Family Focus Friday

On Fridays, my focus is on Family Health and Wellness. As I was perusing this topic, I found several quotes that spoke to me. Also, they are from three very different types of people which I thought was interesting to note how family is something all of us have in common, whether we acknowledge it or not. Check them out below:

• “Cherish your human connections- your relationships with friends and family” (Barbara Bush).

• ”Family is the most important thing in the world” (Princess Diana).

• ”Family is not AN important thing…It’s EVERYTHING [emphasis mine] (Michael J Fox).

All three of my family working on my website and info…

• What’s hitting me HARD about this is that lately, as I am starting my own business, I realize that I am not focusing on my own family’s health and wellness as much as I should be or want to be. We have spent MUCH time getting my website and social media ready. But thinking about our ‘downtime’ I realize much of it is on our own, with our own phones and headphones or in our own rooms, rather than doing family outings, etc.

A few nights ago, my older son asked if we could watch a tv show together as a family. We have a tv in the living room, but it usually only turns on when the boys play video games. So, we did. It was interesting. We chose a show I had seen before (except the newest episodes), so I new more of the back story. We had some interesting conversations and questions, but mostly we were absorbed in the show. Then something happened. I don’t want to pay for the most expensive option of our streaming, so the app we used has commercials. A commercial came on. We all looked at each other. What do we do with 2 minutes of downtime?? My son who set this all up told us we couldn’t use our phones as part of ‘together time”. Soooo, we had to talk to each other. We were being silly and goofing around. The show came back on for a bit, then another commercial. This time when it came on, we were all speaking as quickly as we could to each other like a game. Asking questions, telling stories, etc before the timer went off.

The point of this story is two-fold. One, the ridiculousness of how much time we spend doing things that do NOT build relationships. At least in this example we were all in the same room. But it‘s not enough. Second, if you have a time limit to talk with the people you care about, what do you say in that time? If you think hard about the second question, you realize WE DO HAVE A TIME LIMIT. Cherish your family. They are EVERYTHING.

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Journal Prompts

• What do you like to do as a family? What are your favorite pastimes and traditions?

• Thinking back, what is something you MISS doing as a family now that you used to do?

• Is there anything NEW you would like to do as a family?

• What is something you need to give up in order to spend more time with your family?