The Hidden Gifts

Our Memorial Day kids time at Awakened Village will focus on doing some story work in preparation for designing some projects our families will share over the summer. The project will be chosen from the interests or our youth and we’ll work on them when we’re together and at home with our families.

These three stories connect interests and talents with a big impact. That’s something we want our families to believe about their own gifts and passions: that they are God-given and can matter in the lives of people and in the wider world.

Joseph and Dreams

Sometimes the things that happen when we are kids point directly to important things we’ll do as grown-ups. Joseph has an amazing relationship to dreams. There were times dreams got him into trouble when he was young, but eventually dreams made him the second-highest ruler of the Egyptian Kingdom:

Thought Questions

God gave dreams and the power of dream interpretation to Joseph. How did some people react to these gifts? Do you ever fear that people won’t understand or value your talents and interests? Sometimes it takes a long time and hard work for our interests to bring success. What does the story of Joseph show you about this?

What benefits did Joseph’s talents eventually have? How would you treat your talents and interests differently if you thought they could save lives or make the world a better place?

David: Always a Warrior

Since he was young, David was always willing to charge into danger because he sensed God was with him:

Thought Questions

Why do you think David wasn’t scared to fight off predators or giant warriors? When people loose their sense of fear and self-consciousness, it’s often because they can get “in the zone” or “find their flow”. Have you ever felt in the zone or flow? When?

Young Jesus At The Temple

When Jesus was about twelve years old, something unusual happened when his family visited the Temple. See if you can spot what this story has to do with Jesus mission when he became a grown-up:

Thinking Questions:

Jesus hasn’t seen his parents in three days, but he doesn’t seem too worried. What things do you do that make you loose track of time?

When Jesus parents find him, he says, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” Do you ever feel like you’re with God or doing God’s business when you’re doing something you love or something you’re interested in?

Connect It To Your Life:

Your interests, talents, and passions might be the same as the heroes in these stories. While at the time these young people were just doing their thing, God eventually used these gifts to help people and make the world a better place. You don’t have to worry about changing the world right now. Just believe your interests and talents matter. As a community of families who believe in your power to make the world better, it’s our job to support, bless, and encourage your interests.

Take some time and some art supplies and write about or draw a picture about your interests, talents, or abilities. It’s OK to take some time to think about it before you draw or write. You can even ask a parent or adult for help thinking about what you want to create.

When you’re done, we’ll share your work with our community and with your family so we can all be supportive.

For Parents

Having a strong sense of a cohesive life narrative is essential in two high-priority ways:

Dealing with Adverse Events

Resilience

We live in times of endless challenges. Each one threatens to damage of sideline our children. We need to build resilience because we can’t shield our kids from all adverse life events. Harvard did a massive study about resilience and found a cohesive life narrative and agency were essential elements (#2 & #4).

Designing Alternatives

Agency

The high rate of disassociating change and the urgency for alternatives to standard models of society and life demand that our families work now to design the future we want to live in. That requires we build agency in our children by showing them they have control over their story and can direct it towards a different future.

Story work is also the first zone on the spirituality-powered personal development path. It’s also the beginning point of building a generative community through healthy leadership dynamics. Our community is working on a high-level initiative to design learning and growing pathways for both youth and adults called Project-based Learning that integrates all these things. Your participation at any level in the process is essential.

Our Plan

1. Work with our young people to identify their interests and the impact they can have to make the world a better place.
2. Create shared projects for community time and at home that can give direct experience of an interest making a difference. This will build coherence and agency.
3. Tie this small-scale projects into larger high-priority projects for our community, specifically in a way that whole families can share.