Peter and Belinda Letchford

Discover your Family Vision Workshop

By Peter and Belinda Letchford

Lifestyle-homeschool.com

There are many questions that can be asked to facilitate discussion between husband and wife in order to arrive at a vision statement for their family. These are the questions we asked ourselves and we offer them to you as a starting point.

Our Process

We go through a process of asking questions, recording the answers individually and then coming together to discuss and marry our individual answers to form family answers. We then categorise, summaries and come to conclusions as we build a big picture of the types of words that describe what we want our family to be.

This workshop will take you step by step through that process.

You will need:

100 postit notes each - at least 7.5cm square – use a different colour from each other (We will call these post-its colour A & B)

50 post-it notes of a different colour (Colour C)

Ream of A4 paper – you won’t use it all but have it handy

Coloured textas/markers

A Pen each

A timer

Why you need these stationary items:

This workshop is based on the process of brainstorming – both as an individual and as a couple. We have found the quickest method has been to write each brainstormed thought on a post-it which then makes it easy to shuffle the idea around as you categories and combine. You use the A4 paper to hold your post-its as you work through each stage. The timer keeps you on track.

This process may seem confusing until you are actually working it out – I encourage you to set aside some time, gather your stationary items and begin brainstorming – it may take more than one session as you become familiar with sharing your heart and ideas but the end result is so worth it!

Starting your time together:

First there needs to be a commitment to be honest; honest with yourself and honest with each other. Honesty can only happen when there is an atmosphere of trust. It is helpful to discuss this, to make a commitment to each other that you will listen and respect their comments and feelings.

Either one of you may have a Bible reading to share and then to begin your time in prayer. Though God is always with us, inviting Him into this brainstorming session reminds you of the third person present.

Ready Set Go…

Write the first question on two pieces A4 paper, one for husband and one for wife. Grab a pen, a pack of post-its (Colour A for him & Colour B for her) and ask yourself these questions. For the first part of this workshop you will be writing answers independently from each other. We do find it beneficial though to remain in the same room and working on the same question as each other.

Brainstorming works best when there is a time restriction. Pete and I work well with 3 minutes but I encourage you to be flexible and find out how each of you thinks with a timer ticking – you may need 5 minutes. Don’t let this drag out though – the benefit of brainstorming is that you write down the first things that come to your mind. Write your ideas on the post-its – you can use as many post-its for each question as you like. Stick them to your A4 so you keep organised.

You repeat this process – write the question down for husband and wife on separate A4, brainstorm with a time limit, and then move onto the next question.

1. What do I wish my life to look like?

2. How do I wish my life to be on a day-to-day basis?

3. What can I say I truly know about my life?

4. How would I like to be with other people in my life

a. My family

b. My friends

c. My business associates

d. My customers

e. My employees

f. My community

5. How would I like people to think about me?

6. What would I like to be doing in ….

a. 2 years from now

b. 10 years from now

c. 20 years from now

d. When my life comes to a close

7. What specifically would I like to learn during my life

a. Spiritually

b. Physically

c. Financially

d. Technically

e. Intellectually

f. In relationships

Asking these questions can easily take 1 hour. You now have 7 sheets of A4 each plastered with your post-its, ready to share with your spouse.

Take a break and a big stretch!

Marrying our ideas:

To marry means two become one. According to the dictionary to marry means to combine, connect, or join so as to make more efficient, attractive, or profitable (This is actually the case in marriage – the wife is made to complete the man, that makes his task on this earth – dominion – more efficient, attractive profitable). So now as we look at all these ideas we have put out there, we want to marry them – to make them one, to make these ideas more efficient, more attractive, more profitable to our life and to the life of our family.

This does not mean you loose your individual-ness. There will be some answers that are purely individual goals but as you discuss things you will see themes and concepts arising that you will both want to take hold of for your family.

STEP 1:

Take another A4 and rewrite the question and begin to discuss your previously written answers. As you discuss each answer (his and hers):

• Clarify – what do you really mean when you say that? Do you mean ….? Clarify and confirm.

• Group duplications - if both of you have written the same thought put the post-it on top of each other and place on the new A4. They are obviously significant words.

• Find common threads – you may have to rename words/concepts if it helps to clarify and come to an agreement. You want to refine not alter your original thoughts.

Aim for 5 ideas that are common to both of you for each question - one of you may not have written down something that was significant to the other but when it is shared your heart knows that it should be a part of the common vision.

As you discuss each question you will move your post-it from your individual A4 to these new A4 Family question sheets. This new A4 will hold both husband and wife’s answers, the answers you agree upon as visionary for your family. As you play around with grouping, clarifying, renaming your ideas together you will discover common threads for each question (Marrying!) Write these 5 common threads on another coloured post-it. (Colour C)

STEP 2:

Take another A4 and label it Common Family Threads

Looking at all 35 common threads (Colour C - 7 questions – 5 common threads for each) we now want to find 5-6 key words.

This takes a lot of discussion.

• You discover what your spouse means when he/she wrote it down.

• You conversation is sparked to another idea as you clarify what was initially meant

• You add ideas / you remove ideas

Write these key words down. You are reducing the 35 common threads to 5-6 key words.

What you are doing here is making connections – you may use different words to each other but you mean the same thing, or your heart beats towards the same idea. This takes very careful communication as you become both flexible but also remain true to your original thoughts, feelings and ideas. You need to respect the individual as well as be aware that you are one, in marriage.

STEP 3:

Take an A4 and label it Family Vision Statement Brainstorm.

Write each keyword on this sheet and together discuss what each word means to you. As you come to an agreement write it down. Edit it, chop and change it. Just because it is on paper it does not mean it is set in stone! The reason we use post-its is for the ease of moving and changing as ideas grow.

If you are having difficulty writing what each keyword “looks like” then write your definition phrases independently and share again from there. Continue to brainstorm, write ideas, merge ideas and write definitions until you come to an agreement.

Use these 6-12 phrases to write your Vision Statement. Then test your vision statement … Does it answer these questions?

• What is the purpose of our family?

• What do we want our family to be characterized by?

• What do we want our family to be?

Vision Statement becomes Alive Once you have a vision statement that you can agree on and are excited about; it then needs to become alive in your family. There needs to be very clear steps to take to work towards becoming this statement. You need to set some family goals.

Setting Goals

We need to use our Vision Statement to set some SMART goals. SMART being an acronym to help us in our goal setting:

S - smart

M - measureable

A - achieveable

R - realistic

T - timeframe set

In all our discussions we recognize several main areas of our life –

• our relationships to God, to each other and to others

• our home life

• our homeschooling

• our business life

• our church and community life

We want to set goals in each of these areas in light of who we want to be.

Fine tuning our Goals

One tool we use to help us work towards setting goals is a business management tool called SWOT analysis.

In this analysis we consider the

S - strengths

W - weaknesses

O - opportunities

T - threats

This helps us to see the situation for what it is and helps us to look for solutions in places where we may not automatically otherwise go.

An example of a family goal would be to have our evening meals together and to use it as a time of fellowship and conversation.

• What are the Strengths of that idea? It enhances and builds family relationships. It is a time for dad to catch up on what has been learnt throughout the day.

• What are the Weaknesses of that idea? Dad has to be home on time else the little kids get too tired to eat dinner. Everyone wants to talk and it gets loud or crazy.

• What are the Opportunities of that idea? To teach the children conversation skills – to listen to others and to encourage other people’s conversation not their own. To encourage opportunity to be interested in other people’s passions and interests.

• What are the Threats of that idea? The TV news at 7.00 cuts conversation short. Being tired and preoccupied. Telephone calls.

Seeing these different aspects to this goal helps us define how to overcome the difficulties and enhance the benefits which will lead to actually achieving our goals.

In conclusion:

Setting goals is a helpful activity for a few reasons:

1. It sets your path

2. It helps you prioritise

3. It gives you a learning tool, as you analyze your successes and failures and motivates you to change.

Once you have your Vision Statement and some goals the next important thing to remember is that these are tools to help you not rules to live by. In order for these tools to be the most effective in your life you must revisit them, assess how you are going and revise as appropriate.

• Does our vision Statement need refining? Does it reflect the changes happening in our family?

• How are we going on our goals? Do they need to be reset?

It is only in the revisiting and being honest every year that we can truly grow towards our purpose.