🏡 Hearthen
A quiet studio room after a session — chairs around a table, workbooks open
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What households say
after a session

Accounts from couples and families who came to Hearthen looking for a more structured way to talk with each other.

Participant accounts

These are written accounts shared by participants after their sessions. Names and details are used with permission.

YH

Yusuf & Hanim

Couples Workshop — Petaling Jaya

"We had tried talking about this particular topic on our own for about two years and kept arriving at the same place. The workshop gave us an actual sequence to follow — it turns out structure helps. The workbook is still on our kitchen table."

April 2025

SL

Sarah Lim

Family Mediation — Bangsar

"The pre-meeting made a real difference. I was able to explain the background without everyone in the room, so when the family session started we weren't spending the first hour just getting everyone onto the same page. The facilitator kept things fair without ever making it feel managed."

March 2025

RM

Raj & Meena

Couples Workshop — Cheras

"I was skeptical going in — I am not the type who finds these things easy. But the session wasn't what I expected. It was calm, practical, and there were breaks. By the second segment I had stopped thinking of it as a workshop and just started talking to my wife. That was useful."

April 2025

NR

Nadia Razali

Year Membership — Ampang

"We signed up for the year membership because we knew the next twelve months were going to involve a lot of family decisions. It has been worth it. We have used three of our four facilitated sessions so far and attended two workshops. Having the membership meant we didn't have to think about whether to book — we just did."

May 2025

CK

Chen & Karen Ong

Family Mediation — Kepong

"We needed to make a decision together as a family and couldn't do it on our own — not because of conflict, just because the topic needed more room than a dinner-table conversation allows. Hearthen provided that room. The written summary afterwards was genuinely useful."

March 2025

AT

Azrul & Tina

Couples Workshop — Subang

"We would have liked the venue to have parking right outside, but that is a very minor point. The session itself was well run — clear, calm, with a facilitator who clearly knew what she was doing. The prompt card has stayed on our fridge and we do actually use it."

April 2025

Session case studies

Three detailed accounts of how households used Hearthen sessions — with permission and identifying details changed.

Challenge

A couple who kept having the same disagreement

A couple in their mid-thirties had been circling the same topic — how to divide household decisions — for about eighteen months. Every conversation ended the same way.

Approach

Couples Communication Workshop

They attended the Saturday workshop. The structured listening exercises helped each of them say, clearly, what they actually wanted — not their position on the disagreement, but the underlying need. The facilitator slowed the conversation down at the right moments.

Outcome

A workable arrangement and a way to revisit it

They left with a written agreement in the workbook and a shared language for revisiting it at home. Six weeks later, one of them wrote to say they had used the prompt card twice and the arrangement was holding.

"The session gave us a structure we could actually use. We stopped talking about the topic and started talking about what we both needed." — Workshop participant

Challenge

Three adult siblings and an elderly parent

An adult child reached out after an elderly parent's health had changed. Three siblings living in different parts of the Klang Valley needed to make shared decisions about living arrangements and care responsibilities.

Approach

Family Mediation Facilitation

The pre-meeting established the scope of the conversation and what the facilitator needed to be aware of. The three-hour session covered the main decisions without trying to resolve everything. Each sibling had time to speak without being interrupted.

Outcome

A written summary and a follow-up session

The written summary clarified what had been agreed and what still needed to be discussed. The family returned two months later for a follow-up session using their year membership, which covered the remaining items more efficiently because the groundwork had already been done.

"The facilitator never pushed for a resolution. She just made sure we all got to finish our sentences." — Participant, Family Mediation

Challenge

A household relocating from KL to another city

A household of four adults — a couple and two of their adult children — were planning a relocation that would affect everyone differently. The conversations at home were becoming circular and occasionally stressful.

Approach

Family Communication Year membership

They signed up for the annual membership to support the household through the transition year. They attended one couples workshop, one family workshop, and scheduled two facilitated meetings — one at the planning stage and one after the relocation.

Outcome

A transition that felt handled rather than managed

By the end of the year, all four members said the structured sessions had helped them each feel genuinely heard at a moment when individual concerns were easy to overlook. The second facilitated meeting after the move was shorter and more practical than the first — because the harder conversations had already happened.

"We didn't need a lot of intervention — we mostly needed a reliable time and place to talk properly. The membership gave us that." — Participant, Year Membership

340+

Households served

4.8

Average participant rating

6+

Years at Jalan Imbi

78%

Of members return for a second year

Malaysian Community Dialogue Network — 2023

Recognised for sustained contribution to facilitated household dialogue practice in the Klang Valley.

Southeast Asia Dialogue Facilitators Forum

Active member since 2020. Our facilitators participate in annual practice reviews with facilitators across the region.

Contact the studio directly

Phone

+60 3-2148 9264

Email

[email protected]

Studio hours

Tue–Fri 10–18
Sat–Sun 09–17

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