As we age, we often look back on our lives and consider how we’ll be remembered. We wonder if our family’s stories will be preserved and passed down from one generation to another.
Most of us know to turn to an estate planning attorney or accountant to help with our financial futures. However, we often forget the importance of telling our stories. It’s commonly referred to as legacy planning.
It can be as simple as reflecting on your life and creating a journal sharing your experiences. Technology has also given people more options to explore. These include video interviews between generations, audio conversations between loved ones, and self-published books that document your family history.
Creating a Personalized Family History Book
This option gives families a chance to create their own family history book. Working together, different loved ones can complete different tasks to document the past. This preserves it for future generations.
A few ways to self-publish your story:
- MyCanvas: This platform allows you to create an Ancestry Family History Book. If your family has an account with Ancestry, you can connect to it and import your information. These leather-covered books are available in two sizes with prices beginning at $75 each.
- Storyworth: This is another interesting option to consider. This platform makes it easy to preserve family memories. It also can help loved ones stay connected and engaged. At your selected timeline, you email a prompt to family members who choose to participate. They answer the prompt and send their responses back. The platform can even provide you with a list of prompt ideas.
Video and Audio Interviews to Preserve Family Memories
Interviews are another way to bring generations of your family together. They can help generations hear and preserve memories and history. For example, have the youngest generation ask questions of family elders. Depending on your skills and comfort level, you can record and save these interviews as video or audio.
You can also have some loved ones be responsible for a video or audio timeline of the family’s history. For instance, ask various people in the family to explore different decades. Have them verbalize highlights from those times for your video. In addition to documenting your stories, these activities can be a fun way to bond across the generations.
If you can’t do it in person, platforms like Zoom and Skype make it easy to connect across the miles. You can use free versions to keep your costs down. An added benefit of video chat platforms is many also allow you to record and save these interactions.
Conversation Starters for Legacy Planning
As with many projects, the most difficult part might be beginning. To make that a little easier, here's a list of conversation starters:
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When and where can our family’s roots be traced to? How many generations can be tracked?
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Who are the family’s founding members? What are their stories?
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Who is currently the oldest living relative? And the youngest?
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How many families are there in the current generation?
If you’d like to focus on the family elders to document their history, some great questions to ask are:
- What city were you born in? In what year?
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How many siblings did you have? Are you older or younger?
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What were your parents like when you were growing up?
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What was your father’s occupation? Did your mother work outside the home?
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Did you have any pets as a child or teenager?
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What was the worst trouble you ever got into when you were younger?
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How much did your first car cost? Your first house?
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What year did you get married? What kind of wedding did you have?
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Describe the best advice you were ever given. Who gave it to you?
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How has the world changed since you were a kid?
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What stories do you want to make sure future generations of the family know?
We hope this list helps spark great conversation among your loved ones and gives you a solid start at legacy planning.
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