These Holidays Celebrate Our Obama Victory with Conversations About Love & Change

For the holidays my familia (which includes the families of all my brothers) will be sharing conversations about gratitude, love and positive change.  Our theme is “Celebrating the Holidays in the Era of Obama”.  We will make the dialogues happen informally while doing meal preparation and around the jigsaw puzzles we do instead of watching television.  It will also be the focus of our traditional talking circle for Christmas and then New Years.  Our anticipated outcomes are increased connection with each other, more inspiration, and the evolution of multiple ideas that we can later turn into projects for mutual support and community action.

The following outline provides a step-by-step plan to organize a family talking circle with the agenda of expressing love and conversing about positive change.  As some families are not ready for such communication, simplify the plan to meet your reality or organize a conversation among your friends.  Remember by initiating such dialogues we deepen our skills to listen to each other and use conversation to support positive action.

1.    Enlist support. For the holidays, enlist one or two friends or family members to help plan a talking circle about love and change, possibly an hour gathering on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, or for New Years.
2.    Reach out.  Contact other family members or friends with one-to-one conversations before the proposed event to enlist their support for the idea of the family talking circle.  These pre-event conversations can increase your connection with them and develop enthusiasm for the event.
3.    Select convener/facilitator. Volunteer or draft someone to open the talking circle and introduce the theme and questions.  The suggestion is that for this year the theme might be “Advancing positive change for family and community in the coming year”.  The plan will be for each person to take a turn to speak to the theme questions, and then everyone can converse on the final action/commitment question.
4.    Use Talking Stick. Introduce the practice of the “talking stick” to facilitate the conversation.  This tradition, which comes from our indigenous culture and is also practiced by others, is used to slow down conversation, make it purposeful, and ensure that all members are heard.   Whoever holds the stick has the responsibility to speak their truth, and everyone else is to listen without interruptions or crosstalk.  When the speaker is finished, s/he passes the stick to the next speaker.  The talking stick doesn’t necessarily have to be a stick; families often select an object that is meaningful to them, like a favorite stone, shell, or other artifact.
5.    Theme Questions. For this talking circle, it is suggested that the group use one of the following question combinations:
(a) Everyone share two to three items for which he or she is grateful, what meaning does Christ’s teaching of love have for you,  and what positive change would you like to see occur within our society, community, or family? Or,
(b) Everyone share two to three items for which he or she is grateful.  What does the election of Mr. Obama mean to you, and what changes would you like to see occur in our society, community, or family?
Before beginning this dialogue estimate how much time each person can speak so that you can finish at the desired time.  For example if the group numbers 6 and the commitment is for an hour, this gives everyone roughly 6 minutes to share on these theme questions, leaving the group has about twenty minutes for a conversation on the final action/commitment question.
6.    Commitment/Action Question. After everyone has spoken to the themes above, the group can then address the action/commitment question:  What can we do to advance these changes and what commitment do I make?  Try to encourage someone to write up the commitments to later distribute them or to hang them on the refrigerator or somewhere else where people can be reminded.
7.    Closing. Finally, it is inspiring to close by inviting everyone to share a final word about how they feel, followed by an invitation to hug at least a couple of people before leaving the circle.

I encourage you to try organizing such a family circle with an openness to accept whatever happens as being great either because it went so well, or because you simply involved your family in a practice that can evolve into skills and a tradition that will serve the group for years to come.  What ever happens, commit to learn from the experience. The change we desire in the world occurs as we courageously experiment to interact in more caring and respectful ways.  For more ideas on facilitating family talking circles or fostering refer to my book Family Activism: Empowering Your Community Beginning with Family and Friends (Vargas, 2008)