Visual Stories in Indigenous Spaces: Delivering Big Messages that Heal

Allyson Kelley
Mar 13
6 min read

People often ask, "Where do all of AKA's visualizations and illustrations come from?" The answer is usually a wandering story about the mind. Yes, the mind. All good things come from a thought that begins in the mind (bad things, too). Our elder Dr. Dolores Subia BigFoot developed Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT). TF-CBT reminds us that our thoughts create feelings, feelings create behaviors, and behaviors reinforce thoughts.

The saying be careful what you think comes into play here, as our minds can be filled with overwhelming thoughts, information, and ideas that get in the way. Our ethos and mission at AKA has always been... "How do we live a good life, help others live a good life, and elevate collective healing along the way?"

AKA is all about healing and love. Healing means recognizing our mistakes and learning from them. Forgiving ourselves and others. Love is a big word that represents our commitment to serving others. At AKA, love shows up as spending time with communities, being a generous listener, showing respect and kindness to all, investing in communities, and creating powerful visualizations, collaborative art, and conceptual models. We love these visuals because they convey powerful messages from our collective research and evaluation efforts that might just heal the world.

Beautiful creations can come from our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. Our visual models developed at AKA do not start as perfectly centered, illustrated, and designed products. They actually start as a thought, then sketches in my mind, then on paper, with barely legible handwriting. Sometimes I read theories about a particular concept or study to help me understand how concepts and ideas fit together. In other cases, I use a grounded theory approach to create new theories, meaning, and messaging from a research study or evaluation I am working on. Yes, theories can be helpful for testing, ideation, or visualization of what happens as a result of a certain intervention or action. There is something in the black box these days that we sense. Illustrations help us conceptualize possibilities of what is happening in the box (unknowable, unobservable, unmeasurable, unpredictable)...

An Indigenous doctoral student asked me, "What's your favorite theory?" I stared, like a deer in headlights, not knowing which theory to pick. Too many teachings, wisdom, tests, validations, ideas, concepts, and drawings floating around in my murky, aging mind. I finally responded, "There is never just one theory; it's about meta-theories and borrowing, combining, and conceiving what could happen because of an event, and then testing your theory."

The Forest of Resilience

We completed a major contract with our partners at the Rocky Mountain Tribal Leaders Council to examine what happens in tribal communities when a mother passes away. This was part of a larger project to support Tribal Maternal Mortality Review Committees and AI/AN maternal death disparities in Tribal communities. Because words are not enough, we asked AKA Associate Christie Farmer to help us find a Native artist who could draw trees for our model. She recruited Jaylea RunningCrane. Jaylea drew this circle of aspen trees after reviewing Blackfeet teachings on quaking aspen. She writes, "Each of the twelve trees represents a key aspect of maternal health, grandparental support, and community strength. These trees are planted in a sacred grove, forming a space for reflection, education, and community gathering."

We reflected on White Bison's work and visuals to emphasize that healing is all about the metaphorical soil conditions. We also knew about Suzanne Simmard's work on Finding the Mother Tree and found this National Geographic Sketch of the Mother Trees, showing how trees talk to one another in the forest to create protective connections and relationships.

Artist: Jaylea Runningcrane, Blackfeet, 12. Aspens with the Medicine Wheel in the center

Sketch 1

We reviewed literature to understand the forest, the trees, and what people need to heal. One finding was that grandparents are raising their grandchildren. I drew this sketch based on the aspens above to conceptualize the healing forest and to guide how to apply these teachings and visuals to our work on maternal mortality at RMTLC.

Sketch 2 - placing words on aspens, conceptualizing theory, meaning, and application

Our talented designer Linda Donahue created this visual model for our Forest of Resilience work. This visual conveyed everything we learned and wanted people to know in a colorful page vs. hundreds of pages of text, meaning lost in the black Times New Roman 12-point font.

Sketch 3

Linda brings this design to life with colors, legible text, and a cohesive flow that becomes part of the library of knowledge on how people heal.

Citation: Kelley, A., Ertz, D., Crawford-Martin, B., & Farmer. C. (2024). The Forest of Resilience: Indigenous Elder perspectives on Grandfamilies, culture, and wellbeing. Rocky Mountain Tribal Leaders Council. Billings, Montana. Unpublished Report. Available at: https://drive.google.com/file/d/139L2zDFPql-F1jH95C3pNKpSFhjceWjw/view

NPAIHB, Mind4Health, and Visualizing Training Outcomes

We love our partners at NPAIHB. Their work in public health, research, and building capacity for the coming generations, and improving community health is simply the best in the West, well, maybe the world. We work alongside them to translate their research into papers, visuals, and practice. This Mind4Health research is just one example. Not everyone loves to read a good research journal article, well, maybe if you are a doctoral student in a methods class seeking inspiration or guidance, but the general population does not. And this is a problem because we want what NPAIHB is doing and what research is telling us: to reach as many people as possible. This research is Indigenous wisdom, knowledge, and information that, when conveyed respectfully and intentionally, can improve the health and well-being of all.

We love the social determinants of health and the socioecological model. Both remind us of the interconnectedness and balance of being in the world, seeking and finding wellbeing. This Mind4Health model began with a review of the impacts of colonialism on well-being and suicide prevention.

Sketch 1

A dark night of the soul, a paper and pencil was all it took.

Sketch 2

Messy, multiple edits, ideas, comments, and feedback from the scholars and thought leaders at NPAIHB and beyond.

Sketch 3 - The final Mind4Health Model.

The visual upholds the Indigenous teaching that children are always at the center of the circle. This model shows the layers of protectedness offered in the Mind4health intervention. It shows the aspects of a decolonized suicide gatekeeper training approach, along with focus and outcomes to heal coming generations.

Citation: Caughlan C, Kakuska A, Manthei J, Galvin L, Martinez A, Kelley A and Craig Rushing S (2024) Mind4Health: decolonizing gatekeeper trainings using a culturally relevant text message intervention. Front. Public Health 12:1397640. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2024.1397640

Elder Wisdom and the Life Course Method

So, here is an example of a visual model that began with an elder study completed in 2026. I am going to walk you through my process. I interviewed eight Indigenous elders to gather wisdom for the future and document their childhoods. This study was grounded in a life course theory. Basically, a life course approach and theory mean that the research and study consider the person's entire life, from conception or birth to death or the present day.

Mind Sketch 1

It's all in my mind. I am trying to figure out how concepts and the life course theory fit together in a visually cohesive teaching model.

Sketch 2

I am getting my traction, feeling like this model and the teachings from the Indigenist Stress Coping Model mean something. I borrowed from more memories, thoughts, theories, and research here.

Sketch 3 - I send the sketches and concepts to Linda Donahue, our talented illustrator and visual communications expert. She uses InDesign to create one-of-a-kind illustrations with culturally-responsive colors, imagery, and visuals.

Sketch 4 - Elders review to validate the model, there are more changes. This model was submitted as part of a research topic in Frontiers, Indigenous. The intention is that this visual educates millions, brings awareness about the impact colonial impacts and events on Indigenous wellbeing, and elevates the legacy and wisdom of our elders. The final model will live in the world, long after all of this ends.

Citation: Kelley, A., et.al (2026). Telling Our History: A Narrative Study with Indigenous Elders, Wisdom for the Coming Generation. Frontiers in Public Health.  [Manuscript submitted for publication].

Some visuals never make it to the world; they stay in my thoughts or memories... sometimes trashed in a dumpster or burned. Others are transformed so much by our talented design and illustration team (Linda Donahue, Jeanne Bowman, Macrina Singleton, Jenn Prinzing, and more) that they look nothing like the original drawing I started with. These visual models are the anchor of how we translate big healing messages into practice, reaching a wider audience than just peer-reviewed journal readers or funding agencies.

How do you communicate health information messages beyond words and numbers? Do you rely on theories? Practice? Memory? Beliefs? Faith? Does the message start in your mind as a word? A color? An image of an elder? A memory of a sacred moment in time?

I don't know.