The Power of Family Traditions

Family traditions are a great way to achieve the goals we have for our home life and family. The benefits far out weigh the number one hesitation or reluctance to starting or continuing a family tradition; the time and work involved. But traditions don’t have to be time consuming or energy sucks. There are ways to maximize the benefits while minimizing the challenges and reap the rewards family traditions bring.

When the topic of tradition comes up in conversation or in the reading that I’ve done, nine times out of ten, tradition is painted in an unfavourable light. As if it is just a bad thing or something that keeps us ‘stuck’ in the past. I’ve never really understood this. As someone who had their childhood disrupted and their family structure taken away, I experientially understood tradition is a powerful tool that’s remarkably stabilizing, especially for children.

The Power of Family Traditions

While “tradition” is a big subject and can mean different things to people, in this post, I’m talking about tradition as it relates to family and legacy building. In a culture that often has a negative view of tradition, it can be hard to see what a powerful tool it actually is. And without positive personal experience, tradition can be something to avoid rather than embrace. Or not considered at all, especially if our own childhood didn’t have any in it. Research shows that tradition can and should play a significant role in raising a healthy family. Why? What does tradition do for us?

The Benefits of Traditions

1. Stability and Consistency

Family traditions are wonderful for creating stability and consistency in life. Much like routine rituals, such as family dinners or weekly activities, traditions create a sense of comfort and security for children.

2. Family Identity

Traditions foster a sense of belonging within us. When we preserve and practise traditions, our children develop a strong sense of identity and belonging to their family. Something that’s extremely important but can be quite difficult to accomplish, especially during the emotionally challenging teen years. Established traditions serve as a valuable tool in keeping our teenagers’ identities and sense of belonging tied to our family units.

3. Emotional and Psychological Benefits

Creating new or practicing ‘old’ family traditions fosters closeness and strengthens relationships. Shared experiences create lasting memories that reinforce familial connections. By creating or keeping our family traditions alive, we bridge the gap between the younger and older generations in our families. Healthy traditions emphasize love, support, and togetherness, providing children with emotional security and resilience. Knowing they are part of a loving and supportive family boosts their self-esteem and well-being.

4. Value Transmission

Just like with individuals, families have their own core values. These values will become a compass for our kids as they go through life. It’s obviously important then to impart healthy ones worth emulating. Children learn by observing our actions and attitudes. Through traditions, we can pass on to our children values like empathy, kindness, and hard work. An example of this is families who make it a tradition to serve their community during Thanksgiving and Christmas food drives.

5. Socialization and Community Building

Family traditions can create opportunities for interaction with extended family and community members, helping children develop social skills, an ease interacting with older adults and a sense of community. Traditions, such as in the example above, can strengthen ties with the wider community. These connections provide a support network for the whole family.

6. Appreciation for Life Stages

Rites of passage traditions celebrate important achievements in life, such as birthdays, graduations, religious rituals or maturation milestones. By teaching children the importance of acknowledging and prioritizing special moments, these traditions can build an appreciation for slowing down and savoring life and the support systems around them.

Overcoming Common Challenges in Tradition Building

It’s never too late to fully embrace the joy and benefit traditions bring by incorporating them into your family. It can, however, be a challenge to start a new tradition, particularly if your children are older and not keen on the idea or your husband doesn’t see the value in practicing them.

When we left the cult’ure’ we grew up in, I wanted to start what I hoped would become traditions in our family. My husband was reluctant. Our religious upbringing said no day should be valued over any other and without any family tradition memories of his own, the value they add wasn’t clear to him. Many years later, he appreciates the traditions we’ve created. But to get to this point, I had to try different things. Some flourished. Some failed, and some morphed into what became our tradition.

Surprisingly, our kids themselves pronounced many of the things we do as “our tradition”. I find it funny that you can do something consistently for several years and nobody seems to notice, but you do one thing once and suddenly it’s a ‘tradition’ that you find out about when one of your children casually mention it to you or someone else. In my house, it often went like this: “my family does *this* every __________________”. My child when talking to a friend (or sometimes to me). While that can be eye-opening, and also stress inducing depending on when you find this out, I loved when our traditions were born this way. It was so fun!

However, like me, you may discover finding traditions that work for your family can take time and be a trial-and-error process. It’s good to keep an open mind and stay flexible. One easy way to get started can be through a meal. Creating a tradition around food is a great but simple way to start if you’re new to tradition building. I actually think this is a pretty good deal for us as moms. Everyone has to eat; every day. Building food traditions is relatively uncomplicated. In my family of origin, we could pick the family supper meal and dessert on our birthdays. I incorporated this childhood tradition into my family starting when my children were little as well. Using this example, you can see that traditions don’t have to be complicated to be impactful. You don’t have to have lots of money. Or even lots of time.

The one thing tradition does need is consistency. Which I think is why some of us shy away from building them. Consistency can be hard. And in this modern world, commitment issues are real. Making the commitment to something you can’t build like you do a habit can be daunting. Traditions typically come around periodically, so we have to commit to periodic consistency, which can be harder even than building daily consistency.

When the idea for a tradition takes shape in my mind, I can get very excited about all its possibilities. I clearly see all the beautiful family times we will create by incorporating this new tradition into our family times. But then, months later, when it’s time to implement this new tradition, the work involved in doing so can twist the whole idea into an unappealing, unnecessary chore to add to an already too long to-do-list. How do we overcome this challenge? Here are some ideas to help lessen the challenge of building family traditions.

Six Strategies for Building Lasting Family Traditions

1. Acknowledge the Reality

It’s quite common and normal to feel overwhelmed and stressed when implementation time comes around. If you identify with this, welcome to the club! Take some time to clarify your goal for this new tradition. What are you wanting to create in your heart, family, and home? Clear understanding of why you’re creating this new tradition will help when it’s implementation time.

2. Reframe the Commitment

Additionally, it’s helpful to reframe the commitment to our new tradition not as an obligation but as an opportunity for building on what we’re seeking to achieve. The “I have to do this” pressure creates overwhelm and distress. When we shift from a “I have to do this” to “I get to do this” mindset, we free ourselves from duty and obligation and step into the possibilities realm. We’re actively pressing towards a goal we have. We believe the emotional and relational benefits of this tradition will help us achieve this goal. If we focus on the benefits of the tradition, rather than the work of its implementation, we’ll be more committed to seeing our vision through.

3. Start Small and Simple

Also, begin with the simplest version of your new tradition. Don’t make the tradition so complicated, especially in the beginning, that it’s too hard to follow through with it. Stay focused on the outcome, not the process. Think about the joy, connection, and memories you’ll create. Keep your end goal in mind, it will help dispel the lack of enthusiasm for implementation.

4. Build Flexibility into the Tradition

Furthermore, a certain amount of flexibility within traditions can reduce the pressure of them. How much flexibility will probably depend on your kids! Children are funny. Sometimes the littlest adjustments cause great distress, while things we think may be difficult for them, they handle with ease. By staying open to adjusting based on our current season of life, or changing it to accommodate our energy levels or time constraints, it allows us to fully embrace the tradition each time it comes around.

5. Involve the Whole Family

Include your family in the planning and implementation. Make at least some of your family traditions a collaborative effort. When all family traditions rest solely on your shoulders as mom, it’s easy to get burned out. You could even create a tradition out of implementing another tradition. Such as, make it a tradition to draw names for certain tasks that need done in order for another tradition to happen. Or assign roles to certain family members so they are “traditionally” responsible for that part of its implementation. This not only reduces the burden on you, but can make the tradition more meaningful for everyone.

6. Allow for Imperfection

Allowing for imperfection was something I had to grow into. I was idealistic and “needed” my reality to match. Which was hard on my family, especially when my children were young. As I matured and healed, this became much easier to do. Unrealistic expectations and/or a need to be in control can quickly hijack our ability to allow for imperfections; making what could have been a joyful, happy family activity an exercise in frustration and upset all around. Ask me how I know! Traditions don’t have to be perfect to have a positive impact. It’s far more important they bring laughter, joy and connection than making sure they’re perfect, or what some would call Instagram worthy.

Here are some fun ideas to get you started on your family traditions journey. Or ideas you can add to your already thriving journey.

Ideas to Start Your Family Traditions Journey

1. Weekly Family Game Night: Set aside one evening each week for the whole family to play board games, card games, or even video games together. It’s a fun way to bond and unwind.
2. Monthly Movie Night: Pick a day each month to watch a movie together. You could rotate who gets to choose the movie and pick the snack.
3. Sunday Pancake Breakfast: Start a tradition of making pancakes (or any favorite breakfast) every Sunday morning. Get the whole family involved.
4. Story-time Before Bed: Establish a story-time where you read a chapter of a book or a few pages of a picture book before bed. This can be a calming and cherished routine that encourages a love of reading.

Ideas That Work Well As Annual Traditions

1. Annual Family Photos: Choose a specific time each year (the first day of school or during the holidays) to take a family photo. Over the years, you’ll have a wonderful collection of memories to look back on.
2. Gratitude Jar: Start a gratitude jar where family members can write down things they are thankful for throughout the year. On New Year’s Eve or Thanksgiving, you can read through them together.
3. Birthday Interviews: On each family member’s birthday, conduct a fun interview asking questions like “What’s your favorite food?” or “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Save these interviews to look back on as your children grow.
4. Random Acts of Kindness Day: Choose one day each month or year to focus on performing random acts of kindness as a family. Whether it’s baking cookies for a neighbor, donating toys, or helping someone in need.
5. Christmas Cookie Day: Host a yearly Christmas Cookie Baking day and invite as many extended family members as possible. This is a great way to ensure cherished family recipes continue to be made and enjoyed through generations.

Family traditions are worth building into your long-term family vision and goals. Traditions are a journey to take, rather than a destination to get to, therefore, our goal with them shouldn’t be to check a box, but rather to create moments which, over time, bring us closer to our desired goals for our heart and home.

What traditions do you cherish in your family? Have you struggled to stay consistent in building family traditions?

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