Do You Want To Go Down In History? If So…

 

What kind of legacy do you want to leave? Is it important to you that people remember who you are, that they have an accurate picture of the person that’s YOU? If so, it’s time to record our life story. Your parents probably began this when you were born. Most do. They go crazy with the camera and record every little smile or cute thing their baby does. The life takes over. The photos and videos are fewer, with more space in between. Well, that may not be true now in the age of social media. Young people especially are plastering images all over sites like Facebook and Instagram. I don’t know about you, but if I had to learn about someone’s life from social media I’d be overwhelmed with the vast quantity of information I’d have to sift through and I’d just give up.

Why not make it easy? You can write, make audio recordings, or video record your life story. If you like to make recordings all by yourself, get to it! For some, though, it’s easier if a good friend or family member asks them questions and gets the story interview style. No matter what approach you choose, you might want to include basic information about yourself, things like your date of birth, full name, identifying features, family relationships.

OK, the basics are done. Now what? Have animals been important to you? Then tell stories about your pets. Tell us about your heroes, your family traditions and how they got started (if you know). Let us know what kind of student you were and what you studied. I know, for example, that my husband had a reserved seat in the front of the classroom right beside the teacher much of the time. I know his high school counselor told him he wasn’t college material yet now he has a masters degree in biomedical informatics. What does home mean to you? What’s your spiritual life like? Finally, what are your dreams, hopes, and wishes? That actually was a question on the hospice social work assessment form as people were confronting their mortality. Is there anything in particular that you didn’t get done but really wanted to?

The legacy you leave is not just your physical possessions and your money. It’s the essence of who you are and how you lived. If you begin telling your story now, you still have time to make revisions. If you wait until you’re infirm or dead, someone else has to tell the story for you and they get to make the revisions. No one knows your story like you do. How do you want to go down in history? Let us know!