Reading time: 3 minutes
What happens when you come from a long line of genealogists and end up with three busy boys as the next generation? Genealogy and the desire to understand your heritage gets stalled…until you and your sons discover the Timeline view in Artifcts!
Yes, I was one of the guilty parties. My mom has binders and binders of ancestry and genealogy information, can tell the stories about our family history ‘way back when,’ and has tried to tell us her story over the years. But if you were to ask me to tell you those stories about her, I’d look at you with a blank stare. I wouldn’t know where to start.
That is until we discovered the Timeline view in Artifcts, and I saw my own life story revealed to me in a way I hadn’t seen before. You see, pun intended, I am a visual person and process information very analytically. Yes, it is interesting to see my family tree laid out with names and branches, but it doesn’t really tell me about the people, how they were wired, or how I might have been influenced by who they were or how they thought. When I understand those things about my ancestors and influencers, I gain perspective on my own heritage.
Seeing my mother’s Timeline motivated me to create more Artifcts for my Timeline. As each new Artifct takes its place on my Timeline, it highlights one more life event, one more story, that shaped me. I could immediately see in my Timeline how my experiences, represented through my objects and stories, wired me to be who I am today. If my kids want to know who I am, why I place certain values on ambition and work, and why I work as much as I do to achieve and provide, all they need to do is look at my Artifcts Timeline.
My Timeline now shows my world travel (creating an open and adventurous mindset); it shows my cadet days in the Civil Air Patrol (doing search, rescue, flying, and establishing the building blocks for my leadership style); it shows my days as a firefighter and EMT (helping people and being driven to serve); it shows my pilot experiences (adventure, focus, and determination); it shows my entrepreneurial experience (innovating and managing risk); and it shows my family and our shared experiences.
So, to all of you who think you’ll get to it "someday," realize that someday may come too late. Start capturing your story one event or object at a time. When you open that box that’s been in the basement for 10 years and find something cool, Artifct it to tell the story using images, audio/video, and text. When you travel, take a photo of that menu or interesting memento and explain where you were and who you were with.
Once you get your Artifcts going and see them in your Timeline, you’ll have bursts of energy to go fill in the blanks, you’ll start seeing yourself for who you really are, and you’ll build out your story to carry your heritage to the next generation. And the best part? Your kids will love it too!
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Traveling to Salt Lake City for RootsTech?
Stop by our Booth #1517 to hear Matt share more of his stories on Thursday at 6:30 p.m. MT and Saturday at 12 noon MT.
You can also read previous ARTIcles Matt has written, including Father, World Traveler and Now Downsizer and Stuck In the Middle With Stuff.
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