How Not To Pull Your Family Apart

“I wish I had been a fly on the wall,” Doug jokes. “Did you two do serious battle?”

“There is no denying that at times it got, shall we say, a bit informative. But it’s what you don’t know that you don’t know that can trip you up,” Jackson offers.

“Or what you think you know that you don’t know,” Doug observes.

Smiling, Jodi adds, “As the artist Francis Picabia said, ‘Our heads are round so thoughts can change direction.”’

“Clever!” Jackson smiles and then hesitantly admits, “but seriously, at the end of the day, or the end of multiple dinners, we had a much better idea of why people turn to advisors for help.”

“You mean as a referee?” Doug asks.

Jackson replies, “I guess! But more as an interpreter to help us see possibilities.”

Although Jodi and Jackson envisioned some things differently, they each heard responses to questions that helped broaden their perspectives. To further boil it down to what is essential, each person should write down five or six keywords to describe how they envision a future care plan to conclude the exercise. It is important to remember it is not about a process, not about a product, not yet about a plan, it’s about you.

As a result of the exercise, on the next CPT call, Jodi shares the chart that she and Jackson put together. “This is a quick summary of what we have gathered from documentation, planning exercises, and conversations.”