry her.
• She said, ”I am now married
to this man.”• Fukuji replied, “But don’t
you love your children?”• The color of her facechanged slightly and she
cried. Fukuji didin’t realizethat he was talking with thedead.
• While he was looking down
at his feet feeling sad andmiserable, the man and thewoman moved on quickly
and disappeared aroundthe mountain on the way toOura.

• He tried to run after
them and thensuddenly realized they
were the dead.
• He stood on the road
thinking until daybreak
and went home in themourning.

• It is said that he wassick for a long time after
this.
(“The Legends of Tono” n.99
Translated by Morse,R.A.1975
Originally published by Kunio
Yanagita as Tono monogatari in1910

Intensity of experience• “After the disaster I had a spiritual experience.
Nature and the landscape around me appeareddelightfully beautiful. I was attracted and kept myeyes wide open. Ordinarily, the landscape is notsensible for me. If I was an artist I could make adrawing or write a poem. This experience was not
special just for me. Other people also had similar
experiences.”• “But such intensity of experience has gradually
weakened as several months have passed. My mind
and changed sensibilities have become soft.”(Kataoka)• “We want to forget,nevertheless weremember.”
women’s voice in Ozuchi

Haiku on disaster• Tanka and Haiku, canestablish emotionalbalance. There ismeaning in taking
action and sharing witha group.
• The cultural aesthetic
form can containpeople’s complex
feelings.

"The three disasters
Storms turn into a soft wind
A new, humane wind“.
「嵐去り 後に残るは 優しき心」
28.May.2011(Herman Van Rompuy, EUpresident）

make a safe play‐space• The people evacuated from the Fukushima area affected by
the nuclear power plant accident are sheltered in Saitama
Alina. There are many people sheltered there. Carpets werespread across the entire floor and passage. Many volunteers
were busy working, but a gloomy, heavy mood was dominant.
• A play space was set up at the corner of the passage. About
ten children were playing a board game there with volunteers.
Alongside, several children were playing volleyball with aballoon. Laughter was heard only at this corner of the room.
This space seemed to be alien and strange.
(A psychologist in Saitama)

The voices of children are a treasure• For children, playingand laughing is just as
necessary for living asfood and water.

• “Nevertheless, I look atthe sea again today.”• “I try to make dirt anddebris into arecollection.” (A womanin Kamaishi)Our hope is generated from the actionof personal agency• People have a basic
power to connect raw
and difficult
experiences to theirown life story.
• We try to learn from andnever deny the past. This
will create a certain image
for our future.

The root of our hope is human connection• Transform the model ofpsychosocial support
from an individual
pathology model

to a collaborative,connecting,community model• “We discovered a treasure,the link between people.”(people in Kamaishi)• We must be responsible forfuture generations.

Thank you for your attention！
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