This month's CTIPP CAN walked through a storytelling framework as we prepare our 2025 advocacy efforts. Through networking and resource sharing, we discussed why effectively sharing stories is one of the most powerful advocacy tools, particularly when multiple people and organizations work together. We reviewed our advocacy targets to build momentum to create change in the year ahead and beyond.
This is the third CTIPP CAN of a four-month series focused on education, networking, and resource-sharing for the trauma-informed movement.
RESOURCES:
Reflective exercises: Elevator pitch and Narrative building
ROUGH TRANSCRIPT:
[00:00:00] Welcome to the November 2024 CTIPP CAN call where we will be discussing and working on storytelling for advocacy. Before we begin, I want to address two things. One is a giant elephant in our virtual room as we talk about political advocacy. And the other is, again, a Thanking folks for providing feedback after the last call and to address one new concern that rose up in the comments that we received on the first front.
[00:00:38] This election, as we said in prior, see tip can calls. really showed how divisive our nation's politics has become. This is a massive opportunity for trauma informed advocacy to promote healing. We have and will continue to work hard to ensure the trauma informed movement maintains and builds bipartisan support.
[00:01:00] So be mindful that others on this call may have different feelings than you do about the election. Either way, this election went There were going to be many millions of people who experienced anger, sadness, grief, fear, and a whole host of other negative emotions and feelings, and very likely a combination of them.
[00:01:21] As we navigate conversations around advocacy, feelings of hopelessness and questions of whether or not this is worth engaging in may arise for folks who were negatively impacted by the outcome of the election. For others who were negatively impacted, it may increase the passion and purpose with which you are approaching your advocacy.
[00:01:41] And of course, for those who were positively impacted, there will be other feelings as well. We have discussed throughout this series that we would do our best to continue moving forward regardless of the outcome of the election. With the election now behind us. I encourage folks to continue their initial advocacy efforts while adjusting if need be, but not assuming that what we were working toward cannot or will not work.
[00:02:09] In building a nonpartisan movement, it is important that we are willing to work with folks from all political backgrounds. And because we know that trauma does not discriminate against any person or group of people, there is true opportunity to show how the trauma informed movement is nonpartisan. As we grapple with the outcome of the election, I do not want to minimize the impact that it has had on many people.
[00:02:35] CTIPP CAN has breakout rooms for people to connect around the pieces of developing our advocacy plans for the coming year that we have been working on. While most people have loved the breakout rooms and have said that they provide some of the most value of this entire series, and there will be a lot of time for breakout and reflection during today's call.
[00:02:57] Again, thank you to everyone who has given feedback on this series. And we are so excited to hear from many of you again, after today's call, there have been other inquiries to ensure that the breakout rooms are able to be focused on what people are coming to this call to discuss. Which for this whole series is creating a plan for advocacy in the year to come.
[00:03:18] And for today, we are focusing on sharing our stories for advocacy. We, of course, value opportunities for mental health support. And also value the need for boundaries to ensure that there are conditions of empowerment and safety for all participants to participate in these calls. If you are coming to this call to develop your advocacy pitches, you are in the right place.
[00:03:42] Of course, when we connect in the breakout rooms, we will share parts of ourselves. And that connection is so powerful and wonderful, and we want to ensure that this can happen. But the main topic of discussion and goal in the breakout rooms should be to develop and practice our advocacy efforts. If you are coming to this call with a crisis that you need support for, please know that we wish that we had the capacity to support this as an organization, but we do not have the resources nor expertise to provide the right support for that right now.
[00:04:14] This is painful to say, but also a responsibility that we feel we have. If you are in need of a greater level of support, whether because of the election or something else, and that is why you came to this call, we have put a few resources that you can reach out to on this slide. There are also other organizations that may have groups that can support a greater level of processing than we are able to right now, but we do not have the resources to support mental health crises on this call.
[00:04:42] I hope that in trying to set boundaries, we are not creating more harm. We know that there is a lot of pain in this world and wish that we could do more. We will continue to work at a systems level to ensure that more support is available. And we hope to build capacity to do more than we are currently able to support as an organization moving forward.
[00:05:03] If a conversation in a breakout room goes awry today, please know that we will be here in the main room to support conversations focusing on the stories that we are here to promote. The last thing that I will say on this is that it is not fun to say this. I wish that we could do more. But it feels like our responsibility to establish this in order to create those conditions of safety and empowerment for everyone in these calls that we value so much.
[00:05:29] We have wrestled with this and will continue to, and promise to continue doing the best we can. At the end of this call, if there's time, we will debrief from the breakout rooms as we always do. And then after that, if there's time, we are happy to hold space for folks to discuss how the process of the elections and the final results have and are impacting them if anybody wants to, for a bit.
[00:05:52] With all of that said, in the first two months of this four month series, we have covered why trauma informed advocacy is so important, and have at least started the process of creating an agenda to move forward on. The third piece we will cover today before bringing it all together in December's call with a plan of action for 2025 is to craft a narrative that influences and inspires change.
[00:06:18] As humans, we have relied on stories to help move and shape civilizations for as long as we have existed. Stories have helped ensure that critical lessons learned by prior generations do not have to be relearned by future generations the hard way. As well as the benefit of community and relationship building that comes from sharing with others and belonging to something greater than ourselves, even if just for a moment.
[00:06:46] We will work on two different narrative forms today, an elevator speech for when we need to communicate key ideas concisely, And then we will also create a longer form narrative using the story of self, story of us, story of now framework that can be used in different situations to help move our agenda forward.
[00:07:06] Storytelling according to many high level business leaders and politicians is one of the most important skills to develop. The good news about this is that it is something that we can work on, and there is no one right way to do it. Storytelling, especially the sort that we are discussing here today, is deeply personal to each of us.
[00:07:27] It is at its best in authentic expression of ourselves, our experiences and ideas, and that is going to be dependent on many of our own characteristics. I am an abstract big picture thinker. So my authentic storytelling style is generally a circuitous journey through at least loosely related elements that I tie together, or I should really say that I try to as my success in doing so is more up to the listener than it is to me over the course of the story that I tell.
[00:07:59] If you're artsy, your art, your authentic story might paint a picture. If you're a scientist, your authentic story might be more formulaic. If you're an attorney, your authentic story might present the facts of the case that you are making. I'll stop with my examples there, but you, but, but hope that you get the point.
[00:08:17] That today we will provide a couple of frameworks to help you organize the points that we are trying to make to impact change in the ways that we want to as advocates. But we are not here to tell you how to tell your story. What you do and do not share. How you go about sharing, that's up to you. I do encourage, as I have throughout this whole series, a commitment to an ongoing process of learning and growth, where as we practice, we can make tweaks to these narratives over time to most effectively communicate what we hope comes across, which a lot of times, we can get a sense of how well we are doing this based on the responses and the questions that we receive.
[00:08:58] More to come on that later, but the last thing I want to touch on before we launch into the elevator speech and the story of self story of us story of now framework is something I skirted past during the first session, which is leaning into our why our why keeps us grounded in this work and I believe, whether we explicitly stated or not, is a source of passion that we can tap into that other people can sense and helps move them to support the changes we are trying to promote.
[00:09:28] Hooray for the wonders of parallel process and mirror neurons. Many of our whys in this work, I recognize, are deeply rooted in painful experiences, and it is not necessary to share that which we do not want to, and it may not even be helpful for us to access the full depths of every experience we have that motivates us in this work all of the time.
[00:09:52] As we do this work, There may be painful memories that come up as we think about our why in this work when that happens to me, I'll do a regulation exercise. Breathe and sit in my power and come back to the work, often feeling great passion exuding, whether it is direct or vicarious. It may be helpful. It certainly has for me to tap into a core reason that motivates my advocacy when I develop and share my thoughts as it motivates action and presents the passion I feel for the work that I am trying to move forward.
[00:10:28] If that does not work for you, and you certainly know you better than I do. Then don't do this. As we discussed on the last slide, there is no one way to advocate and you need to do what works for you. The best that I can do is share what has worked for me and what I have learned. Before I move off the why, I just want to highlight further like I did in the first session that I learned this concept of leading with why from, from a Ted talk by Simon Sinek on the golden circle, which you can find on YouTube.
[00:10:59] A normal order of sequence for us to share something is to say what it does, then how it does it, and then why it matters. What Simon Sinek argues in his description of the golden circle is that the most powerful method is to actually reverse this. Leading with Y, then talking about how it will work, and finally describing what the outcome will be.
[00:11:23] He equates this method with the layers of the brain. As we know, our brains develop from the bottom up and the inside out. So leading with Y communicates to the core of our beings. Rippling through the limbic system, our emotional system. Centers that drive decision making and finally speaking to the neocortex and providing the language to be able to speak to specifics of the decisions that we've already made with our hearts.
[00:11:49] This is how we move people and inspire action. It's not just what we do, it's why we do it. I do these CTIPP CAN calls because when I was in my mid twenties, CTIPP provided me with the tools in both knowledge and other resources to advocate for the changes that I believe are critical for the world. I had mentors that taught me about the legislative process and trauma informed care, and were and are still there to support me on this process of learning and growth I continue to build upon.
[00:12:21] This movement is so much greater than any one person. And I believe that everyone who wants to make transformational change, someone drawing on the slides. Can you all see that? I've never seen that. Yeah. I don't know how, I don't know how that's happening or, or why, but just saw that. That was strict. Um, if you're drawing on the slides, please.
[00:12:49] Um, but as we move forward, This movement is so much greater than any one person, and I believe that everyone who wants to make transformational change for the better in the world around them should have the conditions of empowerment to do so. So we host these monthly calls and make resources available on our website to support trauma informed agents of change for anyone who is interested with as far as few barriers to entry as possible, and we continue to work to reduce the barriers to entry we come up against as best as we can.
[00:13:22] In doing so, we are building and nurturing a growing national movement led by a diversity of perspectives and voices to heal our traumas, both individually and collectively, present day and historical. Also, while I appreciate whoever was drawing stopped, I'm also interested at some point in the future.
[00:13:41] Not on this call. How you did that that that I have no idea how that was happening. That was fascinating. So all of that less the drawing on the slide more what I was trying to speak to that is an example of leading with why and an elevator speech that I hope exemplifies a potential consideration that may be helpful as we go through the rest of this call in developing our stories to advance the important changes we are all working on as we move into the two different.
[00:14:10] forms of narrative to activate and inspire change that moves our agenda forward. We will start with our elevator speech, and then we will expand from there to the story of self, story of us, story of now narrative framework. Elevator speeches are not only good for in an elevator, though they are also good for elevator rides.
[00:14:31] to us. Two quick stories before we dive in. First, there are multiple members of Congress who live in the same condo building as I do here in DC. You best believe that I have used my elevator speech in the actual elevator with them. 30 seconds is all it takes, sometimes even less. to provide background or an update on a particular issue.
[00:14:54] In addition to an elevator speech literally being used in an elevator, elevator speeches are also a great tool to have for other moments where you don't have a lot of time to share your key thoughts. The best example I have was one day I was waiting for a meeting with a congressional staffer. The Congress member walked into the office.
[00:15:14] And I shook his hand and had a short period of time to share about the Community Mental Wellness and Resilience Act and the importance of the bill before having more time to discuss, to discuss that with the staff or further. Having that elevator speech in my back pocket allowed for me to meet that moment that I had about 30 seconds with him before he went into his office.
[00:15:36] As we develop our elevator speeches, there are two big things that are important to focus on. First, As best as we can, we want to use accessible language. For one, we need to be able to say what we need to in a short period of time. So having easy and comfortable language that we can remember is key.
[00:15:57] Additionally, ensuring that the other person is not confused, or at least doing our best to ensure this, is also important. As we have a short amount of time to communicate in this form, an accessible language helps us do this. Second, we want to be concise. When we use our elevator speech, there is not much time, unless it is so successful that we wind up capturing their attention and getting more time, which serves as a wonderful time to swoop in with that story of self, story of us, story of now narrative, which we will work on later in this call.
[00:16:31] But in that commitment to being concise, we want to ensure that we focus on the key points and weave those together in a coherent, albeit short, narrative. We are sharing the elevator speech planning tool in the chat that I encourage you to open and look through as I speak to it. And then we will take some time for short independent reflection before a longer time for a breakout for those who would like or continued independent reflection for others who would prefer to not be in a breakout room today.
[00:17:01] But as you, I'm assuming that the That it was shared in the chat. Um, please let me know if not, as you can see at the top of the sheet, the elevator speech is a go to statement we can access at any time we need as indicated on the exercise, we will be developing a statement that takes no more than two minutes.
[00:17:23] If you can communicate what you need to in less than two minutes for the purposes of this exercise, that is a very good thing. It should not be so brief that we don't fully communicate what we feel we need to, but we should also keep fluff out of our elevator speeches. If, and when we capture their attention, we can always add more.
[00:17:44] You will recognize that for those of us who were on last month's call. Like, half the work is already done from our problem and solution statements that we did. We don't need to write everything down on this document, but should communicate the problem we are working to solve and the solution we are proposing.
[00:18:04] The reason I encourage a standard elevator speech to really be between 30 and 60 seconds is because while you see on the sheet that the activity calls for two minutes, you'll also note that there are prompts that tailor the elevator speech to a particular audience. If you are in a position that you know a specific person who you need to advocate to on this call, then by all means, feel free to put this together as a two minute version as you work on this today.
[00:18:34] However, for those of you who don't yet know exactly who you'll be advocating to, if we have a shorter standard elevator speech prepared in that 30 to 60 second mark, we are then able to bring in other information to personalize the message as we move forward, but can begin the process of forming language around the key message today.
[00:18:56] Also having the shorter version of the elevator speech serves for moments where you are surprised to see someone you want to advocate to and or others just don't have a lot of time, like in the two stories that I shared earlier. I've been using the LOVE Act a lot through this series, so my abbreviated elevator speech for that is that there is an abundance of trauma informed efforts in Philadelphia, as well as many efforts to address rates of substance misuse and violence that already exist.
[00:19:28] But they often compete rather than collaborate, which calls into question if such efforts are truly trauma informed and also often fails to integrate what we are doing into the fabric of communities. Providing community ownership over at least certain elements of this work is critical. The lowering overdose and violence epidemics.
[00:19:51] Love Act would support cross sector community led coalitions to embed systems thinking and trauma informed strategies to address the root causes of these and other issues that plague our city, as well as coordinate and align existing efforts across government agencies and services. Now, if I am meeting with a member of the Kensington caucus that exists in city council, I will add on with some information about the co creating Kensington plan in my elevator speech.
[00:20:22] Again, that's where that 60 second piece can be built out into the full two minute speech, which highlights how investment could support the third phase of this community driven plan and the opportunity to highlight this work in Kensington as an example of what can be done in other neighborhoods around the city.
[00:20:40] If I'm meeting with the chair of the public health committee, on the other hand, I'm going to share the success of similar efforts and how this is a truly public health approach to address many issues that Philly is facing. I will always look into the people I am meeting with as well to see if there are any personal angles that I can make to connect this beyond just the professional as well.
[00:21:02] But you see how from the concise elevator speech, I can then expand to incorporate more from meeting to meeting as time allows. Now, similarly, in my advocacy for the Community Mental Wellness and Resilience Act, the CMWRA, at the federal level, my elevator speech is even more simple. It's not enough to bring support after disaster strikes.
[00:21:24] As extreme weather events and other community wide traumas become more common, we must do more to build capacity within communities to support and promote healing before disaster strikes. The Community Mental Wellness and Resilience Act does just this. If there was a recent extreme weather event in the Congressmember's district, then I will thoughtfully, again, we want to be trauma informed in our approaches to advocacy while advocating for trauma informed policies and practices, bring this in as a point to discuss how proactive approaches to promoting population level Resilience is critical in addition to reacting following a disaster and how so often the in the immediate aftermath of a disaster.
[00:22:10] What we really see is the community taking care of the community and neighbors helping neighbors and how the C. M. W. R. A. Does this? I hope that these examples highlight how our elevator speeches are short, memorable statements that quickly get to the heart of why we are advocating and what we are trying to accomplish.
[00:22:31] As you all who have heard me talk before about the LOVE Act and the Community Mental Wellness and Resilience Act, you know that I have much, much more to say about both of these issues and solutions. However, for this exercise, we want to be concise. Both of my elevator speeches that I shared with you today were three sentences long, though the Love Act one was a longer three sentences as there are more components to it than the CMWRA.
[00:23:00] However, the general format for both are to start with a problem statement. That second sentence discusses the solution we need, and the third sentence introduces the policy I am advocating for as a key part of that solution. Again, following that why, how, what framework of the golden circle. So we will start with some silent reflection on the elevator speech here.
[00:23:24] If you know who you are developing this for, again, feel free to make a longer one that answers all of the questions on the sheet. If you don't know exactly who you are advocating to yet, that is not a problem, and you can develop that shorter elevator speech like we just discussed. And if you don't yet have something you are advocating for, you can just describe why the trauma informed movement, or some specific element of it, is important to you and matters.
[00:23:52] It's good to practice this exercise as we're going through it. We are not going into breakout rooms yet. But we're going to start with five minutes of independent reflection to begin working through the elevator speech. If you would like to go into breakout rooms after these five minutes to connect with others and practice our elevator speeches, or at least what we are initially coming up with in these first five minutes, please let me know in the chat now.
[00:24:20] And I will make small breakouts for folks to connect and practice these following these five minutes of reflection. We know that not everyone wants to, or has the ability during these calls to participate in breakout rooms. So we won't assign everyone to a breakout room. But again, if you would like to be in a breakout room to practice this exercise after five minutes of independent reflection, Please let me know in the chat so I can make sure you are, you can practice with at least one other advocate.
[00:24:49] You don't need to complete an entire script, but can just jot down some thoughts. This time is for you to reflect and think about what is most important for you to share. I'm going to go ahead and stop sharing my screen for the time being, because YouTube, in its many wonders, has like timers. So we're just going to have that five minutes counting down for these five minutes.
[00:25:13] I'll keep an eye on chat for those that want to be in breakout rooms and then we'll come back together. Um, and then I'm going to go ahead and restart this and then I'll actually be quiet for five minutes.
[00:30:27] All right, just finishing up the breakout rooms as I do this. Um, if there is anybody else that wants to be in a breakout room. Please, please do let me know going to go ahead and stop sharing move back to the slides. All right. So now that those five minutes are up for those who are interested in connecting with others, we're going to open up breakout rooms for eight minutes.
[00:31:01] Before we do that, we just want to ensure that we are holding up with our community agreements. Nobody should be forced to share anything that they don't want to, while also having the space for everyone to share their thoughts and ideas. Please demonstrate respect for others and engage in curiosity around others perspectives rather than judgment.
[00:31:21] Be inclusive and make space for others. Speak from your experiences as best as possible, and in this call and after, we encourage everyone to engage in ongoing self reflection and do what you need to to take care of yourself. If there are other community agreements you feel are important, please feel free to put them in the chat and or share them with your groups in the breakout room.
[00:31:45] But this serves as a good starting point for community agreements that we should all hold ourselves and each other accountable to. I think that I just saw a few others come in the chat and double check. All right. So I will go ahead and remake. These breakout rooms really quickly. Um, so pardon the awkward silence here as I, it's not really silent if I just like, and actively speaking, is it appreciate again that folks want to connect, and for folks who are not joining a breakout room, please do feel free to just continue to write and you'll have these eight minutes.
[00:32:34] To just right, I think that I now have gotten everyone. So we're either going to have groups of two or three in the breakout rooms. I'm going to go ahead and open all of those, and we'll be back together in about eight minutes. Here, so opening those rooms now.
[00:33:03] I'll go ahead and pause the recording.
[00:33:14] Welcome back. For those of you who are in a breakout room, we hope that that was a good time to connect and that you all had a time to practice and share and continue to work on your elevator speeches. Same for those of you who are doing independent reflection here in the main room with us. We don't expect them to be perfect now, but for many of us, sharing with others can help us think through how we want them to sound.
[00:33:38] So I hope that time was valuable. I know that it was all together pretty short. We are going to make the next breakout room. and the next independent reflection time longer, but we just want to add on now and develop our story of self story of us story of now framework before going into more time with each other.
[00:34:00] The story of self story of us story of now framework supports longer form advocacy efforts. When we put this together with our elevator speech, it is incredibly valuable. I have used this framework for three to five minute pitches. And I have used this framework for full keynote speeches, so it can be flexible for the purposes of today's call.
[00:34:23] We're going to keep it on the shorter side as we want for our advocacy pitches to lead to conversation that help us understand how to continue moving our issue and solutions forward. But just know that this, unlike the elevator speech, can be built out further. This public narrative framework was developed by Marshall Ganz and has been used for effective advocacy efforts at many levels and is meant to enhance personal connection and clarity of message.
[00:34:52] I have discussed before how advocacy itself can be healing, and this framework has been a huge tool for me in my healing journey, taking many of my most painful experiences, weaving them together, Into a coherent narrative and working to make meaning out of them as I try to create positive change in the world around me.
[00:35:16] I hope you find the same as true for all of you. I will run through a shorter version of mine now as an example before we all practice on our own. This one is for the Love Act. This call is about all of us, so I'm not going to share the many different story of self, story of us, story of now frameworks that I have used, but I have also developed some for the Community Mental Wellness and Resilience Act, advocating for trauma informed schools, and many others.
[00:35:47] My story does not change. But what I share of my story as it relates to the different policies and practices that I am advocating for, that part may. So this framework provides flexibility to support our advocacy across many dimensions.
[00:36:07] Now, not my story. I grew up in a loving family that had the resources to support me. However, trauma does not discriminate against anyone and can affect anyone, any family, any community. I have experienced several traumatic events in my life and was diagnosed with complex PTSD as a teenager. This was the result of a choking incident that led to my inability to eat solid food for four months when I was 13 years old as anxiety attacks triggered.
[00:36:39] by food near my mouth made eating an incredibly difficult experience for me, and I survived simply by drinking enough ensures every day to get the caloric intake my body needed. Just a couple years after that, my best friend and his father passed away in a tragic plane crash and it was not just these events that were traumatic, but the ways in which they left an indelible mark on my life.
[00:37:05] In the immediate aftermath, these events nearly destroyed me. It was the love and support from my family. who particularly in following the deaths of Doug and Danny were also grieving, but from the community around me that helped me not just get through these trying times, but ultimately grow stronger through these experiences.
[00:37:28] When I was going through the eating disorder, the regular episodes of severe anxiety and the lack of nutritional balance, particularly during that stage in my adolescence, made it difficult, if not impossible, for me to access the thinking part of my brain, the cortex. As humans, when we are under conditions of extreme stress, whether real or perceived, our brains and bodies react with the life saving fight flight freeze fawn faint response.
[00:37:57] In the short run, this response focuses our energy on escaping danger and conserving valuable resources that allow us to survive. However, when the danger persists and we are in this state for long periods of time, it can cause poor psychological, physical, and behavioral health outcomes. This response became hyper activated for me when I almost choked on a piece of food.
[00:38:22] And while obviously not eating was not going to save my life, in fact, it would have killed me if I had not been able to relearn how to eat. Unable to access my logical thinking cortex, my brain and body were doing what they could to escape from the immediate threat of what they thought could have killed me after the choking incident, as our instincts are designed essentially to keep us alive.
[00:38:47] Then, when the closest person to me, Doug, who had been my best friend for four, since I was four years old, passed away tragically, it compounded the earlier trauma that I had experienced and the threat was no longer just food, but could be anything. Like so many young people today. I struggled mightily with mental health as well as my physical well being.
[00:39:10] The thing that truly saved me was not the traditional mental health services I received, at least not those alone, but was really my community. My coaches gave me opportunities to find passion in exercise and sports. Sports and gave me something to look forward to each day. Even when I was struggling, my teammates were there for me on my hardest days and were there to celebrate the good ones with me and my family and friends were there to provide me with love and support when there is a loss, so great, our lives that we never truly bounce back to who we were before it happened.
[00:39:47] The hopeful part of that is that when we are surrounded by resources and supports that help us navigate through these hardest times, we can grow stronger through the adversities that we face, a term known as post traumatic growth and post traumatic wisdom. Unfortunately, too many people are not surrounded by such opportunities for healing, and this perpetuates horrific outcomes for our society that it is, that it is experiencing.
[00:40:13] At the very beginning of my career, I worked at a Philadelphia public school and, and at a community center in Philly. There, I saw so many individuals and families who had experienced far greater adversity than I had with far fewer supports and resources. Throughout society, we falsely and harmfully discuss issues of substance misuse, violence, and many more as moral failings of individuals.
[00:40:41] Yet, while there must be individual accountability we must hold for ourselves and others, these issues are more so moral failures of our society. Here in Philadelphia, for example, if you look at a heat map for where the rates of gun violence are highest in the city and what communities experience the racial trauma of redlining when the city instituted such policies nearly a century ago, there is incredible overlap.
[00:41:08] Additionally, if you look at the data from the Philadelphia ACEs study, ACEs are Adverse Childhood Experiences, the zip codes with the highest ACE prevalence in the city overlap with these same communities as well. We must, if we are to truly address these issues, take responsibility and work to heal the society.
[00:41:28] traumas that have been perpetrated and continue to be perpetuated. So as we work to lower overdose and violence epidemics among other intractable issues, our city is facing. We must do more than continue to just treat individuals as well. Treatment is necessary. It is insufficient and we will never be able to treat our ways out of the problems that we are facing as a society.
[00:41:54] We must stop making trauma an issue only at the individual level and recognize how traumatized systems promote stress and adversity disproportionately toward marginalized people and groups of people, which then perpetuate the negative outcomes that we are working to address. The city is making many critical investments to ameliorate these issues, and the LOVE Act does not get in the way of current investments, but takes an important step to address systemic trauma and embed solutions through communities.
[00:42:24] By creating grants for community led transformation efforts, It has been shown that there is greater buy in that works upstream to prevent many of the issues our society is grappling with by working to heal trauma and reduce stresses at a systemic level. By bringing together systems thinking with trauma informed approaches, we have seen tremendous outcomes generated at a community level.
[00:42:47] And by collaborating across government agencies and services, And collaboration is a core principle to any truly trauma informed approach. We can better support wise investments to produce and measure better outcomes and a return on investment. The LOVE Act is supported by promising practices from what has worked elsewhere.
[00:43:07] It does not get in the way of existing investments in the city, but rather builds upon them. I would not be here today if I didn't have people to support me when I was going through the hardest times I have faced. We can create a Philadelphia where we weave the social fabric. So everyone has that kind of support.
[00:43:26] We can pass love. So I think that in the chat, there was dropped this public narrative planning sheet, which you will see on this sheet, that there are questions that can guide your consideration under the story of self story of us story of now framework. What I shared was just my example. We're going to go ahead.
[00:43:48] And, and this time we're going to take about eight minutes for reflection and thoughts about our own story of self story of us story of now, uh, within this framework, which should have been put in the chat for you all to see and use. Use whatever process feels best for you, but know that for those of you who are doing breakout rooms today, you will likely not have enough time to draft your entire spiel in the next eight minutes.
[00:44:16] So perhaps think about writing down some core ideas for now to answer some of the questions under the three categories on the worksheet that call to you. And for those of you who are doing Independent work, you're going to have more time to perhaps draft even more and maybe get through an entire initial draft of the story of self, story of us, story of now framework.
[00:44:37] Either way, your process is your process and we encourage you to do whatever works best for you for now. Um, what what we're gonna actually do is I'm not gonna assign breakout rooms the next time. Um, we're just gonna open up. Breakout rooms for those that want to go in, but we're going to wait eight minutes, uh, to do that.
[00:44:59] And so I, uh, I'm going to stop the screen. And as amazingly as YouTube having one eight minute or one five minute timer, it also has an eight minute timer, which is phenomenal, phenomenal. And so we will go ahead and take eight minutes for everyone to go through that public narrative planning tool, and we'll come back together here in a bit.
[00:45:22] I
[00:48:01] sincerely apologize for that. Those ads in the middle of YouTube commercials.
[00:48:28] Do not mean to say that so dismissively. I am sorry that I got about five minutes left and then we'll come back.
[00:53:17] We'll come back together here in about 10 seconds.
[00:53:35] My apologies for that jarring sound as well. Um, All right. So again, as a quick reminder about community agreements before we hop into breakout rooms for those who want to, as the community agreements outline, we want to create a judgment free environment. We are all getting started and so don't worry about needing to be perfect with either resharing the elevator speech if we go into a breakout room and share that.
[00:54:06] Or the story of self story of a story of now narrative. This is an opportunity to practice so we can continue feeling more comfortable as we move forward as listeners. Please don't interrupt anyone who is sharing their story. And when you are sharing your story, please be mindful of time so that everyone who wants to has the opportunity to share.
[00:54:27] The community agreements on this slide are all the same as the slide when we shared them before, but we want to ensure that we are creating conditions of empowerment and safety for everyone to do the work that we are doing together today, especially when we share our stories. These agreements are very important.
[00:54:45] This breakout is going to be longer than the first one, and we're going to provide 18 minutes for connection during this breakout room, recognizing that these stories will necessarily take longer than our elevator speeches alone to share. Now we recognize that in the time provided to jot down some thoughts, you likely don't have the whole thing worked out yet.
[00:55:06] If you do and want to share that fully, that is fantastic. If you are not there yet and want to share some things you are thinking about and how you want to pull them together, that is also valuable. If there is extra time and everyone has shared, this provides an opportunity to consider how you might use your story for advocacy, or perhaps what other stories you might want to uplift to support your advocacy.
[00:55:31] As we've discussed, building coalitions is a great way to build our advocacy muscle. And perhaps this also leaves room to reconsider Or share some elements of our elevator speeches. We wanted to provide plenty of time for you all for this. Please ensure that everyone has an opportunity to share. And we're going to go ahead and open up the breakout rooms again.
[00:55:52] We want for these to be small. Like I said earlier, instead of me assigning breakout rooms, we did that for the first one. We're just going to open up rooms that you all can assign, uh, choose a room. The one thing that we ask for so that everyone has a chance to share is if you see a room that has. three people.
[00:56:10] Please start another one. And if you are in a room by yourself, we will navigate that as it happens. But I'm going to go ahead and open up the breakout rooms. And of course, if you want to continue to do independent reflection during this time, you are more than welcome to do that as well. So you should see an opportunity to pick breakout rooms.
[00:56:34] Let me know if that, or to join breakout rooms. Let me know if that isn't the case and I can redo this, but we wanted to create more opportunity for choice here. Um, then me just assigning folks again.
[00:56:51] If anybody's struggling with this, please feel free to come off mute and let me know.
[00:57:00] We get back and, uh, come together very, very quickly. We're, we're just so grateful to all of you, as I've said before, who have been with us these past few months for the C TIP CAN series, as we prepare for trauma informed advocacy in 2025. It's hard to believe that next month is going to be the final session in this four month series, but we will be bringing together planning and consideration our agenda.
[00:57:26] And our stories together next month into a plan of action to move forward in the new year. In addition to some exciting tools that CTIPP has to support you in your advocacy journey. So we hope that all of you join, whether this is your first call or whether you've been with us now for all three months, as always, the call will be on the.
[00:57:47] Third Wednesday of the month, December 18th from two to three 30 PM Eastern time. And it's going to be the same exact zoom link that you all use to get on this call here today. We're excited and also kind of sad to be wrapping up this series. And we're very, very excited to see where you all take this work in the new year.
[00:58:07] As we've mentioned earlier and in prior calls, we greatly appreciate all of the feedback we have received as we shaped this series, your feedback continues to provide us with helpful insights as we continue to move forward. So if you are able to please let us know what you think in the form linked here.
[00:58:25] For those of you who have been with us for a while, you know that this call was a little bit different where I did not talk nearly as much as I normally do. And we allowed for more time for processing and connection than we have in the past. We want to know how that experience was for all of you. So please know in this form that unless you tell us who you are explicitly in your answers, which.
[00:58:47] We don't, we are not asking you to do what we have tried to do is make this form anonymous. So you can share honest, critical feedback. We value honest and critical feedback, whether it's for better or for worse, as we want to provide the best support possible to each of you and the movement as a whole now and moving forward.
[00:59:05] With that, I'm going to take down these slides, and we would love to hear the helpful things that you learned or discussed in your breakout rooms for those of you who were able to stay, and for those of you who want to share from your independent reflection time, anything that came up, whether it's the elevator speech, questions about that, thoughts about the story of self, us, and now, I open it up for thoughts from all of you.
[00:59:32] Okay, well I'm not going to be shy because everybody's being quiet. Um, so my name is Zsa Zsa and I am in Texas. I am outside of San Antonio, Texas. And I currently work with or volunteer, um, with, um, Comell County Drug Court. I'm the mental health liaison for them. And I also help work with Texas Cure, which is an agency that works with incarcerated individuals.
[00:59:57] And I'm currently working with family members. Um, and so in our breakout session, we talked about Who in our circle is affected by this? So like you said, Jesse, when we're trying to get out into the community, who are we speaking to? Um, I am trying to get into our, our house, our capitol is in Austin, and I'm trying to get up there to talk to those folks.
[01:00:19] So this has given me valuable, valuable lessons, um, And you spoke about the two minute thing. When we go before the House of Representatives, we get two minutes. So if there's 89 people speaking that day, you get two minutes and not a second more. So this is great because it's helping me develop my, my statement that when I go up there and speak to those people, I want funding, I want grants, I want help, I want programs and all this stuff.
[01:00:46] And I'm just like the little tiny dot of sand in this big, big, big community. Um, so this is awesome. These lessons are very, very beneficial and I appreciate, um, being able to hone in on statements like you said, and keep it short, sweet, and to the point, but still make it personal with the people that I'm speaking to.
[01:01:04] So, I, I, I value this and I appreciate what I've learned. Thanks so much, Jaja. Thank you for sharing. Mm-Hmm.
[01:01:17] And also good luck in Austin from all of us, we're gonna be rooting for you. Mm-Hmm. , I'm very nervous. Understandably. Yeah. It's going to be good. Yeah. Cause yeah, it's not something I do, but one of the guys, he's the assistant director or whatever his title is. He's like, well, you need to come up here and help us.
[01:01:40] And I was like, yeah, I don't know how to do that stuff. Give me people. I'll do the counseling side. You do that side. So yeah, I'm stepping out of my comfort zone if you will. Understood. Understood. That's how we learn. Exactly. What is that? The growth zone, right? We're right outside of the uncomfortable.
[01:02:01] There's some LinkedIn posts that seems to be up there like every day from something. Yeah, that growth zone. That's exciting. But, um, I see some chats that breakout rooms, please, please. Yeah. Delia or Delilah. Sorry. That's Delilah. Yeah. Um, I just want to say thank you for this. Uh, I also had a breakthrough for, um, being the quiet one.
[01:02:28] And I was very honest in my group. Um, I really, I'm in Austin. So yeah, I am in Austin. Um, and I really want the Autism CARES Act to pass. Um, and, uh, and I'm going to be vulnerable here. Some people have heard my story, but some people haven't, but I was just recently diagnosed at 40 with autism. So that is my personal story, personal connection to it.
[01:03:03] So yeah, thank you for letting me talk. Thank you so much. Great. Thank you so much for speaking up, Delilah. Thank you. And we've got multiple advocates now in Austin. We're so excited to hear about everything that comes out of Texas. That's phenomenal. Thank you. It's so brave. So brave.
[01:03:28] Lots of hearts, which I love. Thank you.
[01:03:41] Are there other thoughts about the elevator speech or the story of self us and now before we break, or how this time is hitting any of us more broadly, no pressure. I just have a quick question. This is my very first time meeting with your group and I'm very grateful that I stumbled across you. Are you, will this continue into 2025?
[01:04:14] Will you, is this an ongoing thing? Yeah, we're so grateful that you stumbled upon us too, Dawn. We're thrilled to meet you. Uh, so yes, so after next month's session, which is like this four month bootcamp of Um, we went over why trauma informed advocacy is important, developing an agenda, sharing our stories, and then we'll bring it all together.
[01:04:35] We're going to keep in touch as a community so that way we can hear how things are moving along in our advocacy plans and to provide support. We know that, you know, there, there, there will be opportunities to celebrate with one another, and there may be opportunities where we just need You know, the community of advocates who are there to support one another as we navigate through right and so we want to keep this community alive and well as we navigate and then we'll talk more about it next month, but we have invested in an advocacy tool that as you all move on particular bills will move on our federal priorities, but at the state and local level, you can leverage the investment that we made to be able to mobilize around trauma informed policies with the asterisk that we'll make sure that it's aligned with our mission.
[01:05:26] We're not just gonna like give software for anybody we want for it to be aligned but assuming that it is so that way there's another benefit of community building and movement building that we will continue to go on as we move forward in the next year. CTIPP CAN calls have been happening since 2017, I think they started.
[01:05:45] Um, from my predecessor, Dan, so awesome. Thank you so much. Thank you. We're thrilled that you're part of the community and, and Nicole, I think that I saw your hand. I don't mean to call you out, but I was like, I have to jump off because I do need to get onto another call, but I can't believe I haven't found this before.
[01:06:05] Now I'm an industrial organizational psychologist and I study it. Thank you. Like, how do you measure workplace psychosocial harms and I'm looking at just the, my advocacy work is research and that's what I will be doing for the next few months while I can. And so I'm really excited about this. I would love to understand if there's ways that I can.
[01:06:28] Um, and so I'm out in Washington state. I'm in Seattle. Uh, but yeah, the trauma informed care and applying that to the workplace. I think it's a really undervalued area that we're not like work is a giant source of trauma for so many people that we're not addressing, um, at a fundamental level. My research is like, based on the ACEs, everything you've said, I'm like, this is amazing.
[01:06:51] This is what I love hearing. Uh, so, um, um, I have to go, but I would love to connect with anybody who wants to. You can find me on LinkedIn. Um, and Jesse, I'm going to send you a connection. Can I get like 30 minutes of your time? Okay. Thank you. That goes for anyone. Have a great next call. Yeah. Thank you. Bye.
[01:07:14] I'm from Virginia and we had a great breakout room, but I would just say when you are worried about talking to other people, what I find. When I talk to people that I know do not align with what I think, um, i. e. I had a board member for board of supervisors who feels that our library is way too gay friendly.
[01:07:36] It's not, but whatever, you can look up Samuel's public library online and you'll see that there's a big fight going on. And last year I actually wrote him and asked him to meet with me and we met at a pub and he had all kinds of interesting things to say, but. I knew that there were lots of things we were aligned on that had nothing to do with this.
[01:07:57] And I will say that it's surprising when you find that little teeny tiny bit where you can connect how people can actually listen. And I'm a firm believer that if you can just stretch their brain this much or open the door this much, there's a chance that later on they might listen a little more. So, We, we all are here to make resilient, great people continue to live in this country.
[01:08:24] And so we'll do it. That's what we're all here to do. Thank you so much for sharing. That's sage advice and wisdom that yeah. Sometimes you just gotta find out where to, to just get in right. And then make that connection and then expand mine from there. That's beautiful. Thank you so much. Hi everybody. I'm um, I'm Carlton McKinney Jr.
[01:08:48] I'm from St. Louis, Missouri. Um, I am a trainer for quality and training department at the St. Louis Arc. And actually my boss is on here and um, they got me. Got me into this, this community. And I was, I was first was hesitant. Cause I was like, I don't know, like I'm new coming in. So I don't want to come in like broad, but listening to, um, the stories and your presentation, Jesse, also, I am Mr.
[01:09:14] Pride of STL. Um, so I work a lot with the LGBTQ plus our community and to be able to use. these tools, not only for my day job, but also for the LGBTQ plus our community is phenomenal. And that's what, that was also one of my tasks and goals as being Mr. Pride this year is to be able to advocate for not only myself, but for those that's coming behind me, those that's not even out the closet yet.
[01:09:42] Um, and having a safe space for them to come to and be open and be able to talk about it. So I'm actually glad that I joined this call today. Um, Because now I can be able to use those tools in two different settings and also be able to have the mindset to go in and know what to do, what to not to do, what to say, how not to say it, and also be able to give them something to relate to.
[01:10:01] So I'm glad I'm here and I thank you for all the tools. Thank you. We're so glad you're here as well and for all that you're doing. Any
[01:10:15] other thoughts? It's been wonderful spending this time together today.
[01:10:23] Yeah. I know that many have spent a long time on Zoom together, right? I oftentimes say that Zoom calls are like the most boring movie we've ever watched. It's like two hours, and it's just all of us on a screen. But it is great. So nice to get to connect in these ways. We hope to see you all again next month as we finish out this year.
[01:10:42] And then as we move forward in 2025, sending y'all a ton of love, be well. And we look forward to seeing you again soon. Don't hesitate to reach out in the meantime, if we can help in any way. Thank you so much.
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