Some of my colleagues and I have developed a process and program called, "Design Thinking Suicide Prevention," that we have been presenting at mental health conferences.
The reason for it is that we have discovered that certain words scare too many people who don't have to deal with mental issues in their family (although that number is becoming smaller and smaller).
In fact, just the word "mental" causes people to run for the hills unless it directly affects them or a family member.
Design Thinking is an approach well known to Microsoft, Apple, Google, Facebook and other tech companies as an approach to creative problem solving. We have discovered that when you can get into the way people think and then use a framework that they are familiar with, you are better able to have them open their minds to you. We used Design Thinking because it is familiar and within the comfort zones of many tech companies and then we just inserted "suicide prevention" as the problem to be solved.
You can find a more complete explanation of Design Thinking Suicide Prevention, the main takeaway being the "Save the Life of Your Child" infographic above.
What's the connection of this to ACEs?
When we have shared this graphic with adults who are suffering with mental challenges, addictions, etc. they are able to see and feel how not having a solid and sound psychological core caused them to go from stress (where you can still focus on goals with difficulty) to distress (where your focus becomes relieving pain at any cost to your well-being).
Furthermore it has been helpful for groups to share their emotional experiences of having plummeted in their lives to the "I can't stand the pain anymore" low point and finally it is something they can use with their teens and young adults as a catalyst for deep and healing conversations.
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