Week 3 - creating a family mission statement

Week 3 of our 52 week challenge has arrived, and this week Deb at Home Life Simplified has challenged us to create our family mission statements.  After picking my top five values last week, this should be a breeze, right?  As it turns out, I am struggling far more with this week's challenge than either of the other two.  I have been mulling it over for the past couple of days, thinking about Deb's questions:
- What is important to us?  What do we value?
- What kind of relationships do we want to have?
- Are there things that we currently wish to change?
- What kind of family do we want to be?
After mulling, thinking, and pondering, I am left to conclude that I am really, really not good at this.  I'm not sure why - maybe I like to ramble too much to make a concise Mission Statement, maybe I've been spoiled by my exposure to mission statements in the workplace, or maybe my brain is just fuzzy this week because work has been crazy and Dylan has to have more allergy testing and a heart ultrasound and my house is a mess and, and, and...  So I'm embarassed to admit that I kind of cheesed out - though only partially, since I cheesed out using a link that Deb provided!

So I wandered over to Franklin Covey's mission statement builder and chose to build a family mission statement.  I asked for Mike's help, and through his sarcasm and dry (very dry) sense of humour, we managed to go through and answer the 10 categories of questions presented to us.  And, after all that, the site came up with a very long-winded mission statement which was not what we had in mind in the slightest.  Not to say that it was a waste of time, as the questions it asked did get us thinking and talking, but it does just show that sometimes when you think you are taking a shortcut you may instead wind up just taking a detour.

So, for better or worse, here's our family mission statement:

As a family, we will fill our home with love.  Our home is a place where everyone is treated with kindness and respected as an individual.  We will encourage and appreciate each other regularly, and we will allow each other the space and freedom to express all emotions in a judgement-free environment.  Our home is a place where no one is ever taken for granted, and our family and friends know that they are always welcome.