Live Undaunted: How Sharing Your Story Creates an Enduring Legacy

Have you ever thought about what you want your family to remember about you when you're gone? Not just the highlights or significant dates, but the essence of who you are – your humor, your perspective, your voice?

In this week's episode of Stories That Live In Us, I spoke with the incredible Lisa Valentine Clark about the power of capturing our stories in our own words. When her husband Christopher was diagnosed with ALS, one of her first thoughts was: "You have to write your life story in your own words." What followed was an extraordinary journey that resulted in a family treasure their five children now consider "like scripture."

"It's one thing for me to say, 'I remember when your dad, your grandpa, used to always say that,' but that's my interpretation of his life. There's something powerful about telling your own story in your own words, with the conscious choice that this is what you want to be remembered for."

 

The Whole Story

Take a moment to watch our full conversation below. You'll laugh, you might cry, and you'll definitely walk away inspired to capture your own family's stories before it's too late.

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🎧 Listen to the full episode to discover:

• How Christopher, with the help of his cousin Jane, documented his life story while battling ALS
• The surprising way Lisa ensured the book would be meaningful to all five of their children
• How Christopher's Google reviews as "a handicapped person" became a cherished part of his legacy
• The parallels Lisa discovered between her own experience as a widow and her grandmother's similar journey decades earlier
• Why Lisa believes their family story isn't a tragedy but a triumph of intentional living

The Power of One Story

Christopher Clark's story demonstrates the profound impact that intentional documentation can have across generations. While many of us think "I'll write my life story someday when I'm older," Christopher's experience reminds us that we can't count on having unlimited time.

What makes his story particularly powerful isn't just that he told it – it's that he told it in his own voice, with his own humor and perspective. The book includes everything from his childhood adventures to his testimony of faith, and ends with those hilariously irreverent Google reviews he wrote near the end of his life.

Lisa shared how their children underline passages, reference their father's words, and find validation in his written perspective of them: "Oh, Dad liked me for this. Dad saw this in me." This isn't just a record of events – it's a continuing relationship with their father's perspective and wisdom.

And perhaps most remarkably, Lisa discovered how this experience connected her to her own grandmother's story in ways she never expected. Suddenly, her grandmother's matter-of-fact comments about taking over her late husband's Spanish classes made profound sense in ways they never had before. What had seemed like distant family history became an intimate connection between two women facing similar challenges generations apart.

Your Story

You may not be facing a terminal diagnosis like Christopher, but each of us has a limited time to document our perspectives, our humor, and our voice for future generations. We all have stories that deserve to be preserved in our own words.

Story Seeds 🌱

Plant these conversation starters and watch your family stories grow.

1. For Parents/Grandparents: "What's one life experience that completely changed your perspective? How did it shape the way you've lived since then?"
2. For Siblings: "What family stories do you remember being told growing up that had a significant impact on your life choices or outlook?"
3. For Children/Grandchildren: "If you could ask an ancestor who is no longer with us any three questions, who would you choose and what would you ask them?"
4. For Extended Family: "Are there any family members whose stories seem to have been 'lost' or forgotten? What would you like to know about them?"

Story Sparks 🔑

Unlock your family's hidden stories with these research techniques.

1. Create custom MyTreeTags in your Ancestry family tree for family members who experienced similar life events (like "Widowed Young" or "Served in Military"). This can help you identify patterns and connections across generations that might provide comfort or insight.
2. Start a "Life Story Interview" project with older family members. (Go back through blog posts here looking at the "Story Seeds" section to get ideas.) Even if you can only do 15-30 minutes at a time, record their stories in their own voice. Use the audio recording feature in the Ancestry mobile app so you can save it directly to your Ancestry family tree and tag the person interviewed and all those they mention.
3. Add personal anecdotes and memories to your relatives' profiles in your Ancestry family tree. Use the “create a story” feature in the profile gallery.  Include quotes when possible to preserve their authentic voice. Edit those stories and add information as you collect more stories from your family members.

I'm reminded of the Emory University study that found children who know their family stories are more resilient in the face of challenges. But Lisa and Christopher's experience takes this further – it's not just about knowing the stories, but about hearing them in the authentic voice of the person who lived them.

As Lisa so beautifully said: "Our lives are not a tragedy. They are a triumph. They're lives full of love, full of a lot of humor, creativity, fun, impact and change." But here's the key: "You choose it, you choose it and you have to choose it every day."

What story are you choosing to tell with your life? And more importantly, are you documenting it in a way that future generations can hear it in your voice?

Ready to start documenting your own undaunted family story? Subscribe to Stories That Live In Us wherever you get your podcasts to be inspired. And if this episode touched your heart, please leave us a rating and review - it helps other family story seekers find us.

© 2025 Crista Cowan. All rights reserved.