I like Jill Ball's (GeniAus) yearly Accentuate the Positive meme. This year, it revolves around words. The instructions: "For the 2025 challenge, I have decided to move away from prompts that relate to particular situations and resources to a list focusing on our reactions to particular verbs as we reflect on our family history journey." We are free to eliminate those words that don't relate to us, if any. I have bolded the words so they stand out. The list:
Remember to Accentuate the Positive
2025 Prompts
1. I treasured all the wonderful documents I found scanned online -- land records, more censuses, BMD documents, and more.
2. I shared lots of information with other members of WikiTree in building the best biographies we can produce with the best sources to back it all up.
3. I travelled virtually. I am no spring chicken, and I can't fly anymore due to my tendency these days to form blood clots in my legs. I've already experienced having the clots travel to my lungs, and almost didn't survive it. I really would rather not have a repeat performance of that.
4. I learnt a whale of a lot about using WikiTree. There is a lot to learn there, a rather steep learning curve. Of course, these days, there's no printed manual, so I'm creating my own by printing out the various portions of instructions on this or that aspect of WikiTree, and putting it all in a binder. It is so much easier for me to have instructions printed out and in my hand than it is to switch from an input screen where I'm trying to post data, to another screen where the instructions for doing this particular action are located, and then switching back again. By the time I switch back to the input screen, I've totally forgotten what I've just read!
5. I changed my mind about a few things when I found documentation that proved my assumptions or beliefs about an ancestor wrong. That's why WikiTree demands and insists that we provide citations to reliable sources!
6. I received wonderful support from the WikiTree Profile Improvement Project (PIP), which provides guidance to new WikiTree participants. It's a self-paced way, with expert help, of learning how to use WikiTree most effectively.
7. I conquered many of the details of WikiTree through the PIP. It has certainly made learning all this complicated stuff not easy, but less stressful.
8. I found that I'm related to all sorts of well-known people, and have been able to document these relationships: the actor Leslie Nielsen, one of my favorites; Thomas Jefferson (I already knew I'm related to John Adams); Maybelle Addington Carter and Alvin Pleasant Dulaney (A. P.) Carter of the Carter Family Singers.
9. I was proud to discover, through the relationship to the Carters, above, that I am also related to a very dear friend of mine. That was the best discovery of all, and I'm tickled pink! When I told this friend that we are 22nd cousins, once removed, she said, "I guess that's why we have hit it off so well from the start!" I guess so.
10.I read Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone: The Carter Family and their Legacy in American Music, by Mark Zwonitzer and Charles Hirshberg. I was about halfway into this collective biography of the Carter family that I found out I am distantly related to them. That made the reading of the book that much more intriguing to me.Thank you, Jill, for a great meme!
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