WHAT: Family gathering and introduction to Alive Adventures / Youth Empowerment Services.
WHEN: 6:30 p.m. Tuesday.
WHERE: Veterans Memorial Park Amphitheater, 960 Veterans Way, Boise.
COST: Free.
DETAILS: Learn more about the spectrum of programs, including:
Father Mother Son Daughter Retreat, an overnight outing with a ropes course and whitewater rafting, Aug. 16-17.
Boys in the Fire Rite of Passage Journey, a six-day adventure education program for teenage boys, Aug. 19-24.
Boys Only Adventure Ropes Course, an an overnight outing with a ropes course and whitewater rafting, Aug. 26-27.
Adventure mentoring groups for young men and women, bi-monthly activities and a final summer adventure camp, starting in September.
CONTACT: 407-7582
Part of life is wondering what it all means, but most people don't wonder while plunging through swollen rivers, scaling cliffs, balancing between treetops or falling straight back into the arms of total strangers.
In his wonderfully cluttered office in Downtown Boise, D. Forrest Melton explained why wilderness exploration and the existential dilemma go hand in hand.
"You have to make analogies between nature and life," he said. "In our world, we don't reflect enough. People don't really communicate unless there's a crisis."
VISION QUEST
Crisis is what pushed Melton into his current line of work, a mix of adventure guiding, life coaching, team building and experiential therapy for boys, men and families (though he's developing corporate programs and can accommodate women and girls with the help of trained female consultants). From bi-monthly mentoring groups to week-long rites of passage journeys to overnight challenge trips throughout the summer, Melton spends most of his time helping others learn how to reflect, communicate and live with purpose.
He started in 1985 as a facilitator of massive spring break trips, but the empty partying and rare tragedy drove him from the industry. The tipping point came when a young reveler got drunk on a hotel roof and fell down an elevator shaft to his death.
"I felt responsible," Melton said. "It was someone under my wing."
Leaving his job as vice president of sales and marketing for a large travel company, Melton went in search of something more meaningful. He explored Asia in the early '90s before moving to Boise, where he attended a seminar called One Discovery that focused on empowerment.
"I found I wanted to work with the human potential industry," Melton said.
That industry is as wide open as it sounds. For Melton, it has involved everything from large-scale grief management workshops to nature trips for small groups of troubled kids. He has completed more than three dozen training sessions in disciplines including holotropic breath exercises, life success strategies, hypnotherapy and wilderness first aid. His company, Alive Adventures / Youth Empowerment Services, offers adventure camps, ropes courses, family retreats, vision quests - anything to help people better understand themselves and their places in the world.
"It's teaching them to be patient, determined and persistent, purifying their minds with fresh air and good food. They find out what it's like to drink fresh water out of a river, wake up under the stars, hike 10 miles, make fire," Melton said. "Adventure education is about having an experience with the wilderness and using it teach how life works."
THE CIRCLE OF LIFE
While Melton is not a professional counselor, his work addresses some of the same psychological issues. Diane Halpin is a licensed clinical professional counselor, registered nurse and licensed marriage and family therapist in Boise who describes herself as "a healer, a seeker." She and Melton have clients in common and have worked collaboratively with young people and families.
"If we breathe and have a pulse, as human beings we are all wounded developmentally. Whether you have a Ph.D. or you sweep streets, it doesn't matter. These are wounds people cannot see like a physical problem," Halpin said.
In her private practice, Halpin helps people access their feelings and memories to correct what she calls "unfinished business from the past." She said this unfinished business often has to do with loss of trust, in other people or even in oneself. This can lead to the development of negative beliefs about oneself, roadblocks to healthy emotional and spiritual growth and abusive behaviors like compulsive eating disorders or drug addiction. The work Halpin and Melton do, albeit in very different ways and settings, is about helping people tap into this internal life, where the real work must be done.
"What these groups do is help us get in there and dig to those psychological wounds, help them to heal by re-experiencing to a more healed state - if the client's defense mechanisms are open enough to do this," Halpin said. "If there's enough safety and bonding with the group, they start to open up. At first there may be a lot of resistance, but over time, their defenses break down and they become open to new learning and maturity."
IN THE FIRE
Boisean Susan Randall remembers her son Chaco being a little resistant at first, a typical 12-year-old loathe to spend a week away from his family and friends in some remote landscape with a bunch of strangers.
Three rites of passage, one vision quest and five years later, the 17-year-old has gained practical skills, spiritual insight and a lasting, constructive relationship with Melton.
"My son doesn't have an active father in his life, and it was important for me to provide a good male role model. Forrest is that," Randall said. "I can tell the difference when Chaco has been with him. There is a softening and an opening."
Mary Lantz, also of Boise, said Melton has helped her entire family be more authentic and aware, both individually and as a unit. She, her husband and three adult children have been working with him for about a year on establishing trust, redefining their relationships and celebrating their unique strengths.
"I was very touched by his positive energy, understanding, awareness and inclusive thinking, and not just in terms of how he himself experiences life," Lantz said. "In teaching male role model development, he's not telling them how they need to be men or what all men are; he's providing an opportunity to explore that, to experience some companionship in developing that ... . He has honor and respect for individuals and where each of us is."
The family went on a retreat with Melton last summer, and Lantz said it gave her tangible tools to apply to her daily life.
"In fun ways, safe ways, sacred ways, it encouraged us within our framework instead of giving us a list of 10 things to do or a book to read," she said. "Stay open, stay curious is one of Forrest's favorite challenges. It's about being conscious and holding a space for something other than my assumptions or what I believe is expected. It's not an event; it's a process."
Whether six days or three weeks, in the Snake River Canyon or the Grand Canyon, alone or in a community, adventure education is about finding, and more importantly, believing in yourself.
"It's a matter of slowing down, opening the mind to new ideas, awakening into whatever people call their higher power so they can feel alive and vibrant," Melton said, "that whatever the challenges are they will succeed no matter what."
Erin Ryan: 672-6732
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