A book review

I was re-reading a book for my lesson the other day in church, and thought I would share. This isn't a "LDS" Book, or even close. But my lesson was on our family traditions and heritage, and this book is all about how to establish family traditions.

Basically, this book is all about establishing traditions and rituals in your family to strengthen your bonds as a family. By his definition, we are talking about predictable events that connect us as a unit. For example, an entire chapter is devoted to family dinner time. Rituals also includes a yearly family vacation together, or how you exchange presents at Christmas time. Or how, for an estimated 15 years, my family went to every single Friday night football game since either one of my older brothers was playing or I was performing with the band.

These events bring us together because we have something to look forward to, and often an identity to tie us together. Our family was a "football family", in this sense. I have friends that are a "Lake Powell" family, since they go to the same spot every single year for vacation. And we can also use these rituals to establish values with our family- to continue my example, my parents (maybe even sub-conciously) taught us the value that we support each other in a family, by going to see whatever our siblings are participating in. There was a lot of comfort in knowing that if I was performing or getting an award or anything like that, my parents would be there, with my dad behind the videocamera.

He spends a lot of time discussing how to integrate rituals into our lives, no matter how busy. We all have to eat dinner, so we can use that time to connect as a family. We have to watch how we connect - we should aim for pleasant, uplifting experiances, and not use this time to harp about chores or report cards. He suggests using our bedtime the same way. It can be a boring routine, or it can be a connecting ritual, if done properly. That is the "Intentional" part. If we just drift without paying any attention, we will drift apart. But by being intentional about how we connect together as a family, everything is more likely to work out.

If you get a chance, I really recommend this book!