The Change Cycle: The Hero's Journey
Our family, my husband and three of our adult kids, have begun a tradition called “Catan Day”. I blame my husband for Catan Day. I introduced my husband to the board game, Settlers of Catan, several years ago. He is not a huge board game fan, but he found that this one was more tolerable because it was similar to some of the resource gathering games he had played on his video gaming consoles (e.g., Sim City). Fast forward a year or more. One day my husband came home telling me about a Settlers of Catan recipe book that he had seen at the mall. We had been trying to figure out how to help our kids learn some cooking skills to help them eat more healthily as college students and in young adulthood. An idea sparked and last year “Catan Day” was born for our family.
The first Catan Day for our family consisted of an entire day of cooking, game play, and movies. Each person was asked to look through the recipe book and choose at least three recipes they were interested in making. Based upon the food choices, I put together a breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert menu, filling in with my own choices to make complete and well-rounded meals. I will admit that we did struggle to find a one-use brick for one of the recipes selected by our children, “Brick Chicken,” that required an actual brick to sit on top of the chicken while baking.
Catan Day was a resounding success. We all learned a lot about cooking, played lots of Catan, and enjoyed each other’s company. We enjoyed it so much that we decided to schedule a second one for the following year but this time we would use a version of Catan that was based off the Star Trek original series movies and TV shows called Star Trek Catan.
Stage two of Martha Beck’s change cycle metaphor is the “Dreaming and Scheming” stage. It is when the spark of an idea ignites and it fosters curiosity, creativity, and excitement. Eventually the spark leads to the formation of a plan and maybe some brief research to look gather information about whether the idea and/or plan might work or what it would take to make it work.
Last year Star Trek Catan was a spark of an idea with a general outline of what it might look like based upon the first Catan Day we held. My husband once again found the perfect cookbook, a Star Trek themed recipe book. At first the recipes seemed strange and maybe too challenging for what we were going for but as time went on, we warmed up to the idea of trying them out and challenging ourselves a little more than the year before. It was going to be a big experiment!
A few weeks prior to our scheduled weekend, it was time to get serious about planning the event, figuring out the menu, deciding which of the many movies we would watch, and maybe think about some decorations. This time we decided to choose the menu ourselves because we were recent empty nesters and it was more challenging to gather the kids to look at the recipes to choose what they wanted to make. Once we picked the recipes, I created a shopping list to outline what we were going to need and which items would need to be ordered online versus purchased locally.
Next, I turned my attention to some decorations. We wanted to use the Star Trek Cookbook to plan food, as well as decorations. We decided to try making Star Fleet Rations (SFR) (cubes made from rice flour, sugar, food coloring, and extract made to look like square used as food in the original series of Star Trek) as well as some other odd dishes with accompanying embellishments. In addition, it seemed like there should be a fun way to display the SFRs and other foods and play with the Star Trek theme a bit more. So off into dreaming and scheming I went with the help of the internet, including Pinterest and Amazon. It wasn’t long before I had come up with a crazy scheme to turn our entry hall into a space entrance into the USS Enterprise, with the interior appearing more as the interior of the spaceship. I had a vision of what I wanted the experience and décor to be and a plan for how to make it happen.
The next step was to begin taking steps to make it a reality. I had entered stage three of the change cycle, The Hero’s Journey. This stage is called The Hero’s Journey because it implies that success does not happen all at once but requires persistence and can sometimes be tough or discouraging.
I started creating food cards for each dish that included Star Trek fonts that corresponded with the alien race to which each dish pertained. Then I began shopping for supplies, beginning with odd food items that I knew would be difficult to find locally and would keep for a couple of weeks. Then I began shopping for plastic star tablecloths to create the outer space entryway and silver for the entry doors to the USS Enterprise. A few outer space pictures framed as windows for the interior and some food display stands and I was ready to start creating the atmosphere for Star Trek Catan Day. Everything was going well and I was looking forward to our upcoming day together.
My husband and I began our food preparations several days prior to the event. There were a few sauces and a garnish that we could prepare that would help cut down on the actual meal preparation time on the day of the event and help prevent us from feeling overwhelmed. The next day I spent more time working on some syrups, chocolates, colored couscous, and SFRs. I also began hanging the space themed plastic tablecloths in the entry way. It meant hauling around an awkward ladder while holding the plastic and taping it to the wall all the way around the entry hall.
Two of the three kids were going to arrive on Friday evening and I really wanted to have everything ready for their arrival. I wanted them to have this fun immersive experience, and I wanted it to be perfect…. By Thursday, the entry hall was only half done and the SFRs had required more time than I had anticipated. They had to be made in separate batches so that they could be colored different colors. There was also a learning curve to create the proper consistency so they would hold a cube shape.
By Thursday evening I was feeling discouraged and wishing I had some help to pull my crazy idea together. Initially I knew most of the planning and preparation would fall to me because my husband had a full-time job and the kids were all in school, but making the dream a reality was harder than I had initially thought. I had also imagined that my husband and I would be having a beautiful bonding experience as we created this fun experience for our kids together. Cue the movie montage of beautiful music, laughing, conversation, an amazing star filled entry hall, etc., etc., etc.
And that’s not how it happened.
First, I thought about how I had done most of the work and I felt sorry for myself. Then I thought about how I had been setting aside work I needed to do to help my coaching business grow to create this experience for my family. And – there were still lights that needed to be hung on the ceiling, a huge trip to the grocery store to be made, signs to be printed and hung on the walls, as well as the pictures I had purchased. I had also neglected to feed myself sustaining foods throughout the day so not only was a feeling sorry for myself, I also had no energy to keep going.
That night my husband took me to dinner. While I fueled my body, we talked about next steps and why I was feeling disappointed. I knew my expectations weren’t reasonable to place on him. I was the one who wanted to create an over-the-top experience and hadn’t checked in with him to see if he was on board and would be willing to help and whether we even shared the same vision.
I had reached the part of The Hero’s Journey where the thought becomes, “This is harder than I thought it would be.” Every journey towards making a dream a reality has these moments, invitations for self-reflection to ask if the dream is still the dream or if it needs to change. In some cases, we may find that the dream is no longer aligned with what we want or who we are, and the decision may be made to abandon it. In other cases, a small adjustment may be all that is required and then off we go towards the goal again. That night after dinner, after having eaten a good meal and having a heart to heart with my husband, I watched as his creative side came out while we worked together on my vision.
Friday evening, my husband helped me with the final touches. A few more light strands added in strategic locations, a light up moon added to the hallway, and signs and pictures hung. When we were satisfied with the outcome, we went to dinner while we waited for the kids to show up. And we had an amazing weekend together as family.
If you are in the midst of The Hero’s Journey towards your own vision or dream, here are a few tips to try when it becomes “harder than you thought it would be.”
Rest and take care of any physical needs you may have in that moment.
Ask yourself if the vision or dream is still something that is meaningful to you and that you want to pursue. Is it still aligned with your goals and values?
You may find it helpful to have some additional support to overcome the obstacle you are experiencing. If so, to whom could you turn within your community or support system for advice or assistance?
Recognize that challenges and difficulties are part of the journey and that when it happens, nothing has gone wrong. It’s exactly how it is supposed to be.
If you decide that the dream is no longer what you want, let it go. This is not failure; it is being honest with yourself and a form of profound self-care.
Here are a few pictures from Star Trek Catan Day.
Enjoy!
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