Everyone wants to be part of a story. Isolation, pandemic-induced or otherwise, has created an incredible sense of disconnect. Individuals across the globe are starving to be interconnected with something a little bigger and little greater than themselves. In short, people around the world are longing for belonging.
Proof of that longing was clearly visible in last weekend’s “RootsTech Connect” virtual event which had more than 1.1 million individual participants from more than 235 countries. The annual event brings together genealogists, family history researchers, technology specialists, religious leaders and individuals desiring to connect to their family story.
FamilySearch CEO Steve Rockwood delivered the closing keynote address and noted that while FamilySearch’s mission is to create the family tree of mankind, its true purpose actually has very little to do with creating a massive pedigree.
His message was about the binding and bonding power of belonging and being part of a great, interconnected story. He said FamilySearch exists to foster “a storybook of how each individual lived, who they loved and what they learned.”
In a society accelerating in fast-forward, where kitchen tables are often empty and on-the-go eating is the norm, opportunities for such stories to be remembered, shared and extended are in short supply. Few families are gathering, fewer communities are convening and it’s causing the fabric of society to fray. One of the great risks to a thriving society, or organization, is the loss of story and the principles that story contains and preserves.
Years ago, I remember reading an account of the work of Dr. Carl Frost who studied a tribe in Nigeria during the late 1960s. Electricity had just been brought to the village and each family in the tribe was given a single light bulb in their primitive huts. Frost at first saw this as a real sign of progress. But within a very short period of time the tribe began to spiral into chaos and confusion. Squabbles arose, time-tested behaviors and values began to be ignored — the society began to unravel. The trouble was that at night the families would go and sit in their homes and stare in awe at this new technology.
The light bulb-watching began to replace the customary nighttime gatherings around the tribal fire, where the storytellers would pass along the history of the tribe and what principles and character traits had made them great. The tribe members began to lose their sense and place in their own history along with their connection and their commitment to values, and each other, in the glow of a few electric light bulbs.
Sadly, history is repeating itself as young and old alike regularly sit for hours entranced by the glow of electronic devices while ignoring loved ones, who often are only a few feet away physically, but worlds away emotionally. Family and community connections are being lost at an alarming, and ever increasing, rate.
The penalty for failing to share your story is the tragic loss of compelling history, critical values and even a crucial vision of the future. What we forget or neglect, our children may never know, and what our children do not know, our grandchildren are unlikely to ever realize or possess.
As an international business strategist, one of the first signs I could detect in a failing business or organization was the loss of employee connection to story. As people became disconnected from the story, they lost focus, commitment and motivation. The results were often measured by, but rarely consciously correlated to, lost revenue, lost customers and lost opportunities.
As part of the RootsTech Connect Family Discovery Day, Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, an apostle in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, participated with his wife, Sister Patricia Holland, and their three children in a video tour of places and spaces in Southern Utah that impacted their individual lives and family story. History, humorous experiences, principles, values and critical connections were shared in their stories.
Elder Holland described the historic St. George Tabernacle where many important moments that created connective tissue to God, family and community within his life story took place. “I’ve learned over the years since then, that when you attend to that connection to God first, all other connections fall in place,” he said. “Then, and really only then, you find your true place and your eternal belonging.”
More than a leisurely stroll down memory lane, this was a purposeful walk down a purpose-driven path of a personal story. It was evidenced by a sense of the kind of mortal and eternal belonging that fosters meaning, quiet confidence and connection to every earthly traveler.
Talking about the outcome of the three-day RootsTech Connect event, Rockwood noted that while more than 1 million individuals had participated online, he expected the greater impact and more lasting outcome would come from what happens next.
“We know perfectly well that exponentially above that (1 million participants) are the kitchen table conversations, and the texts going back and forth, and the phone calls going from grandma to the grandsons,” he said. “That’s why we’re not driven by numbers. We’re driven by creating inspiring experiences, one by one.”
Author Brenè Brown observed, “True belonging is not passive. It’s not the belonging that comes with just joining a group. It’s not fitting in or pretending or selling out because it’s safer. It’s a practice that requires us to be vulnerable, get uncomfortable … We want true belonging, but it takes tremendous courage to knowingly walk into hard moments.” Such belonging requires a commitment to family, community and country, but it is the stuff of inspiring history.
Isolated individuals connecting to a common cause and community story can transform lives and change the course of history. Helping others recognize their place in the story is a noble pursuit, one needed now more than ever. Rockwood commented, “It’s a story that’s continuously being written with pages from the past, combined with moments of today, that continue to live on in the future.”
Elder David A. Bednar, an apostle in the Church of Jesus Christ, spoke about how easy it is to begin to connect and draw out important stories and crucial historic conversations with questions.
“Inspired questions can invite our friends and family members onto a path of discovery, giving them an opportunity to act and thereby opening their hearts,” he remarked, adding, “This is as low-tech as it gets … Anyone can do this.” Satisfying the longing for belonging, in both a spiritual and familial way, begins by asking someone we care about a question about their personal story.
Finally, Rockwood brought the power of belonging into perfect perspective: “When we see how we and our stories are connected, we will see and treat each other differently,” he said. “Connection of family transcends all borders, all races, all prejudices, all different societal philosophies and beliefs and can unite us as one human family.”
The longing for belonging will continue. The commitment to connect through stories will provide the principles and experiential material to write the next chapters of individual, organizational and societal history.