Duane's Dartboard

According to legend, Indian tribes in North America preserved their heritage by telling campfire stories, illustrating them with symbolic items stored in sacred bundles.

A sacred bundle contained significant artifacts from the tribe’s past, and tribal elders were responsible for sharing the stories associated with each item. Contents likely included a feather, arrow fragments, a pipe or other such relics symbolizing the tribe’s history.

Today, every organization, every family and every individual would benefit from having a sacred bundle. Each has a heritage, a culture and a history worth sharing and preserving. Below are three examples of sacred bundles within my life.

My employer

I work for the American Red Cross, an organization replete with stories depicting our rich, 130-year history.

Stories are shared about our founder, Clara Barton. We also hear stories about how individuals such as Walt Disney and Ernest Hemingway once worked for the organization. Tales of their involvement have been passed down from generation to generation.

In recent years, major disaster relief efforts have provided ample opportunities for our “tribal elders” to share stories that help relative newcomers like me to better understand our history, our culture and our tradition of helping people.

In the office building where I work, many of our walls are decorated with authentic Red Cross posters from the World War II era. Just off the main lobby you can visit our archives room where valuable artifacts from our past are displayed. There, in our “sacred bundle,” we display old uniforms, lapel pins and brittle newspaper clippings. We even have an old, wooden bureau trunk that once belonged to Gen. William Sears, Clara Barton’s field agent and private secretary. These historical items help to provide ballast for the collective memory that shapes the heritage of our organization.

My family

In our family we have several sacred bundles. On a bookshelf in our family room we display a few items that belonged to my late mother. In our hallways we proudly display family portraits and wedding photos.

My wife collects figurines. Although she has a sizable collection, she does not strive for quantity. Rather, each figurine represents an important person or event in our family’s history. Carol can make our heritage come to life as she recounts the memorable events surrounding each figurine in her display cabinet.

Myself

In an obscure corner of our basement, I store my sacred bundle. Inside are artifacts important to me, items that remind me of various points along the pathway of life’s journey.

A couple of times at special family events, I have passed around the items in my sacred bundle. As my children handled each relic, I regaled the entire family with the stories about events that have made our family a family.

Among the items in my sacred bundle are:

1. A silver dollar that was in my pocket the night I asked a beautiful young woman to spend the rest of her life with me. To this day, that coin reminds me of the importance of marriage and the commitment I made so many years ago.
2. A master office key from a former employer. That key reminds me of the fleeting status and authority I once held as a prince in a distant and ephemeral corporate kingdom. Though important at the time, the perks of that job now seem trivial as I look at my career in the bigger picture. Yet the key reminds me of where I came from in the journey that has brought me to where I am today.
3. A pocket knife given to me by my grandfather on my 13th birthday. The knife was not new at the time. My grandfather himself had carried the tool in his own pocket. To me, it represents those things—mostly intangible things—that have been passed down from generation to generation.
4. Other miscellaneous items in my sacred bundle include a bookmark, a small rock and a fountain pen. Each carries special memories. Someday I will include other symbolic items such as the LiveStrong wristband which, for the past seven years, has never left my wrist and constantly reminds me of the importance of good health.

The beginning of a new year prompts us to look forward, anticipating whatever God has in store for us during the coming months.

The end of the year also provides an opportunity to reflect on our journey so far. In these chaotic, turbulent times, we can find purpose and meaning as we share the memories preserved in a sacred bundle.

You have memories and stories that need to be told. What’s in your sacred bundle?

The “rule of three” has long been a favorite of storytellers, writers and public speakers.

The rule is based on the premise that three things clustered together are often more effective than things grouped in other numbers.

In childhood we heard stories about three mice, three little pigs, Goldilocks and the three bears, three musketeers and three stooges. In school we studied the three branches of government. We read drama structured in three acts. Many of us learned how the rule of thirds helps compose an interesting photograph.

Today, as a working professional, I love the rule of three for these three reasons:

1. I can focus. In a cluttered world, the ability to focus and prioritize has become rare. I can always clarify my thinking when I brainstorm ideas, make a lengthy list of options and then select the three most important items on the list.
2. I can organize. For complex projects, I often identify three main categories around which I can create additional structure. For each of the three priorities, I create a hierarchy of related tasks. The structure of the resulting action plan looks similar to those outlines we developed in high school English class to map an essay.
3. I can remember. When speaking in public, I can readily recall three major topics without relying upon written notes. When being interviewed by the news media, I can remember to stay on message when I have three key points to make. When meeting an important business contact, conversation flows more naturally when I focus on three discussion topics.