One of the reasons some people are hesitant to begin working on family history is because they do not have the TIME to get serious about genealogy. Beyond that, they are afraid they will never see their dining room table again. For some people, working on family history projects has a way of taking over their life and space. But it doesn't have to be that way. Meaningful family history work can be done in manageable, bite size increments that can be kept neatly organized. The lesson in my family history class today was about doing family history in just 10 minutes a day. That's right. TEN MINUTES.
The exact amount of time set aside may vary from person to person, depending on their own circumstances. For some it may be 10 minutes. For others it may be 30 minutes or an hour. However the principle is a good one. Instead of getting overwhelmed by the enormity of the task and not starting at all, or getting lost in one or two marathon sessions that we never return to, we can each set aside whatever amount of time fits for us and then incorporate regular periods of family history work into our daily life.
It really is amazing what a person can get accomplished in just a few minutes a day if they are willing to set aside a plan of action. How that plan will look will of course be customized to fit the individual. But here is one suggested process we talked about:
1. Set the timer
2. Begin with a short prayer
3. Open the log you have created, and note what you will be working on that day. (This may be a simple notebook or a document in a word processing program. Use whatever works best for you. )
4. Open whatever family history program you are using. This may be
FamilySearch, Ancestry.com, My Heritage or some other system.
5. Spend the time you have pre-determined on whatever task that you had planned. It might be checking census records for particular family members. It might be writing query letters (either by hand or online) to relatives. It might be viewing a tutorial video to learn something new. Each of those things are worthwhile and can be done in as little as 10 minutes.
6. STOP when your timer goes off. Don't say " Oh, I just need to do one more thing". There will ALWAYS be one more thing. Plan your time and then respect those limits. That makes it far more likely you will come back to it consistently and THAT is what will make all the difference.
7. Save and close your software
8. Close with prayer
3. Open the log you have created, and note what you will be working on that day. (This may be a simple notebook or a document in a word processing program. Use whatever works best for you. )
4. Open whatever family history program you are using. This may be
FamilySearch, Ancestry.com, My Heritage or some other system.
5. Spend the time you have pre-determined on whatever task that you had planned. It might be checking census records for particular family members. It might be writing query letters (either by hand or online) to relatives. It might be viewing a tutorial video to learn something new. Each of those things are worthwhile and can be done in as little as 10 minutes.
6. STOP when your timer goes off. Don't say " Oh, I just need to do one more thing". There will ALWAYS be one more thing. Plan your time and then respect those limits. That makes it far more likely you will come back to it consistently and THAT is what will make all the difference.
7. Save and close your software
8. Close with prayer
A KEY PRINCIPLE of the lesson today was that as Latter-day Saints, we are involved in a spiritual endeavor. MANY people outside the church do family history out of curiosity or from pride in their family history. That's great. But for us, it is something different. We believe we are undertaking a work that has the power to bind families together through the sealing power of sacred temple covenants. With that in mind, we should begin and end each session of family history work with prayer. Because we are doing work the Lord wants us to do we have the opportunity to ask for inspiration and personal revelation to guide us where we should go.
The other principle we talked about was the importance of keeping a log. Especially because this method means committing to working in small, manageable bites it is critical that we stay on track. It is very easy to get distracted on different tangents. Also, if we don't leave a bread crumb trail of notes in a log sheet of what we checked already and what we plan to check on next we may forget where we've already been, leading to wasted effort as we follow the same trail again and again. Besides that, keeping a log allows us to see the progress we make, accumulating our accomplishments bit by bit, like marking a child's growth on the inside of a closet door.
TIME IS UP. This entry took me about 10 minutes. What can YOU do in that time?
Remember, it doesn't take a lot of time. It just takes a little time used well. As it says in Alma 37:6 "Now ye may suppose that this is foolishness in me; but behold I say unto you, that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances does confound the wise."
