Stop... and smell the roses...
When the voices of our ancestors gets too loud and the research gets a bit overwhelming... I try to gain a new perspective....
I’m guilty of hustling through my days… checking off the tasks on multiple to-do lists, and wishing… wishing I had MORE time. But, in the past few months my PERSONAL family history has been a bit of an OASIS of calm for me… in the midst of the chaos.
Instead of juggling 101 things before breakfast… I’m trying to concentrate on ONE FAMILY HISTORY POINT at a TIME… focusing on it, enjoying it, turning it over in my mind and seeing what MORE I can uncover, slowly and carefully chipping away at one details at a time. And it feels as thought it’s time VERY WELL (and peacefully) spent.
It’s not an approach that will open up an unrealistic number of new ancestors to my tree, but the benefits, in terms of research riches and insights to the lives my ancestors once lived, well… they are tiny TREASURES and I cherish them.
Keeping a different pace of research and seeing out ancestors in a different light is keeping me grounded when the voices of the past get too loud inside my mind.
Our lives are just the very latest chapters in a very long story and I am trying to dig deeper into my answering WHO my ancestors were and how they lived, as opposed to WHO they lived with and who was around them.
Sometimes this is all it takes to reignite the embers when they start to die out.
