Pass the Microphone

“Pass the Microphone”
Family Story Sharing Exercise

“Pass the Microphone” is an exercise that can be the centerpiece of a Priceless Legacy “Open Book Gathering.”

Concept:

The Legacy Consultant asks the group a question and then passes the Digital Audio Recorder to each person who answers in a meaningful and personal manner. After the Gathering, the LC will upload the audio file to the Priceless Legacy website where it will be available for listening.

Points to consider:

1. Participation is voluntary
2. Guests may choose not to disclose their names on the recording.
3. Answers should be personal but not too wordy.

Purpose:

1. Icebreaker for guests
2. Put guest in a “thinking about legacy” frame of mind
3. Reinforce importance and universality of the life story preservation mission
4. Make the LC familiar with the Digital Audio Recorder

Process:

1. LC explains ground rules.
a. Recording may be placed on the Internet so they may not want to use their name.
b. Don’t have to answer anything that is uncomfortable.
2. LC asks the first question (and volunteers to “go first”). Speaks into the microphone and then passes it to the next guest. Each guest has an opportunity to answer the question and then the process is repeated. Possible questions are:
a. “One thing I wish I knew about my grandparents is . . .”
b. “I want my children (or grandchildren or nieces and nephews) to remember this about my grandparents or parents . . .”
c. “I am pleased or proud that I have done this to preserve my parents’ or grandparents’ life story . . .” (e.g. genealogy study, scrapbook, photo album, life story book etc.) – Gives LC opportunity to talk about the steps she or he has taken.
d. Ask the group to suggest other questions at this point . . .
3. After the questions and answers have stopped (20-40 minutes) , stop the recorder. Later, upload the audio file to the PLC website for publication per instructions (to be developed).

Ethical Wills in the Denver Post

The Denver Post ran a very comprehensive article about Ethical Wills on Feb 22. I prefer the term Legacy Letter or LifeLesson Book. As Priceless Legacy continues to grow, I look forward to developing a product line around these important publications. Not just the elderly should think about preparing a LifeLesson Book. I have prototyped one already, but the company will not introduce products like that for at least a year. We need to remain focused on our LifeStory business. It is where the need clearly is today.

In fact, I calculated today that with 2.3 million Americans dying each year, we are going to need 700,000 Legacy Consultants to capture all those stories if each one does 3 per year! . . . and we assume that 200,000 preserve their stories themselves. I doubt we'll ever get that large but we won't run out of work either!

Keep Memories All In the Family - NBC mention

We were featured on the website of the DFW NBC affiliate today.

Carine Firestone shared with me a very poignant story about parental love and loss.

Sadly and unfortunately I have nothing but regrets surrounding both of my parents and their deaths. My mother died when I was 21 years old. She was 44. She and I had a very tumultuous relationship. My parents had divorced when I was 15. My Dad abandoned us, and I blamed her. We were always fighting, she and I, and I said so many terrible things to her including "Drop Dead" which she did. You know the old saying "Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it". She died suddenly, and I was not able to get to her side before she died. I never had a chance to say "Mom, I am sorry, and I love you". As a mother now of a 13 year old daughter I realize all of the sacrifices she made. I understand how difficult it was for her as a mother of 3 young children without the help and support financially and emotionally of a husband. I have made peace with my regrets, but I will always regret the way I treated her and the fact that she and I never had a chance to make peace.

My father died 2 1/2 years ago. He and I had a loving close relationship. When he returned to my life 5 years after abandoning us I accepted him back and was thrilled to have him back. He became ill in May 2006 and I saw him slowly deteriorating. I saw him fighting back with courage and dignity. We, my family and I were there for him in his final months. I regret that on the day he died, at the moment he died, I was not there by his side to hold his hand and tell him one last time "Dad I love you always have and always will".

Yes, I also regret not having all of my questions answered by my parents while they were alive. My sister, brother and I have so many questions that will forever remain unanswered.

I added the bold font treatment to Carine's account becuase I think it is so very important.

Thank you, Carine, for sharing with us.

Storytelling can Change your Life

A friend and former colleague sent me a very good story on the importance of storytelling from the Christian magazine Relevant. It is worth a quick read.

Lost LifeStory of Love

I received a very moving story from Linda Lowen who writes for the About.com Guide to Women's Issues. What a great testament to the need to capture life stories while our loved ones are still alive. Linda writes on a broad variety of topics but she has a passion for helping women in particular deal with unresolved grief.

I regret that I never asked either parent to tell me the true story of how they met.father (an American-born Jew) met and married my mother (a Japanese Buddhist) in Osaka, Japan - her hometown. He was a sailor on shore leave and she, to the best of my knowledge, was a secretary. Different family stories exist about their first meeting. One version says he was exchanging dollars for yen in a bank, and fell in love with her there. Another says that they met at a party through mutual friends.

I thought I had plenty of time to ask them. My mother, diagnosed with terminal liver cancer, lived 18 months beyond her diagnosis, and because she was doing so well I hesitated to ask 'those final questions' because she wanted to act as if nothing was wrong. When she declined, it happened within hours, and she slipped into a coma before I could tell her all I needed to say. My nursing home-bound father, in good health, died two weeks to the day after her death. A massive heart attack - totally unexpected. I am an only child with no remaining relatives who can answer that question. To my lifelong regret, the story of their blossoming love died with them.

I have heard similar stories often in recent months. When we wait too long to ask and record the key stories we stand the risk of great regret.

New LifeStories Update

We don't do this for every LifeStory we publish (or we'd be accused of video spamming!) . . . but two more came in today and, frankly, I am procrastinating some financial analysis that I need to do so I recorded this short segment to tell you about them.

The Legacy Preservation Workshop

We just added this video to the Resource Center at Priceless Legacy.

The video explains how a Legacy Consultant might use the Legacy Preservation Workshop Presentation at a community gathering to explain the urgent need for life story preservation. The Powerpoint itself is also available in the Resource Center.

You Already Know Everyone You Need to Know

A new book by Bob Beaudine is out and it is called the Power of Who.

The premise, as the reviews I have read state it, is that we all know a lot of people in our daily lives. These people are prepared and willing to assist us in attaining our goals if we only ask them to do so. This observation Beaudine makes in distinction from "networking" where strangers meet each other often without a clue as to what each is seeking.

For our Legacy Consultants this is a powerful insight. The near universal appeal of the LifeStory preservation mission and the gorgeous LifeStory products we produce is such that each of us has a nearly universal well of human resources to tap - yet how many of us do? Fear of being "pushy" or "salesy" will sometimes cause us to down play our passion. The result is a story not capture and a memory not saved. Real people pay the price for our inactivity.

If each of us knows 200 or more people - think of the power of spreading the word at almost every encounter?

“Tell Your Family Story” Contest

An interesting competition that I learned about from the Association of Personal Historians.

Pendleton Woolen Mills Running a “Tell Your Family Story” Contest

Pendleton Woolen Mills is running a “Tell Your Family Story” contest. You must share your family story in 500 words or less--and you have a chance to win an exclusively designed jacquard blanket depicting the story--patterned after a traditional Native American trade blanket.

“For generations, blankets have been woven with story-telling designs that speak to various aspects of important elements of life, such as rites of passage, legends and community,” says Robert Christnacht of Pendleton Woolen Mills. “This contest gives one family an opportunity to tell their family story in one of the most authentic American traditions, the Trade Blanket.”

You may pick up entry forms at several Pendleton Woolen Mills store locations or online at their website. The winning entry will be selected for its authenticity, creativity and originality by a panel of Pendleton judges. The winner receives 12 of the specially designed blankets.
Entries must be received by April 30, 2009. The winning family will be announced by May 30, 2009.

“To help celebrate the six generations of our family,” says Mort Bishop III, president, Pendleton Woolen Mills, “we wanted to give families around the country a chance to have something lasting, unique and truly special.

Here's the link: http://www.pendleton-usa.com/jump.jsp?itemID=1303&itemType=CATEGORY&path=1%2C3%2C197%2C1303

Mr. Bishop says " chance to have something lasting, unique and truly special." Sounds a lot like a Priceless Legacy LifeStory!

"The Box" By Gail Smith

A fan of Priceless Legacy, Gail Smith, sent me this poem of her creation. I think it captures beautifully the emotions that attend our vital work. (With apologies for the formatting that that blog will impose on her work!)


“The BOX”

Often cardboard, tattered and stained, long forgotten and unexplained!

The contents vary, yet so the same, pictures, letters, our life proclaim!
We all have one, unique, yet not, a trail of life, memoirs forgot

The values vary, some low, some high, dependent on our last goodbye.

Buried Treasures or piled up trash? Reckoned by what’s within your dash!

That little line, defines your worth, from time of death, back to your birth.
Life’s all about, our firsts and lasts and in between with such contrasts!

Our deepest thoughts, our life’s forecasts, yet in the end, it’s all our pasts.
What life story does your box tell? Are you happy with this farewell?

Will your loved ones fondly reflect, upon your box with great respect?
If not, start NOW! Build your best box! Fill it with love; share your hard knocks,

Tell lessons learned, reveal the facts, disclose the joy of all your acts!
When you are gone, they’ll want to know, answers, details told long ago.

They’ll search the box, for hours on end, sweet memories, your touch transcends!
Make sure you share the key to find, the BOX of Life you leave behind.

This will become a treasure chest; your legacy, true and blessed!


Gayle Smith

11/10/08

Unpublished work © 2008 Gayle Smith

Couple's Life Story Package

Just in time for Valentine's Day, Priceless Legacy is thrilled to announce its first customized format for a LifeStory Package. We call it the "Couple's Life Story" package and it allows two people (presumably a married couple) to present their Life Story package together. The longer format includes two hours of interviews with each member of the pair (for four hours total), up to 150 photos and an approximate page count of 150 pages or so.

The price for the package is $1899 and includes one copy of the book, an audio DVD, a DVD slide show and a protective and decorative box.

It is inspiring just how many couples have indicated that they desired to be remembered forever just has they had lived their lives: together.

Transcriptionist/Editors

One of the unsung heroes of the Priceless Legacy process is our able force of freelance Transcriptionist/Editors. These "TEs," as we call them, are transcription and writing experts who live all over North America. We communicate with them via email and they do an outstanding job converting audio interviews from the field to the "narrative transcriptions" that are the base of the LifeStory text.

Most of these TEs work in relative anonymity and as such we honestly don't think much about how the privilege and impact of preserving LifeStories affects them too.

One wrote this as she submitted a finished job last night:

If you can, please pass on to the (Legacy Consultant) - and hopefully to (the Subject) - that this story touched me very deeply as I transcribed it. It made me cry, it made me laugh, and it made me reflect on my own life. Much of her life I saw in mine. I loved the way she spoke and the way she expressed her life philosophies - truly inspiring stuff. If you could maybe pass that on to her from the girl who transcribed her story, it would be great.

I love how life story capture impacts everyone in such a positive way.

Two More LifeStories Came in Today

Two more LifeStories came back from the printer today. They look great!

Why is LifeStory Preservation Important?

Life stories are critical to our understanding of who we are. As humans, we all have a basic psychological curiosity about where we are from, what shaped our beliefs and values, and how our life fits into society. Much as an adopted child will search for a biological parent or families trace their genealogy back generations, we all have a need to know and understand our roots.

Each minute, five Americans pass away. In most cases, their stories die with them since no attempt was made to capture and preserve those life stories. Therefore, there is urgency to our mission and we need to act quickly!

At Priceless Legacy, we believe that every life has dignity and that every life story should be preserved. It is important to the existing family and current generation, but even more important to future generations. Picture the excitement of a child reading about his or her great, great grandmother and what her life was like, the times in which she lived, the daily challenges, and the tragedies and the triumphs. Life stories help us answer questions about our past, avoid repeating mistakes, and address the challenges of the future.

Today, we have a unique opportunity and, we believe, an obligation to future generations. Advancements in digital recording, digital printing, information technology, and Internet communications have emerged that allow us the ability to provide LifeStory preservation at a reasonable price for all.

A Higher Authority

3 what we have heard and known,
what our fathers have told us.

4 We will not hide them from their children;
we will tell the next generation

Psalm 78 says it pretty well . . . Like Hebrew National Hot Dogs, we at Priceless Legacy clearly answer to a higher authority!

Another Legacy Consultant's Experience

Another of our Legacy Consultants speaks of her experience and how it has impacted her personally.

New Year's Challenge

A short video wherein I challenge you to make one of your resolutions life story capture for 2009. Be an an LC, refer an LC, be a client or all of the above . . . this year will fly by as fast as 2008, so we need to get on it right away!


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