The International Assistance Community Support Series, organized by OneAID and Somatic Experiencing International (SEI), closed with an interview with two special guests from Kyiv, Inna Khartova, Founder and Director, and Tatiana Dontsova, MHPSS Director, of Somatic Experiencing-Ukraine. We are honored to share the conversation.

In the spirit of the session, their message is one of inspiration. If it can be done in Ukraine, it can be done.

Recorded on October 19, 2026, the interview is in English and Ukrainian, with volunteer interpretation. Inna and Tatiana speak about joy and empowerment not as abstract ideas but as practices they live out in the middle of war, displacement, and loss. The recording captures the interview portion of the session only.

What You Can Take Away from This Conversation

• Permission without guilt. Why allowing yourself moments of joy doesn’t diminish anyone else’s suffering, and why joy and grief can exist side by side.
• Real versus forced joy. How to tell the difference between authentic joy and the pressure to feel positive, and why the nervous system can’t be fooled.
• Joy as vitality. A way of understanding joy as contact with your own aliveness and your ability to choose and act, including a Ukrainian word that has no direct English equivalent.
• Gentle ways back. Why joy doesn’t have to become one more task on the to-do list, and how rest, curiosity, and small, simple pleasures can help the nervous system slowly rebuild its capacity for joy.
• Stories from lived experience. Moments as small as an apple on a walk or puppies playing in the mud that show how joy can return when we stop forcing it.

This conversation will be especially meaningful for anyone in the international assistance community whose work, sense of purpose, or identity has been upended, and for anyone looking for a more compassionate, body-aware way back toward joy and agency.

Questions, or need support? Reach the OneAID and SEI team at sehumanitarian@gmail.com.