Ancestors and Family - Holdun
Photograph of Lieder family ancestors taken at Christa Dunn’s great grandfather’s silver anniversary celebration.

My wife, Christa, has just finished and published her second book, this one on her father’s family. Her voyage of discovery, as she knew very little of her father’s parents and his siblings, was both frustrating and exciting. She was to discover an extended family of aunts and uncles about whom she knew nothing and in fact had never heard of them.

She says that in the lengthy process of collecting, collating and making sense of a massive trove of documents, memoirs and unrelated tidbits of information, she veered from one emotion to another.  Initially there was the excitement of discovery, then came frustration and annoyance , which was swiftly followed by the bafflement that none of this had been known to her previously. And finally, as the puzzle pieces of her family’s heritage came to be assembled into a coherent framework, came compassion and understanding. Each of us, she realized, must deal with the constraints not just of their time and place in history, but of their own character. Not all of these ancestors were perfect, but in learning about the trajectories of their lives, these people came alive for her, and for this she was deeply thankful.

I read her book with mounting interest as her family’s story was fascinating to say the least. But what caught my attention is what she learned about family and her ancestors and the message that she wanted to convey to her own family. What follows is taken from her book.

“ I view these stories of our ancestors as not just stories, for they are rich in beliefs and values. These are transmitted forming the basis of who we are; they are, I believe, the most valuable legacy we can hand down through the generations. Invisible stories based on past experiences inform the framework of values, perceptions, and beliefs which are transmitted to our children and from them to their children”.

“When we hear about our ancestors it is usually accompanied by a feeling of distance and separation. It is not that we don’t want to associate with those who have come before us. Rather the distance in time and familiarity creates a space in between ourselves and those who came before us. As I have now discovered, it can be a useful experience to explore our ancestry to discover the people who came before us. In the process we won’t only learn valuable insights about our ancestors, but also a great deal about ourselves. The reality is, our ancestors most likely had a greater impact on us than we realize.

Without a doubt my family ancestors have left me, and by extension my descendants, with an exceptionally rich legacy. Our family tree is filled with remarkable persons, some admirable and some definitely not admirable. Both the genes and the personalities they have passed on to us are an influence which continues to reverberate through the family lines. We inherit not just eye color and height from our ancestors, but also personality and mental abilities-the way we think, feel, and react in certain situations.

Someone once said that the proper time to influence a child is about a hundred years before he is born. For any child, a caring adult constitutes the centerpiece of his or her development; having caring adults can truly transform a child’s life. Conversely, just as a plant without water cannot thrive, a child deprived of a supportive adult network is also likely to be emotionally stunted in some manner”.

“Sadly, it is only now that I have learned to appreciate the transformative power of knowing one’s family history. For knowing leads to understanding and from there probably to forgiveness-but without doubt, knowing definitely leads to empathy. For in knowing our family history we come to know not only ourselves, but others, as well as the past in which they lived”.

To forget one’s ancestors is to be a brook without a source, a tree without a root. 

Chinese Proverb