Executive Director of Friends of Grand Rapids Parks, Stacy Bare, shares why it's important to build and improve green spaces in our local communities and how he and his team are doing just that in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
In 2017, Stacy Bare took fellow veterans back to Iraq, where they had all served during the war. The team skied some of the highest mountains in the country and made an award-winning film called Adventure Not War. Now, since becoming a father to daughter Wilder, and weathering a global pandemic, Stacy’s work looks a little different. Instead of bringing folks out to nature, he’s working to build and improve green space in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Connect with Stacy:
Connect with Friends of Grand Rapids Parks:
Resources:
Episode sponsors:
Shelby Stanger:
If you've been a longtime listener, you might remember Stacy Bare. In 2017, Stacy took two fellow veterans back to Iraq, where they'd all served during the war. The team skied some of the highest mountains in the country and made an award-winning film called Adventure Not War. After its release, Stacy continued taking veterans on adventure trips to places they'd previously been stationed. His idea to use nature as a tool for recovery gained a lot of momentum, and he was supported by brands like Merrell, Osprey and Trew Gear. He was even named Adventurer of the Year by National Geographic.
Now, since becoming a father to daughter Wilder, and weathering a global pandemic, Stacy's work looks a little different. Instead of bringing folks out to nature, Stacy's working to build and improve green space in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I'm Shelby Stanger, and this is Wild Ideas Worth Living, an REI Co-op Studio's production.
Before we jump into my conversation with Stacy, I wanted to offer a content warning. Our conversation discusses suicide, PTSD, depression, and more.
Stacy Bare, welcome to Wild Ideas Worth Living. Not only are you a repeat guest, but you have one of the best podcast voices in the podcast world.
Stacy Bare:
Well, thanks, Shelby. One of these days, maybe I will start my own podcast, but it's fun to be hanging out with you, and yeah, just see you. It's been a long time, so it's really nice to see you. I think if I get to be on the podcast two more times, I get a robe, right?
Shelby Stanger:
A robe, totally.
Stacy Bare:
Yeah, sweet.
Shelby Stanger:
We'll get those made right now.
Stacy Bare:
100% percent, the Wild Idea robe.
Shelby Stanger:
I really do want a robe. Okay. So since we last spoke, a lot has happened and I thought we would just start, maybe you could remind people of your relationship with the outdoors, and how the outdoors came to be such a big part of your life after you served our country.
Stacy Bare:
Yeah. I came home from Iraq in 2009. I went to graduate school in Philly, I got a Master's in City Planning and Urban Design. And then with the economic collapse in 2009, I moved out to Boulder, Colorado, which was not my first choice, and faced with what felt like a binary decision of ending my life or rejoining the military. A friend of mine asked me to take a third way, which was, "You can do those things, but why don't you come out and rock climb with me first?" And so I delayed any decision and went out rock climbing, and that felt like a total life change in my own life. I look back on it now, I can think about things like experiencing awe, having a full somatic experience, and that then shifted me into this idea of, if this is so good for me, how do I help other people?
And there weren't, at the time, a lot of other non-profits or organizations working to connect veterans to the outdoors, especially veterans who didn't raise their hand and say, "I had posttraumatic stress," or veterans who didn't have physically noticeable disabilities because of the war. And so I moved through that, and in that time I launched my own individual program to get back to the places that I had fought or served in war. So that project's called Adventure Not War, it's still ongoing. But I went and climbed in Angola with Alex Honnold. I went and led a ski expedition with a couple other veterans and Max Lowe who shot that film. In 2017, we went back to the highest peak in Iraq and skied that. In 2019, Ben Sturgulewski and I went to Afghanistan and made a film about the Afghan ski community. And then I'm still hoping to get out to Bosnia and Abkhazia.
Shelby Stanger:
I want to go back. So Adventure Not War was a program where you took people back to places that they either served or that are associated with war, and you showed them a different aspect of it, for example, skiing in Iraq.
Stacy Bare:
Right. So my goal was really around narrative change. How do we create a different narrative or an additional narrative? One of the really interesting things about that, coming back from Iraq in 2017, and we got a huge amount of press at the time, and it was a really exciting moment. And I thought to myself in 2017, I thought like, I'm going to step into this role as an outdoor athlete, as an outdoor ambassador for brands, and we're going to continue doing this and pushing the envelope for where we're going and everything else like that. And what I found instead was it ended up kind of being this moment where I got to be at this really high level and I got feted and everybody wanted me to speak for a long time. And it was awesome. It lasted for about two or three years, and I thought we were so successful in this project, how could I not continue on this path of big expeditions and adventure film and everything else like that?
And so the pandemic, when it came crashing in, my whole world shut down, because I had been successful as a consultant and I'd hit the peak with the Adventure Not War. I was getting a lot of corporate speaking gigs and really feeling good about myself. And then the pandemic shut everything down. And the first couple weeks of the pandemic was actually really nice. It didn't feel like it was going to last as long as it did. I think we all thought it's going to be two or three weeks, maybe four weeks, maybe six weeks, and then we're going to get back to things. And instead, literally six weeks after giving a corporate talk, I was working at FedEx, throwing boxes, working at a package transfer station. And then I spent the first year of the pandemic driving a forklift for Specialized Bikes. And I saw that, I mean, one of the most fun things about driving a forklift is I worked like... I don't know, I didn't love driving a forklift.
Shelby Stanger:
It's most little boys' dreams. Come on, let's be honest. Like the little kid-
Stacy Bare:
It was really cool for a while. But it's pretty boring, physically monotonous work. But what made it awesome was I was working with really good people. We laughed a lot. We had really intense, big conversations when we had time to do that, we worked three 12s, we worked super hard, we were proud of the metrics that we were getting out. And then we rode bikes together and we all liked riding bikes and we were working in the bike industry. And so we would work Friday to Sunday and we would lift boxes and my right shoulder still hurts a little bit from it. And we would chuck around big boxes and we would do as much as we could. And then Monday you were exhausted. So we slept in on Mondays and then I got to hang out with Wilder. And then on Tuesdays we'd all go ride together. And Wednesdays I'd hang out with Wilder again. And then Thursday I'd have a half day ride, and then Friday I'd be back at work.
And what I really learned is that it was a job that allowed me to do something that I was really passionate and I loved. I loved mountain biking, I loved the community we were creating, but I didn't love the job. It was just a job, but I loved the people I was working with. And it was a nice reminder that work never is going to love you back, but the people you meet might love you back. The things you get to do together might love you back. And that was really helpful for me, I think, to really understand and figure out what was really important in my life and what change did I want to make and where did I want to go, what impact did I want to have? And I think it was a good reminder during the pandemic that joy is the purpose.
Shelby Stanger:
For years, Stacy's message was that spending time outdoors can kickstart and accelerate our healing. While working as the director of Sierra Club Outdoors, Stacy launched the Great Outdoors Lab alongside US Berkeley Professor Dacher Keltner. Their research studied how time outside benefits human health, but Stacy's experience during the pandemic helped him realize that it's not just getting outside that's good for us. It's getting outside and connecting with other people. Armed with this new knowledge, Stacy decided to take a leap of faith in his personal life. After living in the mountains of Utah for over a decade, Stacy, his wife and his daughter Wilder, decided to move to the Midwest.
Stacy, you spent 10 years in the outdoor mecca of Utah doing incredible things for the outdoor community and having a lot of fun yourself and raising Wilder, who's now six, which is, by the way, the coolest name for a child ever. Obviously I'm biased, I love the name Wild in anything. How did you leave Utah for Michigan?
Stacy Bare:
Yeah. So my mother-in-law is from Jackson, Michigan, and in 2019 we visited grandma and then we'd spent a week in the upper peninsula for a week and we had this awesome little cabin. And we're driving home and Wilder, she was three years old, she wanted to go jump in the lake. She always loved water and Lake Superior is never that warm. It's a cold place. We didn't have swimsuits, but she really wanted to get in the lake. And we're like, "What are we doing?" So we get all down to our underwear and we get in Lake Superior and we're playing and it is so cold. And when I finally pulled Wilder out of Lake Superior, her lips were blue, she was screaming bloody murder, because she didn't want to leave the lake. She was freezing. She had the best time. And Lake Superior is such an amazing, wonderful, beautiful place. And we thought to ourselves, what are we doing not here? If this is where our family is happiest, what are we not doing here?
And it just took time from 2019 to now, to figure out how to get to the Great Lakes and how to get to this part of the world. And I don't think either of us ever thought we would move to the Great Lakes. I don't think either of us ever thought we would move to the Midwest. I think we always thought we would continue in the Western Mountains. Maybe we'd go to the Pacific Northwest, maybe we'd go to New Zealand. But now being here since June, it's absolutely the right place. I feel like I can breathe, I feel like I can stand taller. And it just feels like this is the place where we're supposed to be as a family.
Shelby Stanger:
When we come back, Stacy talks about his new project he's working on in Grand Rapids, Michigan, how his mindset about pushing himself has changed, and his reflections on what happens after we cross the finish line.
Stacy Bare has spent his entire professional career showing the world why we should all spend more time outside. Recently, Stacy became the executive director of a nonprofit called Friends of Grand Rapids Park. The organization aims to increase and maintain green spaces in Grand Rapids, Michigan so that everyone can have access to nature no matter what neighborhood they live in. They're working to plant 15,000 trees in the next five years. This plan follows the theory that urban tree canopy can have a massive impact on people's health. What is an urban forest canopy for someone who doesn't know what that is?
Stacy Bare:
Yeah. So the urban forest canopy is just the trees when you drive through a city. And so we might think of those as the trees in kind of the boulevard or the public rights-of-way, but also the trees that are in parks. And that's what an urban forest canopy is. And a lot of cities like Grand Rapids, Grand Rapids historically is a very segregated city and the redlining and Civil Rights Movement kept neighborhoods incredibly segregated, predominantly between white and Black populations. And the Black populations were oftentimes exploited. And that is where the urban tree canopy is far less than in other areas of the city. And it's also where people don't have easy access to parks. There might be a few parks, but not in the same way as the rest of the city.
And so the kind of global standard is called 3-30-300. And so for all the benefits of health and trees and climate resilience and economy and everything else like that, you should be able to look out your window and see at least three trees. You should live in a neighborhood that has 30% urban forest canopy. So that just means the coverage over the street is about 30% of trees and you should be 300 meters from a park or open space, like a relevant recreation open space. And that's about a 10-minute walk.
And so that's what we're trying to do. And I think one of the really amazing things about parks and trees is it remains a broadly nonpartisan issue. And that's really exciting because you get to work with folks and our volunteers come from all sorts of different walks of life. And to see people engage around service in the outdoors and to see people plant a tree, it's the same look I used to get when I worked with people going down big beautiful canyons on the Green River or Colorado River, climbing mountains out in the Tetons or anywhere else. It's that same sense of awe. And there's a lot of people, there's a lot of great brands and programs that are like, "Hey, if you hashtag this or you buy our product, we'll plant 10 trees," but they're planting these tiny little trees or they're just planting seeds.
We're trying to plant a 15 to 20-year-old tree or a sizeable tree. And so it ends up costing 600 bucks to plant this tree, but the benefits from that are so significant when you add it up over time. We need to plant about 15,000 more trees over the next five years in specific neighborhoods to get to 30% urban tree canopy in 10 years. And then to make sure that we're maintaining that tree canopy, because there's always a need to replace trees because trees die. They're a living thing. Trees get run over, trees get cut down. And so we can get to where we need to, but it's going to require a big push.
Shelby Stanger:
So what are you doing at Friends of Grand Rapids Park? You have this awesome job as the new executive director. What's that been like?
Stacy Bare:
Yeah, I've never been an executive director before. And it is wild. I mean, the expectations we place on leaders, you've got to raise the money, you've got to build the strategy, you've got to manage the board. So it's crazy, it's chaotic. I think we need to have a little bit more honesty and transparency with the challenges of leadership in the nonprofit, but across the board. It's fun, it's exhausting, it's never ending. You never get to all the emails, you never get to all the followups. You never write all the grants you want. You always think you can do a little bit more. And so figuring out how to do all that work while still maintaining your health and engaging with family and friends, I mean, good job to all the executive directors out there. And I hope they can find ways for rest.
Shelby Stanger:
Yeah. We do put unreasonable expectations on leaders in any organization, I feel like. We expect the person at the top just to have the answers.
Stacy Bare:
Totally. And I think it's something that I never really thought I would be doing. I mean, I've spent most of my life thinking about how do I get people outside for big trips, multi days. That's what I was really interested in. One of the things that happened during the pandemic is I was reintroduced to my family in many ways. I was home a lot more and I wanted to spend more and more time with them, and they didn't have the time to spend several days outside as much as I had been spending outside.
And so that's kind of what brought me in many ways back to this idea of parks and recreation and trees in general, not just street trees, but how do we create these valid experiences that anybody can experience? Can the street trees in the boulevard, in the public right-of-way help to bring peace and joy to other people? And we're finding ways to promote activities and engagement in the outdoors that go from 15 minute time in an urban forest canopy all the way to 15 days up in Alaska. Both of those can be an effective, legitimate outdoor experience.
Shelby Stanger:
What are some things besides engaging with citizens to plant trees that's working within this Friends of Grand Rapids? I know you've only been there a short time, but what are you seeing that's really working and having an impact on the community?
Stacy Bare:
So in the city of Grand Rapids, for example, we know there are about 30,000 tree vacancies in the public right-of-way. Ultimately, to get to our broad goals, we also need trees planted in private property. So the city owns the public right-of-way. And we could, I guess, say, "Well, the city says we're going to plant a tree here, so we're going to plant a tree here." But there's a lot of reasons why people don't want a tree. And there's a lot of understanding around community forestry and urban forestry that has changed over the years. So historically people have planted maybe a tree that didn't make sense for a city, because the root system of the tree went after any leaking water. And so people have traumatic events around losing water pipes and they don't have maybe the financial resources to rebuild a sewer main or rebuild a water main. So all that is beginning to change and shift and has over the last several years.
But I think one of the things that's really cool that we do around tree planting is we always ask people whether or not they want to have their tree planted and honoring people when they say no. And saying, "All right, we'd love to share with you why we want to plant a tree. But it's your decision." And I think the more we can offer people opportunities at agency, in self-direction, in their own lives and autonomy in their own lives, again, the better off we're going to be.
Shelby Stanger:
Let me ask you, how are you enjoying time outside these days?
Stacy Bare:
Really differently. The time is just really different. I mean, I'm just thrilled to get outside and paddle with my daughter and she wants to paddle and play. Playgrounds are still a really big thing, dotting around, camping, slower hikes. I mean, mountain biking, still riding is super fun. But I am looking for it. I mean, I love all these ways, but I do love really pushing myself. I do love finding ways to challenge myself for days on end and to find my own limits and to push through those. I don't think everybody has to do that. I used to think everybody had to do that. I used to think everybody would want to do that. Now I realize that's not true.
I mean, I went fishing the other day with a new friend and I caught a small mouth bass, and I hadn't felt the sandpaper feel of the inside of a small mouth bass on my thumb for 10 years. And it just brought me back to this wonderful place of joy as a little boy with my dad and my mom and my brother. And that was awesome. It was wonderful. And then I started thinking to myself, where's the most remote lake I could go catch a small mouth bass in, and how can I push myself super hard? And I still want to do those things. But yeah, it looks really different. I think the most vertical I can find in Michigan is a thousand feet on a ski hill. And for somebody who used to define themselves by vertical feet skied, and not huge lines, but big lines, it's a shift. But I think it's fun to keep pushing myself.
Shelby Stanger:
As a person whose path has been redirected many times, Stacy has thought a lot about the Hero's Journey. If you haven't heard of this storytelling template, it's a simple formula that applies to many timeless tales. The hero goes on an adventure, confronts a crisis, is victorious, and then returns home transformed. But lately, Stacy has had a different perspective on this classic storyline.
You mentioned an email that you're rethinking the whole Hero's Journey. And I'm sure it's a really long answer, but I'm sure it's also really thoughtful. Can you kind of give me the cliff notes version of that?
Stacy Bare:
Yeah, I've been working on an essay on that, and I'm trying to be concise and it's run to 15 pages. And so I think I've got a place where that's going to be published and edited and all that. But yeah, so the Hero's Journey broadly, if you think about the story of Odysseus, he goes to war, he overcomes all these travails, he goes into the dark cave, he faces his biggest fears, he comes back, he's on the throne. And that's where the Hero's Journey ends. But what I think is problematic is we never learn what happens after they get on the throne.
Shelby Stanger:
Oh, this is so good because my chapter today is on finish lines.
Stacy Bare:
Right. So what happens after the finish line? Why do we think of-
Shelby Stanger:
Most people get depression. It's awful.
Stacy Bare:
And I think what ends up happening and what happened to me after I got home in 2017 from Iraq after that ski trip was like, well, I'm a hero now. So, of course, people are going to support me. And I'm the guy, I'm the man. And it's like, but nobody prepares you. We don't have enough stories. We don't have enough narratives that are out there that say, this is what you do. Here's how you deal with the grief. And you know what? The throne might not be the right spot. Why is the finish line the goal? What about the journey? What about the process? People want the light switch to keep turning on and they want the light to keep blossoming. And we see that with surfing or rock climbing or whatever. But then we don't want to do the hard dirty work after.
And that's after the Hero's Journey. That's the like, yep, you return to the throne if that's what you're going for. But now you got to work and you don't get to stay in this exalted position your whole life. You've got to do the work. And the work is messy and dirty and it's inward looking and it's outward looking, and it's going to be challenging and painful. We've got to share those stories. And it can't always just be the most dramatic, most incredible thing because otherwise we go out and we do those dramatic, incredible things and then if our life doesn't change, we're like, well, that was a waste. It absolutely wasn't a waste. Adventure's never a waste.
Shelby Stanger:
There's a part in the film Adventure Not War where Stacy reads a quote from French writer René Daumal.
Stacy Bare:
... that says, "You cannot stay on the summit forever; you have to come down again. So why bother in the first place? Just this: What is above knows what is below, but what is below does not know what is above. One climbs, one sees. One descends, one sees no longer, but one has seen. There is an art of conducting oneself in the lower regions by the memory of what one saw higher up. When one can no longer see, one can at least still know."
If we want to have the most impact when it comes to engaging around supporting mental health, supporting climate resilience, supporting economic health, supporting people in the outdoors, the way we're going to do that is we've got to create opportunities for those micro adventures to happen all the time.
Shelby Stanger:
Stacy Bare, thank you so much for coming on Wild Ideas Worth Living. It was such a pleasure to connect with you again. Your perspective on life and your perspective on adventure and just your hilarious warm personality is so unique. I always love connecting with you, so thank you so much.
If you want to learn more about Friends of Grand Rapids Parks, you can check out friendsofgrparks.org. You can also follow them @friendsofgrparks on Instagram. If you want to get in touch with Stacy directly and learn more about what he's up to, you can follow him on Instagram. It's Stacy A. Bare. That's S-T-A-C-Y, A, B-A-R-E.
Wild Ideas Worth Living is part of the REI Podcast Network. It's hosted by me, Shelby Stanger, written and edited by Annie Fassler and Sylvia Thomas of Puddle Creative. And Sylvia right now is doing something incredibly wild. She just got to Brazil where she's going to participate in a big international Capoeira and musical event. Our senior producer is Chelsea Davis and our associate producer is Jenny Barber. Our executive producers are Palo Mottola and Joe Crosby. As always, we appreciate when you follow the show, when you rate it, and when you review it, wherever you listen. And remember, some of the best adventures happen when you follow your wildest ideas is.