McKenzie County ND

The Traveler’s Gift

by Andy Andrews.

Another book report on one of the fine selections the Horizon’s program has donated to our area. The books are located at the McKenzie County Library in Watford City.

Decision for Success

1. The buck stops here. I accept responsibility for my past. I am responsible for my success.

2. I will seek wisdom. I will choose to act. Charge!

3. I am a person of action.

4. I have a decided heart.

5. Today I will choose to be happy. As soon as I wake up, I will laugh for 7 seconds.

6. I will greet this day with a forgiving spirit.

7. I will persist without exception.

This would be a great text for today’s young persons. Besides giving them a glimpse into famous persons’ lives and a brief tour of the world, it gives some wonderful advice.

Arnegard’s Postmaster Sharon Prestangen played Crazy 8s with customers on Friday 08/08/08. Those who won got their name placed in a special drawing box. The lucky person would win $8.88 in postage stamps. Every letter posted that day got the official Crazy 8 cancellation and post cards with the Crazy 8 logo were available. Relay For Life members, Kari Grieger and her son, Jacob, and Lowaine Gudmunsen of Arnegard served hot dogs, chips, lemonade, bars and bottles of water for 88 cents.

“Look out for 09/09/09!” says Prestangen, whose inspiration for this crazy date and episode is the 10 and 1/2 card game famous in Arnegard’s Cafe.

Oh, yes, that R us! Butt (I think you are supposed to put sic here) it is a good feeling to know we have accomplished, and we will accomplish more!

We received some magnificent books through the Horizons program. Man, these books cost mega bucks, and we have a whole trough full. They are at the Watford City library so go and check something out. It won’t matter which one. All of the information is wonderful.

I took Leadership Gold by John C. Maxwell.

Subtitle: Lessons I’ve Learned from a Lifetime of Leading.

I found some fantastic things to share with you. And I am sure you would jump over these and find something wonderful for yourself. So here it is:

“Criticism is something you can avoid easily—-by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.”………Aristotle (We are used to this one.)

“Don’t put live eggs under dead chickens.” ……..Howard Hendricks (We tried but it didn’t work out.)

And now let’s address our own skills in communication. I UNDERSTAND this area needs some work.

Direct quote from the book:

You spend half your day—about 4 hours—-in listening activities.
You hear about two hours’ worth of what is said.
You actually listen to an hour of it.
You understand only thirty minutes of that hour.
You believe only fifteen minutes’ worth.
And you remember less than eight minutes of all that is said.

Ahem…………does this ring any bells? Ding ding ding

Another quote:

Control your destiny, or someone else will.
Face reality as it is, not as it was or as you wish it were.
Be candid with everyone.
Don’t manage, lead.
Change before you have to.
If you don’t have a competitive advantage, don’t compete.

Don’t send your ducks to Eagle School.

If you send ducks to Eagle School, you will frustrate the ducks.
If you send ducks to Eagle School, you will frustrate the Eagles.
If you send ducks to Eagle School, you will frustrate yourself.

I will equate this to trying to give a town a treasure. And everyone refused it.

I now invite you to check out this book and find some treasures for yourself.

And if you have a dripping wet cat who was outside when our rain/hail deluge hit……., get out the towel and the hair dryer! We need ACTION, when ACTION is needed!

Horizons has added a wonderful collection of materials to the McKenzie County Library. The book titles below will address community leadership, poverty reduction, entrepreneurship and self improvement. You will find them to be inspiring, enlightening and some will also be quite humorous! A couple curriculums, DVD’s, lessons for groups, and children’s books are included. Please request the McKenzie County Horizons library to check out these books titles and other materials:

The Leadership Secrets of Santa Claus
Making Vision Stick
The Traveler’s Gift
Leadership Gold: Lessons I’ve Learned from a Lifetime of Learning by John C. Maxwell
The Quilt Makers Gift
The Quilt Makers Journey
8 Challenges Facing Community Leaders
Who Moved My Cheese?
Leadership 101: What Every Leader Needs To Know
Attitude 101: What Every Leader Needs To Know
Good To Great: Why Some Companies Make The Lead…and Other Don’t
Smart Communities: How Citizens and Local Leaders Can Use Strategic Thinking To Build a Brighter Future
The 21 Irrefutable Laws Of Leadership: Follow Them and People Will Follow You
Rural Communities Legacy + Change: Third Edition
Your Field Guide To Community Building
The Magic of Thinking Big
Blink
The Tipping Point
The Power of Positive Thinking
Leading Without Power: Finding Hope In Serving Community
Everyday Creativity: Leader’s Guide, Workbook and DVD
6 Myths About The Future of Small Towns
Better Schools Through Public Engagement
Better Local Leadership: How To Start a Program For Your Town or County
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People–DVD
Establishing A Shared-Use Commerical Kitchen
Who, Me Lead a Group?
Vision To Action: Take Change Too Curriculum
The Entrepreneurial Community: A Strategic Leadership Appraoch To Community Survival resources material
The Leader In You: How To Win Friends, Influence People and Succeed In a Changing World
Do Something In Your Community
Energizing Entrepreneurs: Charting a Course for Rural Communities
Turning To One Another: Simple Conversations To Restore Home To The Future
A Framework For Understanding Poverty
Bridges Out of Poverty
Oh, The Places You’ll Go! (children’s book)
Getting Ahead In a Just-Gettin’–By Wolrd: Building Your Resources for a Better Life
Stone Soup (children’s book)

Striving to improve living conditions for families and individuals who struggle with poverty. Searching for proven or emerging approaches to reduce the numbers of people who struggle on a daily basis–long term.

These were underlying themes for the business and political leaders and nonprofit organizations and government service providers, including many Horizons program volunteers and staff who attended the Grassroots and Groundwork conference in Minneapolis May 28 to 30.

For me the experience was eye-opening and inspiring, to say the least.

One of the most interesting things I learned more about was social capital. Social capital, the relational foundation of a community, consists of trust, connections (networks), and involvement (action).

Strength of communities rests on the relationships we have with one another. Research has shown that communities with a strong foundation of trust between and among different individuals and groups are healthier and thrive economically and educationally.

These types of networks are an important part of social capital in communities:

Bonding Networks — close ties that help people to get by. These connections are usually with family, friends and neighbors.

Bridging Networks — weaker ties that can help people to get ahead and gain opportunities. These connections are usually with people who are different from themselves, who have different types of networks.

Linking Networks — Links to organizations and systems that can help people gain resources and bring about broader change. These connections are usually with organizations that have resources, both within and outside of the community.

Take a look at the social capital in your community. It will help you learn a lot about yourselves today and into the future!

Courage.   Most of us think first of veterans who go to war and  people who run into burning buildings.   Maybe we think of missionaries who tackle hard problems in third world countries.   Or of giving a speech!   I thought of courage the other night when I facilitated the McKenzie Co. Horizens meeting to reduce underage alcohol consumption.   It takes courage to go public on the issue when the neighbors can tell stories on you when you were young!    It takes courage when you have a kid that is possibly bigger than you are and you have to say no!   It takes courage to disagree with your friends when they remember party fun and think you are just a spoiler.  (Do they know how “partying has changed in the last years?)   It takes courage especially if you think your kid will challenge you about your habits.   It takes courage to risk donating precious time and getting hooked into another round of meetings.   It takes courage to try to think up something you think your teens will actually enjoy instead of being bored-scarier yet- you might have to do it together!    So…if any of the above are making you grin or squirm,  you know what I mean by courage.    When you think about the poverty-making bad decisions that young people can make when they are using alcohol, a little courage is a good thing.    

Few acknowledge that underage tobacco and alcohol use are criminal behaviors. But Sgt. Bruce Talbot taught in his Broken Windows presentation last August that the underage use creates a gateway behavior that leads people, particularly teens and young adults, deeper into the criminal life….and away from success.

Among the few are the Community Coalition and the Horizons-Leadership to Reduce Poverty groups of McKenzie County, partners in efforts to curtail behaviors that increase the chance of living in poverty. (Read ‘Rethinking Poverty’ posted by Tim Swenson.)

Mapping Successes for Our Children began with panel presentations March 31 and ended before the group of 60 participants could do the mapping for convincing youth to leave the illegal drugs alone.

On Monday, 18 people followed facilitator Anita Rohde of New Town into a 90-minute session ending successfully with a three-pronged approach to the age-old social problem:

1. Mentoring training, with partnershipsof youth and adults to be trained after the Gatekeepers of Harvey, ND

2. Monitoring and advocating for compliance checks in order to limit access to gateway drugs

3. Sponsor political candidate policy forums and offer alternate refreshments at dry bars. A homemade label on legal refreshments would bear messages supporting the better lifestyle choices for success.

“Parents, young adults and all kids need support to abstain from alcohol and drugs,” says Don Moberg of Watford City, a participant in the Mapping Successes for Our Children II session.

Brittany Bennett, an Alexander High School student, accepted a position on the board of the Lewis and Clark Trail Museum in Alexander. Museum board members usually do a lot of the behind the scenes work at the museum as well as serving on the board. Over the past several years, Brittany has done many chores about the museum as well as serving as a tour guide for visitors.

Holly Helling of rural Alexander also accepted a board position. Holly has been leading crafting classes in Alexander with the purpose of making saleable items for the museum’s gift shop. Other board members are Vi Baye, Joe Weber, and Dorothy Reil.

Pictures courtesy of Holly Helling.

Holly Helling and Teresa Forthun represented the Lewis and Clark Trail Museum of Alexander at the two day 2008 North Dakota Tourism Conference in Mandan April 21 and 22.

Eight Governor’s Travel and Tourism awards, recognizing outstanding leaders in the tourism industry, were presented Monday, April 21, at the 2008 North Dakota Tourism Conference in Mandan. During the conference, Governor John Hoeven, Tourism Director Sara Otte Coleman, and Destination Marketing Association of North Dakota President Wendy Howe, presented the awards in eight travel and tourism categories.

“As the second-largest industry in North Dakota, tourism accounts for $3.8 billion in visitor spending,” said Hoeven.”

Each dollar spent on paid media in 2007 brought in $123 in visitor spending. “Our efforts in aggressively marketing North Dakota as a great place to live, work and play are coming to fruition,” said Gov. John Hoeven.

ND Tourism will spend $1.9 million on the 2008 advertising plan. The plan includes broadcast, direct response television; print, radio, online and out-of-home advertising; as well as newspaper inserts, direct mail and outdoor (hunting and fishing) marketing. Some media has begun, with the majority starting April 1 in target markets of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, South Dakota, and Montana. These targets reflect potential travelers age 35 to 64 within a 1,000-mile radius of North Dakota.

Many thanks are extended to the Horizons Program for the funding to make this conference possible for Holly and Teresa. Also thank you to Holly for the pictures.

Reversing the direction of teaching, Mark LoMurray, a nationally known trainer in suicide prevention, is setting the youth trained as Gatekeepers to approach the two adults they trust the most and lead them to become well-versed Sources of Strength.

“Suicide prevention is really about getting a large part of the community involved, breaking codes of silence and having teens and adults partnering together,” LoMurray insists.

“During the Watford City training, April 14, I think we made a great start on teens, adults, and faith-based groups willing to come together and get out messages of hope, help, and strength. That help is available in the mental health and medical systems, but also on the village side through family, friends, mentoring, healthy activities and spirituality. Also messages that there really is hope, despite feelings of being stuck, alone, and hopeless - By sharing stories of strength and resiliency, we can shine some light on some ways people have made it through emotionally hard and difficult times to a better, more healing place in their life,” states LoMurray.

The following provides insight into the Gatekeeper/Sources of Strength Training. (more…)