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Blazing Your Own Trail

Randy – There is usually no shortage of Royal Ranger events around your home district, and no shortage of events outside of Royal Rangers to participate in, but in this episode we want encourage you and expose you to the importance of blazing your own trail at your home Outpost.  What do we mean by blazing your own trail?

Wayne – Creating an age appropriate adventure for your boys and fathers that is just for them.  In the next 15-20 minutes we are going to unpack our last four-day AR/ER adventure and drill down on some of the life changing, relationship building, and character forming moments.

Randy – That’s not to say that these kinds of things don’t happen at Pow Wow or Roundup, but there is just no substitute for your own Outpost adventure.

Randy – But, before we take one more step Commander Wayne, we need to introduce a guest to the show.  This is one of our closest friends, Commander at the Outpost, and one of our fellow adventures on tis most resent trips.  A very warm welcome Commander Todd Rich.

Randy – Todd since you were there why don’t you take couple of minutes and describe to the audience our most resent trail blazing experience.

Randy — Here are some things to look for during this episode, and we will circle back to these throughout the show.

• Event Criteria
  • Leave Town – You want to be far enough away from home to make it difficult to just go home.
  • Age appropriate
  • Sized just right – We always want to give everyone an opportunity, but there is a manageable number for each event and there needs to be a cutoff.
  • Challenging – Don’t hold back here. Go big or don’t go.
  • Don’t leave anyone behind – Give plenty of time during planning so that everyone can get it on the calendar and make sure to speak to all of the boys individually.
• Spiritual Components
  • Daily Devotions
  • Real time, real life moments. (You have to prepare your hearts for these)
• Relationship Building
  • Journey together, work together, accomplish together, eat together, play together, cry together….
  • Document the trip
  • Social Media
  • Celebrate

Why It’s So Different On Your Own

Wayne — This may be summed up with a phrase you have all heard many times, “behind every set of eyes is a story.”  It takes time and effort to get into most people’s stories, and when you are so close, tackling something so big together for four days it has a way of opening you up and exposing to one another pages of those stories.

Randy – For me it was Arron and Colten

Home Sweet Home

It’s always so revealing when you get back to church and all file off the bus to the awaiting crowd of parents, grandparents and other family members.  When you see Rangers hugging the necks of their fellow Rangers, ER’s hugging AR’s, and boys lingering to soak up one more breath of that rare air of accomplishing something bigger than they thought they could achieve, it feels so worth it.

Randy – I have chaperoned dozens of events with sports team, band, orchestras, and many other school events, but it’s rare to see what we see on these trips.  The camaraderie, determination, and character of these young men will blow you away.  Just when you think the bar is too high inch it up a notch and watch what happens.