My family got together last week to mark one-year since my extraordinary grandmother — the quintessential immigrant-family matriarch — passed away. When she and my grandfather left Ireland in 1957 with their eight children for a new life in Canada, I doubt either of them foresaw the profound impact it would have on so many lives.
Their decision has resulted in a family that today looks like this: nine children (they had their “Canadian baby” in 1962), 23 grandchildren, 35 great grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild. So when I gathered last week with roughly 40 of my family: parents, aunts and uncles, siblings and cousins, I was once again awed by my grandparents’ legacy.
The sound in my aunt’s kitchen and living room last week was deafening. As one of my cousin’s put it at the end of the night, “I feel like I’ve just been at a rock concert. My throat is hoarse from all the laughing and shouting over the sound of everyone else. And my ears are ringing from the noise. Awesome!” The energy was electric.
The evening was filled with the excitement of connection, the sharing of personal updates and the raucous laughter of people who not just love each other, but genuinely like each other, too. It made me realize that, as someone who is fortunate to have an intuitive ability for community engagement and communications, I was standing amidst the source of those skills.
Family is our first experience with community engagement. And my family has helped me foster the engagement skills that I use daily:
- Honesty
- Kindness
- Compassion
- Good listening skills
- Quick wit
- Personal responsibility
- Positive thinking
- Can-do attitude
The grandchildren are no longer children — our ages currently span from 24 to 50. As adults, “the cousins” are good communicators, outgoing, kind, side-splittingly funny people who use their skills to bring something good to the world — in their work, in their community or simply within their own family. We trust each other deeply and can share the good, the bad and the ridiculous, no matter how long it’s been since we’ve seen each other. It’s candid and kind community engagement at its best.
In the course of three emails sent amongst the 23 cousins, we organized a memorial bench for my grandparents that we surprised our parents with at the memorial. The “get ’er done” attitude of my cousins blew me away. It made me wish that I could harness that collective energy daily and make miracles happen. And then I realized that I can.
Every time I positively connect with people — clients, stakeholders, audiences — I have my family to thank for the skills, approach and energy that helps me do good work.
So this week, consider the attributes that make you good at what you do, and how many of those characteristics were developed within your family. Commit to passing those gifts onto future generations. My grandparents did. And I am eternally grateful for their legacy.
~ Maureen Douglas
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