Our 5 Family Values

Post written by Steve Otto. Follow me on Twitter.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about being more proactive in what we do as a family rather than simply reacting to whatever is going on in our lives at the moment. So one of the things we did as a family was come up with our five Family Values. I mentioned them in the article 29 Gifts I Want to Leave My Children but here they are again:

• Courage
• Family
• Giving
• Fun
• Purpose

Little Fingers. It was tough finding words that represented what we valued, but were still easy to understand for our kids – especially our three year old, Jacob. The funny thing is I originally was thinking of having just four values, but we couldn’t narrow them down and decided on five.

So our first step was to keep sharing our five values and to see what our kids remembered. At bed time I started asking the kids what our family values were, and to my surprise Jacob popped his little hand up and started naming them on each of his fingers. So five values seems to just make sense now.

At the Well. Our kids were doing well remembering them, but I wondered how well they understood them and could apply them. I was curious if these values would make a difference in their lives or just remain words. But we began seeing our kids start applying these values. As the word water clicked with Helen Keller at the well, I’m beginning to see our kids truly understand our values as they ask, “Was I showing courage, Dad?” after facing a fear. Or overhearing Hannah share with Jake about how they can Give some of their toys to other kids.

Crazy = Memorable. Some of the best advice I received was from my mentor, Jeff, on how to make it easy for our kids to remember these values. He shared with me to come up with very memorable phrases for each value. And the more off-the-wall or silly, the more they would remember it. Some of the silly phrases come right to mind, but some are proving more difficult. I don’t want to force a funny phrase for each of these – I think they will develop naturally. But I think it is key to keep your ears open for something that sticks. Our kids will probably be the best resource for finding a fun way to remember them. For example, with Jake’s fingers, we save ‘Fun’ for the last word. When we get to the thumb and say ‘Fun’ – I drive it into his side as we have an all out tickle war.

Gifts that Keep on Giving. As Mark Batterson shares on his blog – a great way to reinforce these values is with the gifts you give your children for their birthday. Jake’s birthday is coming up at the end of June and I hope to come up with five separate gifts to give to him. One for each value.

Not just for the Kids. It’s easy to think these are just for kids, but these are making a difference in my life as well. First of all, the best way for my kids to learn these is for me to model them. I can’t exactly go around being afraid to try something new, or not putting my family first and expect my kids to do the opposite. Secondly, by teaching these words to my kids over and over I’ve found its more at the forefront of my mind and I’m looking for ways to express these values. And even better, for ways to include our kids when we express these values.

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