Let Vets Speak: Engaging the Digital
The community spoke. We listened.
“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, not the most intelligent that survives.
It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”
-Charles Darwin
We received many requests from Veterans who want to participate in Let Vets Speak. -From across the country. Many could not make it to 5 workshop sessions locally. Many have profound anxiety. Many needed six months notice to work 5 evenings into their schedule. Many did not think they had a story to tell. —They do, of course.
Living is learning.
Supporting is listening.
Serving is adapting.
The workshop sessions are the a mitigator to reduce anxiety and prepare tellers. Until a person has experienced the particular type of workshop, the benefits are not knowable. Nothing, and I mean nothing, impacted me like the experience I had in ensemble-based workshops. Live micro-local workshops remain the ultimate goal. However, now is now. The world is in the state it is in. In deference to the requests, concerns, and vital stories of Veterans we are adapting. We have many digital tools that make communication and story capture possible. So, we are using them. And, including many more stories.
The capturing and sharing the stories of Veterans is our big, goal. Veterans must be heard.
Veterans and families of Veterans, please continue to reach out with your stories. We can and will work with Veterans by phone, digital conference, or individual coaching when possible. We are rescheduling our May 6 to a fall launch in the form that best serves a world desperately in need of Veterans stories. Tell us your story.
To know war, to PEACE: Let Vets Speak
“Military personnel transitioning to civilian life commonly report difficulty with establishing friendships, reconnecting with family, and a greater sense that they do not “fit in.” Personal narrative interventions have the potential to increase the community’s interest and understanding of Veterans’ experience. … findings suggest that narrative interventions appear to have a positive impact on civilians’ interest in Veterans and therefore, may be a valuable community reintegration intervention.” Community Mental Health Journal https://doi.org/10.1007/s10597-019-00540-3
“Narrative plasticity, however, is highly relevant to core transitional justice goals, including establishing the truth, giving victims a voice and contributing to peace. All of these goals, although they are seldom discussed as such, have an obvious linkage with resilience; and, ultimately, the reversal of narrative social bulimia can be understood as a process of maximizing the potential for storytelling to foster positive interactions between individuals and their environments.” Janine Natalya Clark, Storytelling, resilience and transitional justice, sagepub.com/journals-permissions, DOI: 10.1177/1362480620933230, journals.sagepub.com/home/tcr, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4060-4082