A Creative Way to Encourage Your Family Members
Encouragement is essential for members of an organization or a family to feel valued and seen.
Good leaders, including parents, should always be on the lookout for ways to encourage, affirm, recognize, and appreciate their people.
I believe encouragement matters, but I am always necessarily consistent with following through. I want to be, but my problem is I get busy. Plus, it's difficult for me to come up with compliments and encouragement on the fly. Some days I am good at it, while others I am not.
I can either settle for, 'Well, that's just the way I am." or I can find a way to make it easy for me to encourage and praise the people I love.
Going out of my way to serve my people in this way has the potential to feel like another thing on my to-do list; however, I have found a way to make it both easy and fun.
I prepare ahead of time. I write words of thanks and appreciation on sticky notes and leave them in random places for my people to read. It's a simple but powerful way to affirm and recognize my kids and husband for the ways they shine.
Try this trick and let me know how it works for you.
You'll need a pen and paper, a marker, and a stack of sticky notes.
Here’s how you can do it too:
Create a list. Write down about 25 encouraging phrases for the members of your family. These can be as simple as, "You are so talented!' or they can be more specific like, "I love the way you serve us! You always ask if I need a drink when you one for yourself."
Copy these phrases on to sticky notes. One sentence for each sheet. You can also doodle on them and add stickers if you'd like. Stack them back together, and now you're ready to give a compliment when the time is right. You can stick these in your kid's lunch, on the bathroom mirror, or on your spouse's nightstand.
Start over again. Once you run out of encouraging phrases, make another list, and do it again.
Your family members may not mention the notes they receive, but that's okay. Play it cool. When I first started putting notes in my kids' lunchboxes, I couldn't wait for them to come home to school to tell me how much they loved them. However, it took them weeks to even acknowledge them. They were reading them and being encouraged, and that's what matters.
If you do this, it won't take long before you see the atmosphere in your home change. By focusing on the positive and recognizing your family members on a regular, ongoing basis, you will help them feel build confidence in themselves in your relationship. They will eventually become more connected and engaged with you and with one another.
If you need a little help getting started with, you can download a FREE list of encouraging phrases for your family members here.
You'll get this list plus access to other family hacks videos and resources that will help you build your best family.