I created Living ROI as a passion, to share my experiences and support others who want to live more authentic, joyful and fulfilling lives.
Dear Friends,
My family and I play a special game together a few times a year. Every time, I’m amazed at how powerful it is. We take turns focusing on each of us, one at a time, and share what we appreciate about that person.
It’s easy to resist this exercise. To put it off. To think it’s too corny. But the benefits are huge. After doing this for years, my husband and daughters and I know generally what we are appreciated for, and what we appreciate about each other, but there are new examples and growth that show up each time.
My friend and colleague, Lesli Gee, and I wrote The Family ROI Experience: A Step-by-Step Guide to Realizing Your Best Family in 2010. Appreciation is one of the exercises in the book. To tee up the topic, we share this story:
How deeply do we need to feel valued as individuals? To answer, here is a true story that appeared in the magazine Reader’s Digest. It’s about a junior high school teacher who had a student named Mark who was bright and sometimes mischievous. Mark was charming and polite, but he also talked a lot and made other students laugh during class.
One day, things just didn’t feel right to the teacher. She could tell that the students were worn out by their schoolwork. They were getting frustrated with themselves and edgy with one another. So, she decided to try something different. She asked the students to write the names of all their classmates on two sheets of paper, leaving a space between each name. Then she told them to think of the nicest thing they could say about each of their classmates and write it down.
That weekend, the teacher wrote down the name of each student on fresh sheets of paper, one for each student. She listed everything their classmates had said about them. On Monday, she gave each student his or her list and watched them smile. One student whispered, “Really?” Another said quietly, “I never knew the others liked me so much.” Still another said, “I can’t believe it.” The mood in the classroom was completely transformed.
Many years passed and no one ever mentioned the papers again. The teacher wasn’t sure if the students shared them with each other or with their parents. But then, one day, she learned that one of her former students had been killed in Vietnam. It was Mark, and his parents wanted to know if she could attend his funeral. The church was packed with Mark’s friends. It was a rainy day, which made it even sadder. Mark’s coffin was draped in an American flag.
After the funeral, Mark’s mother and father approached the teacher and said, “We want to show you something.” Mark’s father reached in his pocket and said, “They found this on Mark when he was killed. We thought you might recognize it.” Mark’s dad carefully removed two worn pieces of notebook paper that had been taped, folded, and refolded many times. The teacher recognized it as being one of the lists she had given her students, this one with all the good things they had said about Mark. “Thank you for doing that,” Mark’s mother said, “As you can see, he treasured it.”
Later that day, some of Mark’s classmates told the teacher how they, too, had saved their lists. One kept it in her diary, another in her purse. “I think we all kept our lists,” one student told her. That’s when the teacher finally sat down and cried.
Intentional appreciation is powerful. In the book, we recommend sitting down together and writing what you appreciate about each other on paper and then sharing it. In my family, we say it out loud and usually do it during a meal together.
At ROI, we have also played the appreciation game with fellow colleagues as part of a meeting. It is an exercise that builds relationships, trust and confidence.
As we approach the holidays, I would be delighted to share a PDF of The Family ROI Experience book for free. There are several other exercises designed to strengthen your family with communication, values, agreements, traditions, identity, purpose, vision, operations and contributions. If you would like the PDF, send an email to inspired@livingroi.com and we will send it to you.
With appreciation!
Barbara Fagan-Smith
CEO, ROI Communication
Chief Catalyst, Living ROI
P.S. I am slowly catching up on email. Please forgive my delay in replying if you’ve sent me a note!
