Family Strong: Event considered success for hopes of community growth

The Downrange Warriors and Veterans Talking to Veterans organizations, along with Mentor Agility, hosted a two-day event at the Lovell Community Center last Wednesday and Thursday called Family Strong that aimed to strengthen families, build resilience and foster leadership within the local communities, the event publicity stated.

Eighteen coaches from the program came from all across the state and even as far as Denver to help facilitate the event, which was originally organized from the aftermath of the tragic event that took place in Byron earlier this year with the loss of a mother and her four daughters.

On Wednesday evening, members of the public went through the Story Quest Walk and Mural Experience, which had multiple stations and activities for families and community members of all ages.

“The idea that the Story Quest Walk comes from is ‘The Hero’s Journey’ by Joseph Campbell,” Dr. Julie Elledge of Mentor Agility explained. “For reference, the Star Wars movies were created off of that hero’s journey.”

Elledge took that idea and created The Hero’s Journey Change Model, which is an eight-step coaching model that represents the cadence of any story.

“So, in every story, there is a protagonist that is moving along throughout their life, not wanting to change anything and liking their life the way they have built it,” she said. “But then, something traumatic happens and it creates a call-to-action and sets them on a new path.

“In that moment, they’re reluctant and resistant to the change, but this traumatic event shattered their sense of self, their sense of other people in the world, and they have to rebuild that. It starts a new journey in their life, and in that journey they develop new knowledge, new skills, new self-awareness and a new sense of self-confidence.”

The mini version of this process that community members had the opportunity to go through on Wednesday night was to help the individuals set personal goals and goals for the community as a whole to identify and strive to reach.

“In working toward those goals, there will be challenges and barriers to tackle,” Elledge said. “By tackling those obstacles, people will build self-confidence and belief in themselves to really know who they are and understand where they are on their path and where they need to be to grow through challenges and become the heroes of their own journeys.” 

Thursday morning, individuals and community leaders came together to review and reflect on themes and insights gathered from the Story Quest Walk.

“Together, we identified real social needs within our community and began developing action plans to address them,” Josh Foster of Downrange Warriors and an event spokesperson said. “This was about more than just having the conversations. It was about action, empowerment and finding strength to move forward together.”

Overall, Foster and those that helped organize the event felt good about it and felt it will be a step in the right direction to building a more connected community.

“I feel like we got some things accomplished and broke down a barrier of the unknown,” Foster said after the event. “I think people were hesitant at first and then throughout the process really began opening up and you could tell it was working.”

He credits using the storytelling model to elicit the conversations and get people thinking without directly going at them with hard questions about their personal lives and making them uncomfortable, being key to its success.

“That’s what a lot of us do,” Foster said. “We like to turn away or deny we have anything we need to deal with, and then we don’t feel relatable to people and think we are alone. This helps you express yourself through a story in a safe place.”

Bringing awareness to people’s mental health and stability in the community and creating an environment where the deeper connections are made between everyone as a whole and thus feel comfortable in reaching out to someone else was the biggest take away from the process, Foster said.

“Nowadays, the importance of mental health is a real thing,” Foster said. “Trauma is actually in everyone’s life, and sometimes we don’t even realize it. It’s OK to reach out and it’s OK to talk about it. There is no stigma behind that.

“Oftentimes in Wyoming, we are told to ‘cowboy up’ and move on, but it is OK to allow some emotions to come out so you are able to process them.”

Foster then compared holding in feelings and experiences to having a kink in a water hose.

“We get stuck on this one thing and we don’t allow our emotions to flow through and the negative builds up pressure and joy is never allowed to come through it,” he stated. “Joy gets stuck behind everything else and when the negative becomes stagnant, like water, it becomes poisonous in our lives.”

Although big, noticeable changes don’t often come quickly, the groups’ hopes are that it can start with the individuals who were there and participated and cause a ripple effect through the community to develop those types of connections here.

“Sometimes our connections are superficial with one another, but if we take the time to cultivate them and prioritize making the time for one-on-one moments and meaningful, sincere conversations, those opportunities to truly help each other will be there,” Foster said.

Downrange Warriors and Veterans Talking to Veterans plan to hold more events similar to this one in the future to keep building on the progress that was made and continue on a stronger community path united together.