I love bridge images; they remind me that we connect with others through sharing our stories. This simple activity of talking about our memories has the potential for far reaching impact. It can deepen relationships, help us experience life through others’ eyes and grow our empathy and listening skills.
(Thanks to Jessica Arends via Unsplash for the photo)
Taking action to save your family’s story may be part of your “for such a time as this” motivation. I’ll be trotting out a fun family photo challenge in the next few days via social media and want to make sure you’re given a heads up. This will be a short activity with lots of positives:
* It’s free
* Did I mention it’s short?
* You’ll have quick content for your family history
* You’ll create good ideas you can follow up on later
You’ll be able to find the challenge in the next few days on our page at https://www.facebook.com/RememberingtheTime
When you think about writing your memoir or family history, do any of these defeating thoughts ever raise their ugly little heads?
I don’t know how to write a book
How do I share it with my family?
My story isn’t important
Remember, if you’re stuck, let’s talk! I understand the feeling and would love to brainstorm a few ideas with you to help you cross the bridge and make that priceless connection with your family by sharing your story. Helping people is what I do! I even have a few free links to my Quick Start a Memoir class for a limited number of people if you contact me in June. Now is an opportune time.
This past weekend I took a road trip with my grown children to a family celebration In New Orleans. You may have seen a couple photos I posted to the Remembering the Time FaceBook or Instagram pages. It had been ages since any of us had traveled and we stocked up on road trip food, a crossword puzzle book and a new audio book. We had fun, shared driving, and ate enough bright orange Cheezits to pave a parking lot. Because, well that’s what you do on a road trip.
We also celebrated life and learned more about each other through a fun ice breaker app on the phone. Trust me, this is a great way to connect even with people you’ve known their entire lives! “Really, I didn’t know that!” was repeated often.
Each mile we drove, each special event we participated in with cousins, aunts, uncles, and in laws once we arrived was a small step to building a stronger family. We laughed, we cried, we ate and toasted to life together and remembered our family history.
I am a firm believer in taking small steps to build progress toward a goal. It’s one of the best ways to chunk down a big one. Making incremental progress toward your goal is encouraging, these steps keep you moving as you see progress and help keep you from becoming discouraged.
This is not only an excellent life lesson, it works fantastically for family history and memoir projects too. The beautiful old staircase photo in this post, taken in New Orleans reminds me of the importance of taking small steps.
For example, if you are looking to curate, organize, and make sense of a collection of family mementos, letters, and photos so that others can enjoy them too, you need to do more than just stare at the boxes in frozen overwhelm and frustration.
*Think in categories as you look at your collection
*Begin by choosing 5 examples of each category just to get you started and move past the inertia
This is where a set of outside eyes, skilled in separating the gems from the “stuff” can help you make real progress with your story. I can help with that and get you on track! Want to tackle it yourself first? Here’s a couple easy step choices you can make to get started:
*Try my Quick Start a Memoir class for free on Skillshare. Here’s the link:https://skl.sh/2YUDbkf
Take 30 minutes to watch the class, then do the fun project to help you cut through the fluff and organize your story. Questions? Send me a message and we’ll chat about it.
*Give me a call for a free consultation to inspire and motivate you with ideas and action steps to write your family history or memoir.
Maybe, just maybe, you need to stop thinking about this and take a small action step. I want to encourage you, doing this will build momentum and be one of the most satisfying things you can do to seize the day with your story.
Taking incremental action-steps to tell your story will make sure that it is shared with those you love, not relegated to a dusty box stuffed in the garage. Don’t let that happen to you!
You can bless and serve your family well by taking these small steps. No one ever regretted sharing the wisdom they’ve learned and their precious life memories with their family.
