It was my sophomore year in college. As part of my coursework, I had a course in government and politics. Growing up in northern California to parents who were both from Wyoming and attending a conservative school in Idaho, I was trying to figure out my own political identity.

I leaned conservative but quickly found that some of what I took for granted from my background was not considered “conservative” enough to many of my classmates from other states. On the flip side, I didn’t really identify easily with traditional “liberal” issues either.

That semester was very enlightening given that our professor was great at asking tough questions and forcing us to defend our answers. His subject matter ranged from hot button political issues to current events locally, nationally, and globally. For the first time I had to really think about the “why” and “what” of my politics.

One morning began the same way most mornings did in our class. The president of the Young Republicans on our campus was in a heated argument with the president of the Young Democrats on our campus. What was different was our professor was running late. After listening to the argument go on for several minutes and all the groupies on both sides chiming in with their cheers and snipes, I’d had enough.

I addressed the president of the Young Democrats and told him to quit moralizing without anything to back up his stance. If he didn’t have the ability or honesty to use the strategies we were being taught in class, he could at least have the decency to shut up and let the rest of us study our curriculum in peace. He tried to argue back, at which point I told him that where I came from in California, his actual policy stances would have put him solidly Republican and labeled him a moderate conservative. He wasn’t really a liberal, he was just looking for attention and it was getting old, so please leave the rest of us in peace. He and his cronies shut down.

As you can imagine, the “Republican” side began cheering and high-fiving each other thinking they had scored a big victory. This is when I rounded on them. I told the president of the Young Republicans that he was even worse because he was just repeating, almost verbatim, what Rush Limbaugh had said yesterday afternoon on his radio show. If he didn’t have the integrity to think for himself instead of just parroting someone else’s ideas, he wasn’t fit to be president of anything and was just wasting everyone’s time being argumentative and enjoying hearing himself talk. He and his cronies shut down.

It was at this point that our professor walked in clapping and stating that peer review is always better than anything he could say. He then led a discussion around what had happened that morning as we prepared for class. (Apparently, he’d been waiting outside the door listening.)

That day turned into a good discussion on what politics is and what it should be. What was most eye opening to me was the realization that most people join a side but don’t really take the time to think for themselves or to study the issues and work toward understanding. Over time, I think this one thing has only gotten worse.

On the road to self-discovery, I learned a lot about myself and a lot about the political process and what matters. Over the years, I’ve reflected on that experience and my own political involvement and experiences through the intervening decades as a Wyoming resident.

As I have observed the last few political cycles, I’m concerned about the state of what politics are versus what they should be, not only nationally, but also in our local community. What happened to civility in discourse? Where are our informed candidates? Do we really understand issues, or do we just regurgitate slogans?

At its root, politics is just the process of communities of all sizes making decisions about our future and agreeing on what that future will be. We won’t always agree on everything. We may not totally agree on anything. Look at the most basic, fundamental, political entities that all of us belong to, family or friend groups.

Which family do you know that one hundred percent agrees on anything? Mine struggles to decide where to take a family trip or even what we should have for dinner. Friend groups are the same way. And yet, functional, interpersonal groups figure out ways to get along and compromise so the overall group can prosper.

That is politics: figuring out ways to get along and compromise so the overall group can prosper. How we go about that process, and what compromises are made, definitely matter. But there is a way to do it correctly.

At the suggestion of my wife and others, I’m putting together a series of articles fleshing out the process to help all of us get better at civil discourse, lower the temperature in our heated arguments (about who is right) and move toward civil discussions (about what is right), and hopefully move forward to a better tomorrow.

I don’t plan to push political stances but will broach some topics as examples to focus on how to have those conversations. If you are interested, stay tuned. If you would like to discuss these ideas, I’m open.

Ben Bell lives in Evanston with his wife and kids. He is an officer with First Bank of Wyoming and a member of the Uinta County Economic Development Commission, Rotary, and Jump Start Evanston. He’s lived in Evanston for 11 years.