Munsch speaks at national ‘Healing After Suicide’ conference (VIDEO)

By KARI BLURTON
Hays Post

Munsch show some of the tools utilized in his Birdhouse Project workshops, a Rubix Cube and Pick-Up Sticks, both symbolizes how people living with grief tend to want to "pick up all the sticks" and present a 'fake face" to the world while inside they may feel "chaos." — Munsch shows a few of the tools utilized in his Birdhouse Project workshops, a Rubick’s Cube and Pick-Up Sticks – both symbolize how people living with grief tend to want to “pick up all the sticks” and present a “fake face” to the world while inside they may feel “chaos.”

Kris Munsch, Hays, presented his own project-based grief healing toolkit — The Birdhouse Project — to a new audience Saturday at the “Healing after Suicide” conference in Atlanta.

Munsch created The Birdhouse Project in 2009, based on his own years of self-discovery and “rebuilding” himself after his 16-year-old son, Blake, died in a car accident Dec. 23, 2005.

Munsch is used to talking to grieving parents and military families who have lost a loved one, as he has been asked to present the workshop locally and at conferences across the country for years.

However, he said the subject of suicide is not something he ever experienced, admitting he was a little hesitant when first invited to the conference.

“(Suicide) is kind of out of my expertise because I have never been there. I have never walked in those shoes,” Munsch said, adding he does believe the The Birdhouse Project is designed to help people overcome many different types of tragedies.

“What the Birdhouse does is you have life experiences and I have life experiences and they are very different. … I have never walked in your shoes and you have never walked in mine … (but) when you put the pieces of the birdhouses between us, we have commonality and we can talk about the parts,” he said.

Previous Birdhouse Projects displayed at Munsch's home. — Previous Birdhouse Projects displayed at Munsch’s home.

The idea of the Birdhouse project eventually developed after Blake died, when Munsch said he immediately wanted to pick up all the pieces and pretend everything was OK, but said to himself,“ ‘I’m not going to do that, I’m going to let those pieces lie on the floor and leave them,” he said. “I knew I needed to sort my life out, figure out who I am.”

The process of letting the “sticks lie,” Munsch said, led to years of self-discovery and even living in a car and traveling the country for a while. But he walked away with a new foundation — a goal to help others.

“In my mind, when we start to stand for something, it can make people uncomfortable and they tend to want to push us off our foundation,” he said. “They want you go back to the person you were and, in reality, you can’t when you have seen the other side.”

Munch said the power of The Birdhouse Project is participants work to build their own individual birdhouse. Each piece of the birdhouse has a question attached to it, and participants are asked to write on the piece and finish the project with the goal of learning to self-focus.

The Birdhouse Project book and workshop toolkit, written and created by Chris Munsch. — The Birdhouse Project book and workshop toolkit, written and created by Kris Munsch.

“(The project) takes what is bouncing around in their minds and it actually gives it a place. It makes grief tangible,” Munsch said.

“When I ask you ‘Who are you now in this moment?’ We can both answer that question. It takes the past out of it — maybe a specific experience of a suicide or my son dying in a car accident or a child dying from cancer,” he said. “It takes that element out … because (the project) is not really about the tragedy per se. … It’s about how can we move forward after the tragedy.”

Munsch is taking his Birdhouse Project to the annual grief support organization Compassionate Friends Conference in Dallas in July where he will also be the keynote speaker before an audience of 3,000 people.

Visit the The Birdhouse Project website for more information.

Munsch is also assistant professor of construction management at Fort Hays State University and host of Eagle Communication’s home improvement show House 2 Home, where each episode ends with an inspirational segment from Kris.

The Birdhouse Project