The family you create

I met Yasser, a Chilean friend, in Saint Augustine, Florida, in 2021. I shared with him approximately 5 months in a volunteer program. He showed me and insisted on this truth until the day of his farewell: "One is the family into which you were born, and another is the family you create." He finally left for Australia, where he still lives. He was not the only volunteer; there were several, about 7 of us, from various countries around the world. For a moment, we became family. I miss them all together more than apart. At some point, they all left.

John Maxwell talks about the five spheres of life in one of his books. They are: Family, Friends, Health, Spiritual Life, and Work. You are juggling with them during life, as they do in the circus. Your task as an acrobat is to prevent them from falling and breaking. However, they fall and fail occasionally, and the acrobat has to put the pieces together, glue them, and put them back in the air while the others remain in the acrobatics. Of course, when one falls and the others are still in the air, while the pieces are being put together and one is patched, there is a greater risk that some other sphere will fall. Therefore, asking for help during those times may be the right thing to do, thus avoiding another breakup. I say this with full knowledge of the facts. I have broken two spheres at the same time.

Only one of the five spheres can be repaired without leaving a mark. It is Work; it can even be better than before. The rest leave marks of what happened.

All of the above highlight the importance of the family you create and how important it is to take care of it. This family is usually intertwined with the family you were born into because some members are from both. These families are not the same nuclear family, which is the basis of society and allows society to evolve, as parents pass on key learnings to their children, allowing them to be better prepared in the next generation.

The family you create is all those with whom a strong connection is impossible to deny. Friends from school and university, comrades in battles where there was nothing to compromise but friendship, support, and unconditional affection, no matter what. Reunions, difficult moments, and spontaneous low-budget parties help to realize that family.

For different reasons, I have lived longer away from my family where I was born, and, therefore, I have lived very closely the experience of a family that is created. Also, that family sphere has been broken, and I have put it back together.

Two events related to this topic have motivated me a lot recently. The first was my recent 10-day vacation, during which I received visits from my children and my brother with his son (my nephew). The second was a dinner with friends from Cali, which was more spontaneous than planned and held here in Saint Augustine, Florida, where I live today. Both events were in the last month.

I want to share from my vacations that I have reconnected with my brother; he has become part of the family I create. Meanwhile, something as valuable as that, my two children and their son, as cousins, connected a lot and had a great time, while their parents were also enjoying themselves while trying to take care of them. This resulted in my brother wanting to bring his family to live here. I miss them already and hope to see them again as soon as possible. All of them have already left. However, communication with him is now much more fluid because we have joint projects where we provide each other with knowledge and good advice.

And there is something profound about the spontaneous dinner with my friend couple from Cali. He and I graduated from the same school and played volleyball together in the school team. At school, we were more classmates than friends. However, this school is cemented with experiences and values that make it difficult not to feel connected when we have a classmate living nearby. The fact that there is a connection does not mean that there is friendship or strong ties of brotherhood, that is cultivated. In the end, we had a great time at dinner. We shared closer topics and a lot of laughter. They are the closest thing I have to a family here, and the feeling is delightful.

The family I am creating today makes me very happy. Two magnanimous events in this regard occurred in just one month. My family sphere is up in the air, and I'm doing the best I can with all of them together. It is my family sphere, cracked and with marks, the one that today makes me smile from deep inside.