"GOOD THINGS" AGENDA

“GOOD THINGS” AGENDA

When my children were in the primary and secondary schools, I required them to conduct a meeting every Saturday after dinner. One of the five presides while my wife and I served as observers. The agenda was to report about at least three good things each one has done during the current week.

The idea was to inculcate into their minds the importance of doing good things. After the individual report they were allowed to talk about anything under the sun that interest them.

But first they should scrutinize their weekly experiences to find out if they had any problems encountered in school with their teachers, with their classmates, with their friends, with their parents at home or with each other at any time of the day.

The animated discussion lasts from a few minutes to several hours depending on how the flow of the meeting goes on. We all find this occasion quite enjoyable and a very good learning experience. All the time I just considered it a game to keep them together even for a while, until one time when my eldest son joined a retreat, I was suddenly awakened by its impact.

A portion in the retreat demands a kind of optional public confession. There were many interesting stories shared. Some were sad, even terrifying and unbelievable as well as happy ones dramatized by the retreat participants. My son couldn’t think of anything to share or to confess, so he instead, talked about the weekly family meeting.

Somehow it touched the Retreat Master that since then he kept on mentioning about it every now and then until the end of the retreat. My son proudly relayed to me what happened as he eventually realized the value of what we have been casually doing.

Now my daughter in Canada who has two daughters of her own is asking me how I managed to care for them, during their growing up period. I simply advised her to practice the “good things” agenda while giving her kids a sense of protection, a sense of concern and a sense of love. They will never go wrong.